Seven Days Black & White Photo Challenge – Day 7

Seven days, seven black and white photos of my life. No people. No explanation. Day 7.  Challenge someone every day.  Today I challenge The Lantern Room

If I pick you and you don’t feel like participating or if you’ve already taken up the challenge, that’s fine.  I understand.

A Photo A Week Challenge – Threes

This week, Nancy Merrill is asking us to look for groups of three for her Photo A Week Challenge.  Having found plenty of twos for Cee’s B&W Photo Challenge, I realized that coming up with threes was not going to be quite so easy.

Three sea lions at the zoo.  This picture was taken some years ago and I’m having a hard time remembering where but I think it may have been at the zoo in Indianapolis.

Three beautiful blooms at the Orchid Festival in the Chicago Botanic Garden.

Three naked ladies, part of a fantastic music machine at The House on the Rock in Spring Green, Wisconsin.

Three pelicans preening on the Mississippi River in Davenport, Iowa.

 

Three jockeys entering the enclosure before a big race at Arlington Park, Illinois.

Three koi swimming in a pool at Anderson Japanese Gardens in Rockford, Illinois.

For more on Nancy’s A Photo A Week Challenge go to A Photo a Week Challenge: Threes

Weekly Photo Challenge – It IS Easy Being Green

This week’s Photo Challenge at The Daily Post, set for us by Michelle, points to the fact that it is easy being green, despite what some frogs may tell you.

A frog working on a spot of lawn care for the Ribbit Exhibit at the Morton Arboretum in Lisle, Illinois.

A green scene at the Green Bay Botanic Gardens, Wisconsin.

An interesting feature at the Glensheen Mansion in Duluth, Minnesota.

A lively sculpture of children playing ball at the Frederik Meijer Gardens in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

In the Garden of the Gnomes at the Vander Veer Botanical Park in Davenport, Iowa.

And Allo Allo; a little tank at Cantigny Park in Wheaton, Illinois.

For more on The Weekly Photo Challenge at The Daily Post go to https://dailypost.wordpress.com/photo-challenges/it-is-easy-being-green/

Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Orange & Green

Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge this week calls for images that included the colors orange & green. 

An orange signpost amongst the greenery points the way to a gnome garden at the Vander Veer Botanical Park in Davenport, Iowa.

Not only did we find gnomes in the garden but also beautiful orange canna lilies.

An orange dinosaur crushing pumpkins on the green at Goebberts Farm in South Barrington.

Pumpkins and other kinds of squash in a slightly more tranquil environment at the Morton Arboretum.

Despite the fact that this orange truck only has a hint of green, I find my eye immediately drawn to the color, perhaps because it is something of a leading line.  Found at Bluesmobile Cruise Night in Mount Prospect.

We found this old tractor at West Street Sculpture Garden in Galena. Artist John Martinson works with scrap metal to make some interesting if rather bizarre pieces of sculpture and we weren’t entirely sure whether this was one of the exhibits or just something that he uses to move the pieces around. I think probably the latter.

A hummingbird and flower made of Lego on display at the Morton Arboretum in Lisle.

For more on Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge go to http://ceenphotography.com/2015/11/17/cees-fun-foto-challenge-the-colors-orange-and-green/

 

 

 

Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Anything Man-Made

Once again, Cee has provided a golden opportunity for me to share some recently-taken pictures that I might otherwise not have easily been able to categorize, with her Fun Foto Challenge which this week is about Anything Man-Made.

No sight is more welcome to a weary traveler than a rest area which is, in itself, man-made, but there can sometimes be an added attraction as we discovered  on our recent trip to Salt Lake City. Not only did we get to do all the things that you normally do when you stop at a rest area but we were also able to look at some interesting art work.

Our first stop in Iowa presented us with Harvest, a sculpture by artist Tom Stancliffe. Originally from the Chicago area, Tom now lives in Iowa. Harvest is made of silicon bronze and stainless steel.

In Nebraska there’s a piece by George Baker called Nebraska Wind Sculpture. You might miss it if you don’t walk all the way to the back of the rest area but fortunately, since ‘walking about’ is one of my prime reasons for stopping while on the road, I eventually discovered this particular artwork in a small pond.

Also in Nebraska we found this granite sculpture called Nebraskan Gateway by Anthony Padovado.

Up/Over by Linda Howard was among ten pieces by various artists commissioned as part of Nebraska’s celebration of the Nation’s Bicentennial. We saw this one at the Ogallala west-bound rest area before driving on to Wyoming.

On the way home we stopped in Tiffin, Iowa and saw this literary monument. I must just say here that as well as getting to enjoy all this amazing artwork, the rest areas were very clean and well maintained thus helping to make a long road trip a little less tedious.

For more on Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge go to http://ceenphotography.com/2015/10/06/cees-fun-foto-challenge-anything-man-made/

Weekly Photo Challenge: Boundaries

The Weekly Photo Challenge set for us by Ben Huberman at The Daily Post is Boundaries. As Ben points out, boundaries come in many different guises, social and physical, so with that in mind here is my take on this week’s subject.

Sometimes the boundary between two places is marked by a body of water such as the mighty Mississippi River. This image shows the river as seen from the Riverwalk in Dubuque, Iowa, and in the distance, East Dubuque, Illinois.

Sometimes crossing a similar boundary can even mean entering another country so have your passport ready. The Bluewatwer Bridge, seen from Thomas Edison Parkway in Michigan, spans the St Clair River and leads to Point Edward, Ontario in Canada.

Other boundaries are far less imposing. White, wooden fences separate the fields at St James Farm in Warrenville, Illinois.

This sign outside Lambeau Field in Green Bay sets out a code of conduct beyond which boundaries a good Packers fan would not even consider crossing! Right!

The boundaries of this stockade at the old Apple River Fort in Elizabeth, Illinois were not only physical but were probably a boundary between life and death itself.  After the onset of The Black Hawk War in 1832, the original fort was built around a settlement housing approximately 40 people in less than a week, and was the only one to be attacked by a band of warriors led by Black Hawk himself. The battle is said to have lasted for about an hour after which Black Hawk eventually withdrew leaving only one militia fighter dead and one wounded. Elizabeth Armstrong was singled out for her help in defending the fort and it is possibly in her honor that the name of the town was later taken.

For more on the Weekly Photo Challenge go to https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_photo_challenge/boundaries/