It wasn’t easy to choose but for the final Weekly Photo Challenge of the year I give you a few of my favorites from 2017.
I’ll start with sunrise over the Siuslaw River in Florence on the Oregon Coast.

And follow with my two favorite kitties, Benji and Tiger, green and deep in cat thought.


I’ll move on with my favorite local tree against an unusual cloudy night sky.

And close with this sunset in Maui.

It was a good year.
~ Susanne
Some days the weather outside matches the weather inside. Today was cold and dark, with steady rain and gusty winds. I didn’t feel like it but went out regardless to run some errands. As I left the last store I noticed the rain had stopped though the wind was chasing the clouds fiercely across the sky. They raced in glorious shades of white, some like snow, some like wool or pale yellow and gray. And finally some brilliant, infused with sun, all against increasing blue patches of sky.



I sometimes forget how the clouds only make the sky more beautiful.
~ Susanne
I love to retrieve a place again whenever the need arises. And so as we enter the dark days of winter, it’s time to revisit the land of the Sun, where palm trees reach high into clear blue skies.

And the heat is almost unbearable you think as you walk the trails of the Desert Botanical Garden.

Where desert plants thrive and cacti abound, including my favorite, the saguaro.

These cacti crawl like snakes on the ground.

While this purple variety is pure loveliness.

So is the monarch feeding on desert flowers

And the quail standing coyly among the thorns.

Was it only last month?
~ Susanne
I was raised in West Seattle and rarely ventured into other parts of the City, save for the occasional trip downtown or jaunt to the Zoo. And so I’d never been to Green Lake until we moved to the north end rather unexpectedly (at least to me) the summer before I started high school. I was immediately smitten and spent much of that first summer at the park, swimming, walking, bicycling and just hanging out at the lake.
The neighborhood is more built up now (and too expensive a place for mere mortals to live), yet when I visited over the weekend I found it still friendly and accessible, with parking available at the Community Center.

At 2.75 miles, the paved path around the lake is perfect for people of all ages. Though already December and frosty, it was a beautiful day and many were out enjoying the fresh air and fall color.



When I made it to the Aqua Theatre on the south end of the lake, I knew I was on the home stretch. The Aqua Theatre was built in 1950 for the ‘Aqua Follies,’ and featured such acts as synchronized swimming and diving in its heyday (think Esther Williams) and other musical productions. By the late sixties it even featured Led Zeppelin and the Grateful Dead, before falling into disuse and disrepair.

A shell of its former self, it’s now used by joggers who wish to add to their exercise routines by running up and down the stairs. I tried that once. Once was enough.

I continued on my way and found this tree perfectly reflected in the calm lake.

An hour later I was back to where I started, slower than most perhaps but just as refreshed.

Green Lake Park was included in the comprehensive plan developed by the Olmsted Brothers for the City of Seattle in 1905. By then much of the land around the lake had been homesteaded and so the creative design firm had the lake lowered to create more public shoreline. I’m glad they did. It remains one of the most popular parks in the City.
~ Susanne


~ Benji
I’m not sure what I was looking for by returning. It was years and years ago when I attended Frank B. Cooper school, kindergarten through 6th grade. But it was the school’s 100th anniversary and the building, now the Youngstown Cultural Arts Center, where artists live and work, would be open for celebration and tours.
But why go? Was I hoping to run into childhood friends? (Maybe.) Did I hope to trigger memories that were no doubt bound up in those indescribable hallway sounds and smells? Warm sandwiches left in lockers, new shoes shuffling on heavy floors, recess bells? Whatever the reason, I made the trek to the old school on Delridge Way, and was met by that overpass, still standing, though empty and lonely of children.


I entered through the front and was welcomed by young greeters. Had I ever been there before they asked? (Um, yes, maybe 50 years ago?) There were other alumni visiting they said and encouraged me to look around. I could take a tour of the artists quarters too if I liked. I did a bit of both.

Almost reverently I walked through the building, tracing steps from long ago till I found the stairs I’d climbed many times before.

It was 4th grade, and I was with my best friend Joyce, the one with perfectly blond hair (she was Scandinavian and her hair was almost white, and sleek and straight.) We were debating who was the best, Paul Revere and the Raiders (her choice) or the Monkees (mine), when Miss Warner interrupted and told us to stop acting like monkeys. How we laughed at her words though I felt my group had been impugned.

There was the auditorium/lunchroom where we bought hot lunches for 35 cents from smiling ladies wearing soft shoes, dressed in white aprons and hair nets. I loved the hamburgers where much of the meat was stretched with oatmeal; and who can forget the ice cream sandwiches? Weren’t they 12 cents?

We ate in the same room that served us up assemblies and Disney movies after school and where I stood on the stage and spoke a part in the Christmas program.

I visited the gym and wondered how we’d played ‘red rover’ and ‘soak out’ in such a small space. (Did they still play the game where we got people ‘out’ with the sting of a red rubber ball? I doubt it.) Somehow, we even had room to square dance to ‘pistol packin’ mama’, a song I’m pretty sure is no longer welcomed on school grounds.
And who could forget the naughty kids being sent to the Principal’s Office where they sometimes got the paddle for their foolery?

Not me. I was an ‘office girl’ behind the desk, answering the phones with ‘Cooper School student speaking.’ (I guess I was destined to be in an office.)
I wandered the hallways for an hour or so, taking pictures and looking for memories and stories to tell, perhaps hoping for an epiphany. Or perhaps waiting to meet someone from the old days. Neither happened. Or did it? Maybe the old friends were there under gray hair and lined smiling faces? And maybe the stories were found but are still waiting to be told? We shall see.
~ Susanne
I must admit that ‘cheeky’ is not a word I use (does anyone?) Still, for this week’s photo challenge, I give you the always adorable, and oft times cheeky, Benji.
