Young ducks, geese and seagulls- photo post

Today I had an eye appointment. Close to my eye doctor is a little man made pond that's teeming with ducks, geese and seagulls. This time of the year, you get to see lots of adolescents! You can click through to larger versions, but the larger versions are still resized to 25% of the originals.

These ducklings are divers. It was adorable watching them disappear under the water to pop back up a foot away.

Young seagull. Just fyi- they sound adorable squeaking out the normal seagull cry. It also kind of reminds me of  Felonious Gru! 

Really reminds me Gru.

Mama diving duck and her ducklings.

Just a seagull, but I loved the colors in this picture.

This duck seemed as baffled by my daughter wearing heavy, steel-toed boots on an 80 degree day as I am!

Goslings!

I hope you enjoyed the photos!

Fabulous week- with photos!

Mt. Susitna

The photo above was taken earlier this week. We hadn't planned on going to take pictures of Susitna, we actually went the other way for photos of ducks and other wild life. But while we were driving back into town, I was stunned by how pretty the sunset looked, and so we did stop for photos. Click on the photos to see larger versions.

I also saw this piece of graffiti-

Bee the love you seek, I love you all, Forever.

Here are some of the birds we saw at Potter's Marsh that evening.

Seagulls

Bald Eagle in flight

Ducks and a sandpiper

Remember when I said my raspberries had become a nice little thicket?

That started out as 3 canes 3 years ago. Next year should be amazing with all the second and third year canes. We plan to plant some of the smaller canes at my dad's house.

Raspberries and strawberries from my garden. Yum yum! The strawberries started a few years ago as a single hanging basket from Wal*Mart that my husband got me because I really, really wanted strawberries growing in my yard. They needed transplanting fairly quickly, the original plant wasn't in great shape. But it sent off lots of runners. I replanted some of the runners in 2 spaces in my yard. They've been coming back reliably ever since, and sending out more runners. So now I have 2 strawberry patches. Everyone loves to see the strawberries ripen. They are so sweet and big!

In fact, I'm going to go have some soon!

This weekend is our annual Greek Festival, it's always a lot of fun. Baklava and tiny cups of rich, dark coffee, music and dancing. Then Monday Michael has a job interview. My fingers are crossed!

I've been working on a pattern using ruffle yarn. It's a lot of fun.

Gestalt prayer and new beadwork

Gestalt therapy is complicated and controversial, but this "prayer", and gestalt principles had a lot of resonance with hippies, so it was one that I did grow up with hanging in my home.

I do my thing and you do your thing.

I am not in this world to live up to your expectations,

And you are not in this world to live up to mine.

You are you, and I am I, and if by chance we find each other, it’s beautiful.

If not, it can’t be helped.

(Fritz Perls, 1969)

The problem with it for a lot of people is that on the surface, it seems very selfish, but that's not how my mom took it, and not how it was meant. The basic idea is that people need to be self-aware, to view themselves as a whole person and to fulfill their needs in order to be completely functional and to really appreciate other people's needs. It's about making improvements in who we are by not living up to other people's expectations of who we are, and instead really looking in ourselves to see what we want to be and working on that.
(more about Gestalt therapy here)

Anyway, like I said, there was a very popular poster in the 70s that was in a lot of hippies homes, including mine. I decided for my version, that I'd use a photo of seagulls that I took recently.
Click on the image for the larger printable version.

You can share the top version to share on Facebook at Don't Eat the Paste Quotes.

Also! I posted instructions for filigree earrings!