Photography Tidbits

Over the weeks, I inevitably collect some random photos that don’t ever make it into regular posts, which is why I make this kind of post! Enjoy the random photo-ness. 🙂

I cut the end off of an orange to slice it, like normal, and found this cute little orange-face grinning back at me!

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Here is a picture I edited with my camera with the “Painting” setting. (Click on any individual picture in a collage to enlarge it.)

I got these animal pictures when we went to the Science Museum with our friends recently.

More funny food! This guy is made from Swiss cheese, crackers, applesauce (for the pupils), and a pickled onion. XD

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My little sister swinging. 🙂

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Mushrooms!

And Coffee Bean’s eye. (A moment of silence for Coffee Bean. *sniff*)

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I hope you enjoyed the “random assorted flavors of Allison’s photography!” 🙂

***Allison***

 

Jinx the Cat’s Rabbity Adventure

Hello, readers! The other day Jinx, our cat, had an adventure that he would like to tell you about. Jinx’s words will be in bold type and mine will be like normal. At the end of Jinx’s story I will be back with a few notes and pictures. But now I will hand it over to Jinx… (Be prepared for a lot of words – Jinx can be rather long-winded sometimes. XD)

Greetings, readers of Allison’s blog! Allison has allowed me, Jinx the cat, to do a guest post on her blog. For this particular post, I shall be telling you about a rather trying adventure I had the other day.

But first, I must tell you a little bit about myself. I am the grand and only feline of Allison’s household, Coffee Bean the cat having only recently passed away. (I will not here discuss in detail my views of the aforesaid Coffee Bean, but let it suffice to say that I bear no great burden of sorrow in now being the supreme ruler of the house.) It seems I will have to describe myself a bit, as Allison did not take a truly good picture of me by myself. I am a sleek, handsome, highly dignified black cat, if I do say so myself. Most generally, I pass my days in reclining in high estate wherever I please, drinking delicious draughts of sweet water from FaussEt, and trying to communicate to my humans all of my complicated needs through desperate meows, purrs, and sometimes – I am sorry to say – a few scratches in dire emergencies. They hardly ever listen to me, I am afraid, but ah… that is the life of a cat.

Now. My adventure began one day when Megan, one of the more trying of my humans, carried me out to the rabbit cage against my wishes. Do you know my views on rabbits? No, I suppose not. I shall inform you. I do not like them – they are simply fluffy vermin who always seem to have a nervous twitch about the nose – that’s what I say. Anyway, Megan carried me out, and I was forced to keep company with these disgusting creatures. At first I hid in a corner tried to keep my clean and polished self away from these creatures. But the air was cold, and I was at last forced to take refuge against the frigid air in the… I hate to say it, but the rabbits’ cage.

With my superior night vision, I could see inside the dark cage which was covered in a blanket. There were (I nearly shuddered with disgust) three rabbits already inside! They went by the names of Diamond, Lily, and Olaf. And as if the situation wasn’t already bad enough, another rabbit soon entered the scene – the extraordinarily fluffy Willow. She is the worst of them. I cannot for the life of me see how the humans like such a disheveled monster as Willow is, but… humans are very strange creatures.

But as I have a stout heart and a strong mind, I concluded to make the best of the circumstances. The one good thing I can say about rabbits is that they are very warming creatures. As I reclined among them, my poor numbed paws grew warm again, my ears began to thaw, and my whiskers lost some of their brittleness. In a few moments, I was actually enjoying my stay in the cage. (But only for the warmth, you understand.) After a bit, Olaf the rabbit approached me and snuggled up close. I tried not to be squeamish, and instead I focused on the extra warmth Olaf brought with him.

Even thought the humans were squealing over how “adorable” I was, I could not help feeling a bit sleepy with all of the warmth inside the cage. In fact, I nearly drifted off to sleep a few times.

I waited out the minutes until it was finally time to return to the comfortable house. The humans wanted to leave me in the cage, but the Mother human said that it would not be wise, as she didn’t trust me with the rabbits so close at hand. Of all the nerve! The humans should know by now that I have much too refined a taste to eat inferior rabbit meat! Anyway, Allison came out to take me inside, and was surprised that I resisted her grasp. I suppose she thought that I was actually enjoying the rabbits company. On the contrary, the only reason I resisted was that I was somewhat afraid that the vicious dog they call Maggie was outside the rabbit pen, waiting to destroy me the moment Allison should step outside. Maggie was actually in the kennel, but how was I to know? Finally Allison brought me inside, and ever since I have been trying to recuperate from that horrible adventure by sleeping twice as much on warm, comfortable chairs and sofas.

I’m sorry about all of the high and mighty language, but Jinx is rather proud of himself, as you can see. And another thing: I’m not totally sure that he was telling the truth when he said that he only enjoyed being in the cage for warmth. For one thing, it wasn’t even that cold – not nearly enough to numb his dainty paws at least – and for another thing, I have some pictures as proof that Jinx seems to have got along quite well with the rabbits – especially Olaf. Feel free to browse the evidence. (Mouse over the pictures to see any captions.)

Was that not cute and convincing proof of Jinx’s enjoyment? (Well, at least some of the time.) It looks like he downright made friends with the rabbits! And since poor Olaf hardly ever gets a photoshoot, here is a mini one just for him. (Scroll over the pictures to see any captions, and click the pictures to enlarge.)

Wow! I have written over ONE THOUSAND words for this post! That might be a record… In other news, I’m almost ready to open my Etsy shop! 😀 😀 😀 I might open it tomorrow, but I’m not sure. I’ll do a post about it when it’s ready. Have a lovely Sunday afternoon!

***Allison***

A Winter Walk (Without Snow)

Yep, we went on a walk around our farm the other day with our friends, and sadly enough, there was no snow. 😦 The last couple of years we’ve had really early snow (at least for us), like in October and November, but this winter there has been nothing but a puny little flurry. 😦 Anyway, I still got some pretty pictures, whether there was snow or not, so here goes!

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Some of the trees on our farm have huge bracket fungi on them.

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These are dried Jimson-weed pods. They have quite the thorny complexion, don’t they? In summer, Jimson-weed has a sort of morning glory like flower. A note here: Jimson weed is actually poisonous, so don’t go around stuffing it into your mouths – not that anyone would want to. XD

A simple twig looks pretty up close.

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This is a very tiny, shriveled persimmon. We have a little persimmon tree on our farm that annually gives about four dried up fruits which are almost always to high to reach. Once we actually got to taste one, and it must not have been ripe because, boy was that bitter! It made your mouth dry up like a cotton ball. Blech! But then for Christmas Eve supper we found two “real” persimmons at the grocery store, and those were actually pretty good! They tasted kind of like a mild, sweet melon or something. Plus they were about ten times bigger and plumper than any of our persimmons. XD Have you ever had a persimmon?

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One of our friends. 🙂

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Group picture!

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I took a picture of Maggie running and it turned out really funny!

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We walked up a wet gravel road, and Maggie left cute pawprints behind her. I edited this picture on my camera so you can see them better.

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We went into a woods, and Maggie must have sniffed out some creature or other, because she started furiously digging under a rotting stump. She dug a hole so big that her whole head went practically underground! It was really funny, and we stayed there watching her for a long time. But she never caught anything. XP

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And last but not least, we took this walk when my sister Megan (center)first got her new camera, and my little sister (left) and my friend (right)were watching her work it. I edited this picture (as you can see!) on my camera with the “Painting” setting. Doesn’t it look neat?

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I hope you enjoyed my ramblings and picture from a winter walk! Which picture was your favorite?

***Allison***

P. S. Don’t worry, I will do more Photos from of Old posts, but I’m saving them for a little later because the next ones are from springtime.

P. P. S. Wow! I seem to be doing a lot of P. S.’s on my posts lately, don’t I? 😀

2015, Award, News + Lots of Photos!

Happy New Year! Okay, get ready for a long post, because today I will be reviewing my 2015 bloggy year, doing an award, and telling you one of my New Year’s resolutions. Ready? First up, my blog year – it was a great year, and a HUGE year, at least compared to last year. Taking into account the fact that I only blogged 7 months last year instead of 12 this year, still, the stats increased A LOT. And thanks to all of you, I now have almost 60 followers! SQUEEEE! 😀 😀 Here are the yearly stats for this year and last year:

And here is the little WordPress year in review thingy they sent me:

Here’s an excerpt:

A San Francisco cable car holds 60 people. This blog was viewed about 3,500 times in 2015. If it were a cable car, it would take about 58 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

Now for the award. I don’t usually do awards, but I decided to do this one because it wasn’t just random questions, and I thought it was interesting to see when other people did this. So… I was nominated by Genna and Mercer Creative. Thank you so much!

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1. Thank the person that nominated you
2. Start a blog post and answer the questions below
3. Add 1-3 of your Favorite\Best blog photos
4. Nominate up to ten people

1. How long have you had a blog?
I started this blog in May of 2014, so I’ve had it for about a year and a half.

2. Why did you start blogging?
I kind of forget, but I think it was probably because my sister started with her school program, and it made me want to start a blog too.

3. Do you like photography?
I love photography! 😀

4. Did you start your blog on your own?
Yep. Well, my sister and mom helped me.

5. Why do you like these photos so much?
It was kind of hard to choose just 3 of my favorites, so since it’s a review of 2015 anyway, I’m just going to do some of my favorite photo pictures and posts from 2015. XD

I think one of my all time favorite posts was this dandelion post. Here’s a picture from it:

-Allison (spring flowers) 014

I just love how crystal clear and beautiful the pictures turned out. I also love this Lily (The Flower) post – I love dewdrops!

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A few of my favorite bunny posts are this funny bunny post, these two Lily (the rabbit) posts here and here,

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and this Christmas post from the bunnies. Because they are just so CUTE!

Bunny Christmas

My favorite other pet post might be this Joy the kitten post. I like the angle of this photo, and Joy was just adorable!

-Allison(Joy) 007

Here are some other pictures I really like that I took in 2015, and a few from 2014, which are captioned “2014.”

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-Allison(Willow on the deck, Labor Day) 013

 

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2014

 

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2014

 

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-Allison (Tassel doll) 029

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2014

 

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-Allison (close-ups) 004

-Allison(walk, arboretum, Lily) 010

-Allison (bunnies, forest terrarium) 003

 

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Whew! That was a lot of pictures! I nominate Hayley from Flourishing By Restful Falls for the award.

OK. Now for one of my New Years’ Resolution (the news part of the title). I want to start an Etsy shop! I’m going to be selling things I make online there, including polymer clay animals and other polymer clay things, and maybe stuffed animals like this one. But I need more ideas! I would greatly appreciate any suggestions with what you would like me to make that you would buy. If you need some ideas from what I’ve already made, click on the category “My Creations” on my category cloud on my blog sidebar. Thank you!

So, that’s it! Thanks so much for a great bloggy year, readers!

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

***Allison***

P. S. See you next year!

Merry Christmas from the Bunnies!

Squeeee! Christmas is only two days away! I hope you enjoy this “bloggy Christmas card” post from me and the bunnies!

Bunny Christmas

The bunnies are so cute I can hardly stand it. 🙂 Just yesterday I was in Clementine’s pen (she’s by herself because she’s going to be a mother soon (!!!) ), and I heard some scrabbling coming from behind me. I turned around and saw Willow, my rabbit, balancing on the narrow wall separating the two stalls! She had jumped up all by herself, and it was ADORABLE!

(Whenever there’s a collage like this, you can click on each picture to see it bigger.) Look at Clemmie in the second picture at the top right corner – so cute!

MERRY CHRISTMAS to you, and don’t forget the “Christ” part of Christmas.” 🙂 See you later!

***Allison***

Bunny Therapy

What would we do without our bunnies to entertain us? We would probably be bored to death. I LOVE BUNNIES!

Ahem. Now, get ready for cuteness!

Lily:

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Lily in the warm embrace of Megan’s humongous bear.
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“Why, oh why did they have to choose me?”

 

Willow:

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Puffball or rabbit? Who knows…

 

Clementine:

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Please don’t tickle me! I beg you!

Olaf:

 

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Her eyes are sort of creepy and sort of beautiful. Olaf looks so calm and serene in this picture.

 

Yoshi:

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Sorry for the blurriness, but isn’t he adorable?! Peek-a-bunny!

 

Diamond:

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She’s as long as my sister Megan’s torso!

 

 

And last but definitely not least – Doesn’t she look hilarious?!

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Oh yeah, Diamond is totally chilling out, dude.

 

And a bonus pic of Maggie and Coffee Bean – together! Maggie chases Jinx, our other cat, but Coffee Bean just sits there while Maggie noses him, so Maggie’s like, “What’s the use of chasing him if he won’t run?” It’s so funny!

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Maggie: “See, I’m a good puppy!”

 

Which picture was your favorite?

***Allison***

P.S. I will reveal the answers to the mystery pictures (see my last post) on Saturday. Thank you so much to all the people who already guessed! I’m so excited when I see a comment with guesses for mystery picture posts. 😀

Photos From of Old: Entry #1

My sister Megan did a post about stories from of old that she had wrote when she was little, and I think I’m going to do a series about photos that I either took before I had a blog (*gasp!*), or photos that never made it into posts. This first entry was way back when we had a litter of adorable kittens to play with in the chicken house. And the first picture is a random bluebird. I also edited two of the pictures on PicMonkey just for fun.

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And the edited ones:

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Which picture was your favorite? Would you like me to continue this series or not?

***Allison***

Sunset + WILLOW GIF!

The other night there was a really beautiful sunset, but more importantly – WILLOW IS ADORABLE! Ahem. Sorry. It’s just that I made an adorable GIF of adorable Willow waddling adorable over the floor. She usually hops, but occasionally she waddles, and it is… So. Cute.

But first, the sunset pictures. It really was a beautiful sunset, although probably not quite as beautiful as this one. ← That sunset (which was actually about a year ago now) was probably my favorite sunset ever. It was gorgeous! But, not to offend this sunset, it too was gorgeous, just in a different way. Sooo….

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Wasn’t that purty?

And now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for. I present…. Willow the rabbit!

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Awww, my sweet little flufferpuff! Do you know you’re adorable?!

***Allison***