GOSIA'S FENCES AROUND THE WORLD

I am having fun looking through my archive photos.  This was taken as we were driving along the road, and the washing on the line caught my attention.  

I have these memories from childhood when my mother did hers.  To this day there is nothing that equates to the smell of freshly washed bed sheets that have been dried in the sun.  For me another wonderful childhood memory helping my mother as best I could, handing her pegs to hang up the washing, carrying the oversized basket to her when the washing was dried, and being given more chores to help out as I got older, hearing her laughter as I got into the occasional childish antic which made her laugh.  I loved making my mum laugh and that didn't change as the years went by.

I hope you are all doing okay.  Our days seem to be going quickly thank goodness.  There is always something to do.  Yesterday we were changing two of the lightbulbs that had burned out in the front of our house, and our new neighbors were across the street.  They were enjoying the sunshine and were sitting under their cherry blossom tree.  It made a pretty sight.  We shouted over and asked them how they were doing, had a mini conversation.  A pleasant interlude while keeping our social distancing. I look forward to the time when we  can get to know them better.  I still intend to invite them to a meal when this is all over.  

The lightbulb change turned into a bigger problem and now we have called an electrician and will be getting four new light fixtures.  The ones we had are as old as our 30 year old house.  We got an estimate from one electrician and the two others haven't called back yet (hopefully business is good).  Mundane tasks but we never take anything for granted these days, even more so now.

It is very windy today.  I am watching the branches from one of our trees.  There are pine cones from another that have blown onto the deck.  The cherry blossoms from our neighbor's tree were falling like snow earlier.  Pretty sights in nature also not to be taken for granted, and the sun is shining, a gift.

There are fences in my photo so I grabbed it for Gosia's Meme.  

If you would like to see other Fences Around the World, or join in with your own, you will find the link here.  Thank you for hosting Gosia.

Thanks you also for stopping by, and take good care of yourselves out there.

SUNDAY DRIVE

(An old fence on the left of the barn which has also seen better day.  Still beautiful though.)

Last weekend, feeling a bit of cabin fever, we thought it would be safe to take a ride in the countryside. We wanted to find a nice, quiet area for a walk and so, with a full tank of gas, we set out. 

(An old farm with fences out front again.  Hard to see those fences as they seem camouflaged against the grass.)

Much to our surprise there was a lot of traffic on the roads, and when we drove to all our usual places, the parking lots were packed and people were heading for the trails.  We didn't feel comfortable being around all those people.  There wasn't 6 feet between them to spare, so we drove by and went on our way.  

(Another farm with a silo painted like an ear of corn.  And there are the fences again.)

Not once did we get out of the car, and the only time I opened a window was to take these photos. Our speed was generally between 40 to 55 miles per hour on open roads, much less of course going through towns, and along narrower roads.

(Other rural scenes as we drove by.)

It was good to get out but I don't think we will be doing that any more.  

(Another fence in front of the cemetery.  We were in Manassas by this time.)

(The rest of the photos were also taken as we were driving through Manassas.)

(Approaching the traffic light I noticed the mural on the left.)

(Here's a closer look.)

 (The historical old town area is very nice.)

(You can read about Manassas at this link.)

(I have often thought I would like to look around Iron Horse Antiques.  One of the comments I read from a happy customer, was that it is the best furniture store in the Northern Virginia area and it is one of the top 10. Their furniture is made out of quality solid wood at a great price with professional customer service.  Now that is quite a glowing recommendation.  

Apparently they have obtained solid oak European furniture from military people who have purchased overseas, and there is also Amish furniture of the same excellent quality.  The salespeople appear very knowledgeable, knowing all about the fabrics used, whether they were treated, what was in the cushions and much more.  If ever any of our furniture finally falls apart, I think I will look here first.  Unfortunately I couldn't find a website but it has plenty of good reviews on Yelp.)

These photos I am sharing today for Gosia's Fences Around the World, were taken on our Sunday drive, and I was happy to see several fences, so win-win!

Thank you for hosting Gosia.  

If you would like to see other fences, or join in with your own, you will find the link here.  

Thanks for stopping by.  

Enjoy your day and stay safe and happy.

MY FENCES THIS WEEK

This interesting building is in Duck, North Carolina.  It is an old life saving station.  I saw the fences, so here it is.  

 We are on our way home now.  I liked the sign but more importantly, it has the fence.

 The last three photos were taken of a farm, all from the passenger seat as we were driving by.  I take a lot of my photos with a cell phone now.

 A lot of fencing around here.

I am linking to Fences Around the World.  Thank you for hosting Gosia.  

If you would like to see others from around the world, or join in with your own, you can go here.  

Thank you for visiting everyone and have a great day.

LAST OF THE PHOTOS FROM FRYING PAN PARK

at least until the next time we go there.

There is a small carousel ride near the general store.  

It looks quite old but with age comes character.  I can imagine when it gets dark and all the lights are turned on, with the music playing, it turns into a magical ride.

It is a 1920's Hirschhorn carousel and went under extensive restoration during the winter and spring this year.

After looking at the carousel and all the animals that you've seen in my previous posts, we walked down to the visitor center.  It was at the end of this long road, with two large fields on either side.  We passed another entrance on our way to the farm that takes you directly to the center, and you can park there also.   

Events are held here. We saw a large birthday party going on in one of the rooms, but the museum side was still open.

It was very interesting to see the old photos.

I will add the small captions I found at the side of each photo.  Above it read:

"The Championship Team of Floris Vocational High School, 1924-1925.

"The Floris Home Demonstration Club won the County Championship for most effective club in 1930."

"The community has a picnic dinner after a soybean meeting on better methods for soybean production."

"Playtime on the farm."

"Kids aboard the Cockerill family's mule before the day's plowing began."

The display above shows parts of farming life with old photos, a couple of which I shared in this post. On the door is a list of chores for children on the farm at various ages. 

A closer look at those chores.

and under the pinafore was an old cookbook open to the pages shown below."

More displays showing its dairy farm heritage.

Winding down our outing, the last thing we did was go to the general store.  I liked the old door knocker.

Inside Gregg is deciding on what he is going to purchase.  We came away with bread and butter pickles for Gregg and a blueberry flower honey for me.

This horse print caught my attention also.

A close-up.

I am finishing off with a collage of several animals we saw that day, some you have seen in my other posts.  

And that was our very enjoyable outing to Frying Pan Park.  To family and friends old and new, thank you for taking the time to visit and look at my posts.

NOW THAT WE ARE OFFICIALLY INTO THE AUTUMN....

I am sharing a farmer's market shop owned by Whitehall Farm, link here.  We were there two weeks ago.

It is not exactly around the corner, otherwise we would be there all the time.  On the way we passed these cyclists enjoying the sunshine.

A great day for a bike ride.

Twenty minutes or so later we were pulling into the parking lot.  We started out very early and it was during the week.  No other cars. It is closed Monday and Tuesday, and it crossed my mind that it was closed when we arrived.  But it was just very quiet.

They have a Fall Festival and I believe this is one of the hayride wagons.

Inside the store it had a light and cheery air.  I liked the fall decorations and enjoyed browsing over all the items we could purchase.

We bought fresh tomatoes, a bag of onions, a baguette, bread and butter pickles which was Gregg's choice, a jar of honey, my choice, and dark chocolate covered coffee beans, also my choice.  Quite a varied collection.

I first discovered how much I liked chocolate covered coffee beans at a coffee shop in one of our strip malls ages ago.  They always placed three on the side of my coffee cup, but stopped the practice several months ago.  "What?", I said, "No more chocolate covered coffee beans?"  Now whenever I come across them it is a special treat.  I do the same as the coffee shop, and eat two or three beans with my morning cup of coffee.  Zips me right through the day!

Time to go back and get more!

There were many things that interested us in this shop, the olive oil for instance.  They had all kinds of different flavors.

I asked if I could take a few photos and they readily agreed.  The decorations were very festive.

It's beginning to feel like Fall.

What are your favorite Autumn things? Here are some of mine.

Sweater weather and Homemade soup

Hot Apple Cider and Hot Chocolate

Sitting by the fire

That feeling of drawing in 

your breath on a crisp day

Walks in the evenings and

smelling wood smoke from

the neighbors' chimneys

Walking on crunchy leaves

while walking through the woods

Seeing all the pumpkins

Carved pumpkins too

The first Fall Mums on sale

To name a few...

 and wishing all my friends