Sara’s Fave Photos

This Des Moines, Washington nursery goes in for petunias in a big way. Bigger than anything I have ever seen in the way of petunias, or any flower grouping, really. They must have over 100 feet of the most amazing installation of petunias I have ever seen. And they are fragrant, too! It had just rained pretty hard earlier, so these were not even at their perkiest, but wow, is all I can say.

For more flowers, visit Flowers for Today. It’s great.

And be sure to stop by Color Carnival for more amazingly bright colors.

Our last camping trip gave us some great shadow opportunities as well as the blessings of a warm, sunny day, softly shielded from the sun’s bright rays by the forest canopy. You can imagine how fresh the air smelled. For more shadows of all kinds, please visit Shadow Shot Sunday. People are so creative with shadows!

It’s Pink Saturday again, and here are some pink flowers that are different from my usual kinds. Cindy of the fabulous garden and deck flowers shown here a while back sewed this beautiful crazy quilt. And visit Color Carnival for more amazingly bright colors of all kinds.

Enjoy!

We were at a business function last night at the Columbia Tower Club, on the 75th floor, just at dusk. This is about the highest point in Seattle. What a photo opportunity! Here is Mt. Ranier, perhaps 50 miles away, clearly showing its conical volcano shape. Let’s hope an eruption is far in the future, although they say we are overdue. In the sky are the beginnings of those saucer-shaped lenticular clouds, it looks to me, but I am no expert.

For more skies around the planet, visit Skywatch Friday, and look up!

This new (about a year) house is so great. One of the best things is the backyard space, with no fences between us and the neighbors on both sides, and the scenic horse pasture behind us. This view from our patio shows our little vegetable garden near the birdbath, the two columnar apple trees closer to us, and mostly our neighbor’s yard with the big shrubs. It’s like living in a park!

I feel that gardening and feeding the birds is a way to contribute to a better environment for all. Visit Think Green Thursday for more “green” ideas.

Gifford Pinchot National Forest near Mt. Rainier in western Washington includes at least one fairly primitive campground and a wide creek. I love the sound of plashing water I heard there, rushing round the creek rocks. Morning light and captured promise of a warm day makes the image below one of my very top faves.

Visit Watery Wednesday for other images of water of all kinds.

Something different for photo meme of all things red, Ruby Tuesday. These are glass scuptures, probably by Tacoma native son Dale Chihuly, high up over the old wooden bar. As a person who has lived for a long time in earthquake-prone California, I sure hope they are secured well.

Now that the roses are planted they are just taking off, late in the season though it is. This is a Broadway rose, so happy now. For more Mellow Yellow Monday visions, or Macro Monday close ups, or even Color Carnival scintillations, go on and check them out.

This rose is the only one of the 18 we planted whose name I do not know. All the others had tags, but this one had only a lovely pink rose to choose by. I took it. If anyone knows its proper name, that would be great. The flowers are unusually large, and it’s fragrant!

For more flowers from all over the world, visit Today’s Flowers.

This is one impressive mountain. We were happy that the weather was just so perfect for a traipse around Mt. Rainier National Park. Here’s a view of our local but world-class mountain with some clouds coming up behind. Click on Scenic Sunday for more scenigasms around the planet.

We’re back from camping near Mt. Ranier. The weather gods smiled upon us; so perfect for shadow shots. Here’s one from a sweet nap we got to take. Ah, camping! Visit Shadow Shot Sunday for more fascinating shadows around the world.

This dahlia, from Cindy’s amazing garden in Kent, WA, looks almost like a lotus or a peony. Enjoy for Pink Saturday!

Picked these this week. Not everyone knows about lemon cucumbers, upper right. Pick them before they get bright yellow, when they really look like lemons! They are quite delicate and delicious.

Happy Macro Monday, Mellow Yellow Monday, and Ruby Tuesday. We are off camping and will return in a few days. Ta-ta!

This old fashioned hydrangea is so easy to grow. I had some hydrangea flowers at my wedding, years ago.

As long as it is kept moist (“hydra” is a clue!) with nice humus-y soil,  it will be happy even in full sun up here in Seattle, but I think it is easier to keep happy in shade or part shade, where it still blooms nicely. Another neat thing about them is that prunings made in the spring are extremely easy to root. Just push the stems into the shaded soil, keep moist, and soon you will have new hydrangeas!

For more lovely flower photos, visit Flowers for Today, now entering its second floriferous year!

We are going camping next week again, this time near Mt. Ranier. In thinking about our trip, of course I had to look at some of the photos from last time, and thought I’d post this late day shot of a nearby campsite. The combination of clear light, tall trees and the late hour makes for some mighty fine shadows. Thank you to Tracy of the Hey Harriet blog, who created of Shadow Shot Sunday, for opening my eyes to the sweet penumbra.

Don’t you just want to sit down at that table?