Camera Critters, Pet Pride and Shadow Shots

Make Time for Small Reflections

Annie a 'rescue'
visiting from Illinois ...
watched by two fur-kids

enjoying the sun
on the patio today
in the warm sunshine

Click to embiggen for better viewing

Christmas Day sunshine
enjoyed by this cat at my
sister in law's home

Straight out of the Camera

with Poster Edges

Click for others participating in
Camera Critters, Pet Pride, & Shadow Shot Sunday

Small Reflections ... Smile Back

Thought for Today
"The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitudes of mind." William James

Haiku Friday #33 - Baby Beagle Update

Remember the day
Molly had a visitor ...
inside our backyard?

(clicking on the link above will take you to that Haiku
in case you missed it or forgot)

After a long search
we discovered the pooch lived
across the alley.

Apparently the
baby Beagle outwore his
welcome ... and has been

adopted by a
friend of my next door neighbor.
Buster is his name!



Soon Molly and I
will go visit Buster in
his new BIG back yard!

* * * * *

Volume#34 - I up and did it yesterday!
(Published this morning at Sacred Ruminations)

For a Mr. Linky to other Haiku Fridays
go to A Mommy Story or
Playgroups are no Place for Children.

To see more previous Haikus,
click on the Haiku Friday label below this post
or in the sidebar under About Me.

Thought for Today
"I think dogs are the most amazing creatures; they give unconsditional love. For me they are the role model for being alive." Gilda Radner

(Wordless) Thursday Thirteen # 18

13 Adorable Puppies
(Collages created from my Puppy a Day Widget)

Links to other Thursday Thirteens!

The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!


View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

Get the Thursday Thirteeen code here!

For easy access, I’ve listed more T-13 links along with the
Thursday Thirteen Blogroll to the bottom of my sidebar.

Thought for Today
"Whoever said you can't buy happiness
forgot little puppies." Gene Hill

Haiku Friday - Volume 13 An Unexpected Surprise

Just two days ago
Molly found a little friend
in her own back yard.

Tiny Beagle pup
through the fence did crawl to play.
Lost and hungry pooch

stayed with us until
next door neighbors did arrive
home. To my dismay

no one recognized
active little puppy so
we all launched a search

figuring someone
had to be around who'd know
where the pup belonged.

Darkness fell with no
luck in sight ... and Molly grew
tired of this "pest"

playing with HER toys,
chewing on her sheepskin bed ...
Like an "only" child

Molly's jealousy
made it difficult for me
to maintain the peace.

After several hours,
MANY phone calls later a
frantic call came through.

Joyful, everyone
was relieved this ended well.
As the couple left

I suggested they
get a "tag" on their way home
so that when the pup

managed to escape
next time (as he likely will)
we can call direct!

Beagles I have owned
in the past delighted in
mischief of this sort!

Molly's happier
now that the "intruder" has
left her home in peace.



For a Mr. Linky to other Haiku Fridays
go to A Mommy Story.

Click for Haiku Friday Volume 14.

To see my previous Haikus,
click on the Haiku Friday label below this post.

Click for a Follow-Up 'Ku
Volume 33 - Baby Beagle Update

Thought for today
"Education is more than filling a child with fact. It starts with posing questions." D.T. Max

Saturday Stuph Shared

I'm picking up a couple of my Red Hat "sisters" at 11:15 to drive to a Valentine Luncheon, so I'm a bit "crunched" for time.







Molly wants a walk and isn't taking "In a little while" for an answer. Does she know it's a Red Hat Saturday I wonder?





(In the spirit of full-disclosure, this photo isn't actually of my sweet fur-friend, but I'm in a rush and it looks enough like Molly
to BE her ... sort of ... and this IS what Molly is doing right now ... staring at me expectantly).

I plan to do a "real" post here later this afternoon, so this is a "tide-me-over" to whet the appetite and/or explain where I am
& what's up. Below this is a T-13 on "Healing Affirmations" and a Haiku Friday on "MSN Email Woes" in case you missed them. I did create a 2nd belated Haiku at Sacred Ruminations this morning "On Change" ... but for now, it's a glorious day so Molly and I are headed to the beach!

I hope you're having a wonderful weekend too!

* * * * * * *

6:41 PM addendum
Our walk was fun this morning even though we didn't go to Dog Beach since I didn't have time to give Molly a bath afterwards and pick up my friends on time. Perhaps we'll do that one day next week if the weather stays warm enough.

My visit with the ladies was delightful and lunch delicious. I enjoyed catching up with what everyone has done since the holidays. We celebrated my birthday and another gal's early with cupcakes, but I brought mine home because I didn't want to count the points.

I'm back home with Molly and Ms. Kitty ... checking email and responding to comments ... hoping to read a few blogs this evening before I shut down the computer for the night.

My sister and I finally connected for a phone chat after playing telephone tag for the past several days. They enjoyed their visit to Disney World and Epcott, spent a day at a local County Fair, and are now camped along the ocean somewhere near Daytona where I understand the race is to take place this weekend making their RV site more expensive than usual.

My MSN email is still messed up but I'm planning to devote some time tomorrow to that problem. Hopefully I'll make some progress on that front.

Imaginative Ideas

"It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards."
Lewis Carroll

"I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it's a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope. Which is what I do, and that enables you to laugh at life's realities."
Theodor Geisel (aka Dr. Seuss)

"It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see."
Henry David Thoreau

I've revisited the past ten weeks this morning, and it's time to Thank My Blogging Buddies

As 2007 draws to a close, I'm looking back on the year ... mostly thinking about the changes. Today begins my 10th week as a Blogger. My first post entitled Beginnings, bears the date October 22nd and visually appears unique because I wrote it in Word and pasted it into the editor of Small Reflections because I didn't know how to do anything else. I'd never LOOKED at a blog before (my Taos Writer's Retreat friend) Kara's phone call the previous week. She provided some "guided practice" in that call, walking me through the Blogosphere with links she'd emailed ... offering a glimpse into this alternative reality I found intriguing enough to enter. With Santa Ana winds blowing and multiple fires burning out of control all over Southern California, I entered this "virtual world" ... hesitantly.

Kara left a congratulatory comment, but a virtual stranger named Joy found and commented on that 1st post ... offering me her encouragement and promising to return. How could I not post again? My next two posts, although published by me on the 23rd and 24th, bear the same date as my 1st one because I created them on that day while wandering the Blogosphere and experimenting with what I encountered. Answering questions on other blogs provided me with HTML code to copy and paste on my own, and I couldn't resist the opportunity to try doing so ... hence the "Could this be me?" and "What Time of Day are You?" posts.

My friend Jackie, traveling in an RV with her husband, commented on the 3rd post ... but no one other than me commented on #2. Lucy left a comment there a few weeks later on November 11th after finding my blog and looking around a bit.
I had trouble with "dates" for a while and understand it's possible to modify them after the fact, but I've not tried that yet anyway.

Joy found me again on the 26th as I introduced Molly and Ms. Kitty ... experimenting with inserting photos into posts. My friend Carol, also on the road with her husband, found and commented on the collage of Molly ... (later I gave equal time to Ms. Kitty). Joy discovered my first really successful photo upload, the one I'd been trying to add since the beginning, and reminded me that "baby steps" lead to success. The next day I shared two more photos from the Mabel Dodge Luhan House with details about my Writer's Retreat experience there and Karen left her first of MANY comments.

My 1st "visual scribble" resulted in a veritable deluge of comments and led to others like it later on, in addition to "outing" my true identity. Who knew that when clicked on these signed images enlarged enough to be come legible? Certainly not me! Just as with leaving my recent "cry for help" post just days ago, temptation was great to removed them and remain "a nonny mouse" storyteller (with a lower case "s" on purpose), but I took the high road and left them in place ... adding #2 here, #3 here, #4 here, and an "authentic graphic piece" from my framed collection here with a left-brained linear transcription here.

Annie found me on November 6th and introduced me to Google Reader, simplifying my blog reading immensely ... though I did have to learn the hard way not to bite off more than I could chew. As I visited blogs and encountered posts of interest, the teacher-in-me had to share ... so I learned to create what I've since learned are called "love-links" and leave them scattered throughout my own posts because I realize not everyone has the kind of available time that I do as a young-at heart & "happily retired" individual. No one has to click on any of them, but I offer them an invitations to those with time and interest ... much as I'm doing with "my own past" in this post.

Not long ago I happened upon another Storyteller (she uses a capital "S" however) named Amy Jane who has created a series of links in her sidebar to "introductory pieces" about herself, and when she visited here ... she asked if I could point her to some about myself. Doing so was tedious, challenging and time consuming. I suspect part of my motivation for including so many links in THIS post is due to her request. In the future I can provide a single link in answer to such a question, and others can read as much or as little as they choose about me depending on what interests them.

That reminds me about memes, hoopla, and Lucy's alliterative game. I've done the following:
1. posted 7 Random Things About Myself
2. published 5 T-13s (#1 on authors and books worth sharing with young children, #2 a random list of things I'd do if I knew I couldn't fail, #3 on Ice, #4 a list of quotes I find inspiring, and #5 links to video clips by Straight No Chaser - a unique & entertaining A'capella singing group from Indiana University)
3. shared Christmas Hoopla
4. posted my Playful Ps and Varied Vs with Verse as per Lucy's encouragement
5. written of Five Really Good Things here and here.

I've been serious, reflective, grateful, and playful with my postings (among other things). I did an (as yet) incomplete series on the slow, challenging, tedious transformation of my front yard in 2006 with photo illustrations: parts one, two, three, and four are posted with additional posts to come. While other bloggers posted photos of snowy weather, I shared what Santa Ana winds leave in their wake here and here ... and what gentle rain looks like in Southern California. Mary designed and shared a lovely award for my Christmas Carol Quiz and introduced me to Blingee where I learned to add snowy effects.

I completed NaBloPoMo (30 posts in 30 days during November) on both my blogs and made many new blogging friends in the process including (but not limited to) Sandy, Melissa, and Eve. Then I joined Holidailies (31 posts in 31 days during December) and met John who along with Peajay, Joy, Karen, and Mary solved the Christmas Carol Quiz. Now Sandy has convinced me to participate in the Blog 365 challenge. If you didn't know it before reading this, you must realize by now that I'm more than a bit obsessive and perhaps compulsive as well. According to my Archives, this will be post #75 published on my 71st day as a blogger, so Blog 365 just could be a piece of cake! LOL

So ... we've arrived at the present. I actually started and my 1st post and worked my way back to return to this point ... reviewing as I did so. Smiler and Melissa deserve special mention for teaching me what little i know about HTML thus far. Somewhere along the line, in addition to all the bloggers mentioned previously ... I met Grandy, Ladybug, Mama Zen, MP Jones, Moanna, Mother of Invention, Talking Bear, His Girl Friday, Kikipotamus, and others I've no doubt forgotten to mention ... but you know who you are! If you send me an email reminder, I'll add you to you list (as long as you promise to forgive the oversight). This has gotten much more complex than I intended at the outset. If anyone discovers links that don't take you where they're supposed to, I'd appreciate knowing that too so I can fix them. (Obsessive, remember?)

So ... without further ado ... I wish to say THANK YOU BLOGGING BUDDIES! As a token of my appreciation I offer one and/or both of the following to display (or not) on your blogs as you choose.

Andrea, who I learned recently created the Christmas Hoopla thing, shared this on her blog and graciously gave me permission to "snag it" for myself and pass it along to my friends. It seems fitting somehow. LOL (I've given up ROFLing because it's just too hard to get up these days!)

Thanks a bunch!

Please say Happy Birthday to Molly who is 3 years old today.

"Over the River and Through the Woods to Grandmother's House we Go ... "

Hmm ... no horse ... no sleigh ... and no "Grandmother's house" any more in MY family (except for my brother's widow who lives in Hemet, but she's my age ... and we can't be old enough for this role, can we?) ... I plan to avoid mirrors today :-).

Until my siblings and I each got married (and for a few years afterwards), we observed Thanksgiving Day at home or with extended family. When we celebrated holidays with Dutch relatives on my Mom's side, it was always in someone's home ... with dinner served on the best dishes around a huge table, in a "formal" atmosphere, and staying out of trouble presented ongoing challenges, for I was the baby of the family, always trying to measure up to the "bigger kids" standards.

When I was born, my sister was 4 and my brother 9. Until my arrival, they had the dubious honor of being the youngest kids in the extended family because my mom was youngest of five and my dad second youngest of thirteen. Many of our cousins on my Dad's side of the family were married and had children our age & older by the time we arrived on the scene, so those were huge family gatherings ... often "potlucks" in a centrally located park ... where the men could play pinochle, the women visit while doing hand-crafts of some kind, and the kids entertain themselves playing together.

Turkey smells permeated the air and everyone helped with preparations. My mom's pies were the best! She made the thinnest, flakiest, melt-in-your-mouth crusts ever ... and I miss her presence here on earth. My Dad and brother have also passed on ... though memories fill my heart and soul.

Later, my siblings and I took turns having "Thanksgiving" at our respective homes. Mom always made pies, but we cooked turkey with all the trimmings ... and always invited what my brother-in-law laughingly referred to as "strays" ...(friends who for one reason or another couldn't celebrate with their own families)... to join our celebration. This year, my sister and her husband are off traveling in their RV (currently on the East Coast near Jekyll Island with two of my best friends and their husbands). They'll be celebrating the holiday together. How interesting that what goes around comes around ;-)

This year, my neighbor and friend who IS "Grandma" has invited me to share Thanksgiving at their house ... surrounded by kids, grandkids, and dogs of all sizes. Should be fun and I'm looking forward to the festivities. I wish you and yours a wonderful day of gratitude and fellowship.
Hugs and blessing,

Video Experiments -- Molly plays with her friends, Sassy (the black Lab) & Lucy (the Golden Doodle)

I've got a nifty collection of video clips of Molly, but have never been able to share them with others, because the files are too big for email. Today I'm checking out whether or not they'll upload and run here. It's taking a long time to "process" but I'm hopeful it will all come together if I'm patient.

Guess I should have centered the image (and perhaps made it larger?) Live and learn. This process is taking longer than I care to repeat, so there will be no "do-overs" today to fix anything. After all, it's an experiment.

Okay ... it's been about 30 minutes (maybe more) and I'm about to give up. I'm tired of waiting for something to happen. How long can it take?

YEA!!!! It seems to work. Just when I was about to give up and chuckitall because I couldn't make anything work in "Preview" mode, I decided to press "Publish Post" on a whim ... and there it was ... working fine. I'd forgotten my neighbor was carrying on a conversation with someone as I filmed it. Such is life ... humming "I'm not perfect and I know I never will be..."

So ... the image size looks fine. Centered might be better, but I won't quibble. I'm just happy my efforts yielded results. Aren't they QTs? Molly's not quite 3, Sassy's 8, and Lucy (the Golden Doodle) is about 8 months in this clip. She's gonna be a moose!

On a different topic -- where in the world
did the "fish tank" screen saver
on my desktop come from?
That's really wierd!

Equal Time for Ms. Kitty

It's the day after Halloween and I admit, I'm relieved to know Ms. Kitty has survived yet another ghostly holiday. M has encouraged me for years to bring her inside at this time of year, telling grisly tales of what some misguided folk do with black cats ... but she will have none of that.

She's an independent sort who values her freedom and definitely doesn't want to be indoors for any length of time ... especially with "the great white beastie" smells close by. The only way she ever enters the house is of her own volition ... and she'll remain calmly explorative only as long as the door remains open & accessible for a quick exit on her own terms. These days it's always from the front of the house ... into the living room where Molly is not allowed because it's carpeted.

This morning I found Ms. Kitty where she usually hangs out currently ... sleeping on the white bench pad my new neighbors donated after she had filled it with black hair in THEIR yard. They've since replaced it with another and have sprayed the new one with something to discourage her from claiming IT ... and interestingly ... she seems to like the new location of her comfy pillow on MY front patio ... underneath one of the blue chairs just outside the French Doors. Apparently it's protected enough for her to relax the way she once did in the fenced yard two doors inland ... before she adopted me.

Actually, Ms. Kitty has "a small igloo" of her own ... purchased especially for her by me after Molly moved in and claimed the larger one in the back yard that was home to Zonker for 16 years before he passed in 2001, a couple of weeks after I retired. It's furnished with the comfy cat bed that she once slept in at my feet in the family room ... (as long as the back door remained open). Once it was clear to me that the cat didn't want anything to do with the puppy ...(nor ME for a while)... I created a safe haven for her on the deck above the garage ... near the spa. She's long slept on the warm cover when the nights get chilly ... and since there's a gate at the top of the stairs to keep the dogs away, it seemed perfect. For a while I kept food & water there for her as well.

However, Ms. Kitty had other ideas ... and it didn't take long for her to claim the front yard as her own ... along with the front yard of my neighbor toward the ocean. That worked fine until they sold the house and moved back to Riverside to be near their family. The new owners made significant changes inside & out before moving in last year, and they have a cat of their own ... hence the changes described above.

I've tried putting the igloo on the front patio, but Ms. Kitty didn't use it there ... so I've moved it back on the deck where she DOES retreat occasionally ... usually when it rains. As my friend M is fond of saying ... it's good to have options ... and she does.

Now ... for all my cat loving friends, I offer this collage of kitty photos ... giving equal time for THIS fur-friend. For those of you unfamiliar with Blog-reading ... clicking on the collage gives you a larger view. Enjoy!

Reflections

Success At last!

I've tried to upload this photo ...(taken by me on the grounds of the Henningston Gardens in Taos, NM)... for days without success until now. This lovely pond is located within walking distance of the Mable Dodge Luhan House where I attended a Writers Retreat this past summer. I wrote there a couple of days and was visited periodically by a friendly Chocolate Lab puppy who interrupted my muse occasionally by inviting me to toss his ball & play fetch. I wanted to use this snapshot more prominently on my Small Reflections site as a recurring image, and perhaps I'll figure out how to do that eventually. For the moment, I'm happy to post it here.

I thought this weekend was time to "fall back" on the clocks, and perhaps it is. I'm not quite sure why I awoke so early this morning ...(at 1:45 instead of my usual 4am or so)... but as I made coffee and booted the computer, I wondered how the automatic clocks like the ones in the Cable Box, DVR, PALM, my computer, etc. handle the time change. Seems like it's supposed to occur at 2am ... but nothing reset to 1am when 2am rolled around today. I guess I was mistaken because it's a little after 4am and nothing has changed on the Computer or DVR clocks. I've never been awake to watch this change happen before and I'm not sure it matters ... but since I am awake and thinking about it ... I found my fingers typing those thoughts here. I'm assuming the time doesn't change today after all.

One of the interesting aspects of starting my two Blogs online this past week is that (for the first time ever) ... I've discovered I'm able to "compose" (as in create original text) at the keyboard. Until now, I've ALWAYS written first drafts by hand and typed the text into the computer to print out ... so this is new for me. Although as I share that thought, I realize the one exception to this is "email" for I've composed those messages at the keyboard forever it seems. So ... perhaps it's not so strange to be able to create in this way for posting after all. Actually, I've had lots of practice, but didn't realize it until now. It’s all pretty cool.

Although everything now seems more obvious & easier for me, initially I was confused by the "Preview" ... "Publish" ... and "Save" functions of this editor and my "perfectionist" self ...(who I've been diligently trying to set free and/or ignore for some time now)... caused me to do some fairly stupid things on previous posts. Fortunately I've given up "worries" about such things and am simply grateful to be learning better ways to do this all the time. It's all coming together for me and I'm pleased with my progress.

Molly has decided it's time to eat and won't leave me alone any longer, so I'll post this and get on with my morning activities. I suspect Ms. Kitty is scratching at the windows of the French doors out from ... waiting impatiently for her breakfast as well.

Life with fur-friends

Molly and Ms. Kitty kept me company yesterday as I cleaned up the front yard ... each reminding me to savor the moment as I worked.

When I'm too busy to play with her, Molly chews on the shrinking remnant of what
locals refer to as her "Laker's Ball" (no doubt because of it's color scheme) that was left in our yard months ago by Jake (another yellow Lab who joyfully played fetch with anyone he could find to toss the ball). He and his sister, Jessie, visited this Spring along with their family, residing in the "vacation rental" next door for a month. Similar in age, the three pups had great fun together each day. Apparently everyone overlooked Jake's favorite toy as they packed & moved on.

After their departure, Molly waited patiently by the neighbor's gate hoping the dogs would come out to play ... but left Jake's ball untouched for three days before finally "claiming" it as her own & making it her favorite front-yard "fetch" toy ... perhaps because it reminds her of the fun they had playing together. I wonder if she realizes it's getting smaller each day as she tears off pieces? Will she miss it when it's gone? It's certainly not long for this world. K who lives across the street and thinks Molly's "beautiful" gave her a couple of balls as replacements, but so far ... Molly chooses this toy consistently.

Molly's the neighborhood "greeter" ... visiting with passers-by happily ... inviting them to throw her "ball" so she can retrieve it, but Ms. Kitty tends to be more aloof and prefers to "hide out" when strangers come near. Opposites in color and temperament, these two fur-friends teach me lessons daily and reflect different sides of my own personality.

Independent and wary, Ms. Kitty's a feral cat who lived on her own for years, before M started to give her treats whenever he visited. Back then she'd hang out a couple of doors inland from my house ... relaxing in the the "safety" of the enclosed yard of the tiny beach cabin used only occasionally on weekends ... taking shelter under the large wooden porch in inclement weather. It didn't take her long to visit MY yard looking for handouts. Not being a "cat" person, I resisted until she showed up one day with a festering wound on her neck while M was visiting. He bought a cat carrier and we took the kitty to my vet. I paid for the medical treatment and a 5-day stay to get her back on her feet ... after which she "adopted" me ... and has been living here ever since. She wasn't thrilled when I brought Molly home a couple of years ago, but they've learned to coexist. I doubt they'll ever be "friends" ... but they know we're "family".

Interestingly, in the past few months Molly has developed a "wary" and/or "skittish" side with occasional strangers while Ms. Kitty has learned to trust a few more people ... allowing a some to approach and even touch her these days. These subtle changes remind me of my own evolution.

As a young person I believed the views of friends and family members who perceived me to be an extrovert like Molly, but in my mid-30s (as I started to journal regularly) ... I realized that's what others wanted (even needed?) me to be ... and like a "good girl" ... I complied. Over the next decade or so, I realized I'm quite introverted like Ms. Kitty ... and in the past few years I've come to recognize & appreciate a "continuum" of connectedness within myself. As I've learned to pay as much attention to my inner needs as to the needs of others ... I've experienced balance ... and find it easier all the time to choose when to be alone and when to engage. It seems that the best way to be available to others, is to take care of myself & encourage them to do likewise.