Weekly Photo Challenge: Changing Seasons

Posted in Challenges by Annie T

This week’s WordPress Daily Post Weekly Photo Challenge is “Changing Seasons.” I recently decided that my favorite time of year is in fact the transition period between seasons so I think this topic is fantastic!

Matt and I have lived in our house for nearly two years now and I often find myself taking photos of the view from the north-facing edge of our tiny deck. I have amassed quite a collection of photos throughout the changing seasons so I’ll use this Photo Challenge as an excuse to share some of them!

Do you have any favorite photos that illustrate “Changing Seasons” ? Please feel free to link to them below or link to your blog if you are also participating in the Weekly Photo Challenge!

7Dec2012

25 Days of Christmas: Days 1-7

Posted in Challenges by Annie T

(5) Santa: Just an ornament; I haven't seen Santa yet this year

(2) Decorations: Our house is all decked out!

(6) Stocking: We don't have stockings so these will have to do!

(7) Snow: Queen of the snow drifts! (2010)

Here are my photos for Days 1-7 of the 25 Days of Christmas Challenge!

Day 1 – Lights – Looking up through a light tree at Longwood Gardens
Day 2 – Decorations – I know, more lights! But this is how we have decorated our house this year. Icicle lights all around!
Day 3 – Gifts – We haven’t wrapped any presents yet this year so these are some gifts from two years ago.
Day 4 – Tradition – This is our advent calendar! We stash candy and goodies behind each little door for each other. Matt gets the odd days and I get the even!
Day 5 – Santa – Our snazzy, sparkly Santa ornament.
Day 6 – Stockings – We don’t have stockings but we do have these awesome red boots!
Day 7 – Snow – I couldn’t decide on this so I chose two. One shows Bailey on a huge snow drift during the winter of 2010 and the other is a road that we take on our drive to work.

Craving more 25 Days of Christmas fun? Go visit Pami at Pa-BLAM and Katie at Kitchen Notes and Other Sundries… they are doing the 25 Days of Christmas Challenge, too!

3Dec2012

Streaking, Reflections, and Other December Challenges

Posted in Challenges by Annie T

I don’t usually take part in online challenges but I am making several exceptions this month! Here’s a quick run down of the fun challenges that I will be participating in for December:

1. I’m Going Streaking!!

As a part of the Runner’s World “Streak,” I have committed to run, walk, or elliptical at least 1 mile every day between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. I completed my mile for day 12 of the streak this morning and I feel great!

“Streaking” is a big deal for me because, although I was a runner in college, I’ve really done very, very little running since graduating in 2007. I am usually quite content to come home from work and make dinner/watch TV/blog/do anything besides exercise. But all of that has changed since I started my streak on Thanksgiving. Now I actually wake up BEFORE work (something I never would have believed that I’d ever do!) and I elliptical my mile while groggily watching the morning traffic and news. It’s an awesome feeling to come home from work and know that I have already finished my exercising for the day. 🙂

I have to give a quick shout out to Jocelyn from Running Noodle because without Jocelyn I never would have known that the Streak challenge existed. I read Jocelyn’s “Streaking” Post last winter and decided then and there that I would try streaking myself this year. I learned this weekend that streaking is actually a whole blog/twitter/social media “thing” with it’s own hashtag (#RWStreak) so I guess I’ll start tagging my streaking posts from now on!

2. Weekly Photo Challenge: REFLECTION

I kept seeing posts with beautiful “reflection” photos featured in my WordPress reader so I did some investigating and learned that WordPress sponsors a Weekly Photo Challenge. It’s easy to participate so I thought this would be a fun way to add to my December challenges. I think to actually join the challenge properly I need to create a brand new post titled “Weekly Photo Challenge: Reflection” but this post will have to suffice for week 1.

I have two photos featuring reflections for this week. The first (above) is a rare self-portrait of me taking a photo of Bailey via the car’s rear view mirror. She loves car rides! (Ignore my wrinkly forehead… I was thinking hard!) The second (below) is a photo of a Delmarva DockDog named Sam. I love how Sam and his toy are converging with their reflections!

3. 25 Days of Christmas Photo Challenge

Yes, another photo challenge. (When I decide to do something I go all out!) I learned about this photo challenge from Pami at Pa-BLAM. There’s a nice holiday-themed topic for each day and, like Pami, I will probably do a post every 7 days or so with the photos from the previous week. I’m going to have to rely on some holiday photo archives for a few of these though… I mean, I HOPE that I see snow on December 7th but at this point that’s not looking too likely!

OK, well that just about sums up my December challenges. I think that #3 is going to be really fun but overall I am most excited about Streaking. Wish me luck! 🙂