Ohrid station, Gostivar-Ohrid line, 1965.

Letter(s) generously translated by bw-collector; penned 20.11.1916 in Siegmar (Chemnitz) by three of the Fräulein in the photograph.

 

A wonderful group photograph sent to "Otto". One of the authors is his sister, perhaps the Fräulein taking the photograph? His cousin writes „Liebes Ottel! Gefällt Dir der Gefreite? Den möchst Du wohl gerne verhauen?“ - would you like to spank the corporal, so I suspect she might be the one wearing his uniform.

I'm not sure what writer of Cider with Rosie, Laurie Lee would have made of Jojo but as a Socialist and generous-hearted traveller I've a feeling he would approved of my revolutionary stance lol. He found everyone interesting and if nothing else I'm sure he wouldn't think Jojo was boring. However my rather dapper boater on at a quirky tilt is not solely an affectation of bohemien decadence, I wear it for a good wholesome reason. Last summer I had to have a sun spot removed from the side of my nose and under a local anathetic it was a slow and rather unpleasant operation with staying perfectly still for two hours with lots of scraping and stitching. Well I haven't quite got to putting on Factor 100 Sun Cream yet. Unfortunately I have another appointment coming up as I have a hernia which resulted from a weakness in my stomach muscles following previous surgery for my bowel cancer. It's not a big lump but you can see it here and it gives me a kind of stomach-ache and makes me feel bloated. So you can't blame me if I enjoy a glass or two of alcohol, but of course Jojo's tipple is French Red Wine. Everyone seems to complain about long waiting queues on our NHS and not only did I get my doctor's appointment the next day they're offered me an appointment for September which is less than eight weeks away. Of course if they decide to operate I will have another wait but at least I will know if there's anything to worry about. I'm no spring-chicken but yes I try to take good care of myself as hopefully you will be able to enjoy Cider with Rosie and my orchard of pleasures for some years to come.

Be generous!!

 

Lol, I always use the fact that I'm a college student as an excuse to undertip... I need the money for lenses books... heh...

---------

Explored on July 12th, 2009 | #474 Thanks everyone for your constant support! :)

Sometimes when we are generous in small, barely detectable ways it can change someone else's life forever. ~ Margaret Cho

 

A Zen View

Magical Light of Shwedagon Panorama at Yangon

 

Be the first to kick start your generous support and fund my production with more amazing images!

 

Currently, I'm running a crowd funding activity to initiate my personal 2016 Flickr's Project. Here, I sincerely request each and every kind hearted souls to pay some effort and attention.

 

No limitation, Any Amount and your encouraging comments are welcome.

 

Crowd funding contribution can be simply direct to my PayPal account if you really appreciate and wish my forthcoming photography project to come alive.

Please PayPal your wish amount to : men4r@yahoo.com

 

Email me or public comments below your contribution amount for good records with your comments and at final day, at random, I shall sent out my well taken care canon 6D with full box n accessory during random draw to one thankful contributor as my token of appreciation.

 

Now, I cordially invite and look forward with eagerness a strong pool of unity zealous participants in this fundermental ideology yet sustainable crowd fund raising task.

Basically, the substantial gather amount is achievable with pure passion n love heart in photography and not necessary be filty rich nor famous to help me accomplish raising my long yearning photography career, a sucking heavy expense that been schedules down my photography making journey had inevitably, some circumstances had badly fall short behind racing with time and inability to fulfill as quickly in near future consolidating good fund .

Honestly, with aspiration and hope, I appeal to urge on this media for a strong humanity mandate through good faith of sharing and giving generously on this particular crowd funding excercise to achieve my desire n is not just purely a dread dream , is also flickers first starter own crowds funding strength turning impossible into reality through this pratical raising method that I confidently trust it will turn fruitful from all your small effort participation, every single persistency will result consolidating piling up every little tiny bricks into an ultimate huge strong living castle.

In reality, I have trust and never look down on every single peny efforts that been contributed as helpful means, turning unrealistic dream alive is the goal in crowd funding excercise, No reason any single amount is regard to be too small when the strength of all individual wish gather to fulfill my little desire to make exist and keep alive. .

I sincerely look forward each and every participants who think alike crowds funding methodlogy works here no matter who come forwards with regardless any capital amount input be big or small , please help gather and pool raise my objective target amount as close to USD$10K or either acquisition from any donated item listed below:

 

1- ideally a high mega pixel Canon 5DS ( can be either new or use ok)

2- Canon 70-200mm F2.8 L IS lens ( can be either new or use ok)

Last but not least, a photography journey of life time for a trip to explore South Island of New Zealand and Africa.

.

My intended schedule may estimate about 1 month round trip self drive traveling down scenic Southern Island of New Zealand for completing the most captivating landscape photography and wander into the big five, the wilderness of untamed Africa nature for my project 2016 before my physical body stamina eventually drain off.

 

During the course, I also welcome sponsor's to provide daily lodging/accommodation, car rental/transportation, Fox Glacier helicopter ride and other logistic funding expenses, provide photographic camera equipments or related accessories .

Kindly forward all sponsors request terms of condition n collaboration details for discussion soon.

 

Great Ocean Drive- the 12 Apostle's

 

Please Click Auto Slide show for ultimate viewing pleasure in Super Large Display .to enjoy my photostream . ..

Due to copyright issue, I cannot afford to offer any free image request. Pls kindly consult my sole permission to purchase n use any of my images.You can email me at : men4r@yahoo.com.

 

Don't use this image on Websites/Blog or any other media

without my explicit permission.

 

For Business, You can find me here at linkedin..

 

Follow me on www.facebook.com here

  

Grandmothers; Grandfathers,

their gnarled hands like ancient

trees, shaking seeds,

 

grieving

for their disappearing

memories.

 

Dancing, chanting...

As embers of the sacred fire

glowed,

 

they removed their moccasins,

held hands; then walked

toward their youth

 

through Night's shadows,

the bells on their empty moccasins

reflecting moonlight...

  

c. Douglas Fireman

  

View On Black

Acrylic paints, paper napkin, distress inks, cut out, butterfly and bird from very generous swappers.

After receiving a generous amount of money for Christmas and saving money throughout the year, I'm trying to decide what BM kit(s) to get next. Here is my current want list in order from my top want to least and their price.

 

1. Used "Old" Light Grey Tiger I $330 dollars with shipping.

2. M10 Wolverine 30% off at $192.50 with free shipping.

3. Dodge WC-64 KD $125 with free shipping.

4. Stug III Ausf. F $195.00 with free shipping.

 

Depending on what I purchase, I could maybe afford two kits. (For example, the WC-64 and the Wolverine.) My current collection of tanks is one Chaffee, one Sherman, one Hellcat, and one Panther.

 

I would really appreciate any input from you guys on these kits and any others you recommend!

This weekend, I was very generously given 626 assorted rolls of 35mm, 110, 120, and 220 roll film, some APS canisters, and 3 bulk rolls (100ft) of slide film. If this wasn't all expired stuff, this would easily top the $2000 range.

 

Some of the more interesting films in the lot included:

Kodak: Vericolor, Hi Speed Infrared, 'Recording Film', Pantomic X (ISO 32!!), Pro400MC, Tri-X Pan 400, Technical Pan, Plus X Pan 125, and Kodacolor VR 1000.

 

Fuji: Pre-Velvia Fujichrome (50, 100, 400, and 1600), Fujicolor 1600 Super HG, Neopan SS, NPH 400

 

I spent some time picking out the interesting 35mm cannisters and photographing them. Please do check out my blog for more photos of this incredible haul.

 

Tumblr | Blog

JPGroove has very generously donated two Dals to be used as prizes for Dalicious the Dal photo contest hosted by the Dolly Market forum. For details on the contest please check out this blog post - pullipsandjunk.com/2014/08/21/the-return-of-dalicious-dal...

 

First prize will get first choice of Dals, second prize will get the other Dal.

To mark the end of crew operations (driver and conductor) at Catford garage, the powers that be very generously let this preserved RT and RM2046 out on a variety of routes for the final few days. RM2046 and RT1702 were both used in service on Route 75 (9th), 47 (10th), 185 (11th), 54 (12th) and the 36B on the 13th March - the final day of crew operations.

 

RT1702 (KYY 529) makes a fine sight here - posing for my camera on the way back to South London :)

Location forgotten - anyone???

 

RT1702 was looking quite immaculate considering its 40+ years on the road! Interestingly, the bus was allocated to Catford (TL) garage from 1966 to its withdrawal in 1972. It was also one of the buses that took part in a pre-Festival of Britain tour of Europe.

 

RT1702 (KYY 529) 4/50

new, body 3675: Park Royal 3RT8

upper window surrounds repainted cream, fitted with GB plate

7/50 embarked on SS Embio from Hull for visit to Europe

8/50 Tour of Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg, West Germany, France

10/50 return to UK

1/51 AV into normal service (Mortlake)

*/51 P used on Circular Tour of London during Festival of Britain

1953 J used on 134

1957 GM (Victoria)

5/58 GM to Aldenham overhaul

5/58 GM from o/h, unlicensed, still body 3675

8/58 GM relicensed

8/59 SW transfer into store..

8/59 AP ..change store, ..and out (Seven Kings)

8/59 used on 169A

60-1 AP

7/62 AP to Aldenham overhaul

7/62 AP from o/h, unlicensed

10/62 RD transfer (Hornchurch)

63-5 RD

8/66 RD to Aldenham overhaul

8/66 TL from o/h, unlicensed (Catford), still body 3675

9/66 TL relicensed

67-8 TL

11/69 TL to Aldenham repaint, and return

1970 TL

7/71 TL into store, and out again

7/72 BX into store (Bexleyheath)

8/72 bought by R.Denton, Orpington

preserved by RT1702 Preservation Society

 

And more on Route 47 here: www.londonbuses.co.uk/_routes/current/047.html

 

As an aside, Catford garage (TL) was one of the original garages operated by Thomas Tilling:

TL - Tilling Lewisham, TC - Tilling Croydon, TB - Tilling Bromley survived into London Transport days.

 

Catford garage was opened on 11th May 1914 and was not very old when requisitioned for the war effort. It did not re-open until 1920 when Thomas Tilling's Lewisham operation moved there due to space constraints at his other garage.

 

Thomas Tilling gained an agreement in 1923 to double the size of Catford and in addition the roof has been raised twice, first in 1930 to enable double deck buses to use the garage and again in 1948 to accommodate AEC Regent III RTs. The garage was modernised again in 1970.

 

Taken with a Nikon F-501 SLR and 75-200mm zoom lens [Scanned from an original Kodachrome slide with no digital restoration]

 

You can see a random selection of my bus photographs here on Flickriver: www.flickriver.com/photos/southallroutemaster/random/

I placed ads in FreeCycle asking for clippings for succulents. I'm starting a succulent garden - Look at how generous these two people were with me. This guy's yard is full of beautiful plants and has been lovingly decorated (I'll post pix) 0- feel free to tag and leave me any kind of advice that you have :-)

View Large On Black

 

Charlevoix................Quebec !

for The Endless Book

 

"Nada lhe posso dar que já não exista em você mesmo. Não posso abrir-lhe outro mundo de imagens, além daquele que há em sua própria alma. Nada lhe posso dar a não ser a oportunidade, o impulso, a chave. Eu o ajudarei a tornar visível o seu próprio mundo, e isso é tudo."

 

(H.H.)

Note on reverse generously translated by Nettenscheider.

 

„Im Sturmanzug als Truppführer. Von links Vizefeldwebel Kiefer, rechts Vizefeldwebel Ebert (?)“

 

“These moments of nocturnal prowling leave an indelible impression. Eyes and ears are tensed to the maximum, the rustling approach of strange feet in the tall grass in an unutterably menacing thing. Your breath comes in shallow bursts; you have to force yourself to stifle any panting or wheezing. There is a little mechanical click as the safety-catch of your pistol is taken off; the sound cuts straight through your nerves. Your teeth are grinding on the fuse-pin of the hand-grenade. The encounter will be short and murderous. You tremble with two contradictory impulses: the heightened awareness of the huntsmen, and the terror of the quarry. You are a world to yourself, saturated with the appalling aura of the savage landscape."

 

- Ernst Jünger, Storm of Steel

The holiday season tends to bring out the very best in every one because we are all so willing to be grateful and generous this time of year. The sad part of this ideology though is that we somehow tend to overlook the rest of the year. Life is truly precious, and it should never go unappreciated or uncelebrated. My personal philosophy these past few years has been to live every day with as much appreciation and happiness as I am capable of. It's certainly not always easy to do, but I've definitely found that my dolls have helped me along the way. They remind me every day of how blessed I truly am and have been, and they inspire me to continue to live life with a smile.

 

My dolls have given me a new found appreciation for all the people in my life. Five years ago, when I started collecting them again, I expected to be questioned, or even ridiculed by my father. I didn't think he would understand or support my decision. Most of all, I feared he would think I was "too old" for them. When I finally mustered the courage to renew my doll hobby, I was pleasantly surprised by my dad's reaction. Contrary to what I thought, my dad welcomed the idea with open arms and an open heart. In fact, he was just as interested in my dolls as I was. He was always offering to go on doll hunts, make me new shelves, rearrange my room, and design doll stands. He showed an interest in all the things I was creating for my dolls, and he was always so complimentary. My sister was equally supportive and interested as I knew she would be. Whenever I look at my dolls, I always remember which ones Dad bought me, the ones he surprised me with, the ones he remembered the names of or poked fun at, and the time he invested in my hobby. The same can be said about all the dolls that remind me of my sister. I've also come to realize just how many people in general are so supportive and interested in my doll hobby. Whether it's someone admiring my displays and complimenting them, or my aunt who helped me make doll earrings, or my uncle who built my massive Bratz shelf, or all the people who are so sweet and have given me dolls, all the love and time other people have invested in me truly amazes me. It's overwhelming when I see just how much I am loved and appreciated. It touches my heart that so many people want to know more about my dolls, or are so willing to contribute in some way.

 

My dolls have also helped me see that time is a gift that should never be wasted. I didn't know that a year after I started collecting dolls again, that I would lose my father. I had spent many of the previous years pretending not to like dolls because I was embarrassed by them. Words cannot express how grateful I am that dolls reemerged into my life at the time they did. They made my last year with Dad so much more enjoyable. When I first brought my dolls out of storage in 2011, they brought so much happiness with them. The last year with Dad was the hardest one of my life, but it also holds some of my most cherished memories. Colleen, Dad, and I spent our weekends roaming the flea markets scouring for dolls. I remember that we spent many afternoons brooding about how we could somehow fit more shelves for dolls in my room. I dedicated a large portion of my time to doll related projects such as stands and paintings. Dad and Colleen were always so curious about my creations, and always had helpful suggestions and ideas to contribute. There was also the time my Beautiful Hair Ariel's leg broke, and Dad spent a long time in Home Depot looking at various supplies, trying to come up with a way to fix her. Colleen and I started identifying our dolls and their possessions back then, and there were days we entirely dedicated to the quest. What I have come to realize is that it was my early days collecting dolls that have given them so much meaning to me. If I had chosen not to unbury my doll hobby back then, Dad would never have been part of it, and my dolls wouldn't hold the same signifigance to me. Dolls have put time into perspective for me--I spent most of my teenage years scorning them and not being true to myself, which in turn has made me realize that time should never be wasted, but always appreciated.

 

It's truly amazing how much joy my dolls have filled my life with. They also touched my dad and my sister's lives. We were all inspired by them in a beautiful way. Dad began collecting toy trucks not long after my dolls returned. He even started to repair and repaint many of them. Colleen's love of reading also grew--she became obsessed with tracking down new books and authors to indulge in. The happiness and inspiration that my dolls possessed was truly contagious. But most of all, I think my dolls touched my life. They made me accept who I am, and to love myself for the first time in my life. I liked who I became when dolls rejoined my life. I felt inspired, motivated, creative, dedicated, and passionate. Most of all, I just appreciated feeling something other than emptiness. They helped me find confidence--I realized that if it didn't matter when people laughed at my dolls, why should it ever bother me when someone else casts judgement on me? It occurred to me that I could do anything I put my mind to, whether it was doll related or not. All of these positive emotions didn't just apply to my dolls, but also to every aspect of my life, and for that I am so grateful. I also came to see through my dolls that life is truly all about perception. I found that if I put my energy towards finding things I liked about a doll, rather than disliked, I was a much happier, more fulfilled person. I started to apply that ideology to the rest of my life, and I haven't looked back since. Life will certainly always "hand me lemons" but it is up to me to decide what to do with it, and how I perceive it.

 

It astounds me all the ways my dolls have taught me to be more grateful. My dolls remind me every day that I am a truly lucky person. They hold my last memories of my father and my childhood close to me, and in turn, I feel like I can better appreciate all the other things I've been so privileged to have. Dolls have shown me that I am capable of creating my own happiness because I can chose to to smile no matter what happens to me in life. They have made me thankful for just being myself--I realized through them that I didn't want to be anyone else or trade lives with them. They have made me see that I have had so many things in my life all along that I chose to overlook and not be grateful for. Every day I am thankful for all 2,400 plus of my dolls, my lovely house (which somehow fits all my dolls), my two lovable cats, my two adorable guinea pigs, my health, the food I get to eat every day, the warm bed I sleep in every night, my entire family, the time I got to spend with my mom and dad, and most of all my sister, who I'd be entirely lost without. There will always be rainy days or times I want to crawl into a hole and disappear, but at the end of the day, I will always find a way to smile. There is always a reason to wake up in the morning, whether it is for something as simple as a warm breakfast, a song on the radio, a pet, or a bunch of plastic dolls. I will always try to make the most of this life I am so lucky to have. My dolls have taught me that it is so important to to appreciate what you have while you have it, because at any moment, it could all disappear. So that is what I try to do--I try to never go to bed angry, to take a moment every day to soak it in, and most importantly, to tell the people I love how I feel, that I am grateful for them, and that I appreciate all the things they do. I truly believe that every day should be Thanksgiving, because today is the only day we are guaranteed, and we are all so lucky to have it.

Colt foal born 25th March 2007. Kirtlington Stud, June 2007

Generous Horizons.

 

servizi non vere terrena schiavi paradiso sfondi condanna sospetti innocenti,

pasáistí tubaiste ordaigh flogged naoimh búistéirí isteach theagasc dlíthe damhsa,

تحذيرات الإعدام تعذيب الخناجر دوافع صاخبة أشرعة القاتلة البؤس الرعن في,

Beschlagnahme abgehende Anrufe unnötige Expedition nachfolgende Szenen korrigieren Dämonen opera,

discursuri rele plângând în viață servitorii dimineață vechi de băut uitare lecții otrăvitoare de răspândire,

utrpela modrice zgodbe borijo tovariši sive valovite vode polna jezen popoldne veslanje smrad,

לאבד תמותה עייפה לחשוד שיניים מבעיתות שריקות נשמות מסע ריסוק רצונות אדומים לגזרים,

優雅な祈り熱烈な栄光キリストは明るい王国は本当にすべて提供しています嘆願与えられた様々な贈り物を聞きます.

Steve.D.Hammond.

Letter on reverse generously translated by xiphophils; authored in France on 17.7.1915 and addressed to the sender's brother, Fritz Thiele in Stuttgart-Cannstatt. Einheitsstempel: Festung-Eisenbahn-Bau-Kompagnie Nr.5. Postage cancelled the following day (Feld-Poststation 4 - Der 6. Armee).

 

"France, 17 July 1915

 

Dear brother,

 

I have received your letter with joy, but have to let you know that our dear father has now died as well on June 18 at 3 p.m. Here I also send you an old photo from Antwerp. I have written to Gustav today as well. Otherwise everything is still fine.

 

Best regards to you and your bride,

Heinrich"

 

Men of Festung-Eisenbahn-Bau-Kompagnie Nr.5 in South Antwerp. Most of these fellows are armed with Gew 88 rifles fitted with Model 1865/71 Pionierfaschinenmesser bayonets. Notice the fellow in the centre of the group appears to have sharpened his bayonet; an uncommon practice as bayonets were purposely designed to have a dull edge.

The generous nature and the old town of Trancoso, founded by the Portuguese in the 16th century, were the privilege to just a few inhabitants – the hippies that discovered the place in the 70s. Since then, the village grew, the electricity came and commerce developed. But the essence of #Terravista_Trancoso_bahia_brazil as well as its main attributes, remain the same.

Generosity comes in all shapes and sizes. On 30 July 2016, six of us from Calgary had the honour of meeting a 92-year-old gentleman who has lived most of his long life on a huge area (380 hectares, 939 acres) of beautiful land near Hanna, Alberta. Though Gottlob Schmidt (known as Schmitty) has now moved into town (Hanna), he is not far from his beloved land and still loves to spend a lot of time there. My friends and I understand why. This untouched land is not only beautiful to the eye, with its undulating hills with small, scattered pockets of Aspen woodland, but it also hides all sorts of natural treasures, including the wildlife that enjoys this native grassland. There are so few areas of native grassland left in Alberta, so each one is very precious. Schmitty told us that he has never seen his land looking so green! Perhaps not too surprising, as we have had so much rain recently, usually accompanied by thunderstorms. In fact, the rain started on our return journey to Calgary and I was driving from our meeting place back to my house in torrential rain. I found a good scattering of small hailstones covering my lawn, too.

 

This is where the word 'generosity' comes in. Two years ago, Schmitty donated all his land to Alberta Parks, along with certain strict regulations (listed on a link below) on how the land was to be used. He was very warmly recognized for his extreme generosity. The Park is known as Antelope Hill Provincial Park and, when Schmitty is no longer able to visit and enjoy his old, family homestead, the Park will be opened to the public. For now, it remains his own, private property.

 

The highlight for us was meeting Schmitty himself. I can only hope that I might be lucky enough to be in half his shape if I ever reached that age! It was an absolute delight to spend a little time with this man with the big heart, when we first arrived and again later in the day, when it was time for us to head back to Calgary. We also got to meet Schmitty's good neighbours, Donna and Ken.

 

www.albertaparks.ca/media/5788002/antelope-hill-pp-fact-s...

 

calgaryherald.com/news/local-news/you-can-thank-this-man-...

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIVVBdkoUVY&feature=youtu.be

 

My friends (specialists in mosses, lichens and liverworts and other things) and I, were given permission to spend the day there, to list all our findings. Our time was spent climbing one main hill and walking part way around it, calling in at several of the small areas of woodland. This bright yellowy orange fungus was hidden with others within the trees. These were the other highlight for me! It is quite rare that we come across one of these Amanita Muscaria mushrooms, and it is so exciting and such a treat when we do! Of course, it's just a "fungi nut" talking, ha. They are so attractive, especially at the earlier stage when the cap is like a round ball, covered in white flecks, but also poisonous! I will add a previously posted photo of the earlier stage in a comment box below.

 

"A large conspicuous mushroom, Amanita muscaria is generally common and numerous where it grows, and is often found in groups with basidiocarps in all stages of development. Fly agaric fruiting bodies emerge from the soil looking like a white egg, covered in the white warty material of the universal veil... Amanita muscaria poisoning occurs in either young children or people ingesting it to have a hallucinogenic experience... A fatal dose has been calculated at an amount of 15 caps. Deaths from this fungus A. muscaria have been reported in historical journal articles and newspaper reports. However, with modern medical treatment a fatal outcome because of the poison of this mushroom would be extremely rare."

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanita_muscaria

 

Various plants were good to see, too, including about four Prairie Crocuses that were still in bloom. I hadn't seen Skeletonweed for a long time, but there were quite a few small clusters of it. A new plant to me was a tall one with white flowers - White Evening Primrose (seen in my next photo). The occasional gorgeous wild Rose made a bright splash of colour, too.

 

Of course, for me, any visit to a ranch would not be complete without wandering by any old barn/shed/cabin. Another find was a beautiful, old, glass doorknob on one of the sheds.

 

On our return walk back to the cars, I suddenly spotted a huge, green caterpillar on the trail. A Tomato hornworm. It had been years since I saw any kind of huge, green larva and, though not my favourite things, I was glad to get a photo of it.

 

After a few hours of exploration, the only things that we were so happy and relieved to leave behind were the mosquitoes! Never had I seen so many of them - the air was filled with these tiny, blood-sucking insects that followed us every step of the way!

 

Thanks so much, Heide, for driving Sandy and myself all the way out there - about a two and three-quarter hour drive. Much of the distance was on the same roads that I had driven last week with my daughter, but this was the first time I had ever been as far as Hanna and just beyond. Hanna now has a Tim Horton's, opened around three months ago : ) Thanks, Heide, too, for trying to find the old railway roundhouse - unfortunate that there was too much construction in the area, so one can't get to the roundhouse. And thank you so much, Peter, for arranging and organizing this wonderful trip! Most importantly of all, our thanks to Schmitty, who so kindly allowed us to share the special land that he has called home for so many decades. Our thanks for allowing us to spend the day there and, even more importantly, thank you for your great gift to all Albertans, with your incredibly generous donation of Antelope Hill Provincial Park.

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 northwest of Lettice’s flat, in the working-class London suburb of Harlesden where Edith, Lettice’s maid, grew up. Edith’s father, George, works at the McVitie and Price* biscuit factory in Harlesden as a Line Manager, and her mother, Ada, takes in laundry at home. They live in a small, two storey brick terrace house which opens out directly onto the street, and is far removed from the grandeur of Lettice’s Mayfair flat, but has always been a cosy and welcoming home for Edith. Usually even before she walks through the glossy black painted front door, on washing day Edith can smell the familiar scent of a mixture of Lifebuoy Soap, Borax and Robin’s Starch, which means her mother is washing the laundry of others wealthier than she in the terrace’s kitchen at the rear of the house. Yet with her father’s promotion, Edith’s mother is only laundering a few days a week now.

 

We find ourselves in the Watsford’s scullery at the back of the terrace behind the kitchen, which like most Victoria era homes, also serves as the wash house. Ada is busy looking for something between several large baskets of dirty laundry yet to be washed, and a basket of dry undergarments with lace trims that belong to the Watsford’s uppity landlady, Mrs. Hounslow, which require goffering**. “Now where did I put the other half of my goffering iron?” Ada mutters as she searches for the toothed bottom half of her black iron with its matching teeth and handle which sits atop the laundry copper***

 

Like all the houses in the terrace, the Watsford’s scullery has an old square-sided ceramic sink in the corner, set on bricks, joined to the same pipe as the one directly behind the wall in the corner of the kitchen, however the small room is dominated by the large built-in washing cauldron made of bricks, set above its own wood fire furnace with a copper cauldron in its centre. The distemper on the walls of the scullery are tinted ever so slightly blue, a traditional colour for laundries, as it made whites look even whiter. Around it stand wicker baskets for laundry, a dolly-peg**** and a very heavy black painted mangle***** with wooden rollers, whilst on the copper’s top a panoply of laundry items stand, including an enamelled water jug, bowls, irons, a washboard and various household laundry products. The room smells comfortingly clean: scents of soap and starch that have seeped into every fibre of the space.

 

“Ah! There you are!” Ada exclaims, withdrawing the bottom of her goffering iron from where it has been wedged between the brick side of the laundry copper and an empty basket on the floor. “Come here, you wretch of a thing! How did you get down there? I bet George put you down there mistaking you for a boot scrape for his dirty gardening boots!”

 

“Oh Mum! Mum!” Edith’s breathy cries proceed her, echoing through the Watsford’s terrace and announcing her presence before she bursts into the room.

 

“Goodness! Edith? What on earth!” Ada gasps in delighted surprise as she deposits the heavy goffering iron onto the top of the copper, and glances up to the open door leading from the kitchen into the scullery. “I wasn’t expecting you today, Edith love! You said you weren’t coming.” She laughs. “What a lovely surprise!”

 

“Oh Mum!” Edith gasps again, catching her breath as she falls into her mother’s welcoming open arms, burying her head into her shoulder which smells comfortingly of the sweet scent of Hudson’s Soap******.

 

Releasing her daughter, Ada holds her at arm’s length and admires her smart three-quarter length pilum coloured spring coat and her usual purple rose and black feather decorated straw cloche hat. However, what strikes her more about her daughter today than her outfit is the flush in her young cheeks, the gleam in her pale blue eyes and the radiant smile gracing her lips. “Look at you, my darling girl.” The older woman self-consciously pushes loose strands of her mousey brown hair back behind her ears. Chuckling awkwardly, she remarks with a downwards glance. “Don’t you look lovely today, Edith love. Did you find out what your surprise from Frank was in the end?”

 

“Oh did I what, Mum!” Edith swoons with a sigh, leaning against the laundry copper.

 

“Well?” Ada asks, smiling in delight because of a mixture of her daughter’s unexpected appearance in her scullery and her obvious happiness. “What was it? Grab that stool from over there, and sit down.” She indicates with a careworn hand to a small three legged stool near the copper on which stands a basket of laundry waiting to be pressed. “Tell me all about it.”

 

Edith does as her mother bids, and after placing the basket of frothy, lacy laundry on the flagstone floor, settles down upon the stool which she draws up closely before the door of the copper and her mother’s anxiously awaiting figure as Ada sinks down upon the wood pile next to the copper.

 

“Do you need a glass of water, Edith love?” Ada asks, standing up quickly again and picking up a battered cream enamel jug with a green handle and a green rained lip.

 

“No Mum.” Edith huffs. “I just… need to catch my breath a little. I’ve run all the way from the Underground*******.” She indicates with her hand for her mother to resume her perch on the wood pile again.

 

“Goodness! Run all that way to tell me about Frank’s surprise!” Ada remarks sinking back down again with another chuckle. “It must have been grand: grander than a trip to Clapham Common******** I’ll wager, since you’re so dressed up.”

 

“Oh, it’s much grander and more exciting than that, Mum!” Edith enthuses.

 

“So, tell me what you did then, Edith love.”

 

“Well, I did as Frank asked me to do, and as you’ve pointed out. I got dressed up and I wore my white blouse with the Peter Pan collar*********, just like he asked me to.”

 

“You knew you weren’t going to Clapham Common then, Edith love?”

 

“Well, I didn’t know for certain, Mum, but as I was saying to Hilda on the trip up from Mayfair…”

 

“Hilda went with you?” Ada asks in surprise, her eyes widening as she speaks.

 

“No! No, Mum. Of course, as you know Hilda and I both have Wednesday half-days off, so we caught the train together from Down Street**********, but as we weren’t spending our half-day together today, we caught the train together as far as Leicester Square, before she went off to the British Museum*********** to see some famous stone or other she wanted to look at, whilst I went on to Clapham Junction.”

 

“A stone! That sounds most peculiar. Going to see a stone in a museum! Hilda is always welcome to come and look at my flagstones any day she likes,” Ada says with a sweeping gesture towards her feet. “And clean them if it so pleases her.”

 

“Oh Mum!” Edith scoffs with a wave.

 

“Then again, Hilda is a little peculiar, and that’s a fact.” Ada opines. “Although I do like her in spite of those peculiarities.”

 

“Anyway Mum,” Edith says, drawing her mother back to her story. “Hilda and I had a conversation about what my surprise might be. Hilda said that it could still have been a picnic, even if I did feel a bit overdressed for the occasion.”

 

“There’s nothing wrong with dressing up for a picnic, Edith love.” Ada remarks.

 

“Hilda said the same thing, Mum.”

 

“Back when your father and I were courting, going on a picnic was a very fine occasion, and we always wore our very best bib and tucker************.”

 

“I know you did, Mum, but we didn’t go for a picnic in the end, although Frank did take me for a nice tea at some rather smart tea rooms along Lavender Hill*************.”

 

“So, Frank took you for a special tea then, Edith love? That is lovely!”

 

“He did, Mum, but that isn’t the surprise he promised me.” Edith goes on. “That came beforehand. I arrived and Clapham Junction Railway Station************** like we’d agreed, and he was there to collect me. From there he took me to a photographic studio nearby where a friend of his works, a Mr. Simpkin, as an assistant photographer. He took our photographs.”

 

“Oh, that is an even lovelier surprise, Edith love!” Ada smiles.

 

“But that isn’t the best of it, Mum!” Edith exclaims, barely able to contain herself, slipping the dainty lace glove off her left hand and holding her fingers out before her mother.

 

Ada looks at her daughter’s left hand, which is slightly careworn with housework, although not as badly as her own. Usually her hand is bare, but she cannot help but notice the gleaming thin band of silver glinting on her ring finger today. She gasps as she looks up into Edith’s beaming face.

 

“Oh Edith! Frank finally proposed!”

 

“He did, Mum! He did, and I said yes!”

 

Ada stands up from her perch on the pile of wooden logs, just as Edith gets to her own feet, and steps forward and embraces her daughter lovingly.

 

“Oh Edith!” Ada feels unshed tears stinging her eyes as they then start to leak from her lids and spill down her cheeks. “Edith I’m so happy for you***************, my darling, darling girl!”

 

Enveloped in her mother’s arms Edith sighs gratefully and presses herself closer to her mother. “Thank you, Mum. I’m so happy too!”

 

The two women break apart, both their faces awash with tears, but faces beaming with happiness.

 

“Oh Edith!” Ada laughs with relieved delight as she starts to spin herself and her daughter in the small square of flagstone covered floor in the laundry. “This is the most wonderful, wonderful news!”

 

Around and around they spin, laughing and squealing like young girls rather than women, until finally Ada’s longer pre-war ankle length skirt and old fashioned petticoats knock over a basket of laundry, sending the contents tumbling across the flagstones.

 

“Oh! Careful Mum!” Edith exclaims, bringing the two of them to a halt. “The washing.”

 

“Oh pooh to the washing, Edith love!” Ada exclaims, the smile still broad on her face and she stoops and gathers the sheets and pillow slips up. “It can always be thrown back into the copper for boiling again. It isn’t every day that my only daughter gets married! Oh, you just wait until I tell your Dad!”

 

“Well, I thought I might tell him myself,” Edith ventures. “If that’s alright, Mum.”

 

“Alright? Well of course it’s alright, Edith love!” Ada replies. “How could it not be? It is your news after all: well, yours and Frank’s that is! But can you wait that long until your Dad comes home from his afternoon shift? I mean, won’t you be expected back at Cavendish Mews?”

 

“Not today, Mum. Miss Lettice has gone off with Mr. Bruton to Essex, so I can stay until Dad gets home and my absence won’t be noticed.”

 

“Oh wonderful!” Ada claps her hands. “Your Dad and I been waiting for this announcement! Now I can tell you that not so very long ago, your young Frank came to visit us on a Sunday, and he asked us for your hand in marriage.”

 

“Really?” Edith asks. “That was very sneaky of him, especially when he told me that he’d ask when the time was right.”

 

“Well, I guess he felt that now was the right time, Edith love. He did confide in me that he felt awful telling you white lies like he did, but he had to do it, in order to keep it all a big surprise, and Your Dad and I kept quiet about it too.”

 

“Well, it certainly worked, Mum! I was so surprised when Frank asked me to marry him!”

 

“So how did he propose in the end, Edith love?” Ada asks, taking Edith’s hand and rubbing the silver band on her finger. “Tell me everything!”

 

“So, Mr. Simpkin had us settle in at the studio and he posed us for a photograph, knowing full well that Frank was going to propose, as I now know. He even handed Frank the ring behind my back. Mr. Simpkin had Frank stand in such a way that he could propose to me and slip the ring on my finger.”

 

“Did Frank get down on one knee, Edith love?”

 

“No!” Edith laughed, raising a hand to her lips girlishly. “He just blurted out, ‘Edith Watsford, would you do me the honour of becoming my wife?’ and he slipped the ring onto my finger, even before I could answer.” She sighs contentedly. “Of course he needn’t have worried that I was going to say no, because of course I didn’t!”

 

Edith bursts into a fresh barrage of happy tears before falling upon her mother’s neck again, who embraces her hard and joins in her crying. Breaking apart again, Ada looks down at the ring again.

 

“Frank apologised to me about the engagement ring being silver. He promises me that my wedding ring will be gold.”

 

“And so it will be, Edith love, but a silver ring is more than enough for now.”

 

“I told him the same, Mum. He’s even had our names engraved on the inside and 1925.”

 

“Well! Isn’t that a thing!” Ada replies, suitably impressed. “Have you told Nyrie, Mrs. McTavish yet, or has Frank gone to do that now whilst you’ve come here to tell me and your Dad?”

 

“No, we’ll tell Mrs. McTavish together next week, Mum. I couldn’t wait to break the news to you though.”

 

“Oh Nyrie will be over the moon when she hears: as thrilled as I am, and your Dad will be.” Ada sighs again. “My little girl, poised to become a woman.”

 

“We’re not getting married just yet, Mum. This is an engagement ring, not a wedding ring. And we’ve already decided that I won’t tell Miss Lettice our news yet, until we’ve set a date. And I’ll hang the ring from a chain about my neck to stop it spoiling with all the hard graft I must do at Cavendish Mews, and I’ll wear it proudly on my finger on Frank’s and my days out together.”

 

“That’s very wise, Edith love. I’m sure your Miss Lettice would be understanding of you wanting to work up until you’re wed, but,” Ada screws up her face. “Well, people like her can be fickle, and you might find she dismisses you and she just employs a new maid-of-all-work.”

 

“Oh, I’m sure she wouldn’t do that, Mum.” Edith assures her. “She says I’m invaluable to her.”

 

“No, you’re probably right, but I think you’re wise about keeping quiet about your news just for now. You might be surprised how much a marriage status can turn you from invaluable to dispensable maid in an employer’s eyes.”

 

“Well, like I said, I won’t let on until we’ve set a date.”

 

“Wise girl. You’ve got a good head screwed onto those shoulders of yours.”

 

“Well, you helped put it there, Mum. You and Dad.”

 

Ada looks around her and exclaims, “Goodness me! What are we doing, standing here in the scullery? It’s not every day that my only daughter announces she is getting married! Let’s go into the kitchen and I’ll see if I can’t find us a little something celebratory to toast your engagement with your father.”

 

Together the pair leave the laundry and the washing behind, laughing and celebrating Edith’s wonderful news.

 

*McVitie's (Originally McVitie and Price) is a British snack food brand owned by United Biscuits. The name derives from the original Scottish biscuit maker, McVitie and Price, Ltd., established in 1830 on Rose Street in Edinburgh, Scotland. The company moved to various sites in the city before completing the St. Andrews Biscuit Works factory on Robertson Avenue in the Gorgie district in 1888. The company also established one in Glasgow and two large manufacturing plants south of the border, in Heaton Chapel, Stockport, and Harlesden, London (where Edith’s father works). McVitie and Price's first major biscuit was the McVitie's Digestive, created in 1892 by a new young employee at the company named Alexander Grant, who later became the managing director of the company. The biscuit was given its name because it was thought that its high baking soda content served as an aid to food digestion. The McVitie's Chocolate Homewheat Digestive was created in 1925. Although not their core operation, McVitie's were commissioned in 1893 to create a wedding cake for the royal wedding between the Duke of York and Princess Mary, who subsequently became King George V and Queen Mary. This cake was over two metres high and cost one hundred and forty guineas. It was viewed by 14,000 and was a wonderful publicity for the company. They received many commissions for royal wedding cakes and christening cakes, including the wedding cake for Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Phillip and Prince William and Catherine Middleton. Under United Biscuits McVitie's holds a Royal Warrant from Queen Elizabeth II.

 

**To goffer something means to crimp, plait, or flute (linen, lace, etc.) especially with a heated iron.

 

***A wash copper, copper boiler or simply copper is a wash house boiler, generally made of galvanised iron, though the best sorts are made of copper. In the inter-war years, they came in two types. The first is built into a brickwork furnace and was found in older houses. The second was the free-standing or portable type, it had an enamelled metal exterior that supported the inner can or copper. The bottom part was adapted to hold a gas burner, a high pressure oil or an ordinary wood or coal fire. Superior models could have a drawing-off tap, and a steam-escape pipe that lead into the flue. It was used for domestic laundry. Linen and cotton were placed in the copper and were boiled to whiten them. Clothes were agitated within the copper with a washing dolly, a vertical stick with either a metal cone or short wooden legs on it. After washing, the laundry was lifted out of the boiling water using the washing dolly or a similar device, and placed on a strainer resting on a laundry tub or similar container to capture the wash water and begin the drying and cooling process. The laundry was then dried with a mangle and then line-dried. Coppers could also be used in cooking, used to boil puddings such as a traditional Christmas pudding.

 

****A dolly-peg, also known as a dolly-legs, peggy, or maiden, in different parts of Britain, was a contraption used in the days before washing machines to cloth in a wash-tub, dolly-tub, possing-tub or laundry copper. Appearing like a milking stool on a T-bar broomstick handle, it was sunk into the tub of clothes and boiling water and then used to move the water, laundry and soap flakes around in the tub to wash the clothes.

 

*****A mangle (British) or wringer (American) is a mechanical laundry aid consisting of two rollers in a sturdy frame, connected by cogs and (in its home version) powered by a hand crank or later by electricity. While the appliance was originally used to squeeze water from wet laundry, today mangles are used to press or flatten sheets, tablecloths, kitchen towels, or clothing and other laundry.

 

******Robert Spear Hudson (1812 – 1884) was an English businessman who popularised dry soap powder. His company was very successful thanks to both an increasing demand for soap and his unprecedented levels of advertising. In 1837 he opened a shop in High Street, West Bromwich. He started making soap powder in the back of this shop by grinding the coarse bar soap of the day with a mortar and pestle. Before that people had had to make soap flakes themselves. This product became the first satisfactory and commercially successful soap powder. Despite his title of "Manufacturer of Dry Soap" he never actually manufactured soap but bought the raw soap from William Gossage of Widnes. The product was popular with his customers and the business expanded rapidly. In the 1850s he employed ten female workers in his West Bromwich factory. His business was further helped by the removal of tax on soap in 1853. In time the factory was too small and too far from the source of his soap so in 1875 he moved his main works to Bank Hall, Liverpool, and his head office to Bootle, while continuing production at West Bromwich. Eventually the business in Merseyside employed about 1,000 people and Hudson was able to further develop his flourishing export trade to Australia and New Zealand. The business flourished both because of the rapidly increasing demand for domestic soap products and because of Hudson's unprecedented levels of advertising. He arranged for striking posters to be produced by professional artists. The slogan "A little of Hudson's goes a long way" appeared on the coach that ran between Liverpool and York. Horse, steam and electric tramcars bore an advertisement saying "For Washing Clothes. Hudson's soap. For Washing Up". Hudson was joined in the business by his son Robert William who succeeded to the business on his father's death. In 1908 he sold the business to Lever Brothers who ran it as a subsidiary enterprise during which time the soap was manufactured at Crosfield's of Warrington. During this time trade names such as Rinso and Omo were introduced. The Hudson name was retained until 1935 when, during a period of rationalisation, the West Bromwich and Bank Hall works were closed.

 

*******Harlesden is an interchange station on Acton Lane in north-west London. It is on the Bakerloo line of the London Underground and the Lioness line of the London Overground, between Stonebridge Park and Willesden Junction stations. The railway line here is the border between the Harlesden and Stonebridge residential area in the east, and the Park Royal industrial estate to the west. The southern end of Willesden Brent Sidings separates the station from the West Coast Main Line.

 

********At over eighty-five hectares in size, Clapham Common is one of London’s largest, and oldest, public open spaces, situated between Clapham, Battersea and Balham. Clapham Common is mentioned as far back as 1086 in the famous Domesday Book, and was originally ‘common land’ for the Manors of Battersea and Clapham. Tenants of the Lords of the Manors, could graze their livestock, collect firewood or dig for clay and other minerals found on site. However, as a result of increasing threats from encroaching roads and housing developments, it was acquired in 1877 by the Metropolitan Board of Works, and designated a “Metropolitan Common”, which gives it protection from loss to development and preserves its open character.

 

*********A Peter Pan collar is a style of clothing collar, flat in design with rounded corners. It is named after the collar of Maude Adams's costume in her 1905 role as Peter Pan, although similar styles had been worn before this date. Peter Pan collars were particularly fashionable during the 1920s and 1930s.

 

**********Down Street, is a disused station on the London Underground, located in Mayfair. The Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway opened it in 1907. It was latterly served by the Piccadilly line and was situated between Dover Street (now named Green Park) and Hyde Park Corner stations. The station was little used; many trains passed through without stopping. Lack of patronage and proximity to other stations led to its closure in 1932. During the Second World War it was used as a bunker by the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, and the war cabinet. The station building survives and is close to Down Street's junction with Piccadilly.

 

***********The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human culture from its beginnings to the present. Established in 1753, the British Museum was the first public national museum.

 

************“Best bib and tucker” is an informal, old fashioned idiom that means one's best, most formal clothes. It's a humorous way of saying someone is dressed up nicely, as if for a special occasion. The phrase originates from the time when men's shirts often had a frill at the front (the "bib") and women might wear a decorative lace piece over their neck and shoulders (the "tucker").

 

*************Lavender Hill is a bustling high street serving residents of Clapham Junction, Battersea and beyond. Until the mid Nineteenth Century, Battersea was predominantly a rural area with lavender and asparagus crops cultivated in local market gardens. Hence, it’s widely thought that Lavender Hill was named after Lavender Hall, built in the late Eighteenth Century, where lavender grew on the north side of the hill.

 

**************Clapham Junction is a major railway station near St John's Hill in south-west Battersea in the London Borough of Wandsworth. Despite its name, Clapham Junction is not in Clapham, a district one mile to the south-east. A major transport hub, Clapham Junction station is on both the South West Main Line and Brighton Main Line, as well as numerous other routes and branch lines which pass through or diverge from the main lines at this station. It serves as a southern terminus of both the Mildmay and Windrush lines of the London Overground.

 

***************In more socially conscious times it was traditional to wish the bride-to-be happiness, rather than saying congratulations as we do today. Saying congratulations to a bride in past times would have implied that she had won something – her groom. The groom on the other hand was to be congratulated for getting the lady to accept his marriage proposal.

 

This cheerful laundry scene is not all you may suppose it to be, for the fact is that all the items are from my 1:12 miniatures collection.

 

Fun things to look for in thus tableau include:

 

The red brick copper in the centre of the image is a very cleverly made 1:12 artisan miniature from an unnamed artist. Believe it of not, it is made of balsa wood and then roughened and painted to look like bricks. I acquitted it from Doreen Jeffries’ Miniature World in the United Kingdom.

 

The great wrought mangle with its real wooden rollers is made of white metal by Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces.

 

The dolly-peg is an antique Victorian dollhouse miniature and it’s tub is sitting behind it. I am just lucky that something from around 1860 just happens to be the correct scale to fit with my 1:12 artisan miniatures.

 

There is a panoply of items used in pre-war laundry preparation on the white painted surface of the copper. There are two enamel rather worn and beaten looking bowls and an enamel jug in the typical domestic Art Deco design and kitchen colours of the 1920s, cream and green. Aged on purpose, these artisan pieces I acquired from Kathleen Knight’s Dolls’ House Shop in the United Kingdom. The grater and the two small irons also come from there. The boxes of Borax, Hudson’s Soap and Robin’s Starch and the bottle of bleach in the green glass were made with great attention to detail on the labels by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire.

 

Before the invention of aerosol spray starch, the product of choice in many homes of all classes was Robin starch. Robin Starch was a stiff white powder like cornflour to which water had to be added. When you made up the solution, it was gloopy, sticky with powdery lumps, just like wallpaper paste or grout. The garment was immersed evenly in that mixture and then it had to be smoothed out. All the stubborn starchy lumps had to be dissolved until they were eliminated – a metal spoon was good for bashing at the lumps to break them down. Robins Starch was produced by Reckitt and Sons who were a leading British manufacturer of household products, notably starch, black lead, laundry blue, and household polish.

 

Reckitt and Sons who were a leading British manufacturer of household products, notably starch, black lead, laundry blue, and household polish also produced Jumbo Blue, which was a whitener added to a wash to help delay the yellowing effect of older cotton. Rekitt and Sons were based in Kingston upon Hull. Isaac Reckitt began business in Hull in 1840, and his business became a private company Isaac Reckitt and Sons in 1879, and a public company in 1888. The company expanded through the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries. It merged with a major competitor in the starch market J. and J. Colman in 1938 to form Reckitt and Colman.

relay for life at Sanctuary of rock

 

Visit this location in Second Life

Today, I spent time with my camera capturing different moments, and the star of the day turned out to be my favorite little bird, the robin/ redbreast - I believe the sun was generous this morning, perhaps due to the recent shift to winter time. As I stepped out from the Charnwood Water car park, the swans and all kinds of ducks came over, looking for breakfast. During this transition to winter and the colder days ahead, I usually bring bird feed when I go to the park. Squirrels, excited by a leftover Halloween pumpkin, gathered around me too. I generously scooped out part of the pumpkin for them, and within moments, three or four Eastern gray squirrels appeared, taking the seeds and treats inside the pumpkin to bury under the leaves for the cold days to come.

After a short walk, I encountered my favorite little bird, the Robin-Redbreast, and shared the remaining food with them. One of them, likely a juvenile, came within about two meters of me, unafraid and ready to pose. I took plenty of close-up shots. It’s worth mentioning that with my Nikon D850 FX camera, I always strive to share the exact image I see through the viewfinder—cropping isn’t really my style. Once again, I stuck to that principle, though I regretted not bringing my Nikon 80-200mm f/2.8 lens with me this time. Next time, it’ll definitely be in my bag.

 

On my Flickr account, I’ve posted the shot of today: a robin, bathed in the backlight of the morning sun filtering through tree shadows, curiously observing me from a shaded area. I hope you enjoy it. Wishing you all a wonderful Sunday!

  

Do robins puff themselves up?

 

Male robins will always attack any intruder into their space, occasionally – though fortunately not often – fighting to the death. Both sexes of robins have red breasts and both puff out their chests as a sign of aggression.

 

The Robin, also known as the European Robin (Erithacus rubecula), is a small bird species native to Europe, including the United Kingdom. It's widely recognized for its distinctive red or orange breast, which contrasts sharply with its otherwise gray-brown plumage. Here are some key points about the Robin:

 

Appearance: Robins are small birds, typically around 12.5–14 centimeters (5–5.5 inches) in length. They have a round body shape, short legs, and a slender, pointed bill. Their most notable feature is their bright red or orange breast, which varies in intensity among individuals and is more vibrant in males.

 

Habitat: Robins are highly adaptable birds that inhabit a variety of environments, including woodlands, parks, gardens, and urban areas. They are commonly found in habitats with dense vegetation, where they can forage for insects and other invertebrates.

 

Behavior: Robins are known for their bold and inquisitive nature. They are often seen perched on branches or hopping along the ground, searching for food. Robins are territorial birds, and males will vigorously defend their territories, especially during the breeding season.

 

Breeding: Robins typically breed from March to August, with the peak of breeding activity occurring in spring. They construct cup-shaped nests made of grass, leaves, and other plant materials, usually hidden in dense vegetation or low shrubs. The female lays several eggs, which she incubates for around two weeks until they hatch.

 

Diet: Robins are primarily insectivorous, feeding on a variety of insects, spiders, worms, and other small invertebrates. During the breeding season, they may also consume berries and fruits to supplement their diet.

 

Symbolism: In many cultures, the Robin is associated with various symbolic meanings, including joy, renewal, and good fortune. Its appearance is often considered a sign of hope and the arrival of spring.

 

Overall, the Robin is a beloved and iconic bird species in the United Kingdom, admired for both its striking appearance and cheerful song.

 

I hope you'll enjoy the my images as much as I enjoyed taking them.

  

Thank you so much for visiting my stream, whether you comments , favorites or just have a look.

I appreciate it very much, wishing the best of luck and good light.

  

© All rights reserved R.Ertug Please do not use this image without my explicit written permission. Contact me by Flickr mail if you want to buy or use Your comments and critiques are very well appreciated.

 

Lens - hand held or Monopod and definitely SPORT VR on. Aperture is f5.6 and full length. All my images have been converted from RAW to JPEG.

 

I started using Nikon Cross-Body Strap or Monopod on long walks. Here is my Carbon Monopod details : Gitzo GM2542 Series 2 4S Carbon Monopod - Really Right Stuff MH-01 Monopod Head with Standard Lever - Really Right Stuff LCF-11 Replacement Foot for Nikon AF-S 500mm /5.6E PF Lense -

 

Thanks for stopping and looking :)

Collections of moments captured in around " Downtown Toronto " ! Thanks for your Visit ! Friends !

 

Thanks for all the Fun and Joy through your Lovely Pictures and " Thank you " for all your

gracious and generous comments on mine ! Have a Wonderful Summer !

Letter generously translated by xiphophilos; penned in Zeithain on the 27.9.1914 and addressed to Familie Benedix in Leipzig. Postage cancelled Zeithain-Übungsplatz the same day. Photogr. Frank, Chemnitz.

 

Nine Soldaten hailing from 1. Kompanie, Reserve-Infanterie-Regiment Nr. 244 photographed in Chemnitz just two months after Germany invaded Belgium.

 

By War's end, the regiment would lose 50 officers and approximately 1,200 NCOs and enlisted men.

Letter generously translated by xiphophilos, penned in Baboeuf, on 16.2.15 and addressed to Fräulein Elisabeth Rademacher in Ostende near Herdecke (Westfalen), the author optimistically advises the war will soon be over because "the Russian is soon going to be done".

 

An interesting photo in that these fellows are still wearing their field-grey Kollers, which according to many sources were abolished in 1913 and replaced with the M1907/10 pattern tunics.

Divided reverse. Letter generously translated by xiphophilos, authored on 15.10.1917 and addressed to A. Schultze

Schneidermeister (master tailor) in Berlin. Postage cancelled a day later (K.u.K. Etappenpostamt 198). Photogr. Hegedűs Utóda, Szentes.

 

A pair of Hungarian infanrtymen from an as yet unidentified formation, pose for a memento photograph in Szentes in south-eastern Hungary.

 

More commonly seen in our respective collections are the "FJI" stamped cockades, which were worn by Austrian troops. The "IFJ" that we see here, identify these fellows as Hungarians. Both stood for Franz Josef I.

Generous serving of fresh pirarucu with shrimp in Brazil nut cream at Casa do Saulo, Santarém, voted best restaurant in northern Brazil.

diariodofb.com/2019/06/11/casa-do-saulo-e-eleito-novament...

Letter generously translated by xiphophilos; penned sometime around 8.1.1916 and addressed to a Frau Froni Lindenmeyer in Fürth (near Nürnberg). Einheitsstempel: Dragoner-Regiment „Königin Olga“ 1. W. Nr. 25. 4. Eskadron. Postage cancelled 8.1.1916 in Bruxelles (Belgien).

 

A marvellous quality studio portrait of a cavalryman from a not-so-common formation, Dragoner-Regiment „Königin Olga“ (1. Württembergisches) Nr. 25. Of note is the just as uncommon, Ersatz bayonet (EB) 56 affixed to his Karabiner 98 AZ. These bayonets had a heavy steel hilt with five diagonal cut grooves on each side, with an overall length of 44.3cm.

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts is the permanent home of Dale Chihuly’s iconic artwork “The Sun” thanks to generous donations of Montrealers.

 

The Sun stands 5.5 metres tall, is made up 1,573 individual hand blown glass pieces and weighs 2,000 Kilos.

 

The sun was first unveiled at the New York Botanical Garden in 2006. Then it spent some time at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in 2010. And it eventually made its way to the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts in 2013 where it remained until 2014 when it was displayed in London’s Berkeley Square.

 

When the sun left, Montrealers were heartbroken, so the Museum of Fine Arts started the fund raising campaign to bring the sun back permanently.

 

A 2014 personal donation of $500,000 by the Montreal investment manager Sebastian Van Berkom enabled the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts to permanently acquire the dramatic blown-glass sculpture that patrons and passersby had warmed to since it first arrived here for a 2013 exhibition.

 

The sun returned 05 May 2016 and the Museum of Fine Arts organised a special "Welcome Back" event in its honour.

  

CHIHULY:

Born in Tacoma, Washington in 1941, Chihuly is regarded as the "Tiffany" of our day and has been exploring the plastic potential of blown glass for over fifty years. With fire, gravity, breath and centrifugal force, this accomplished master plays with colours, reflections and organic forms, using repetition, accumulation and layering arrangements of modular and singular elements to create unparalleled rhythms and visual effects.

 

The Chihuly Controversy:

From the NY Times - 21 Aug 2017.

Mr. Chihuly was never the lonely artist toiling in his garret. Making art in a crowd, with a crowd, was the Chihuly way, according to people who have known and worked with him over the decades. The pattern only deepened with time and success, as he gained global recognition for the prolific output of expressive glass works, sculptures and paintings that bear his name and can sell into the millions of dollars.

 

“The more I worked, the more I sold work, the more people I could hire,” Mr. Chihuly said in an interview in his 34,000-square-foot studio complex here in Seattle, near where he was born and raised.

 

But now, at 75, with mental health issues and old physical injuries that have forced a retreat from hands-on work, Mr. Chihuly is facing a hard-edge court battle — and a potential cloud over his life and art — around the question of what those teams do. A former contractor has sued him and his wife, Leslie, who is the president and chief executive of Chihuly Studio, seeking compensation for millions of dollars of paintings that the contractor says he created or inspired, but for which he said he was never properly credited or compensated.

 

These are painful days for Dale Chihuly, as he winds down a long career facing a challenge that stabs at the heart of any artist: his originality. Mr. Chihuly emblazoned his signature on the world by working and rethinking the vocabulary of glass as art. Physical challenges and scars compounded the difficulty of that path. He lost vision in an eye in a 1976 car crash that also permanently injured an ankle and a foot. A shoulder injury from a bodysurfing accident made glass blowing, with its heavy weights of pipes and glass, impossible to do. He suffers from bipolar disorder, marked by sweeping swings of elation and depression. And with greater dependence on others, he said, has come greater vulnerability to claims that his work is not his own.

 

“Yeah, I would say it probably made it easier to attack me,” he said. “I absolutely need my teams.”

 

The Chihulys, in their own countersuit in Federal District Court in Seattle, have dismissed the claim by the former vendor, Michael Moi, as an act of greed and jealousy. They said that Mr. Chihuly’s vision still defines and shapes all art that leaves his studio.

 

“He was a handyman,” Ms. Chihuly said of Mr. Moi’s role in the company, which employs about 100 people in several locations in the Seattle area.

 

Mr. Moi’s lawsuit says that exploitation and uncredited work were built into the Chihuly team system, and that the mental swings of working under a bipolar artist — manic bouts of energy followed by crashes of depression and paranoia — were part of the unpredictable dynamic of how and when work got done, and who did it. Mr. Moi, through his lawyer, declined a request for an interview.

 

“Up-and-down manic cycles were a constant,” the suit says.

 

Certainly, workshops for art, overseen by an artist with a famous name, are nothing new. Painters from Peter Paul Rubens to Rembrandt created elaborate systems of production, as have modern artists like Jeff Koons and Andy Warhol, who famously declared his art to be a factory-produced commodity.

 

And legal experts said that claims of inadequate credit by an underling generally have faced a tough road because courts require proof that the person who filed for a work’s copyright, Mr. Chihuly in this case, intended to share credit of authorship.

 

“I think no one would have even assumed that Chihuly did all his own work, first of all, because there’s too much of it,” said Christine Steiner, a lawyer in Los Angeles who represents galleries, artists and museums, but does no work for Chihuly.

 

In both law and art value assessment, she said, works that go out the door of an artist’s studio, however they are produced, are generally deemed to be a product of that artist’s vision. Because of that, she said she sees little effect on Chihuly art-market values no matter what happens in the case.

 

But the Chihuly case also opens up what many artists say is an uncomfortable and complicated debate about age, infirmity and the foibles of human nature where one person is in control, egos are large, and vast fortunes are being made.

 

“Any artist is going to suck up all the energy in the room,” said Toots Zynsky, a glass artist who studied with Mr. Chihuly in the 1970s and remains friends with him. “So the more you admire someone, the less you should work for them.”

 

Ms. Zynsky trained at the Rhode Island School of Design in the early ’70s, as did Mr. Beers, the architect, when Mr. Chihuly was teaching in the school’s famous glass program. She said she decided early in her career that assistants should never become long-term employees — three years and out became her rule — because she feared she might stunt their style and growth or take too much from them in creating her own art.

 

Another artist who has known Mr. Chihuly for many years said he believes Mr. Chihuly is still making “Chihuly art,” even if others are constructing and finishing it.

 

“As long as Dale can put it down on paper, right to the very end I think he’ll be able to keep going,” said Benjamin Moore, a glass artist in Seattle. But Mr. Moore said he has also been saddened by the attacks on his friend, and the decline in Mr. Chihuly’s vitality over the last decade.

 

“He was such a whirlwind of energy and excitement and enthusiasm, he was like a magnet, drawing the most talented young people around him just to be in his presence to learn,” Mr. Moore said. “But he’s a shell of the man that he was — it breaks my heart.”

 

In the lawsuit, where pretrial motions are underway, Mr. Moi said the level of Mr. Chihuly’s disabilities were never disclosed to art buyers or the public and that Chihuly Studio often intimated that Mr. Chihuly’s paintings were entirely by his own hand. Other legal cases in recent years involving Mr. Chihuly and his former employees — him suing them or vice versa — were settled out of court, but those disputes could be dredged up again in depositions or testimony as the case goes forward.

 

“For years Leslie Chihuly and Chihuly Studio have undertaken efforts to hide Dale’s struggles with mental health and his inability to work on a daily basis, not to protect him, but to ensure that the cash cow known as ‘Chihuly’ continued to moo,” Mr. Moi’s suit says.

 

Mr. Chihuly, who said he now rarely paints for more than an hour or two at a time, perhaps three days a week, was working on a recent morning, surrounded by four assistants. One handed him a brush, then held the paint container at his elbow as he stood over a horizontal glass sheet, partly painted already with specially formulated enamel, composed of ground glass suspended in liquid.

 

“Do you want one over the other, or do you want it side by side?” Mr. Chihuly turned to ask an assistant, Jodie Nelson, referring to the blotched paint dobs that he was about to apply.

 

Ms. Nelson’s response was immediate: “I want what you want.”

 

Mr. Chihuly then proceeded to paint, in sweeping, fast brush strokes as a Bob Dylan song played in the background. The goal, he said, was to approximate, but not fully duplicate, two other glass painted images that would then be put together, fired and then lit for display, creating an illusion of three dimensions, called “Glass on Glass.” The design is still new — only displayed for the first time recently at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas. During a pause, he gestured to one of the glass layer paintings hanging on back wall. “I rejected that one this morning,” he said. “I don’t like the way it looks.”

 

There’s no question Mr. Chihuly has become an institution and created a bridge between decorative and fine arts that some art scholars have compared to Louis Comfort Tiffany. Chihuly Studio creates some 30 site-specific pieces a year, ranging in price from $200,000 to millions of dollars, and has done commissions for collectors like Bill Gates and Bill Clinton. Mr. Chihuly’s show at the New York Botanical Garden, through Oct. 29, has drawn more than 484,000 visitors since April, making it one of most attended exhibitions in the garden’s history.

 

At Chihuly Studio on a recent afternoon, workers were assembling a huge glass chandelier for a university, tinkering with a sculpture scheduled for installation in Union Square Park in New York, and painting flower images on glass in three big warehouselike buildings in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood.

 

Seattle became an art-glass capital largely because of Mr. Chihuly, through the Pilchuck Glass School, a nonprofit academy north of the city that he helped found in 1971, and the two museums built around his work or glass art in general. Chihuly Garden and Glass, which opened in Seattle in 2012 next to the Space Needle, is the city’s top-ranked tourist attraction on TripAdvisor, and has become a cash cow of its own. Admission costs $29, and the gift shops sells everything from Chihuly umbrellas ($36), to blankets ($500), to numbered prints of Chihuly paintings (about $3,000).

 

“Second on my list of things to see, after the Space Needle,” said Alison Yeardley, a fourth-grade teacher from Boston, who was spending three days of her vacation in Seattle and had just left the Chihuly Garden and Museum on a recent morning.

 

Mr. Chihuly said that in looking back over the long arc of his career, he can pretty much pinpoint where his mental state was, in the cycles of up or down. In the mid ’90s, for example, he remembers working for weeks with little sleep on a project to build and hang chandeliers over the canals of Venice. But then a couple of months later, working at Waterford Crystal in Ireland, he said, the cycle turned. “I was depressed, but yet I had my team with me and I could continue to work,” he said.

 

“I like my work when I’m up,” he added. “Van Gogh, you know, he worked when he was depressed as well as when he was up, and I’ve never been able to figure it out.”

 

Mr. Beers, the former student, said he looks back on those early mornings in the glass shop in Rhode Island partly as a response to the practical realities of working in front of a furnace, seizing time before the heat of the day, but also for the quiet sense of calm that seemed part of the experience for Mr. Chihuly and his students.

 

“It was a more peaceful sort of Zen time, that early in the morning,” Mr. Beers said. “Or maybe he just couldn’t sleep, and it was time to get to work.”

Prayer Flag #5: Generosity

 

Oh look! Candy Carnival brought not one or two, but three gifts for your birthday! Wasn't that generous of her?

 

This is another prayer flag that I received in a swap. My favorite part of it is the crocheted flower and leaves. I also love that the bird and branch are hand-stitched in place with big, bold stitches. I told my partner that I liked birds; I put them on a lot of things, including this doll dress.

♫♫♫

Flickriver | Sets | Slideshow

 

Have a beautiful Sunday everyone!

(Londres, Angleterre, Royaume-Uni).

 

(London, England, Großbritannien).

 

(London, England, United Kingdom).

 

// Shots for sale on Getty Images. // Clichés en vente sur Getty Images.

summer nights

 

kim klassen created the most wonderful texture dedicated to summer...she has a generous heart and mad skills and talent. because of her inspiration, many of us are growing in artistic learning and creativity.

 

kim.d is also wonderful and talented, generous and inspiring heart that desires to see us grow, and lends her talent to all who wish to be inspired!

 

thank you to both of these lovely ladies who have helped me reach outside my own box and try something new...and in the process, have fallen IN LOVE!

  

Margaret Olley 1923-2011.

Margaret Olley was born in Lismore as her parents operated a farm near Kyogle. When she was two years old the family move onto a sugar cane property near Tully in northern Queensland but they returned to a sugar cane farm near Murwillumbah in 1931. Margaret then attended the primary school in Murwillumbah with her siblings. She was one of three children in the family of Joseph and Grace Olley. The family sold the sugar cane farm and moved to Brisbane in 1935. For her secondary education Margaret Olley was sent to Somerville House private boarding school in Brisbane which began its life as the Brisbane High School for Girls in 1899. It is currently run by the Presbyterian and Methodist Churches. Margaret attended Somerville House in 1937 through to the end of 1940. Here the art teacher Caroline Barker noted Margaret’s talent for painting and so her mother sent her to Brisbane Central Technical College in 1941 to study art. Olley was not happy with the approach to art in Brisbane and moved to a technical college in Sydney in 1942. She graduated with first class honours from the National Art School in Sydney in 1945. She held her first solo art exhibition in 1948 which was also the year that noted Australian painter William Dobell painted her portrait in a post war fantasy ball gown. His painting won the Archibald Portraiture prize and boosted Margaret Olley’s social and art world profile. She was also painted by Russell Drysdale. When her father died in 1953 she returned to live at the family home in Brisbane. She continued painting and travelling abroad for some years until 1962 when she had sell-out exhibition in the Johnstone Gallery in Brisbane in which she sold 38 paintings at £3,000 each making her the most successful Australian female painter to that time. She began to specialise in still life, flower paintings and work depicting young Aboriginal women. With greater notoriety Olley returned to live in Sydney. For around a decade she lived the love of her life with Sam Hughes who sadly died in 1982 the year in which her mother also died. She continued her world travels in the 1980s especially to France, other parts of Europe, to Asia and to America.

 

Back in the 1940s in Sydney he had met art collector Howard Hinton who bought art works prodigiously and donated most to the Armidale Teachers College which in turn donated them to the current Armidale Regional Art Museum. It was the memory of his donations that began her life of donating her art works to galleries. Over the years she donated extensively to the Art Gallery of NSW, the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra, Queensland Art Gallery, New England Regional Art Museum, Newcastle Regional Art Gallery and to the Tweed Regional Art Gallery in Murwillumbah etc. By 2006 she had donated over 130 paintings to the Art Gallery of New South Wales worth over seven million dollars. Her art donations and her support of younger artists resulted in her being made an Officer of the Order of Australia in 1991 and later she was made a Companion of the Order of Australia. In 1990 she established the Margaret Olley Art Trust to coordinate donations to galleries and in 2008 she donated one million dollars to the Art Gallery of New South Wales for the purchase of an 1888 painting by Paul Cezanne. In her later years in Paddington she developed a strong friendship with painter Ben Quilty who won an Archibald Portraiture prize for his portrait of her in 2011 the year that she died. Her later paintings focussed on flowers and curios and items in her Paddington home. During her life she held over 90 solo art exhibitions. Her colourful home and studio have been recreated in the Tweed Regional Art Gallery in Murwillumbah and she opened one stage of the Tweed Art Gallery in 2006. Her still life paintings are renown for their colourful extravagance which epitomises Margaret Olley’s optimism and passion for life.

 

This camera was generously donated by Mark (Ubique Ulf). It's a beautiful camera and the lens is in great shape. Shutter not working, but that's good excuse to adapt the lens to digital :)

 

Matt (Matt's Crazy Lens Adventures) has a slightly different (newer) version of this camera/lens at www.flickr.com/photos/59224964@N05/albums/72157672959418970 with same nice samples.

Amtrak Generous Electric P32 #59 has a Missouri River Runner train on approach to the Jefferson City station on 07-11-2015. The old Missouri Pacific shops were in the trees on the left.

Once again I'm thanking the generous, wonderful person who has gifted me a Flickr Pro Account.

 

Without this early Christmas gift I would not have been able to continue in keeping a Pro account as the yearly cost has risen beyond that which I can afford.

 

So, with this Gifted Pro Account I will now be around for yet another year.

 

Thanks again "Anonymous" !

generous as always you would come out more loaded than this

Generosity

Letter on reverse generously translated by xiphophlis.

 

"Laon, Sept. 1, 1917,

 

Dear Josef and Emma,

 

Here I want to send you another sign of life and at the same time a photo on which I am doing guard duty. The guy in the back is a Frenchman. So far we are doing quite well, which I hope of you too, and thank God I am also still healthy.

 

Best regards,

 

Alfred."

 

Representatives from at least three different formations outside a magazine of the "K.V.A." - I'm not quite sure what formation the acronym represents at this stage.

 

The beer signs on the door of the magazine suggest there might be more than just ordnance inside.