Astrid's Photo Scavenger Hunt 15/04/2021

This weeks prompt chosen by Astrid is 'The Colour Purple'.  Fortunately I do still  have a few pictures that will fit that heading so here goes.

THE COLOUR PURPLE 

 While searching through my archives - fortunately all saved on a Photo Stick - I noticed how the flame on this burning Christmas pudding was a shade of purple.

Another Christmas picture, this time of a lovely felt heart tree decoration made for me a few years ago by Kate.  It always has pride of place on our tree each year.

A photographs of our daughter-in-law's wellies in the garden of a holiday cottage in Northumberland taken some years ago.

More purple pictures this time of flowers taken around gardens and places we have visited.

   This picture was taken in The Shambles during a visit to York some years ago.  These people always fascinate me.  I know I could not keep still that long, my nose would itch!!!

Remember those gorgeous wellies in an earlier picture..................well look who is wearing them  now!!

and now wearing our son's wellies too!!! 

Roxy, their dear chocolate labrador, who is sadly no longer with us.  

Now off to see what everyone else has posted.  Keep well and stay safe.  Many regulations have been lifted here in the UK this week so what with that and the spring weather, life does seem a little brighter. xx

Astrid's Photo Scavenger Hunt -9 March 2021

The word selected by Astrid this week is Farm.  As we live opposite a small holding and then a couple of farms on the other side of the road from us and they are part of our daily view out of our window, I thought it may be appropriate to use photographs taken at different times of the year of 'our farms'. 

Spring

I love the fields when they are this gorgeous shade of spring green.  The farmer originally kept a few cattle and free range chickens on his field.  One silly hen kept getting out and laying eggs in a clump of grass next to the path way.  Only once did we see anyone pick up the eggs as they walked past.  Most just ignored them. 

    

When we have heavy rain a lake forms just beyond the old railway line.  It is often covered with different water birds.   Here the mist has come down as far as the canal and hidden Weets Hill in the background

Summer

Every year we watch the hay being made in the field.  First cut,  dried, then scattered  again, then put into lines ready for the bailing machine that  scoops it up and spits it out the other side in neat round bales.  Eventually they are picked up again, wrapped in black plastic and left for collection to be taken to the farm yard. 

Autumn

It is with mixed feeling when the trees start to change to their beautiful autumnal colours.  I love to see the change but know that summer is ending and winter is on its way.

Early morning autumn mist over the distant canal.

Winter

I just love to see the snow when it covers the farm fields and the hill beyond.  One year when the farmer had just started keeping sheep in the field on his smallholding we were expecting heavy snow.  So with the help of his teenage children he built a shelter for the sheep out of bales of straw and covered the top with a blue tarpaulin.  

But the silly sheep just saw it as a huge supply of hay and started munching on it first on the outside, then they moved inside and were eating it there.  The roof began to sag.

Going....going................

..........gone!!

But I must say, in the farmers' defence, that we did have very heavy snow overnight.

The trees in our garden that same morning.

Well now off to see what everyone else has done.   HERE is the link back to Astrid's site.   Keep well and see you next week with The Colour Purple.  

Astrid Dragon's Photo Hunt - 02.04.2021

Welcome to Astrid's first Photo Hunt.  She has selected the word Chocolate for our first prompt; a very appropriate word.  I'm sure that where ever you are, we all associate chocolate Easter Eggs and Hot Cross Buns with this time of the year.

We have always given our grandsons either a chocolate egg or sometimes a chocolate rabbit and this year is no exception.  I have been itching to buy them ever since they came into the shops.  B kept telling me that they are grown up now and I don't need to get them an Easter egg but eventually gave in.  We are expecting to see them this weekend with their girl friends as we are allowed to see people so long as we stick to the rule of 6 and are outside in the garden.   My picture shows three chocolate bunnies, two blue and one pink and one box of milk free eggs for one GF who has to avoid dairy products. I had a job to take the photograph, the foil wrapping was so shiny.

Thanks Astrid for taking over the reins from Kate.  Look forward to joining in each week.  Wishing you all a very happy and blessed Easter.  Lets hope this is the start of things improving for us all, where ever we live.🌼

Kate's (Last) Picture Scavenger Hunt .26/13/2021

Sadly this is to be Kate's final Picture Scavenger Hunt due to her very busy life these days.  It has been fun though I did find Fridays came around very quickly!! Good job Threads through my Life aka Lovely Lady kept me on my toes.   

My selection of pictures seem to  be more black/white than light/dark, or maybe there is not too big a difference.   Anyway, here goes...........

LIGHT/DARK 

On one visit to  our son and daughter-in-law in Scotland they took us to see The Kelpies near Falkirk, the largest equine sculpture in the world. They are 30 metres high and are a monument to Scotland's horse powered industrial heritage.  For those who do not know what a Kelpie is (I didn't)  they are a shape-changing aquatic spirit of Scottish legend. They are said to haunt rivers and streams, usually in the shape of a horse.

I took some lovely pictures of them, in spite of the rain that day, but on getting back to their home our son took my phone and using some app which he says is on my phone (but I have never found it again) turned all my photographs into these strange black and white pictures.  They show both dark and light of the same subject and well as a picture at the end just so you can see what they should look like.  They are amazing, makes one feel very small next to them as they are huge.

What they should really look like.  If you are ever in that part of Scotland they and the Falkirk wheel are really worth the visit - free of charge too!! 

My next Light/dark photograph is one I took over the Christmas period when we made a large silver star to hang in our window.  I fortunately found some very tiny LED lights that I could put around the edges which outlined the star beautifully.  

 The star hanging in the window with a winter sunset behind it.  It was not dark enough yet for the lights to show.

A picture I have used before but I think it shows light and dark in a most beautiful way.  A lone heron in the evening sunset at Tau Game Reserve, South Africa.

And finally......................

A saddle back stork meeting a lone buffalo at Nkorho Game Lodge Waterhole.

Hello - who are you? 

I'm off...... there are two of you!!! 

Thank you Kate for running the photo treasure hunt for so long.  It has given us nearly five years of fun searching through our archives or going out to take the relevant photographs.   We have also kept in touch with  bloggy friends and made new  ones. It has been fun and I wish Astrid of Dragon Stitches and Stuff by Astrid best of luck hosting the blog and sure she will keep it going for us to continue with our frantic searches for the relevant photographs on a Thursday night.   Good luck with all your new ventures.  Look forward to life's restrictions being lifted  so we can  say .....see ya around🧡  xxx

        Now off to see what everyone else has done this week.

Kate's One Word Scavenger Hunt 19/03/2021

 

For the third week this month Kate has selected Sunrise/Sunset.  I have so many pictures particularly of sunsets taken from our lounge window that I have had a job to choose.  We can't see sunrises from our flat windows, just too far around the corner but I have quite a few taken from different watering holes on the Africam.com site.  I take pictures off my computer screen with my smart phone.  So here are my selection for this week.

Sunrise over Tau Game Reserve, South Africa

The next set of photographs were taken out of our lounge window a few years ago.  It shows the sun gradually disappearing behind the horizon.  

 Sunset in over Weets Hill, Lancashire,  August 2013

One more week of Kate's One Word Scavenger Hunt before she hands over the reins to someone else due to her ever increasingly busy lifestyle.  Thanks again Kate for all the hours of pleasure you have given us over many years. 🧡xx 

 It will  officially be Spring by then as it is the Spring Equinox on Saturday 20th March.  So it will be all change.  See you then.  xxx  

Kate's One Word Scavenger Hunt 12/03/2021

This week's topic for our picture hunt is Look up/Look down.  This really had me thinking for a while till I realised the way I should go.  So here is my interpretation of Kate's words.  

I searched through old photographs taken whilst driving round the Panorama Route, Mpumulunga, South Africa when we lived in nearby Hazyview.  To give a brief explanation much of that part of South Africa is either Highveld or Lowveld and usually there is an easy drive down between the two.  But here the cooler Highveld towers above the much hotter and drier Lowveld below where we lived.  The Panorama Route took in many lovely sites like Bourke's Luck Potholes, Pilgrim's Rest and God's Window.   That is where the first picture was taken. 

Here we are looking east over vast forests owned and maintained by the Forestry Commission and beyond that across the town of the aptly named Hazyview and towards the Kruger National Park and eventually towards Mozambique.  I like to think this photographs shows both looking up at the clouds whose shadows make dark blotches on the forests below where your eye is drawn to look down.  We loved being up there as it was a way to escape the extreme heat of the Lowveld below. 

This next picture I took of Rosie's Pan where I think it shows both looking up and down.  The clouds above are reflected in the water below. 

  

Here a male Kudu is standing above the water with his reflection down below. 

I have more pictures 'looking up' than looking down so here is one last one of storm clouds building up over Naledi Dam as the sun was setting.  

That's it for this week.  Thanks Kate for keeping us going with your weekly picture hunt. Now off to see how everyone else has interpreted the prompt for this week.