Photo 365 #42

September 18, 20146 Comments

I had to go pick the kids up from Faith Formation (CCD for all you old-schoolers) last night and, as the sun is setting a little earlier each night now, I couldn’t help watching the western sky out my window as I drove north to church.

septembersunset

No, I didn’t take this while I was driving. (If I had, it wouldn’t have turned out so well.) I did take a couple others where the trees weren’t in the way, and they turned out just as nicely as these.

I love sunsets. And fall. I only wish the hint of green I could see in my rearview mirror would have shown up because the setting sun gave the clouds a faint rainbow appearance last night that was just magical.

Photo 365 #40

September 16, 2014September 16, 201410 Comments

Today was a beautiful, glorious day, the kind of day that makes you feel glad to be alive.

As I was wandering my yard this afternoon, I happened upon these beauties. I suspect these are the last tomatoes we’ll see this year (in our garden, anyway), but there are still a few apples clinging to a half-dead tree in the yard.

I love fall. 🙂

Photo 365 #31

September 7, 2014September 8, 20144 Comments

Bubbles had his very first football game. He spent most of it looking like this:

2014-09-07 13.05.56

That’s him in the #40 jersey. They actually have two kids wearing #40, which made trying to keep track of the right kid interesting. But apparently the coaches plan on playing the older kids more than the younger kids (the team is for fifth and sixth-graders), which I think is dumb because we didn’t pay $75 to watch our kids warm the sidelines. They work hard in practice, too, and they have as much right to play as the older kids.

Are all players equally-abled? No. Lord knows Bubbles shouldn’t have been playing receiver during the game because he left his glasses off and he can’t see (well) without them. But the final score was somewhere in the neighborhood of 28-0 and at that point, what harm would it have done to let the younger kids play? It’s not like we were going to win.

So far, I’m not impressed. I hope things change. I hope Bubbles gets to play more. I hope a lot of things, but mostly I hope that we didn’t just throw $75 down the drain.

Photo 365 #28

September 4, 20144 Comments

Among other things, our holiday weekend involved a trip to Spook Cave:

spookcave

It was a lot of fun, except for the part where you had to bend over till your nose met your knees for half the ride. Still, we had a good tour guide and a lot of fun.

Photo 365 #27

September 3, 2014September 3, 20148 Comments

We get some of the prettiest sunsets. This one’s from last night:

I could look at this picture all night long. 🙂

Photo 365 #26

September 2, 20146 Comments

Yes, it’s another picture from our weekend trip up north. It’s one of the trails at Effigy Mounds National Monument.

This could make a pretty book cover. Hope you’re all having a happy Tuesday!

Photo 365 #25

September 1, 2014Leave a comment

This is a portion of the Great Bear Mound at Effigy Mounds National Monument. Though the mounds have settled over the centuries, this one was still too big to fit in the frame.

I love the way the shadows play out in this picture. I didn’t really notice them when I took it – I was more concerned with getting a picture of the mound at the time – but the more I look at it (and the one I took after this), the more I like it. It’s like looking at the clouds on a summer afternoon and trying to put a name to the shapes they form.

I see a stag in these shadows. What do you see?

Photo 365 #24

August 31, 2014January 12, 20152 Comments

We took the kids to see Effigy Mounds today. This was the view from Fire Point:

It was a beautiful day on the Mississippi River.

Photo 365 #20

August 27, 2014January 12, 20159 Comments

Today’s photo post is accompanied by a little piece I wrote a couple of weeks ago about the humid heat of an Iowa summer combined with the indescribable heat of a hot flash. It’s more an experiment in painting with words than anything else, and I hope I’ve achieved what I set out to do (which is to attempt to convey the misery of having a hot flash in high summer). Comment away and let me know how I’ve done!

Impressive, no?

I stepped out of my perfectly climate-controlled office…

Photo Friday: Firsts

August 22, 2014August 22, 20143 Comments

So, last night was Bubbles’ first football injury. He got tackled and landed on the ball, bruising his ribs. Poor guy was heartbroken when the doctor in the emergency room told him he couldn’t play football till his family doctor released him to play, which won’t be till next week at the earliest.

injury