Thursday’s Special: Fall
This week Paula has invited us to share a photo(s) representing Autumn/Fall. Where I live Fall is a beautiful time. The many trees in the area turn vibrant colors, everywhere you look shades of red, yellow and orange are popping. 
Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Letter I – Needs to start with the letter I
Share Your World
If you had to move to a country besides the one you currently live in, where would you move and why?
I suppose I would choose to live in Israel. There is a feeling of “home” there if you are Jewish, though the way of life is very different from the United States. The bureaucracy there is a tangled web, things we take for granted having here are not so easily gotten there. The land is beautiful.
What color would you like your bedroom to be?
Just the color it is! We redid our bedroom many years ago, choosing wallpaper for the walls instead of paint.It is shades of blue. I love the bedding I chose and made curtains to match. I still love it though it is many years ago.
What makes you Happy? Make a list of things in your life that bring you joy.
My Husband
Nature
The Beach and Ocean
Friends
Birds
Blogging
My camera
What inspired you or what did you appreciate this past week? Feel free to use a quote, a photo, a story, or even a combination.
The amateur orchestra my husband practices violin with in NYC found upon arriving at the studio on Sunday, there was no available room for them to practice in. I suggested they take it outdoors to an open sitting area a block away which is what the group did. The people sitting in the area enjoyed the impromptu concert, and it was one of those “only in New York” moments.
Wordless Wednesday
Tuesday Photo Challenge – Bird
The Tuesday challenge from Dutch goes the Photo is Bird, this week. How could I pass that up??
American Robin
Carolina Wren
Female Red Wing Blackbird
American Bald Eagle
Oyster Catcher
Black & White Sunday: Shape
One Word Sunday: Mobile
Nurturing Thursday
Thursday’s Special: Pick A Word
Weekly Photo Challenge: Scale
singular noun
If you refer to the scale of something, you are referring to its size or extent, especially when it is very big.
verb
If you scale something such as a mountain or a wall, you climb up it or over it. Or a building in this case….
Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Happy
One Word Photo Challenge: Lake
What perfect timing for the word lake. Tuesday I spent the day with friends visiting another friend who lives on a lake. We sat under her covered dock all day and drank coffee and chatted. We watched the Blue Herons that flew gracefully by, and the subtle changing colors of autumn on the trees surrounding the lake. Blue skies above and water stretching out below. Nature in abundance.
Exceptional
Exceptional: unusual; not typical, unusually good; outstanding.
I spotted this Butterfly today, and found it to be of exceptional beauty. It is an American Painted Lady.
Travel theme: Names
Ailsa asks us this week: “Are you ready to name names with your own version of this week’s theme?”
Yes! Some of the names of the towns at the New Jersey Shore….
Wordless Wednesday
Share Your World
What do you consider is the most perfect food for you? (It can be your favorite food to something extremely healthy.)
I am gluten intolerant and stopped eating sugar for health reasons. No carbs, no sugar, what’s perfect? My favorite go to meal is a salad with strawberries and almonds in it topped with a piece of grilled salmon.
Are you focused on today or tomorrow?
Both. I’m always looking ahead, I wouldn’t say focused, but planning ahead in terms of appointments and if something special is coming up. As I am getting older I do find I am thinking more about the tomorrows- and the lack of any guarantee of them-especially since friends have died suddenly and have lost their tomorrows, bringing it to the forefront of my mind.
If you could interview one of your great-great-great grandparents, who would it be (if you know their name) and what would you ask?
My maternal great grandmother was a seamstress and pattern maker. We do not know who came before her, it was said she was an orphan, so I would be interested in meeting her to find out. She died at the age of 54 from undiagnosed and untreated diabetes.
My Grandmother’s parents
What inspired you or what did you appreciate this past week? Feel free to use a quote, a photo, a story, or even a combination.
I appreciated being off from school and seeing the sunrise instead of missing it because I needed to rush to get ready.
A Photo a Week Challenge: Picture in Picture
Pedestrian
Superficial
Superficial: appearing to be true or real only until examined more closely
Facebook is what came to mind when I saw today’s prompt. It reminded me of the time someone said to me “you’re always smiling and so happy!!” Well yeah, do you really want to see a post of me yelling at my husband, or perhaps a great capture of me washing the kitchen floor and cursing under my breath? Sure there are the occasional posts of people overcoming challenges they are faced with. Like just this morning when I saw a friend of mine from High School, smiling, with a post under her smiling photo that said: I have adjusted to living with Parkinson’s Disease but miss dancing, with the hashtag “new normal” and #rocksteady. Yes, Facebook can be a place to share one’s trials and triumphs and get positive feedback in the comments that can help boost one’s moral, but at the end of the day she is still living with her new normal and no amount of posting her smiling face is going to change that. I am pretty sure she must have her dark moments, but no one really wants to hear or see them.
To the outside world we present a superficial appearance, putting on the smiles, speaking in soft tones, speaking politely (usually). My true colors appear now and then and people are so surprised to find out I am not that patient, kind person they thought I was. They have met my sharp tongue and ability to fly off the handle with little notice. Hard as I try to maintain that superficial exterior, it crumbles away now and then.
While cleaning out a box of old photos recently, I came across two that made me laugh, that most likely would not have made it to Facebook had it been around in 1974 and 1978.
Here is my mother in 1974 at the age of 42, in a stance quite familiar to her children, but usually not the outside world.
She had returned something she bought in a local camera shop that had broken, and the guy snapped her photo before giving her a new whatever it was. You didn’t want to start up with my mother when she had been “wronged” a trait I seem to have inherited from her. # attitude
The following photo was taken in 1978, when I was 21. Who knows what I was brooding about, but I was a pro at it through my teenage years and early 20’s. This is the kitchen in the home I grew up, and I have no idea who took the photo. Another that most likely would not have made it onto my Facebook or Instagram feed. #brooding
I suppose we all need to maintain a certain degree of superficiality (?) to those we do not want to be privy to our innermost thoughts and who we really are. It’s all smiles and thumbs up. # superficial
Cee’s Black & White Photo Challenge: All Things Farm Related
Readington River Farm-Flemington, NJ
The Cow and Goat photos were taken at the Woodstock Animal Rescue Farm. It is a farm for animals that have been mistreated. I visited the farm last summer and wrote about it here. 
Nurturing Thursday
The 7 Day Black & White Challenge-Day 7
Marilyn at Serendipity is participating in the 7 Day Black & White Challenge and invited anyone who wants to participate to do so. I figured I’d give it a try.
The rules are: Seven days. Seven black and white photos of your life. No people. No explanation.
Share Your World
If you were given the opportunity to ride in a helicopter would go?
NO WAY!!! I haven’t been on an airplane in 10 years- the thought of being in a helicopter, so confined, so high up- forget it!!!
What are some of your favorite type of proteins to eat? (meat, seafood, eggs, soy, cheese, nuts)
I love cheese, nuts, and salmon. I eat chicken but usually only once a week, and red meat maybe twice a year.
What would be your preference, awake before dawn, at dawn, or awake before noon?
Before dawn or at dawn is usually when I get up. In the summer I am usually up before sunrise and love that quiet time with my coffee and the silence of the world. My very favorite thing to do is watch the sunrise over the ocean.
What inspired you or what did you appreciate this past week? Feel free to use a quote, a photo, a story, or even a combination.
I was inspired by my first grade class and their responses to the question of what it means to be kind. You can read them Here
The 7 Day Black & White Challenge-Day 6
Marilyn at Serendipity is participating in the 7 Day Black & White Challenge and invited anyone who wants to participate to do so. I figured I’d give it a try.
The rules are: Seven days. Seven black and white photos of your life. No people. No explanation.
A Day In The Life 
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