Friday's Fave Five

I've never posted on Friday's favorite Five but I really like the idea and have been lurking for a while. I enjoy reading the posts I have visited. It's about time I added my part to it!! So here goes. I added some photos I took tonight on a walk around the park.

1) I love paths. I've said it before here, and am always drawn to walk on a path, seek out paths especially the ones that are less travelled. I wonder who before me has travelled the path, where the path might lead, what I will learn on the way through the path. Lots of things to like about paths!!

2) It is hard to tell here but the wind is really blowing. Its gusting about 30 or more miles per hour and the wind is warm and soft. I love walking on windy days, feeling the breeze against my skin, the gentle push against me as I walk. I am one that would be out in a hurricane trying to challenge my ability to push through what it throws at me. I love the wind!!!

3) I love Fall for all the crisp layers of leaves fallen from the trees, just begging to be walked through!! I don't much like raking leaves, unless it is into piles so I can turn around and shuffle my way right through the middle of the pile. I love the crisp crunch of dry fallen leaves.

4) Blue Cheese!! I did not like blue cheese for the better part of 40 years and have just discovered its creamy sharp yumminess thanks to my neighbour who forced me to try it and see what I was missing.

5) Halloween candy season and I am munching on a Skor Chocolate bar as I write this. I stole them all out of the chocolate box and now have a stash in the freezer. Oh and they taste great too with a glass of Shiraz!!

Please visit http://susannesspace.blogspot.com/ to read other entries to Friday's Favorite Five!! Its great reading!!

Chicken Wings - Tex-Mex style

About once a week or so, my hubby and I enjoy having Chicken Wings for dinner. Its a very casual dinner, one where its okay to eat with your fingers, get all sticky and gooey and for sure its okay to lick your fingers during eating!! I have a lot of different recipes for Chicken Wings so we don't have to eat the same old kind each time we cook wings. I think we would not enjoy them so much if we weren't adventurous and trying different things with them.

I often thought about putting recipes here for everyone to share and finally have jumped in and taken the plunge!!

These wings are called Tex-Mex Wings. I found this recipe in a local paper so had to try them. Not too many ingredients, just oil, spices and hot sauce.
In a large bowl, combine Olive Oil, Ground Cumin, Paprika, Ground Oregano, Chili Powder, and hot sauce to taste. Add salt to taste as well.

Stir all ingredients to make a paste.

Add Chicken wings to the bowl and stir to coat the wings.

You probably should get right in there and make sure the coating is evenly distributed over all the wings.

Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper and arrange the wings over top. Bake in oven preset to 425 degrees for 30 to 35 minutes.

The recipe also calls for Avacado Dip to go with the wings, but I didn't have some of those ingredients here, so did not make it.

Tex-Mex Wings with Avacado Dip.

1 ripe, medium avacado, peeled and cubed

1/3 cup light sour cream

3 TBSP. Fresh Lime Juice

1 TBSP. Honey

Place all these four ingredients in a food processor and pulse until smooth. Transfer to a serving bowl, cover and refridgerate until ready to serve.

12 Chicken Wingettes

12 Chicken Drumettes

2 TBSP. Olive Oil

2 tsp. Ground Cumin

2 tsp. Chili Powder

1 tsp. Ground Oregano

1/2 tsp. Paprika

2 to 3 tsp. Hot Sauce, such as Tabasco, or to taste

Salt to taste.

Lime wedges for garnish.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Place the chicken and remaining ingredients in a bowl, toss to combine, and then arrange on the baking sheet. Bake 30 to 35 minutes, turning once or until cooked through. Arrange wings on a platter with the avacado dip alongside. Garnish with lime slices and serve.

I served carrot and celery sticks and sugar peas along side as well. It goes great with a glass of wine as well!!

Hope you enjoy!!

Today's Flowers

Today's Flowers pictures were taken in Fort Langley at the Cranberry Festival a couple of weeks ago. This is in a little courtyard Coffee shop off the main street of Fort Langley.

Flower pot next to a bench overgrown onto bench.

The last of the Petunias. I love the purple coloured petunias the most!!

For more flowers please visit http://flowersfromtoday.blogspot.com/

Dreams

I don't remember many of my dreams, just the odd occasional one that brings me to conciousness with its last tendrils of unreality swirling about my sleepy brain. I know most nights I do dream, but the dreams are far gone in the morning light.
So when I do have a dream that jerks me from sound sleep and stays with me for the day I try to look at it and deduce its hidden messages. I've heard that dreams are the lives we should be living in our awakened states. They carry the messages we can't deny, the things we long to say, the beliefs we should not scoff at. Our hidden thoughts. Portents of the future.
I had a dream of having a hole in the side of my leg that bothered me, one that I kept scratching until the hole grew and the inside was revealed. I reached in and grabbed with two fingers a swatch of hair and pulled. I pulled and pulled and a long strand of hair kept coming and coming and coming out. I just pulled and pulled. I could see this like it was really happening, feel the hair coming out of my leg, feel inside the hole and inside my leg the sensation of it coming out. I felt more and more drained as this happened and could see my self become smaller and smaller the more I pulled. I was pulling mself apart. I was literally pulling my hair out.
Why it came out of my right leg above the knee I don't know.
If there is a hidden meaning to the dream I think it is telling me to watch my stress levels. They have been high as of late.
My hubby thinks I've been really tired lately, maybe the dream has to do with being drained of energy.
It seems like harsh symbolism to me, but I am bothered enough by it to slow down and take it easy.

Macro Monday

Its almost time, just about....................................................................................

For guess what????

For more pictures of Macro Monday please visit http://lisaschaos.com/

Today's Flowers

How could you not turn your face up to a beautiful blue sunny sky?? For more photos of Today's Flowers please visit http://flowersfromtoday.blogspot.com/

A Different Perspective

I am taking a photography course at the local university and one of my homework assignments was to take photos of something from different angles. There are lots of fallen leaves around right now and this one caught my attention. Its kind of a good lesson on life as well to be able to look at things from all perspectives, and how just changing one aspect of something can change the whole picture and view.

Looking at something from only one angle such as the top part of this leaf leaves out the entire back view. And if you can only look at something from one angle you are not seeing the big picture.

We just had a big shake up at work where the director's changed the entire schedules of the employees who work at our company. Of course they are only going to give a number of reasons for such a drastic change, maybe one or two perspectives without giving the entire big picture. It doesn't help the staff who want to see why something like this that affects them so much could happen and they can only see a partial picture.

I guess some things are only visible in hindsight.

I think those might the harder lessons in life to learn.

Skywatch Friday

Here are a few pictures I took, straight out of the camera, yesterday at Willband Creek. It is a natural bird sanctuary between our town and the next town over. I put my camera down on the path for this picture, just to get a different point of view. The sky is cloudy here, kind of grey out. A bit further into the sanctuary, a shot over the small lake.

Another shot overlooking one of the ponds. The sky in this direction was partly cloudy. Not too many trees around here, I was really looking for some colour!!!

For more pictures of skies around the globe, please visit http://skyley.blogspot.com/

This and That

One of my favorite things about this season is the fall colours. Another of my favorite things are the leaves that fall off the trees and form nice crisp leaves on the ground to walk through. No matter what my day has been like, I can always feel lifted up just by taking a walk on a cool fall day and enjoy the colours of the season.

This season speaks to me of slowing down, taking stock of everything in my life to be grateful for, enjoying the moment because it won't be here much longer and making preparations for things to come. Soon enough the weather will turn, the days get longer and darker and colder but for today I am enjoying this time, this season, this moment.

Today's Flowers

Here is a few pictures I took last weekend at Colony Farm Park for Today's Flowers. A bee searching for pollen. I think these are cosmos, not sure.

Fall is coming fast here, the colours of the trees right now are gorgeous, and the last of the flowers are still present.

It was a beautiful fall day, I love how the bright colours of the flowers are against the blue sky.

For more pictures of Today's Flowers, please visit http://flowersfromtoday.blogspot.com/

Happy Thanksgiving to all!!!

Skywatch Friday

I have a little explaining to do about this picture. I went out to Colony Farm Park last weekend, as you can see it was a beautiful sunny warm fall day. I stood at the start of the river path, and took this first picture of the day.
It was the very first picture I took, just up and pointed my camera in this direction and snapped the photo and this is what I got.
Now that morning I had downloaded the few pictures on my camera and re-formatted the memory disk so nothing was on the memory card to account for this. It looks like it could be a double image but I swear there is nothing like this out there, those big trees imaged against the blue sky do not exist, nor does the images you see in the grass. This is straight out of the camera, no touch ups on it at all. Halloween is coming up so its a kind of spooky skywatch photo for you all. The bright blue sky was the order of the day.
The EXIF info about the picture just states one picture, no double image. I can't explain it, neither could my Photography instructor explain it.
Anybody out there explain this???

For more Skywatch Friday pictures from around the globe, please visit http://skyley.blogspot.com/

Watery Wednesday

This is one of the photos that I took for my Photography course to show large Depth of Field but it works perfectly for Watery Wednesday.

I am loving the fall colours as they start to come out here. The blue skies reflecting in the water and the sandy bottom of the river allow you to see all the way to the bottom. I looked but did not see any fish here. There is a path along the river to walk on as well. It is a great place to go for some nature and nurture!!

For more photos of Watery Wednesday please visit http://waterywednesday.blogspot.com/

Macro Monday

I am finally back to having Internet at the house after nearly one month without it. We had to switch internet providers to get it but in the end I am sure it will be well worth the effort. Our business is all tied up in our other internet provider and it will be a while before we are completely changed over to the next. So I should be happy about that but then other things can happen in your day to make it not so sunny. A business meeting at work where I will have to go to work tomorrow and deliver some disturbing news makes me sad today. I don't know how someone can sell a "impending change" to others whose lives it will affect in a big way and which you do not believe in is possible. And you have no control over. Life is going to be crazy for a while.
I took this picture this weekend at a Community Garden I went to visit. I just think it looks like a big bowl of sunshine and it makes me a bit more happy just to look at it. So it is my Macro Monday Picture. I hope you like it as much as I do!!
For more pictures of Macro Monday please visit http://lisaschaos.com/

P.S. I forgot the Macro Monday avatar, I am so sorry.....