Snowballs and Roses

Veil of Blossoms in Mendocino Village

Sunny Convertible

Because a ride to the farmers' market doesn't have to be dull.

Lost, Tossed Teddy Bear

More Astral Projections

The last image shows the solar eclipse projected through fir needles, like thousands of pinhole cameras.

Astral Projections

First, for comparison, what the shadows from the oak boughs look like against my shed wall just before the eclipse began. Then, as the moon obscured the sun's rays, the tiny gaps between the leaves functioned more vividly as thousands of pinhole lenses, safely showing the progress of the event, and casting images of countless crescent suns.

Poppies are Enough

Nearly Ripe Oregano and Tomatoes

Happy Halloween

More colorful neighbors in aqua, plum, and orange.

Neighbors in Aqua

Flat-Faced Hedge

I nearly didn't see the picket gate, near Ft. Bragg, California.

Victorian with a View

It's been on the market a while, and the location is just above the uptown parking lot with its fresh tree planters and cleaned up appearance. In fact, I took this picture a year ago, and the signs are still there, and the place looks much the same. If I could afford it, I'd probably go a little nuts with colorful trim paint.

End of Harvest

The season for deliveries from Live Power Farm has come to an end for this year. Gloria's van, parked in front of the look-alikes, traveled in darkness to bring our pre-Thanksgiving bounty, along with hugs goodbye from her, here at the drop-off house where we always await her arrival. The winter squash will keep for a few more weeks, but it will be back to mainstream shopping again, at least for a while.

Behind Mom's Woodshed

I had a nice visit with my Mom on Memorial Day, and I took a few pictures around her place. This is one of the out-of-territory indulgences I can enjoy posting, now that I'm done with Willits Daily Photo.

This scene behind her woodshed includes a section of metal fence that I've seen in photos of my great grandfather. He was an old Cornish immigrant who retired from blacksmithing, and then kept some farm animals when he lived up at this place. The gray tin ladder used to be attached to the old water tank. Most of the bricks are from the old Victorian house that burned down in 1961. The gardening pots are all my Mom's. The plant shooting up on the right is a blackberry cane, which grow very easily here. If we couldn't eat the berries, I suppose we'd call them weeds.

Emmy's Beautiful House

Still clean and pristine, some of you may remember the immaculate house I posted on Willits Daily Photo last year, and mentioned here again not long ago. As you see, the gardener didn't find all of the California poppies Emmy had planted, and here is the proof. I'll be coming back around for more peeks in the future, with flowers still coming along strong.

Empty Farmhouse

From the front, this house looks like a charming country abode, but in fact the back is collapsing. It may be just too far gone to restore. I've seen other homes of this type with glass filling in the west end of the porch. That's the direction from which the wind usually blows in Little Lake Valley - storms in winter, and afternoon convection winds in summer. This one also has glass to the east, so maybe the microclimate is different out on this side of the valley. Those windows would have preserved the valuable late day light for shelling peas or darning socks.

Blog Action Day 2008 - Poverty: A Trailer Park