Last Sunday, I met up with Jientje in Chicago.  She’s been on a great adventure and I’m sure when she gets back home (Belgium) she’ll tell us all about it.  But for a couple of hours we pointed our cameras at many beautiful things at the Chicago Botanical Gardens.  Here we are reflected in a garden sculpture.

And one of the greenhouses had these huge Christmas balls scattered about.

There we are – don’t we look happy?!  It was so great meeting her!

I keep suet out for the woodpeckers, they seem to appreciate it.

It’s a deal I’ve struck with them – I’ll feed you, you pose for me – it works!

See, he doesn’t even care that I could reach out and grab him, he just ignores the big black thing aimed at him.

Yum!

Then, he acted like he was going to ignore me, but. . .

Off he flew, maybe I did get a little too close, lol.

Sometimes the world gets so busy and hectic and you just need to find a quiet place to rest and recharge.

We drove by this “cat-fish” about 8 times before I finally had to snap a photo, I’m sure the people are used to cars stopping with cameras out the windows, right?!

I love weather vanes!  I just wish I could get closer to them, maybe I should start carrying a ladder, lol.

The lights above the bar of the lodge we stayed in on Washington Island.

I love gnarly trees and roots.  They make me think of my mom.  That might sound odd, except, I remember going out on photo safaris with my parents when I was a kid and my mom liked gnarly trees and roots.

Beautiful candle holders.

We’re still enjoying unusually warm weather for this time of year.  Hope you’re having great days too!

Things have been crazy here, not in the house, but in my mind, it’s just all over the place!  But I have to thank you guys!  Whatever you’re doing is totally helping.  When I went for my scan yesterday I was amazingly calm and I think it’s all these great vibes you all are sending.  I was freaking out quite a bit Sunday afternoon but I woke up calm and remained calm.  We’re on the downhill slope now.  I’ll get results next Monday.

Macro Monday is easy to play, snap a macro (or any close-up) photo, post it on your blog and come back here and sign MckLinky. Don’t forget to visit each other.

Don’t have much to say today, hope you find some sunshine.

Hey I found a dark-eyed junco in our yard who would cooperate momentarily!

I’m pretty sure this is a type of sparrow, but what kind?

He would not come out from behind that branch, but he has a little bit of yellow near the beak, and black stripes with white in the middle on his head.

Does seeing this side help?

The white-breasted nuthatches are typically zany.

Lil dive-bombers, lol

This is my first time participating in Skywatch Friday.  I had opportunity to enjoy the sunset on Washington Island recently.  I hope you enjoy it too.

A coy sparrow

The white-breasted nuthatches stay all summer, but the red-breasted are back now too.

We have a plethora of chickadees tour our yard daily, but a few have gotten zany, hoping over the plastic divider and into the seed! They often hop back out the other side. lol

We have several woodpeckers visit daily. This one was not in our yard, but you’ll be seeing one of them soon.

And this dark-eyed junco is not in our yard but many are – they just don’t cooperate as well in my yard.

The chipmunks are gathering for the upcoming winter. Their puffy cheeks always make me giggle.  The squirrels are driving me crazy getting into the seed too!  All except one, Pixel (the flying squirrel) has been making appearance again – I’m hoping she’ll move back into the birdhouse for the winter.

I have not seen turkeys in our yard but I often see them a few blocks away from our house.

I know some of us have wondered if we could get a nice 3D camera as our grave marker.  Well, I have yet to find one, but I did find this. “click”

This summer we discovered a little weed by our front steps.  We watched it grow into a vine, then we watched it flower, eventually it put on two small pumpkins, one didn’t make it.

The weather changed and the vine started to wither.  I ran out to snap a few shots of the mysterious pumpkin before plucking it.

Smaller than a baseball, a tiny white pumpkin.  Wonder where it came from. . .

Macro Monday is easy to play, snap a macro (or any close-up) photo, post it on your blog and come back here and sign MckLinky. Don’t forget to visit each other.