I'm totally excited for fall, this is my favorite time of year.

Chat with ya later, in the mean time... :)

Meet Sophie. She's been in the family for about 5 years now and has been very skiddish of me for the longest time, until just recently. I think she knows my rabbit Jack passed away. She'd never come up to me or let me pet her for the longest, although she does now, she's very sweet. Funny how animals respond to us in certain times and know when we're in need their friendship.

The downside is she's hard to photograph as she's constantly moving and never sits still, ever. She's very wary of my camera so I've been trying to get her used to it, which has been extremely challenging. Seems her favorite thing to do on a daily basis is to roll around in the dirt then lick it all off, imagine that. That and catching ginormous mice (which are probably more like rats) and laying them on the front porch for us to step on. Yay! :)

Here are the rest of the little bee pics from yesterday's walk. I think it's kinda funny how I stumbled upon the two of them. The little one wasn't moving a whole lot, not sure why, maybe he was nearing the end of his life cycle. Thankful I found him though, even more thankful I found both.

If you need or would like to, you can visit my flickr stream, just search "sandy avery" there and you'll find me. I've posted the pictures there as well along with the dates, times and camera setting information in regards to each photograph. But only if you want to check and make sure I did in fact take them yesterday afternoon. ;)

(the difference between night & day)

(nature vs. nurture)

(2)

I painted this watercolor the other day while listening to "I'm Yours" by Jason Mraz. Painting to music is something one of my favorite teachers in high school, Jack Denton, instilled in me years and years ago. What a wonderful person and teacher he was (and still is), some of the best memories I have from high school come from his classes.

It's unbelievable to me how beautiful Chicago is during the springtime. I love it, just love it. When my brother and I were walking around downtown this past Spring, I saw these lovelies over in the taxi cab turn around near the Chicago Tribune. I thought it looked like the tulips were kissing each other.

I'm "originally" from Chicago, but currently reside in the South. My brother is from the South but now lives in Chicago. :) Interesting how that happened huh. He loves it there, I do too and enjoy visiting as much as I can.

And I've noticed that I've been quite indecisive today on what to post here. Which means I probably need to break away from writing and changing this dumb blog entry over and over, so on and so forth. Kind of a bad habit of mine I guess. I definitely get on my own nerves, a lot. But it's funny, when I'm sure about something, I know. I'm sure (meaning confident). However getting to that point sometimes feels like a dire struggle. Yuck-o.

I'm really in love with the macro (micro) world. Seems I always lean towards zooming into things, as opposed to out. Practicing a shot like this truly takes a tole on the old eyes though. I need my vision checked something terrible, it's changed so much since all this picture taking started. Gotta do that soon.

And here's that elephant again... funny how yesterday was 09-09-09. Made me think of my divorce for some reason... 06-06-06. I'm not joking, people. The date I signed my divorce papers was not my choice and not my doing. What on earth to make of that, yeeeash. Sick joke maybe? I dunno. Yes, I can talk about the date part. Divorces are public record you know.

Dang, and I always have a million and one things I intend to say when I sign on to write a blog, then I get here and it's not what I've wanted to say at all. Maybe I'll start writing thoughts down first then retyping them here, then again writing it once is plenty enough sometimes. Blah blah I'm rambling, time for sleep.

Night. :)

That's right, it's soap. Go on, you know you want to lean into your computer screen and take a big whiff... ahhhhhhh. And here's the awesome Indigo Wild scent guide, just in case you were wondering how many wicked scents they actually make. So yummy.

Yeah I know, this is a short blog. Gotta work early in the morning again, don't have a lot of time to write tonight. Be back soon. :)

I was at a friend's house the other day. She and I were talking when my son ran to me and handed me a bunch of these two leaf clovers, "Look mom, look what I found for you." Yes, they are real. I examined each one thoroughly. There are 10 to be exact and no petals have been pulled off.

They shrivel up fairly quickly after you pick them, so it's a good idea to get them into a book for pressing flat asap. I asked my friend if she had one I could use and she handed me that, which is her child's dictionary from school.

I didn't do a word search first and I didn't pay attention to where I put them either. It wasn't until a day or so later that I wondered what page I had placed them on... and there you have it. God's honest truth. Kinda freaky.

And just so you know, I do not put all my eggs in the basket of clover karma on a daily basis. I just happen to think they are sweet, fun and challenging to find (which is also fun). There is however quite a bit of information out there on the history of the clover and it's meaning. It's hard for me to say exactly what the two leaves signifies. I do know that 4 leaves signifies luck, but I'm not so sure about the rest. Poo, the internet unfortunately is full of different explanations. Regardless, it was still a fun moment.

I'm very thankful for my ex-father-in-law and the simple fact he's the reason I was ever inspired to take (or try to take) photographs in the first place. That along with my divorce, which "forced" me to splurge and spend the money on a camera I really couldn't afford to buy. Yes, I'm thankful for that as well.

I would also be extremely lost without my basket of Sharpie markers. Sounds silly, but it's true. Even if they just sit around in that basket there and I don't actually use them, I need them to look at. I need the visual, I need the color and I need the option and opportunity to be creative whenever I want or need to be. I just need them. I'm very glad they aren't cigarettes.

Whoo, and I finally managed to vacuum out my air returns and purifiers in my apartment today. I can always tell when it's time, even without looking to see how much grime is in the filters. If there's one thing I'm sensitive to, it's the smell of things. Anything. The person next to me, the air quality of any room I walk into... food. You name it.