Photography

Cellpic Sunday—The Country Fair

~ MaryG ~ 7 Comments

My church runs an annual “country fair” which serves as both a fundraiser for the church and a fall festival for the town. A portion of the proceeds are donated to a local nonprofit each year.

It’s always in early October and it has been going on for decades. Different teams work to prepare and then implement the various revenue areas: the book sale, the country store, “trash & treasure,” face painting, bake sale, etc.

For the past few years, I’ve worked jewelry. We get a tremendous amount of jewelry donated by members and friends of the church throughout the year—everything from diamond rings to Mardi Gras beads.

Sorting, pricing and displaying it is a big job! There are about five of us that usually handle this task, with Julie being our fearless leader. Julie is a former Peace Corps volunteer and retired high school teacher with an eye for precious metals. She’s extremely good at making sure we don’t accidentally give away a real gold ring or a vintage sterling brooch for $5.

She tends to monitor and sell the “real jewelry” at the fair while the rest of us sell the mounds and mounds of “costume jewelry.” She can be tough when needed, especially on the early birds who are clearly looking to score some real gold for next to nothing.

Julie has permanently dedicated a significant portion of her basement to donated jewelry, props on which to display jewelry, and tools to evaluate and repair jewelry.

Here’s my snap of Julie the Jewelry Queen setting up necklace displays in the church office the night before the Country Fair.

And here’s a cell pic of our group in action yesterday. (It was taken by our minister.)

Posted for John’s Cellpic Sunday.

Most of us wear our church t-shirts to work at the fair which have our shared UU values on the back.

The indignity of falling

~ MaryG ~ 17 Comments

I was determined to close all three rings on my Apple Watch yesterday, so I went out for a walk in the rain. I wore a baseball hat and a large LL Bean raincoat with the hood up. My peripheral vision may have been slightly impaired.

I was listening to music from my phone in my pocket, when I briefly looked at my watch to see how far I’d walked. I must have stepped on a piece of loose asphalt and turned my ankle.

I went down. All the way down. I landed on my left side and caught myself with both wrists. I was briefly laying on my side in the wet street (a quiet cul de sac).

My watch started beeping and tapping my wrist telling me that I’d fallen and asking if it should call for help. That part was actually nice. Someone cared! But I didn’t think anything was broken, so I hit the little X to decline.

What the fuck ankle! You can’t handle stepping on a little bump?? (This ankle has let me down before.) How many times have I implored my mother and others “watch your step, don’t fall”? Falling is the worst. It’s sudden. It’s stupid. You weren’t watching. Dumb.

A few days ago I voluntarily got down on the ground to take this photo of a mushroom along the side of the rail trail where I typically walk, which has no loose asphalt.

Cellpic Sunday—tiny old things

~ MaryG ~ 5 Comments

A tiny silver turtle, a fish, a bird, a duck and a frog—60-year old birthday candle holders.

A gift from a dear friend of my mother—a 3x “boy mom” who so loved little girls—on the occasion of my first birthday (we think).

Passed by my mother to me, I used them when I remembered. (The candle holes are narrow, so candles must be shaved to fit.)

Now they are polished and ready to go to my daughter.

We pass things on.

They use what they wish.

I first took a picture of them on a silver coaster, but they were hard to see. Lesson learned: use a contrasting background when photographing still objects.

Posted for John’s Cellpic Sunday

Thursday Doors — The ICA/Boston

~ MaryG ~ 12 Comments

This door is a work of art by Kazumi Tanaka, a living artist born in 1962.

First conceived in 1996 during an unusual artist residency at Sabbathday Lake in Maine (the last active Shaker community in the world), Tanaka’s door was not shown until 2025. As part of The ICA/Boston’s Believers exhibition, the anamorphic door sat permanently ajar and is said to have alluded to Shaker founder Mother Ann Lee’s sentiment that the Shakers should open windows and doors to receive “whoever will arrive” in a spirit of openness and generosity.

Thursday Doors challenge

Cellpic Sunday – ultra wide lens

~ MaryG ~ 10 Comments

I no longer own a 35mm camera, so all my pics are cell pics these days, but it’s fun to join in a creative group activity like John’s Cellpic Sunday.

Goosewing Beach Preserve, Little Compton, Rhode Island, USA, August 2025

I took this with the ultra wide lens (0.5x) on my iPhone 15. I like it because it captures lots of beach & sky and my legs look very long and tan and no cellulite is visible at that angle. They almost look like my old legs from my lifeguard days.

Morning (a cinquain)

~ MaryG ~ 10 Comments

Today I’m continuing to join in creative group activities offered by other blogs.

Dwight at Roth Poetry frequently participates in the dVerse poets pub challenges and he inspired me to give it a go.

So here’s my cinquain:

Morning

coffee

Wordle (not hard)

social media scan

news so outrageous it angers

crossword 

[A cinquain is a short poem based on syllable count—a five-line poem with a syllable count of 2-4-6-8-2.]

Thursday Doors — West Chester, Pennsylvania

~ MaryG ~ 15 Comments

Happy Thursday! I’ve just learned of Dan’s Thursday Doors through Ritva’s post and I like it! Who doesn’t love an interesting door?

Here’s my understanding of the parameters:

Thursday Doors is a weekly feature allowing door lovers to come together to admire and share their favorite door photos from around the world. Anyone may join the fun by creating their own Thursday Doors post and then sharing the link in the comments on Dan’s site, anytime between Thursday morning and Saturday noon (North American Eastern Time).

The mammoth bronze doors of the historic Bank of Chester County (now a Wells Fargo) in downtown West Chester, Pennsylvania. The Greek Revival building was completed in 1836 and is in the National Register of Historic Places.

Clearly I was captivated by these doors as I took multiple pictures of them when we were visiting West Chester for a lacrosse tournament in July 2018.

Here’s my son in front of the doors for scale:

I think I really liked the decorative swirls and starbursts in the individual panels and the fact that they’re non-biblical. It’s not a church nor was it ever. In comparison to Europe (and its endless ornate doors), the United States was founded as a secular country. I tend to be drawn to beautiful evidence of that.

Also, I’m reminded that downtown West Chester, Pennsylvania is fun. Or at least it was in 2018. I hope it bounced back after the pandemic.

Outdoor dining in downtown West Chester, Pennsylvania (USA 🇺🇸)

Lens Artist Challenge #363

~ MaryG ~ 18 Comments

I’ve long admired posts by photographers who respond to the creative Lens-Artist challenges, especially scillagrace, but have never responded myself.

While it’s daunting for a first-timer to find 5-10 images, I did find one image in my “archives” that seemed to fit 5 items on this week’s Scavenger Hunt list:

Jars of metallic leaf flakes in a Rhode Island artist’s studio, July 2017

It’s all of these:

Something glass

Something with a smooth texture

Something with a bumpy texture

Something circular

Art supplies

I’m not sure if that counts, but thanks to Lens-Artists for a bit of fun.

I have always liked taking pictures.

Mary