Hello, dears!
I’m back with another collection of miscellaneous photos! I’m not too far behind this time, so it will be a little shorter than usual Etcetera posts. I hope you enjoy some of my favorite recent pictures of nature, people, landscapes, etc. 😉
Sit back, relax, and start scrolling!
Hello, dears!
Is it a bit dismal outside where you live too? This winter has been pretty warm for us, but SO cloudy and rainy. 
If you’re in need of some sunlight, I have just the post for you! 😀
I took these two sets of pictures with my Canadian cousins way back in October, at the 50th anniversary celebration, and just haven’t gotten around to posting this second part till now – oops! I LOVE both photoshoots, though, and I hope you guys will too!
Hello, dears!
Guess what? Last Sunday we got eleven inches of snow, AHHHHH! Since church was canceled and it was Mom’s birthday, we just stayed home and had possibly the best snow day ever. IT WAS MARVELOUS. I took heaps and piles of snow pictures, and I can’t wait to show you a selection of my favorites!
Hello, dears!
Did you have a good Thanksgiving? I did! So far we’ve had one out of four celebrations, and for the rest we’re going to our old farm for the weekend for fun times and delicious food with friends and family. 🙂
Anyway, back to the post. About a month ago I got the chance to visit my dear friend, Aria, and see her family’s lovely farm. We had a wonderful time together, and this time we made sure to take PLENTY of pictures. XD Aria suggested doing a BFF Q&A to go along with them, and I agreed it sounded fun. And here we are! Get ready for some pretty fall photography and answers to a selection of you guys’ questions. 😉 After you’re done here, make sure and hop over to Aria’s blog to check out fifteen more questions and answers!
Hello, dears!
How is everyone today? Are you guys getting as much sopping wet, cloudy weather as we are? MAN. Sunshine is a rare occurrence these days. *shakes head* Well, if you’re in need of some cheering up, I have a fun, sunny post for you today! Last month (yep, I’m behind in posting XD) two families from our old church came up to visit us and we had a ton of fun with them. ❤ Continue reading
Hello, dears!
Just recently I got to meet one of my dearest blogging friends, Aria. She and her family stayed at our farm for a weekend and we all had SUCH a great time together! We had never actually seen each other in real life, but we’d become super close through emailing, letter writing, phone calls, etc. It was almost surreal to finally meet her, but SO, SO EXCITING AHHHH.
I won’t go tell you guys everything today or it would be as long as three posts, but one of the things we did together was a best friends photoshoot! We both love photography and Aria actually has a photography business over at Aria Photo! Some of these pictures Aria took herself, and some we asked my sister Megan to take (well, to press the button) for us. I basically did nothing with these pictures except be in them, heh heh.
Still, Aria gave me permission to post my favorites today along with some amusing behind-the-scenes tidbits, after which you can check out Aria’s post to see HER favorites, and read about how we became friends.
_____________________________
The first night Aria came, we took the Mule (a brand of UTV, similar to an ATV, not a literal mule XD) and drove around our farm, looking for good photography sites. It was SO much fun and the land looked gorgeous in the golden light. The evening we started with this path leading into the woods.
We wanted to get coordinating outfits for the shoot, and then Aria came up with the idea to get matching skirts but in different colors. (You might remember mine from the barn dance pictures.)
It turned out so well! This skirt is SUPER twirly and fun to wear, although it’s a bit delicate and has to be handwashed. It also has like a bajillion color options. You can see the Amazon listing right here.
HA HA we had such troubles with this pose. XD Actually no, I had troubles with this pose… and several others, actually. XD Poor Aria. But in my defense, some poses are a LITTLE difficult when you’re very tall and your best friend is only an average height. It was hard for me to bend back far enough without pulling her with me. XD
I LOVE THIS PICTURE! I just think it’s so cute and sweet. ❤ Also Aria kept exclaiming over how much more tanned her arm was than mine in this picture, but I said IT WAS JUST THE LIGHT. XD Seriously though, in real life our skin tone looked the same. *nods emphatically*
Ahh, I love this photo location because of the stunning light! We tried to twirl each other, but… ahem, I kind of kept messing it up. *facepalm* Thank you so much for being patient with me, dear Aria. ❤ I’m not USUALLY so hard to pose. XD
Ahh, the backlighting is just… INCREDIBLE. I took some more golden hour photos of this location last night that I can’t wait to show you guys! In another post. 🙂
Now the third location. Megan thought we looked like midgets here, and also Aria kind of fell backwards while sitting down, but it was worth it. XD I love this picture.
Oh yes, Aria wanted to do my hair AND my makeup for me, and she did them both beautifully! I never use full makeup and don’t normally style my hair much, so that felt different. I wouldn’t want to go to all the trouble and time normally, but it WAS fun to just be stereotypical teenage girls for a little while. 🙂
❤ ❤ ❤ (Also SEE. Now MY arm is tanner than hers. It’s probably still the lighting. *nods wisely*)
This pose, the outfits, the lighting, the location… they all went together PERFECTLY on this one!
Now we’re into the photos Aria took with her remote. This is by an old, rustic shed we have by our driveway. It’s a great backdrop! By this point my hair was getting kind of frizzy from the humidity, but Aria’s still looks gorgeous, don’t you agree? ❤
The whole time she was there we were both like, “I keep wanting to email you about this trip but then I realize I can just TELL you!” XD It was so strange because we do tell each other anything and everything by email usually.
AHHH I LOVE THIS. Aria said she wants to get a print of this one. ❤ I think Aria is possibly my long-lost sister? Or maybe a long-lost cousin. Whatever she is, I’m awfully glad she’s not lost anymore. ❤
THIS WAS SURPRISINGLY HARD. For one thing, my fingers are a lot longer than Aria’s, so at first the heart was lopsided. XD And apparently even though Aria was more flexible than I was for, say, the bending-backwards photos, her fingers were not as flexible as mine. BUT WE GOT IT. SORT OF.
Now both of our curls were kind of disintegrating at this point. BAD HUMIDITY.
Next we tried some photos in the corn but it didn’t really work out. The corn leaves intruded into our faces too much. XD But it worked quite well to be in front of the field!
Isn’t this one so cute?
Lastly, we took (or re-took) this picture the day before she left. I like to tease Aria that her eyes are blue because she says they’re green. What do you think? I think we’re both right and they’re mint or aqua… or just beautiful. 🙂
Since this is the kind of picture that I think looks good when you can tell it’s edited, I took the liberty of editing it. Tell me if you would rather not, Aria, and I’ll take it off. 😉 I don’t know why I love eyes so much, but I sure do. ❤ They’re just so gorgeous and unique!
________________________________
Lessons learned:
Thanks SO much to my sister Megan for helping us with the photoshoot. We couldn’t have done (at least part of it) without you! Also thank you, Aria, for too many things to count, but especially for listening to anything I tell you, for the looooong and honest emails and letters about everything from faith to health to politics, and for being my best friend forever. ❤ PLEASE COME BACK SOON.
I hope you enjoyed that post, guys! Be sure to check out Aria’s post to see a few different photos (and some photos of just me that I didn’t put on here), and follow her blog to see more posts about her visit in upcoming weeks. And tell me…
Isn’t Aria’s/Megan’s photography gorgeous? Have you ever had a friends photoshoot? Which pose or picture was your favorite? Have you ever met an internet friend?
Thank you so much for reading, dears, and have a lovely day!
***Allison***
P. S. Also, a big thank you to guys for participating in the first week of The Summer Bored Games! We LOVED hearing your feedback and seeing your photos from those challenges – I can’t wait to show you guys the pictures too. 🙂 Ready for some new boredom busters? Check out Megan’s post here!
Hello, dears!
I’ve been half dreading this post and half eagerly anticipating it, because it is SO much work to sort through over six months of photographs and edit and organize the best ones for a post. O.o But it’s always so satisfying to know I’m “up to date” once I finish Etcetera posts, so yay! 🙂
Anyway, today I have for you quite a lot of pictures about quite a lot of things. I’ll attempt to organize this post a bit more than I have previously so it’s not overwhelming. XD I hope you enjoy browsing through the sunsets, farm landscapes, portraits, etc!
When it hasn’t been raining (which is rarely XD), there have been some beautiful sunsets, clouds, and other skyscapes recently.
Ahhh, big, fluffy cumulus clouds just make me happy when I see them. 😀
Isn’t this gorgeous? Sun rays through clouds also make me happy. 🙂
We’ve gotten so many rainbows recently (and so much rain too)! I don’t think I even noticed this one was a double rainbow until I edited the picture. O.o XD What a beautiful promise a rainbow is. ❤
I love how calm and soft this picture is!
The moon looks HUGE beside the miniscule airplane and tiny cloud, doesn’t it?
Does this count as “skies”? I don’t know. But this strange, neat limb broke off one day and it was sad. 😦 Now there’s just a stump left.
I actually combined a couple of pictures to make this one, because I wanted more birds in it. 😛
I thought it was so neat how you can faintly see the entire moon!
Sunsets + reflections? OH YES!
A e s t h e t i c. ❤
This spring there were buttercups EVERYWHERE! It was so pretty! One day Maggie was conveniently laying in a highly-concentrated area of flowers which went perfectly with her sunny, buttercup personality. 😀
BUNNIESSSS! My brothers built new rabbit pens for them, and the next two pictures are when we first put them in. I love how Basil’s ears are always one up and one down. XD
OLAF IS JUST WEIRD. XD
And here’s Lavender! SHE IS ADORABLE. And she’s also grown since I took this picture.
Well this isn’t exactly a pet, but… WARNING, SNAKE AHEAD! We found this black snake one morning while we were cleaning out the raised beds. I don’t particularly like snakes, but it was so neat to get such close-up photographs! It didn’t slither away for quite a while; it just posed. 😛 I got a bunch of good pictures, but I’ll be considerate and only show you guys two. XD
This was a looong time ago, but here’s a pretty picture of blossoms on our what we thought was an apple tree but is actually a pear tree.
In early spring, there were violets EVERYWHERE! There was one row beside a small, white shed in our backyard that was overflowing with blooms. ❤
Such a cute, tiny flower! (Actually it’s a weed, but it’s still cute.)
I LOVE THIS PICTURE! It’s just so CUTE!
Ahh, this is so creamy and gorgeous!
We always pass this on the way to my grandparents’ house and I always want to get a picture of it. This time Mom kindly stopped to let me take some, and I’m SO glad she did! I just love the scenery here, and the rolling hills that seem almost too perfect to be natural. The tractor baling hay adds a nice touch too. 😉
Dad planted corn or soybeans in most of the pastures this year, and it looks GREAT! He got the crops in a little late because of the immense amount of rain we got, but now that they’re in they’re looking gorgeous. I took this picture a while ago; the corn is a lot bigger now.
The cows are gone now. *sniff*
Carmen got absolutely SOAKED (on purpose) one day when it was raining, which made for some pretty neat pictures.
Carmen wondered if I wanted to take a picture of her glasses, and I said, “Sure!”
I took this picture after we finished unloading the tractor-trailer load of our house belongings, and I was all sweaty and dusty. And then I had heaps of fun editing it later. XD I don’t know why I like taking pictures of eyes so much, but I DO!
Carmen wanted me to take a picture of her swinging. 🙂
It was a BIT scary to balance my camera on a fence post on a windy day, which is maybe why I have a slightly strange expression… XD
Oh look, it’s me leaning up agains the fence again! What do you know. XD Carmen took this picture for me, because a friend wanted a photo of the dress I got.
Okay, this is really random, but… did you know you can use a mixture of about half coconut oil and half baking soda to repair worn wood? If you scrub the mixture into scratches or places where the varnish doesn’t look good, it will magically look like new after you wipe it away with soap and water! Trust me, it is amazing. O.o I don’t know exactly how it works, but I think the oil stains and darkens the wood and the baking soda kind of sands it down a little. However it does it, IT WORKS. We’ve used this a lot to “refinish” worn furniture, floors, and trim lately.
We don’t have a huge garden this year, but we are growing a few things in the raised beds behind the big house. One of those things are (or were) radishes! I thought these baby radishes that we thinned out were so cute, hee hee.
GUYS. I FOUND A FIVE LEAF CLOVER. AND MEGAN FOUND A SIX LEAF ONE. We found a lot of mutant clovers around the Cedar House, actually. XD And no, I did not photoshop an extra leaf on. Promise.
This almost looks abstract if you unfocus your eyes.
I love photographing water drops. 😀 Don’t they look like crystal?
Phew, that was a TON of pictures! Not nearly all the good ones, though. *sniff* This post was a great (but hard) exercise in only keeping the best of the best, or else the most interesting. Hopefully I succeeded. 🙂
So, which category was your favorite? Have you ever found a more-than-four-leaf clover? Have you tried the coconut oil trick?
Thank you so much for reading this lengthy epistle, dears, and please have a lovely day!
***Allison***
Hello, dears!
Just a few weeks ago, we had the privilege of hosting a barn dance in celebration of our friend Sam’s (Samantha’s) birthday! It took a while to prepare for, but we all absolutely LOVED the dance. 😀 It was the first one our family had been to.
Sam wanted Megan and I to take some pictures, and of course we happily obliged. 😉 Today I’m going to show you a few of my favorite photos, from decorations to dancing. Enjoy!
I got to help with the decorating, which was super fun. 🙂 At first we tried hanging streamers from the loft, but it was too damp and humid and they just sort of hung there limply. So we took them down. But while we were hanging them we found this gorgeous moth! Isn’t it striking?
Don’t these blue gingham tablecloths go perfectly with the barn dance/birthday/picnic atmosphere?
Our magnolia tree is blooming, so Megan suggested we use some of the flowers for the table. I’m so glad we did, because I had no idea they’d be this beautiful! And they smell amazing.
Unfortunately they are rather prone to closing up into buds, but they’re still pretty that way too. 🙂
We also had bouquets of ferns from our woods, chamomile daisies from our pastures, and larger daisies that Sam brought, which they had dyed blue with food coloring! 😀
I enjoyed making “place cards” for the food, even if I didn’t get around to labeling everything. 😉
Sam brought these lovely stamped paper fans (because boy was it hot that day!).
She also brought a bunch of paper medallions and some balloons to hang from the loft. They looked so pretty!
They set the speakers and such on haybales, which made it seem more like a barn dance. 😀
Hee hee, I quite like this picture of Sam’s sister Jesse. 😀
And this one of Sam. 🙂
Oh, and it was so funny – Sam and I wore almost the EXACT same outfit! Identical shirts and only a tiny bit different skirts. XD She was going to do my hair to match hers too, but we ran out of time, so it kind of looks like an octopus in these pictures. O.o Next time I shall remember to put it back before the dance. XD
Megan took the picture before and this picture from the loft. Aren’t they so neat?
Okay, now we’re finally ready for the barn dance part! One of the ladies from church was the “caller,” who patiently instructed all the dozens of people in how to do each dance. We learned the dance slowly first, without music, and then did it once or twice with music before learning a new dance.
For each dance, we lined (or circled) up in the middle of the shop floor and usually did a short sequence of steps that ended in being whirled off to the next partner, where you repeated the process until the music stopped.
We learned quite a few dances including the Virginia Reel, the Caroline Promenade, the Spanish Waltz, the Basket Weave, the Snowball Reel, the Patty-Cake Polka, the Posties’ Jig, and one or two more which I don’t remember the names of.
I think my favorites were the Basket Weave and the Spanish Waltz, although they were all fun.
I didn’t get pictures of the Posties’ Jig, but HA HA WOW. It was a 10-years-and-up dance for good reason: it had a lot of steps. Our group kind of epically failed at it since we got so mixed up and confused, but it was HILARIOUS. We laughed at ourselves so much. XD
My brother Logan was my partner for a couple of the dances, which was nice because our heights are a good match. 😀
One thing I really like about barn dancing is how changeable it is. You don’t stay with one partner for long, which adds to the excitement (and confusion, but XD). It’s also very fast-paced, which makes it feel like a game.
And I think it’s great that whole families, even younger kids, can participate in most of the dances.
I’m so glad Sam chose to have a barn dance for her party, and that we got to come. 🙂 Hopefully we can do one again soon!
So there you have it! At the end of the dance I was EXTREMELY hot and sweaty, and my feet were so sore from going barefoot on concrete for a whole day that I could hardly walk, but it was definitely worth it. XD XD Next time I shall 1) put my hair up and 2) wear shoes. *nods*
Have you ever been to a barn dance? What dance is your favorite (the Virginia Reel, Spanish Waltz, etc.)? Do you have a favorite picture?
Thanks so much for reading, dears, and have a lovely day!
***Allison***
It has been way too long since my last “Moving On” post, and we’ve had quite a few adventures since Part 1! So, shall I catch you guys up on the news? Alrighty then. 🙂
Let’s see, where did I leave off? Oh yes, right before our cousins came to help us paint. Well… they actually didn’t paint much, but my aunt did. XD The kids played Dutch Blitz when we weren’t needed. We’ve all been playing Dutch Blitz a TON lately, and it’s so much fun! Have you played? Not many people have that I know, of but sadly it’s pretty hard to explain without showing you… Trust me, though, it’s great. XD
So now the Cedar House is all painted and furnished and it looks GREAT! We still have a few things to fix up before it debuts as an Airbnb, but it’s come a long way. (For instance, we replaced that carpet in the picture above after I took the photo.) Would you guys like to see a tour of the house once it’s finished?
Another thing we’ve been doing is learning to use the rebaling machinery. Part of what we do at the new farm is sell hay and straw, as well as make people’s large, unmanageable bales into smaller ones. Dad runs the machinery, the boys usually get the haybales prepared, and the girls usually stack them on a trailer. It’s hard work, lifting hundreds of 40-pound bales, but it’s good for us. 😉
The hay pictures are all in black and white because the light and surroundings usually weren’t the prettiest. XD I think they look really neat in B&W, though!
I guess Logan did help stack that time… maybe because I was taking pictures. XD
A few weeks ago we semi-officially moved down to our new place. We still have to go back to our old farm to pack up stuff and work once in a while, but we’re mainly down here now. 🙂
Since we’re mostly going to be down here, we brought all the live things we have to care for: namely, pets and plants. 😛 I really loved how the plants looked in the back of my car for some reason. XD Does it looks Pinterest-y to you?
They looked so pretty against the cedar siding. 🙂
We also brought the bunnies up! Most of the bunnies stayed huddled together at the back of the truck, but Basil was hilarious – she hopped up on a cat crate (with no cat inside) we put there and stayed on top almost the whole time. What made it funny was it was really windy up there, and her fur got blown about every which way, like she was under one of those super strong hand dryers that ripple your skin. XD She didn’t seem to mind, though. Maybe she liked the fresh air.
We also brought the cats down, but that was a little more… um, interesting. They were RATHER scared, and once Jinx decided he simply couldn’t wait to use the litter box till we arrived, so… yeah. He didn’t wait. IT WAS BAD. XD XD Ah well, we survived, and the cats are safely in the Cedar House now. 🙂 Maggie, our yellow lab, is quite enjoying the new space too, I think!
Dad had to stop to check on a vehicle at one point and I got some more lovely pictures of mountains at the overlook. ❤ You could see everything SO clearly!
Finally we arrived at the pineapple gates. I don’t know why there are pineapples at the farm entrance, but it’s pretty funny. Especially because one of the pineapples is literally yellow and green with lichen, and in exactly the right places! XD
In case you’re wondering if we have animals at our new farm, we don’t. Except for pets, of course. 😉 We’ll probably get chickens later (just not 24,000 like we used to have!), but for now the only livestock are the cows in the leased pastures. They’re not ours, but they are pretty cute. 😉 They also look lovely in the golden hour! Then again, what doesn’t?
When we first started staying in the Cedar House we didn’t have many forms of entertainment, so Mom thought of Four Square! We laid out the pattern in masking tape on the basement floor, and we’ve been having a lot of fun playing it as a family. 🙂
Another fun thing to do here is go fishing! We haven’t caught fish every time, but once we caught nearly a dozen in one day! That was fun. I’ll have more pictures from fishing in a later post.
Ooh, and one super fun surprise we found was a box of really old letters! Part of the big farmhouse was built in the 1850s, and I believe the farm itself is even older. We found some letters from the 1880s! Isn’t that amazing? This letter is one of my favorites, although it’s from 1922, so not quite as old. But LOOK AT THE HANDWRITING. (I blocked out part of the address.)
Isn’t that amazing?! We haven’t read it yet because it’s in German, but we should really translate it sometime. 🙂
Now I shall end this post with a sunset over the pond. ❤ I love sunsets in general, and reflected sunsets are twice the beauty!
Phew, that was a lot to cover in one post. I hope I didn’t leave anything important out… XD Oh well, I can always tuck it in later if need be. I hope you enjoyed the update and the pictures, and tell me…
Have you had interesting experiences traveling with pets? Have you played Dutch Blitz or Four Square? And would you be interested in a post with more about the Cedar House when it’s finished, or about more old letters and other interesting artifacts we’ve found?
Stay tuned for more posts like this in the future, because we still have the big house to finish fixing up. Man, it’s taking a while. There’s just soooo much to paint and work on. Ah well, it’s going to be incredible when it’s finished, and I can’t wait to move in!
Well, thanks for reading and I hope you have a lovely day, dears!
***Allison***
Allison Marie 