Here’a a shadow shot of my friend’s sofa in the Bronx, New York. For more interesting shadows of all kinds, visit Shadow Shot Sunday, aka Hey Harriet.

My recent trip to New York included a truly wonderful trip downtown to Chinatown and Little Italy, which is right there alongside of it, although smaller than it used to be. There are sidewalk cafes everywhere and the best place to go for pastry and sweets is Ferrara’s. Here is a street scene, and the outside of Ferrara’s where they serve yummy gelato (Italian ice cream) and my favorite, the pastry display. This is only a small section of what they have! If you go, try the Baba au Rhum. A plain looking but completely fabulous experience, but not for teetotalers.

We have a road in Seattle, the Viaduct, that is not very safe in case of a big earthquake, so they are probably going to tear it down and build a tunnel, but oh, the views from that marvellous road going north into town. I considered cropping this so you could see the birds on the lamppost on the left side of the road, and eliminating the road altogether, but I decided to leave it as taken. It’s a great road.

For more skies around the world, visit Skywatch Friday.

This is part of my backyard, and my neighbor’s yard beyond the little fence, just two weeks ago. The show is over now, but with the magic of photography, the moment lives on. I am happy that I planted all those bulbs last fall, even though it was such a short, but intense, pleasure. I feel that gardening is a very green activity, and if you’d like to see other photo interpretations of the idea of green, visit Think Green Thursday.

This fountain/art piece was somewhere in midtown Manhattan, not far from Rockefeller Center. If anyone knows the name of the artist or more about it, I’d like to know. I’ve never seen anything like it.

I prefer the first photo with my friend JoAnne marvelling at the noisy rush of water all around her, but the one below that shows more of it. Enjoy the Watery Wednesday post, and visit there for many more watery photos.

Today is my dear sister-in-law Shree’s birthday. We were together in the fabulous Steinhardt Garden in Mt. Kiscoe recently, and what a photo op she provided with her slicker and umbrella. A Ruby Tuesday post just for you, and many happy returns!

I belong to a garden club, and my favorite part is that every three months, people get together and bring things they’ve grown that are beautiful. I find them irresistable to photograph. Here’s a sprig of azaleas, oops, now I see they are rhododendrons!, a peachy pink color that I am in love with. And if you’d like more pink, hie on over to Pink Saturday.

This rhodie photo is one of my absolute faves, so I think I’ll include it for Shadow Shot Sunday and Flowers for Today, and what the heck, let’s go for Macro Monday while we’re on a roll. All those meme sites have super participation from talented photographers, so take a look.

This is not my garden; again it’s from the Bronx Botanical Garden in New York City. This section was to inspire and inform the home gardener. While I have planted vegetable beds with flowers in them, I have never seen the plants planted in diagonal rows. So simple, but such a great idea. If you are going to have neat rows, might as well be at an angle, for pretty.

I like this photo for Think Green Thursday because to me the idea of growing your own food is about as green as you can get, especially if you do it the simple, cheap way with kitchen compost to enrich the soil, seeds, and there you go. No expensive supplies needed, just a bit of know how. Just ask a gardener and you’ll learn enough to get you going.

Just for the heck of it, here is a photo of the raised beds from October of 2007 in my last house. The string trellis at the right is for the flat peas which were already done by then. It was a nice garden, but the current one will be even nicer, eventually.

In one of the back areas of the incredible and huge Conservatory in the Bronx Botanical Garden in New York City, I found this fountain. The sound of splashing water was wonderful, and the air smelled so good. I like the way the water looks dark and mysterious.

For more photos of water in its many manifestations, visit Watery Wednesday.

Yet another photo from the Bronx Botanical Garden and my recent New York City trip. This was taken in the beginning of May, and the peonies were ALMOST ready to pop. For more ruby redness of all kinds, go to Ruby Tuesday, a fine place in blogland if ever there was one.