View allAll Photos Tagged EXCITEMENT
My fruitless plum tree is blooming, my fruitless plum tree is blooming!! The sky is bluck gray, but that's ok because the blooms are starting to blossom. :-)
I really love "my" little squirrel and it's cute face and expression ... wish everyone a beautiful day with a lot of joy and happiness ... and excitement :)
thanks in advance for visiting and all your kind comments and favs ... aleays welcome and really appreciated ...
In all the excitement of 2023, forgot to post this. Newark Festival was all sorts of events spread out over a long weekend. Lots of street performers of whom this chap was just one.
‘POD Point’……Thats enough excitement for one day! Our charging point for the car has been fitted today - and tried & tested, that means we’ll just have to have a ride out tomorrow:-) as apparently Electric Cars don’t like to be left fully charged for long periods. For those on a 366 project - we have now passed the half way point and oh how the time has flown by, it certainly gave us something to do during lock down. Alan:-)………..
For the interested I’m growing my Shutterstock catalogue regularly here, now sold 46 images :- www.shutterstock.com/g/Alan+Foster?rid=223484589&utm_...
©Alan Foster.
©Alan Foster. All rights reserved. Do not use without permission.……
I always feel excitement when autumn is approaching - every year, it feels like the beginning of a new phase in life. Maybe this has to do with childhood memories...a new school year was approaching, I was getting together with my friends again after summer, maybe making new ones, gaining new knowledge and having new experiences.
At the beginning of autumn, many fields near my home are filled with sunflowers. They are like happy yellow exclamation marks, an to me, they symbolize a fresh start. My classroom days are over a long ago, but I am still developing, and enjoying it!🌻
For this week's Self Portrait Sunday theme: "Excitement"
Vintage Day at Candler Field, Williamson, GA
Stearman Biplane taking off
JCH Streetpan 400 film, home developed
Mellon Udrigle, Laide, Scotland
Not a particularly promising morning on my favourite Scottish beach and I could not really have expected much of a sunrise, which made this sudden and dramatic appearance of a crimson slash in a stormy sky amidst the twilight blue of pre-dawn so incredible appealing. I was with a small group of photographers on a course at the time and the excitement was palpable.
0.45ND grad, f/22 at 12 Seconds. Velvia. Please view LARGE
This lovely home is also at the end of our walk.
Once again, I found more excitement in mirroring the image.
Happy Fenced Friday, everyone.
And a Wonderful Weekend too!
I don't think I have enough fun, upbeat photos of Bebe. She usually looks bored or uninterested, which is perfect for serious shots. However, she does have a silly side to her that comes out sometimes. She gets especially excited for car rides and will literally shake from excitement for long periods of time before settling down.
Imagine (if you can) the excitement that little "Ha-Ha" (aka 22 month old Harley) exhibited when the Masterton - Wellington train, hauled by a big rumbling General Motors Canadian-built locomotive, came to a halt right beside him - AND the Driver / Engineer waved to him...!
Harley had a grin on his face that stretched from ear to ear...!
The Masterton train is a long distance Limited Stops express "suburban" train which connects Wellington and the Hutt Valley with the rich Wairarapa farming region that lies on the other side of the nearby 8km-long Rimutaka Rail Tunnel. (It takes roughly two hours to travel from Wellington to Masterton)....
The train only paused for a few moments here in Upper Hutt as Passengers got off and Passengers got on, and then - with a short sharp blast of its horn (which made Harley jump), the train continued its journey to Wellington - 45 minutes to the south...
HOLIDAYS :-)
As from Saturday, we'll be on holiday in Havelock (at the head of one of the 'arms' of the South Island's Marlborough Sounds) for a week. If you don't hear from me, know that we're out of Internet range(!) and I'll catch up when we return!
Continue to take care, keep smiling (even if only through clenched teeth), and stay well Folks - and thanks so much for visiting my Site and for taking the time and trouble to leave a Comment. It's always nice to hear from you...!
We hadn't been up on the Malvern hills for months but Flynn had little time for admiring the view. He's a very busy border collie: toys don't herd themselves, after all. Seconds after reaching the summit, Flynn was dashing back down the marble steps, eagerly anticipating the next instructions on how to capture the ball! He's learned a few basic herding commands & really enjoys "working" with me :) Given Flynn's behavioural issues, it's great having something we can do together, without me invading his space & which Flynn naturally loves doing...
The herding games also help to keep him out of trouble & tire him both physically & mentally. Flynn's had just a over week of being allowed to run free & enjoy his toy-herding "job" now & is pretty much back to the dog he was before all the excitement of his illness: busy on walks but quite happy to spend most of the rest of the day lounging around at home. There have been no more sock-swallowing incidents & he's stopped doing things like obsessively trying to dig holes in the carpet for "fun". I have a relatively peaceful home again, which is so nice - I was almost forgetting what that was like!!
Flynn's behaviour continues to improve generally, as does my confidence in him. Many things are progressing far faster than I'd hoped they could. For example, while I was pleased last week that he tolerated having a lead clipped on at the end of walks, he was still looking a bit stressed. I thought it might be weeks before he calmed down but just days later & he's running over with a waggy tail when it's time to go home. I'm still being cautious dealing with him but it's more for the benefit of my nerves, than out of necessity ;-) Our next challenge is to get Flynn & Barney out for adventures together once more... we should manage it soon, I think!
Poem.
Childish excitement travelling from east to west in late winter.
You know soon, very soon, the West Coast “Munros” will gleam like incisor teeth above the forested landscape.
Forcan, left, and The Saddle, right, are such peaks that advertise the thousand metre micro-climate of semi-Alpine splendour.
Spin-drift sweeps off the upper slopes to accumulate in layers like royal icing.
The snowy back-cloth forms a pleasing contrast to the pastel tans and greens of the bracken and forest of the lower slopes of this historic Glen.
The West Coast beckons.
Such a grand mountain corridor befits the momentous land and seascapes that lie in prospect.
On Saturday April 19th at 9 am SLT, the Geimaiko of Kyoto Kagai will be performing in Fantasy Faire! Please come and enjoy some shopping and then come see some maiko maiko magic! I'm excited to wear some of my recent purchases on stage. Big thank you to the fantasy faire organizers and merchants! Fantasy Faire is a Benefit for the American Cancer Society. They do some amazing work in fundraising in our little virtual world. Please do support their event and mission! :D
Link:
Being a man that dresses up as a woman is, for me, an amazing, incredibly liberating and truly adventurous experience. I love becoming a woman! I love nothing more than putting on make-up, painting my nails, wearing dresses and high heels, it is such a thrilling and delightful sense of freedom. As a woman I feel an inner contentment, a stronger sense of self worth and a real boost to my confidence. I just feel better appearing as a woman than I do as a man.
That may sound like I desperately need to transition but I definitely do not. I do feel more myself appearing in the guise of a woman but I am aware it is all an illusion. I am not a genetic female and I live as a man. I have to acknowledge I am indulging in superficial aspects of femininity, the make-up, the hair, the dresses and the high heel shoes. Wearing these is not in reality the same as actually being a woman. In fact I do have fears that my cross-dressing is offensive to real women. I do have a desire within me to be a female, it has always existed but it is not dominant enough to make me transition. I do need though, to spend time appearing as a woman as part of me gains emotional fulfilment from this.
There is an excitement I experience in the act of daring to cast off my male self and present as a female. There is definitely an element of enjoying the dressing up. I am aware though there is always a sense of relief and contentment in appearing as a woman. There is also huge joy and some sadness as well. The sadness is knowing I am not female. The joy is deluding myself I am finally a woman.
I acknowledge all of that sounds like I am transsexual. I feel I am transsexual to a degree but my male self counters that. I actually like my male life and I truly adore my female moments too. I am aware I need to express my female self now and again and cross-dressing as a woman is my enabler.
In the past I have touched on how I dreamed of being a professional female impersonator in my youth and so my cross-dressing definitely contains a degree of performance as well as fulfilling my deep rooted need to be a woman now and again. I also seem attracted to femininity and favour clothes that are associated with femininity. This causes me to worry I am parodying women. That is not my intention, I adore women but knowing I have an element within me that wants to be a woman I need to dress as a woman and spend time with this part of me unlocked and set free.
I thought these dancing skeletons from The Corpse Bride sum up my expression when I listen to the most recent weather reports. Not sure exactly what is coming right now but one of the last reports said we could get up to 25 inches of snow. This is what I have been waiting for! The snow should start on Friday for us.
Cavendish Mews is a smart set of flats in Mayfair where flapper and modern woman, the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd has set up home after coming of age and gaining her allowance. To supplement her already generous allowance, and to break away from dependence upon her family, Lettice has established herself as a society interior designer, so her flat is decorated with a mixture of elegant antique Georgian pieces and modern Art Deco furnishings, using it as a showroom for what she can offer to her well heeled clients.
Today however we are not in Lettice’s flat. Instead, we are in central London, near the palace of Westminster and the Thames embankment at the very stylish Metropole Hotel*, where Lettice is finally having her first assignation with the eldest son of the Duke of Walmsford, Selwyn Spencely after he telephoned her last week. After she hung up the receiver on the cradle, Lettice was beside herself with joy, causing somewhat of a kerfuffle with her downstairs neighbour, Mrs. Clifford after her jumping up and down caused the lady’s pendant lamps to rattle and sway from the ceiling above. Since then, Lettice has spent hours of her life over the ensuing days going through her wardrobes, trying on outfit after outfit, much to the irritation of her maid, Edith, who has to pick up after her. In a whirl of excitement and nerves, Lettice has gone from deciding to wear pale pink organdie, to navy serge, then to peach and rose carmine satin, to black velvet with white brocade trim. Yet now, as she shrugs her coat from her shoulders into the waiting arms of the liveried cloak room attendant of the Metropole, Lettice knows that her choice of a soft pale blue summery calf length dress with lace inserts accessories by a blue satin sash and her simple double strand of perfectly matched pearls is the perfect choice. The colour suits her creamy skin and blonde chignon, and the outfit is understated elegance, so she appears fashionable and presentable, yet doesn’t appear to be trying to hard to impress. Breathing deeply to keep the butterflies in her stomach at bay she immediately sees her companion for luncheon lounging nonchalantly against a white painted pillar.
“Darling Lettice!” Selwyn exclaims as he strides purposefully across the busy lobby of the Metropole. “You look positively ravishing.”
Lettice smiles as she sees the glint of delight in his blue eyes as he raises her cream glove clad right hand to his lips and chivalrously kisses it. “Thank you, Selwyn.” she replies, lowering her lids as she feels a slight flush fill her cheeks at the sensation of his lips pressing through the thin, soft kid of her glove. “That’s very kind of you to say so.”
“I’ve secured us a discreet table for two, just as you requested, my angel.” He proffers a crooked arm to her. “Shall we?”
Lettice smiles at his words, enjoying the sound of his cultured voice call her by a pet name. She carefully winds her own arm though his and the two stroll blithely across the foyer, unaware of the mild interest that she and Selwyn create as a handsome couple.
“Good afternoon Miss Chetwynd,” the maître d of the Metropole restaurant says as he looks down the list of reservations for luncheon. “It’s a pleasure to see you again.” Ticking the entry off the reservation list he takes up two menus. “Right this way, Your Grace.”
He leads the couple through the busy dining room of the hotel where the gentle burble of voices fills the lofty space and mixes with the sound of silver cutlery against the blue banded gilt hotel crockery, the clink of glasses raised and the strains of popular Edwardian music from the small palm court quartet playing discreetly by a white painted pillar.
“Your Grace.” Lettice says in a lofty fashion, giggling as she makes a joking bob curtsey to Selwyn as they follow the maître d.
Selwyn scoffs and rolls his eyes up to the ornately plastered ceiling above. “You know it’s only because of Daddy**.”
“I know,” Lettice giggles again. “But isn’t it a scream: ‘Your Grace’.”
“I’m not ‘Your Grace’ to you, my angel,” he smiles in return. “Just Selwyn will be fine.”
“As you wish, Just Selwyn.”
The crisply uniformed maître d stops before a small table for two surrounded by tables of suited politicians and a smattering of older, rather tweedy women. He withdraws a dainty Chippendale style chair from the table and Lettice takes a seat. The older man expertly pushes the chair in with her as she settles before the crisp white linen covered table.
“Does this table suit you, Lettice darling?” Selwyn asks a little nervously. “Discreet enough for you?”
“Oh yes, thank you Selwyn.” Lettice replies as she observes all the diners around them, busily involved in their own discussions with never a thought for the two of them, although she does notice an older couple at a table a short distance away observing them discreetly. The woman turns to her husband, indicating something about Lettice’s wide brimmed pale blue hat, judging by her gesticulation and his withering glance in response.
“Could that be one of your mother’s spies?” Selwyn asks, breaking into her quiet thoughts.
“What?” Lettice gasps. “Where?”
“There.” Selwyn gestures towards a potted palm, the fronds trembling with the movement of a passing waiter carrying two plates of roast beef to a nearby table scurrying past.
“Oh Selwyn!” Lettice slaps his hand kittenishly. “You are awful! Don’t be a tease and startle me like that.” She smiles as she returns to perusing her menu. “You know my mother’s spies are everywhere.”
“As are Lady Zinnia’s.” he replies.
Selwyn looks around the room taking in the Georgian revival furnishings, the restrained Regency stripe wallpaper, the watercolours of stately British homes in gilt frames as much as his architect’s eye pays close attention to the restrained fluted columns, ornately plastered ceilings and general layout of the room. “It’s so thoroughly English, don’t you think?” he concludes as he picks up the menu to peruse it.
“Oh,” Lettice says a little deflated as she lowers her menu. “You’d prefer something a little more, European? Should we have dined at a French restaurant?”
“Oh no Lettice darling,” he assures her with a defending hand. “I was just remarking. As I think I told you on the telephone, I haven’t been here since before the war, and I think the décor is much improved. It’s so much lighter and free of that ghastly old Victorian look.”
“I was saying the same thing to Miss Wanetta Ward the last time I came here.” Lettice remarks.
“Wanetta Ward? Isn’t she the moving picture star?” Selwyn looks over the top of his menu at his luncheon companion.
“The very one!” Lettice elucidates. “Do you ever go?”
“To the kinema***? No.” He shakes his head vehemently. “Do you?”
“No, I don’t either, but Miss Ward insists that I must experience it some day. Not that Mater or Pater would approve if I ever worked up the gumption to go.”
“Surely you don’t need to tell them if you do go.”
“Are you encouraging me to be devious, Selwyn?”
“No,” Selwyn laughs, his eyebrows lifting over his sparking blue eyes. “I’m simply suggesting that you are of age, and your own person with your own life in London, whilst they live their lives in far away Wiltshire. You can go to kinema if you wish. No-one need see you. In saying that, my parents feel the same about it, especially Mummy. She is very much against what she calls ‘painted women who are a poor and cheap copy of great art, moving about overdramatically on screen’.”
“I’ll be sure not to tell Miss Ward your mother’s opinion of her the next time I see her.”
“My mother’s opinion is entirely uneducated, Lettice, I assure you. After all, like both you and I, she has never actually seen a moving picture before.”
“Well, considering that both my maid and my charwoman*** go to the pictures, I very much doubt that I ever will.” Lettice concludes. “How would it be if I sat next to them? Besides, I have heard picture theatres called fleapits***** before, which sounds none too promising when compared with a lovely evening at Covent Garden.”
“Well, I don’t know about you,” Selwyn announces, changing the subject. “But I rather like the look of the roast beef with Yorkshire pudding for luncheon. What will you have?”
Lettice looks disappointedly at her menu. “When I came here with Miss Ward, we shared a rather magnificent selection of savories and little deadlies******, but I suppose they must reserve them for afternoon tea, here.”
“Fear not!” Selwyn says, giving Lettice a beaming smile. He carefully catches the eye of the maître d and summons him with an almost imperceptible nod of his head.
“How may I serve Your Grace?” the maître d asks with a respectful bow as he approaches the table.
“Look here, my companion Miss Chetwynd had some sweet and savoury petit fours when she last came here and speaks very highly of them. I’d taken a fancy to trying them for myself, so might we have a selection for two, please?”
“Well Your Grace,” the maître d begins apologetically. “They are from our afternoon tea menu.”
“Oh, I’m sure you could have word to your chefs, especially to please such a charming guest.” He gestures with an open hand to Lettice as she sits rather awkwardly holding her menu, her eyes wide as she listens to Selwyn direct the manager of the restaurant. “It would please her,” He then plays his trump card with a polite, yet firm and businesslike smile that forms across his lips like a darkened crease. “Both of us really, if you could perhaps see about furnishing us with a selection from your afternoon tea menu.”
“Well I…” stammers the maître d, but catching the slight shift in Selwyn’s eyes and the twitch at the corner of his mouth he swallows what he was going to say. “Certainly, Your Grace.”
“Good man!” Selwyn replies, his eyes and his smile brightening. “And some tea I think, wouldn’t you agree, Lettice my dear?”
“Oh, oh… yes.” Lettice agrees with an awkward smile of her own.
As the uniformed manager scuttles away, shoulders hunched, with Selwyn’s request, Lettice says, “Oh you shouldn’t have done that, Selwyn. Poor man.”
“What? Are you telling me that you are displeased that you are getting what you desire for luncheon, even though it doesn’t appear on the menu?”
“Well, no.” Lettice admits sheepishly.
“See, there are advantages to having luncheon with a ‘Your Grace’.” He gives her a conspiratorial smile.
“You do enjoy getting your way, don’t you Selwyn?”
He doesn’t reply but continues to smile enigmatically back at her.
Soon a splendid selection of sweet petit fours and large and fluffy fruit scones with butter, jam and cream has been presented to them on a fluted glass cake stand by a the maître d along with a pot of piping hot tea in a blue and gilt edged banded teapot.
“So,” Selwyn says as he drops a large dollop of thick white cream onto half a fruit scone. “At the Hunt Ball we spent a lot of time talking about our childhoods and what has happened to me over the ensuing years,” He shakes a last drop off the silver spoon. “Yet I feel that you are at an unfair advantage, as you shared barely anything about yourself al evening.”
“Aahh,” Lettice replies as she spreads some raspberry jam on her two halves of fruit scones with her knife. “My mother taught me the finer points about being a gracious hostess. She told me that I must never bore my guests with trifling talk about myself. What I have to say or what I do is of little or no consequence. The best way to keep a gentleman happy is to occupy him with talk about himself.”
“You don’t believe that do, my angel?”
“Not at all, but I found it to be a very useful tactic at the Hunt Ball when I was paraded before and forced to dance with a seemingly endless array of eligible young men. It saved me having to do most of the talking.”
“I hope you didn’t feel forced to dance with me, Lettice darling.” Selwyn picks up his teacup and takes a sip of tea. “After all you did dance quite a bit with me.”
“You know I didn’t mind, Selwyn.” She pauses, her knife in mid-air. “Or I hope you didn’t think that.”
“I suppose a healthy level of scepticism helps when you are an eligible bachelor who happens to be the heir to a duchy and a sizeable private income. Such things can make a man attractive to many a woman.”
“Not me, Selwyn. I am after all a woman of independent means, and I have my own successful interior design business.”
“Ah, now that is interesting.” he remarks. “How is it that the daughter of a viscount with her own private income, a girl from a good family, can have her own business? It surely isn’t the done thing.”
“Well, I think if circumstances were different, I shouldn’t be able to.”
“Circumstances?”
“Well for a start, I am the youngest daughter. My elder sister, Lallage, is married and has thankfully done her bit for her husband’s family by producing an heir, and given our parents the welcome distraction of grandchildren, thus alleviating me of such a burden.”
“She and Lanchenbury just had another child recently didn’t they?”
“My, you are well informed. Yes, Lally and Charles had another son in February, so now my sister has provided not only an heir, but a spare as well.” She pauses for a moment before continuing. “Secondly, and perhaps what works most in my favour is that I am my father’s favourite child. If it were up to my mother, I should have been married and dispatched off by the end of the first Season after the war. But Pater enjoys indulging his little girl, and I know just how to keep him continuing to do so, and keeping Mater and her ideas at bay just enough.”
“And how do you achieve this miracle, my angel?”
“I decorate mostly for the great and the good of this fair isle,”
“I don’t think I’d call a moving picture star a member of the great and good!” laughs Selwyn heartily.
“Yes, well…” Lettice blushes and casts her eyes down into her lap sheepishly. “I did rather get in trouble for that, but only because my mother’s awful cousin Gwendolyn, the Duchess of Whitby, told tales behind my back. Anyway, I design and decorate mostly for people my parents approve of, and I play my part socially and pretend to be interested in the things my mother wants for me.”
“Like marriage?”
“Like marriage.”
“So, if you aren’t interested in marriage, why are we having luncheon then, my angel?”
“I never said I wouldn’t get married someday, Selwyn,” Lettice defends with a coy smile. “I just want to do it in my own fashion, and I believe that marriage should begin with love. If I am to get married to a man I love, I need to know him first.” She pauses again and stares firmly into her companion’s sparkling blue eyes. “I’m sure you agree.”
“I’m quite sure my mother, Lady Zinnia, wouldn’t agree with you and your modern ideas about marriage.”
“Any more than my own mother does. When I told her that I wanted to do this my own way, by arranging to meet you myself she told me ‘marriages are made by mothers, you silly girl’.”
“And you don’t agree with that?” he asks almost unsurely.
“Would I be here if I did, Selwyn?” Lettice takes up the bowl of cream and begins to drop some on her scones.
Selwyn starts chuckling in a relieved fashion, consciously trying to smother his smile with his left hand, a hold and ruby signet ring glinting in the diffused light cast from the chandeliers above. He settles back more comfortably in his seat, observing his female companion as she stops what she is doing and puts down both the spoon and bowl of cream self-consciously.
“What? What is it Selwyn? What have I done?”
“You haven’t done anything other than be you, my angel, and that is a great blessed relief.”
“Relief?” Lettice’s left hand clutches at the two warm strands of creamy pearls at her throat.
“Yes,” Selwyn elucidates, sitting forward again and reaching out his hand, encapsulating Lettice’s smaller right hand as it rests on the white linen tablecloth. “You see, I was worried that it was a mixture of champagne and the romance of the Hunt Ball that made you so attractive. You were so naturally charming.”
Lettice bursts out laughing, the joyous peal mixing with the vociferous noise around them. “I was dressed as Cinderella in an Eighteenth Century gown and wig. I’d hardly call that natural, Selwyn.”
“Aahh, but you were my darling, beneath all that. I must confess that when I suggested luncheon today it was with a little of that healthy scepticism that I came here.”
“But I don’t need your income, Selwyn, I have my own.”
“But you do have a scheming mother, and many a mother like Lady Sadie want their daughters to marry a fine title, especially one that they may have desired for themselves. A Duchess is a step up from a Countess, I’m sure you agree.”
“Oh I don’t care…”
“Shh, my angel,” Selwyn squeezes her hand beneath his. “I know. However, that also makes you a rather exceptional girl, so I’m glad that my misgivings were misplaced. I’m pleased to hear that you’re in no rush to get married, and that you have set yourself some expectations and rules as to how you wish to live. Perhaps you were born at just the right time to manage as a woman in this new post-war era.”
“Please don’t tell Mater that,” Lettice says, lowering her spare hand from worrying her pearls. “She’ll be fit to be tied.”
“I promise I shan’t say a word to Lady Sadie, or my own mother. Both are cut from the same cloth in that respect.” He releases her hand and settles back in his chair. Picking up a scone he takes a bite. After swallowing his mouthful and wiping his mouth with his serviette he continues, “Now, do tell me about your latest piece of interior design. I should like to know more about it.”
Lettice sighs as she feels the nervous tickles in her stomach finally start to dissipate as she settles back in her own seat and starts to tell him about ‘Chi an Treth’ the Regency house in Penzance that belongs to her friends, the newly married Dickie and Margot Channon.
*Now known as the Corinthia Hotel, the Metropole Hotel is located at the corner of Northumberland Avenue and Whitehall Place in central London on a triangular site between the Thames Embankment and Trafalgar Square. Built in 1883 it functioned as an hotel between 1885 until World War I when, located so close to the Palace of Westminster and Whitehall, it was requisitioned by the government. It reopened after the war with a luxurious new interior and continued to operate until 1936 when the government requisitioned it again whilst they redeveloped buildings at Whitehall Gardens. They kept using it in the lead up to the Second World War. After the war it continued to be used by government departments until 2004. In 2007 it reopened as the luxurious Corinthia Hotel.
**The title of Duke sits at the top of the British peerage. A Duke is called “Duke” or “Your Grace” by his social equals, and is called only “Your Grace” by commoners. A Duke’s eldest son bears his courtesy title, whilst any younger children are known as Lords and Ladies.
***In the early days of moving pictures, films were known by many names. The word “cinema” derives from “kinema” which was an early Twentieth Century shortened version of “kinematograph”, which was an early apparatus for showing films.
****A charwoman, chargirl, or char, jokingly charlady, is an old-fashioned occupational term, referring to a paid part-time worker who comes into a house or other building to clean it for a few hours of a day or week, as opposed to a maid, who usually lives as part of the household within the structure of domestic service. In the 1920s, chars usually did all the hard graft work that paid live-in domestics would no longer do as they looked for excuses to leave domestic service for better paying work in offices and factories.
*****Early cinemas were often derisively referred to as “fleapits”, however the name given them was for very good reason. As cheap entertainment for the masses, with entry costing a paltry amount, early moving picture theatres often had problems with fleas infesting themselves on patrons who were free of them from those who had them. This was especially common in poorer areas where scruffier cinemas did not employ cleanliness as a high priority. Even as late as the 1960s, some filthy picture houses employed the spraying of children with DDT when they came en masse to watch the Saturday Morning Westerns!
******Little deadlies is an old fashioned term for little sweet cakes like petit fours.
An afternoon tea like this would be enough to please anyone, but I suspect that even if you ate each sweet petit four or scone on the cake plate, you would still come away hungry. This is because they, like everything in this scene are 1:12 size miniatures from my miniatures collection.
Fun things to look for in this tableau:
The sweet petite fours on the lower tier of the cake stand and the scones on the upper tier and on Lettice and Selwyn’s plates have been made in England by hand from clay by former chef turned miniature artisan, Frances Knight. Her work is incredibly detailed and realistic, and she says that she draws her inspiration from her years as a chef and her imagination. Each petit four is only five millimetres in diameter and between five and eight millimetres in height!
The blue banded hotel crockery has been made exclusively for Doll House Suppliers in England. Each piece is fashioned by hand and painted by hand. Made to the highest quality standards each piece of porcelain is very thin and fine. If you look closely, you might even notice the facets cut into the milk jug and the steam hole in the teapot.
The fluted glass cake stand, the glass vase on Lettice and Selwyn’s table and the red roses in it were all made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering. The cake stand and the vase have been hand blown and in the case of the stand, hand tinted. The red roses in the vase are also made by Beautifully Handmade Miniatures.
The Chippendale dining room chairs are very special pieces. They came from the Petite Elite Miniature Museum, later rededicated as the Carol and Barry Kaye Museum of Miniatures, which ran between 1992 and 2012 on Los Angeles’ bustling Wiltshire Boulevard. One of the chairs still has a sticker under its cushion identifying which room of which dollhouse it came. The Petite Elite Miniature Museum specialised in exquisite and high end 1:12 miniatures. The furnishings are taken from a real Chippendale design.
The vases of flowers on the stands in the background are beautifully made by hand by the Doll House Emporium. The three plant stands are made by the high-end miniature furniture maker, Bespaq, whilst the sideboard is made by high-end miniature furniture maker JBM. The paintings come from an online stockist on E-Bay.
Awaiting for the scoundrel, the rogue, the excitement to take her to a different world than the one her strict Victorian upbringing gave her.
Tales of eloping, of romantic monsters washed up on the Whitby shore. of explorers and men of Mistry.
A far cry from George her stuffy husband to be in is black coat and top hat.
She longs to feel strong hands on her waist, of small tender kisses on her neck. Leaning back onto his strong torso Arching her head back besides his. encouraging this demon to take her to immortality and make her his Bride for eternity.
She falls faintly to the ground with this heady mix of emotions swimming around her delicate mind, The corset of her dress holding her in a tight embrace that she imagines is the embrace or her imaginary lover.
There are so many things that can bring a smile to someone's face. I was out photographing the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art the other day. There were several school children out on field trip I suppos as they were having lunch outside on the lawn of the gallery when the teacher said that it was time to enter back into the building. Their excitment was contagious. Future olympic athletes possibly? I caught the girl in the middle of the frame in full on determination.
Mike D.
The Schooner America 2.0 with Full Sails! She is one of the most majestic tall sail-ships in the Key West sunset-sail fleet. Her huge sails catch the wind and the light as she roams the harbor, giving passengers a day/evening of excitement and open-water beauty.
Schooner America 2.0 - Key West Harbor
Key West, Florida U.S.A. - The Florida Keys
SUNSET - Autumn Light 2023 - 11/24/23
*[left-double-click for a closer-look - harbor sunset-cruise charter]
*[harbor sunset moment - the day after Thanksgiving - Friday night]
*[taken aboard the "Commotion on the Ocean" Fury Catamaran
Sunset Cruise in Key West Harbor with the Cory Heydon Band]
History: Designed and built by Scarano Boat Inc. in Albany, N.Y., the America 2.0 had big shoes to fill. Its 1995 predecessor, the 139-foot America (now berthed in Santa Barbara) won the hearts and minds of many islanders on and off the docks. That ship replicated the original America, a 101-foot sailing vessel that won an 1851 race against 15 yachts of the Royal Yacht Squadron in what would become known forever as the "America's Cup" in honor of that ship. The 1851 original America ended up a blockade-runner for the Confederacy and after the Yankees seized her, became a blockade-buster for the federals. She remained government property until falling victim to a shed collapse in 1945, and with the shed was scrapped and burned. A 170-year history with two replicas built.
America 2.0 (105 feet) replaced the 1995 replica schooner America (139 feet). The '95 replica is now berthed in Santa Barbara, Calif.
The America 2.0, the Adirondack III, the Western Union, the Appledore and many other tall ships are credited with helping
to keep Key West's maritime traditions alive for years to come.
Key West: Far from Normal - Close to Perfect
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_West,_Florida
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_keys
"Margaritaville" - Alan Jackson & Jimmy Buffett
www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4XtBiWgXLE
"It's Five-Oclock Somewhere" - Alan Jackson & Jimmy Buffett
www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPCjC543llU
RIP Jimmy Buffett - Passed 9/1/23
2007 was a wonderful year for our family and we look forward to the excitement that a new year brings in 2008. My thanks to all my flickr friends for their sharing of experiences and their photographic skills. It is always a great learning to see the skills of my many contacts and others on Flickr. My hope is that you all have a wonderful year ahead. I will keep a close watch and see you soon.
(The TeePee was used in Calgary for the 1988 Winter Olympics and is now located outside Medicine Hat in Southern Alberta) This shot was captured on our return from a cross Canada driving trip of some 14000 Kilometers - a welcome site as we scurried home to our own beds after some 45 days on the trip
The excitement was hard to contain for Helen as she waited for him to knock on the door, she had spied him walking to and fro trying to get the nerve to come and ask her for a date.
Then he made his move, and her heart was all a flutter ❤️❤️ the moment had arrived .
"This morning was the best! Instead of getting left at home I got to go to the park playground and chase the Wild Things all over the sand, barking and bouncing and leaping in the air. We all yelled and raced and climbed and wow, was it FUN!
A friend came walking by with her little dog and she was almost scared of me, not usually seeing me in Total Abandoned Excitement Mode! Crazy fun to be had when the Wild Things come!
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