Tree House

Near Raphine, VA

Sharing with Black and White Weekend

Large Critter, Small Critter

This little turtle was only about three inches long. He was resting next to our sliding door yesterday.

Sharing with Sepia Saturday and Saturday's Critters

Five Friday Topics

Blog Post #5555!

I'm using the Willy Nilly Friday format today to share 5 different topics.

1. The theme for today's Photo Friday is Civilization.  This picture represents reading and art, two of the cornerstones for civilization. This sculpture is at Lord Fairfax Community College in Middletown, Virginia.

 2. The lake at our community's entrance looks pretty in the sunshine. I'm sharing this with Skywatch Friday, Weekend Reflections, and My Town Shoot Out.

3. My buddy Flash had minor surgery last week. He needed his teeth cleaned and one tooth extracted. Since he had to have anesthesia for the dental work, Dr. Coston removed the skin tag from his shoulder and and cut his nails extra-short. They've always been long and they grow quickly. This picture is a "before" shot. Flash seems to have recovered well.

4. My Canon G16 is back from the shop. It's now one year old and I've sent it to Canon for repair four times! They couldn't figure out what was wrong and tried to tell me it was perfectly fine. I got impatient on the phone and finally had their guy Dave (or Dayvon) talk to my husband, who has also experienced the problem. (The framing seen through the eyepiece gets way off sometimes after zooming.) Well, whatever Frank said gave Dave the idea to try something with the camera. He came back to the phone and said that the problem was with the digital zoom and he had been able to get it to do it himself!

It seems the zoom was automatically going into digital zoom and when I went back into optical zoom, the view from the eyepiece was no longer matching the actual image. The work-around is to turn off digital zoom from the tools menu. Now I've done that and the problem seems to be solved. I don't know why the tech people didn't figure that out and tell me before. Dave said they use set testing procedures which indicated all functions were operating as designed. I have been so frustrated with the problem since many shots were ruined by my not seeing what the camera saw. I blogged about this in October, November and December. Each time I sent it off, it was gone for several weeks.

This picture came out as planned. I cut it off deliberately; perhaps you recognize the motto.

Sharing with Signs, Signs and Orange You Glad It's Friday

5. Frank took this picture of me in a restaurant. I have a short list of restaurants where I can eat comfortably because I have a long list of food allergies. Add to that the other diets that I'm trying to follow in order to improve my digestion and other symptoms and it's challenging: low fermentable carbs (Fast Tract) diet, low-histamine diet, and low sulfur diet. Oh, and low-glycemic too but I'm neglecting that for now as it resulted in weight gain.

Anyway, the restrictions have limited my desire to travel, since I find that trying a new restaurant means I'll either get sick or at least wind up sending the food back to the kitchen because they forgot to follow instructions. That takes the joy out of traveling and a lot of the fun out of socializing! Right now my husband is on a vacation trip without me because I simply did not want to go. I hate flying anyway! We do take short car trips because I can pack food, but it's a hassle. I'd probably become a hermit if I didn't need human interaction at times.

 It's a good thing I live in a beautiful area. I can enjoy a staycation and have my meals at home. They are monotonous but at least they are safe. Well, except for reflux and weight gain. I could probably do better with those except that I can't stand feeling hungry and weak!

Garden, Gate, Goose

Today the sun came out, finally! These pictures are from a few days ago when it was still rainy. The scenes are down near the North Fork of the Shenandoah.

Sharing with Good Fences 

and Little Things Thursday

Waterfowl Families

Do you see the goslings on the right in the first picture?

And here we have Mother Mallard with here children.

Sharing with Wild Bird Wednesday

and Water World Wednesday

and Wednesday Waters

Lynn's Cousins, 1968

Sharing with Monochrome Wednesday

Black and White Wednesday and Wordless Wednesday

It's Green in Strasburg!

Sharing with Seasons, 

NF Trees and Bushes, and Wordless Wednesday on Tuesday

Downtown Front Royal Randoms

The Good, The Random, and The Fun

The Good:  This old locomotive is a treasure! It stands on a short section of track behind the Warren Heritage Society's Ivy Lodge on Chester Street. This once hauled limestone at the Riverton Quarry and it was restored by Moyers Automotive. The engine was made in 1944 and the two tipping cars are older.

Sharing with Tuesday's Treasures

The Random: This alley in Front Royal reminded me of a European street.

The Fun: A little bakery on Main Street features a friendly face and an assortment of "Glorious Pies."

Sharing with Our World Tuesday

Farmland, Springtime

Here are some rural scenes for The Barn Collective. Also we have some horses and cows for Camera Critters. 

Yes, one of these silos is leaning.

Murals at El Charro

The exterior of this restaurant in Harrisonburg is decorated with large rodeo-themed murals. A "charro" in Mexico is a horseman, often in a rodeo.

Sharing with Monday Murals

Along WV 259

The Lost River Valley is a scenic area in West Virginia. WV Route 259 continues into Virginia as VA 259, which passes through Broadway and down to I-81 at Mauzy.

Here we see the Lost River United Methodist Church, which I am sharing with InSpired Sunday.

I've seen a number of red-winged blackbirds this year. I managed to click the shutter as this one flew off.

Sharing with The Bird D'Pot

Portrayals, Front Royal

This wraps up my series on the Battle of Front Royal Reenactment. I enjoy seeing people in historical costumes!

Several people have commented that they had not heard of this battle. It was pretty much a step in a series of actions as Stonewall Jackson kept Union troops busy in the Shenandoah Valley so that they could not join the campaign around Richmond. It was unusual in that it was fought in the streets of the town (although later there was urban fighting in nearby Winchester, and towns along the Valley Pike saw plenty of action).

Vivandière (Sutler or Merchant)

Wounded in Monochrome

Since color photography was not around during the American Civil War, I decided to experiment with monochrome for a few reenactment pictures. It's not hard to do this in Photoshop. I find the sepia filter is a bit subtle so I saturate just a little after I use it. (For some reason Sepia is under Adjustments, not Filters, at least in CS6.)

Which effect do you prefer for this era, sepia or black and white?

Sepia

Black and White (Grayscale)

In case you missed yesterday's post, the occasion was a reenactment of the 1862 Battle of Front Royal. This urban battle was one of Stonewall Jackson's surprise attacks during his Valley Campaign.

If you've been to a reenactment, you've probably seen men pretending to be wounded or dead. Ignoring that tragic aspect of a battle would pretty much reduce the event to a parade instead of a depiction of history!

Sharing with Black and White Weekend and Sepia Saturday

Battle of Front Royal

Last weekend's reenactment of the Battle of Front Royal was the first. Most Civil War reenactments take place on fields, not in a city. But the actual battle happened on the streets of town in May 1862, and that's what the organizers wanted to show.

Fortunately Front Royal is experienced at closing down it's historic streets for parades, so the usual barricades went up and the event went smoothly.

Yesterday's Rainbow

Sharing with Skywatch Friday

Living History Ladies

These gracious women were dressed up to help us imagine life in the 1860's in Front Royal.

Sharing with Little Things Thursday