Two Flower Photos in my Zazzle Store

I took both of these flower photos in Bend on August 9, 2009. Now both are on products in my Zazzle store. Which photo do yo like best? I think the top one would make a nice mousepad.

My Web Page: Tapirback.com

Dec 31, Part 1 - Bend, Oregon: Weekend Reflections, "Warm Inside"

We were supposed to drive to Portland today (three hours, crossing the high desert and the pass over Mt. Hood), but a snow storm started early with anticipated freezing rain still to come, making today one of the worst driving days all year if it pans out. I took this photo at Starbucks around 8:00 a.m, while we were still discussing whether or not to hit the road. Now at 10:48, I'm home, still watching the flakes turn into inches. We'll put off the drive to Portland until tomorrow. The photo? Nothing special, just a reflection of the day, but I've always liked these hanging orange lamps.

See more Weekend Reflections here . . . but I'm a day early. You may have to wait until Saturday.

Dec 28, Bend: Cold and warm

The wall across the street that retains the ground for the church and its parking lot finally looked interesting today with snow emphasizing its lines.

Usually Safeway is one of the coldest places in town, but today it seemed positively warm in contrast with the outdoors, and the colors felt warm compared to the outside black and white winterland.

Some apples and eggs. Let's just ignore the M&Ms and Reese's Bars. We've been snacking on cookies this season already. Mmmmmm.

Safeway from the outside. Cold.

Toward evening we went out again. I thought the antennae on this truck were amusing. Someone adapted it rather creatively to hold pipes.

This is Paul's building. It's just been painted. I like the colors and I like the lights.

Speaking of lights, I haven't taken that many photos this year with Christmas lights (nor in any other year, but I've taken a lot more photos this year, so it would seem that I'd have more of lights, too). I think it's been cold both here and Astoria, and not very tempting to stand outside and try to get exposures right. Inside this rug store, I thought I'd take a pic of this funky reindeer. Kinda cute. He has personality, anyway.

Dec 26, Bend: Splashes of color in a black and white world

We drove into Bend last night in the dark, and weren't able to see the fairy kingdom made by frozen fog on trees and bushes until this morning. I took all of the photos in this post in color, and I didn't change the color in Photoshop. A few of the photos came out really well. Others are included to help me remember the day.

There was only a dusting of frost on the ground - no snow - but every branch and needle were covered in lacy white, making the green of the trees look more black than green by contrast. After this week, I won't be back to Bend for a number of months, so I've included a lot of photos in today's post. It was magical being out in these conditions.

First stop, Starbucks, where the papers were full of the news of the fizzled "device on Flight 253. This is when I realized what an entirely different feel the day would have had if the thing had gone off - not only for family and friends of the passengers, but for everyone. Of course, the news continued to be filled with bits about airport security failures, failures to make use of information in databases, etc. The consequences will not be over at the end of the day, even though (thankfully), the passengers touched down safely.

We stopped in a parking lot, because we wanted to take photos of various plants we'd seen along the roadside. There were a few colorful leaves on this dark green bush.

This one came out really well. It may help to enlarge it.

I took this because I liked the shape of the small trees. When I saw it, I liked the color in the otherwise-monochromatic scheme.

Heh. Iced mocha today? Actually, I've been getting cold coffee drinks lately, but not at McDonald's.

Aesthetically, I could have left this one out, but I like the variety of trees covered in frost.

Approaching the traffic circle.

This is one of the things I wanted to photograph. I like the deer in the wreath and the feathery white background. Bend has sculptures of one sort or another in every traffic circle in town, or nearly all of them. Some are realistic and some are not. I think the city has done a nice job trying to beautify the sterile new streets.

The exposure isn't quite right here, but I liked the sun glow on the trees that were painted on the door to Pine Mountain Sports. It looked very nice as we entered.

We stopped at Strictly Organic for some breakfast burritos, and this was the view out the window in front of the counter where you can sit down to eat. I've had their coffee before, and I think it's the worst I've ever had anywhere. In fact, after much consideration, I threw it out. But their burritos were fantastic.

The bell-shaped lights are reflections from inside Strictly Organic.

The "numbers" they give you that correspond with your order aren't numbers at all, but countries. Funny that we got Tanzania, because Lee will be there on his upcoming trip, so he was able to show me his route and where he'd be staying. I'm certainly looking forward to the photos.

More reflections, more frost. I like the shape of the arch in the bricks, too.

I took this out the other window. I like a number of the elments here, but the first thing that caught my eye was the unusual coloring of the trim.

Again from the cafe window: red, red, nice shapes of the bike rack, and a square within a square.

In the corner of the room behind us as we were eating, was this nice tree painted on the wall.

The counter where we ate was cool. I think it must be palm wood in laminated rectangles. The next photo shows what nature can do in Creative Design class.

Isn't that wonderful? The smaller dots look like a jaguar's coat.

I'm not sure why I included this one. It was just part of the moment.

Strictly Organic supplies water for dogs. But today a dog would need an ice pick.

Frosty bike. Cool bike rack design.

I've taken pictures of these grates before and liked the color better without the frost, but this time I noticed the type: It says, "Bend, Oregon - Est. 1905."

Oak leaves. I love the pale brown.

This is one of my favorite pix of the day. I took it through the windshield of the car, looking at the lacy white-on-white trees on the right, but it turned into a nice composition, and and love the colored sign, too. We were almost home.

Oct 10, Bend: Morning colors and things on the tops of buildings

There are always unusual things to take pictures of in Bend, Oregon. On the way to a garage sale this morning, I spied this found-metal fish on top of someone's garage. Very Bend.

Down the street was more garage art. What the heck is this horse doing on the point of the garage roof? Who knows. Maybe they couldn't part with it after it wore out. Anyway, it's something a little different.

Of course, this is also the time to be enchanted by trees turning colors. Some turn faster than others, and they turn such a variety of colors.

It's also a good time to find native high-desert plants in flower - at least, I think this is a native sage.

The trees on Wall Street near Revere were screaming red.

Here's a closer-up view of the same trees.

And more sagebrush, also on Wall Street near the highway entrance.

The flowers on the brush are subtle, and so pretty this time of year.

Flowers with more of the sage. The dusty colors complement each other perfectly.

I also like the gratings around the young trees in this part of town.

Here's one with a touch of Autumn showing.

These leaves are more withered than showing the natural trend of the season. The colors are here, but they are also fading rather than glowing as brightly as they otherwise would. A freak early snowstorm on October 4th (seen here on Lee's Bend, Oregon, Daily Photo blog) zapped the life (or part of it) right out of many of the plants here.

I left this photo in mainly to remind me that I want to go back and photograph some of the old buildings in this area. They are definitely frontier era, and quite charming, even though sometimes hard to photograph between the cars and behind the power lines. This one is on Revere Avenue and Division Street.

Today is Laurel's birthday. Happy 28th!!! We called, but were sorry we weren't there to help celebrate. Laurel, if you read this, I or we will be bringing something to Astoria for you by Wednesday or before. See you then :)