Throwback Thursday: Days Gone By

June 30 will forever be in my memory as my dad's birthday. I present photos from June 30th in past years, including one of my dad. 

1998

Dad's last birthday

2005

Belonged to my first husband

2010

2016

Click for larger image

Click for larger image

2019

#throwbackthursday

Brown and Curly

It's been a while since I've played "Name This Texture"

Sure. Bark. But cool-looking bark.

Date Night

Every delicious Italian meal begins with ciabatta bread dipped in olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Yum.

Calla Lily

 #flowersforfriday

Throwback Thursday: Falls Park

Writing about the parks in Eugene got me to thinking back on some of my favorite parks in Post Falls, Idaho. Here are some of my favorite photos from Falls Park taken over the years.

2007

Picnic with Jodie

Below the Dam

2011

Spring Runoff

2013

Idaho Camus

Lunch Time for the Goslings

2014

Get It!

Old Dam Mechanism

Gates Open

2016

Bedrock

Diving Practice

2018

Winter's Day

Frozen by the Falls

Eugene Park Tour - Meadowlark Prairie

I met a friend at this wetlands park today. It's huge, with a paved bike / skate / walking path surrounding it. The path continues east all the way through town.

Neither of us has been walking much lately, so we took it easy. We certainly enjoyed the scenery -- almost as much as we enjoyed each other's company.

My friend said she'd been there a few weeks earlier, and the the water has receded quite a bit.

Still, there were large ponds and flowing streams. We stopped to watch the little family swimming along.

The edges of the wetlands are covered in tall grasses. 

Luckily, this park is about a 5 minute drive from home, so I can return often. Perhaps next time I'll visit around sunset when more wildlife is active. 

Note to self: Take my tripod and telephoto lens to get sharper images of the birds.

Friends, Friends, Friends

I hope I'm this kind of friend. 

I know others are for me.

Sunset - June 20, 2022

We've had so much rain lately, that the clouds have obscured the sunset. Last night, the clouds lifted just enough for the color to break through.

I love living here.

Wisteria

Her name is music.
Wisteria.

She flows as a melody,
cascading over fences, undulating in the breeze.

Wisteria. Catch her quickly!
Her flowers are fleeting,
taunting me to stretch toward her,
to breathe in her scent. 

Wisteria.
Dressed in a sweeping gown of purple and white.
The delicate dame,
releasing her petal charms, floating to my feet.

A little poetry on the fly.

Baby Whites

These little flowers are about the size of my thumbnail, and cover the fields and wetlands behind our home. 

It might be called the "common daisy."

Another Iris

 This has soft colors, unlike some I posted in May. Say, "Ahhh."

#flowersforfriday

Throwback Thursday: Sweet Memories

One thing I love about photography is how the images take me right back to the place where they were taken. Here are a few images from June 16th in years gone by.

2008

Mushroom that sprouted in our front yard

Volunteer columbine found in our back yard

2011

Jodie's high school graduation. She likes pie more than she likes cake, so we always make something special for her.

2013

Warriors and Veterans of the Coeur d'Alene Tribe. War memorial in Plummer, Idaho.

2016

Green on green. Fly on a hosta leaf in our front yard. Post Falls, Idaho.

2019

Celebrating Father's Day. Jeanne and Dale on our new backyard deck.

Small as a Thumbnail

 

Sad today. Photos of sweet little flowers heal me.

Two for Tuesday

Last Tuesday Dale and I decided to put a jigsaw puzzle together. I was feeling a little out of sorts, and making order out of chaos usually improves my mood. Instead of putting just one puzzle together, we did two. 

We have a few of these two-in-a-box puzzle sets and are small enough to complete in an evening, small enough to put together side-by-side on the same table, and a big enough challenge to be satisfying.

The box we chose contains The Baker and I Love Donuts. 

Dale put The Baker together. I solved I Love Donuts. Two ... for Tuesday!

It's not uncommon for these inexpensive (and cheaply made) jigsaw puzzles to have missing pieces. Unfortunately, the puzzle Dale constructed was missing one piece.

That didn't put a damper on our side-by-side enjoyment. Simplest Date Night ever.

#twofortuesday

Eugene Park Tour - Bond Lane Park

Dale and I visited Bond Lane Park on a beautiful sunny day at the end of April. It's another park in the Cal Young district of town. So far, this is one of my very favorite parks.

Like most neighborhood parks we've visited so far, there is a lot of open green space and a playground for the kids. There are plenty of picnic tables and benches dotted around the green area. This particular park is surrounded by dense trees.

In addition to the climbing structure, swings and slide is this "spider web" monkey bars

and a bouncy dinosaur. The day we visited, there were several families enjoying the playground with lots of giggles and screams of delight.

The main reason I enjoyed this park so much is because of the paths through the woods. One path leads to this picturesque bridge. It spans a gully and empties into a nearby neighborhood. 

Another path leads into the woods. It's an easy loop trail with a gentle rise and fall. There's all kinds of vegetation, including ferns and tall grasses and mushrooms.  

There's also a lot of ivy covering the ground and growing up the trees.

Here in Eugene/Springfield, ivy is an invasive species. Every year the parks department calls for volunteers to help keep it in check. This impressive rooting system was left clinging to the tree once the leaves were removed.

The path through the woods reminds me of my beloved Kiwanis Park near my old home in Post Falls, Idaho. I hope this is one park Dale and I will return to again and again.

Now that it's summertime, (and I'm caught up blogging about the parks we've visited so far), Dale and I hope to visit more parks on Tuesdays and/or Saturdays. It's been raining a lot lately, which has put a bit of a damper on our travels. We're so ready to jump into the convertible and explore more of our new state.