The latest Round Robin Photo Challenge is “Red.”

Last month, I posted a photo of a beautiful white Camellia. From my same visit to Middleton Place Plantation, here’s a scarlet red version:

It’s amazing how vibrant that flower really was in person. As vibrant as the color in the photo is, I don’t think the webpage could possibly do it justice.

Imagine the possibilities! What writer who likes horror stories wouldn’t want to live in a home like this? I suspect that a house like this might not get many visitors on Halloween night just out of the scary factor; on the other hand, I’m sure there are those Halloween enthusiasts who’d flock to it for the same reason!

I found this house, quite unexpectedly, right outside the Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond.

This beautiful Queen Anne was built in 1894 as a replacement for the original Superintendent’s house. The original cost to build it was just $4,000! The home had, unfortunately, fallen into a state of disrepair and was actually slated to be torn down until the Historic Richmond Foundation stepped in. They found a buyer who would restore the home and it has since been converted into apartment homes.

I drove to Maymont this morning to work on the latest Round Robin Photo Challenge: Summer Gardens.

Maymont is a 100-acre estate with two separate gardens: the Italian Garden, which is pictured here, and a Japanese Garden that is closer to the James River. The Italian Garden is a popular location for local weddings, and as soon as I rounded the corner to approach them, I was immediately met with one of the richest, sweetest smell of roses I’ve experienced in a long time.

I’ll post more pictures from Maymont’s gardens in the next few days, but I wanted to make sure I made the deadline, so enjoy this one!

I was supposed to post these yesterday as part of the latest Round Robin Photo Challenge, but a long, meeting-filled day at work was just enough to make me forget.

In any case, these were taken this past weekend, when I took my parents to Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens here in Richmond. My mom feels that her hair was a mess on that particular outing, and has made it clear that I am to show no one the photos that I snapped of them, so I’ll stick to three samples of flowers that I spotted as we toured the gardens.

Of the three, this next one is my favorite. Although I like the vibrant reds, both the color and the flower itself seemed so delicate in person that I wanted to try to capture it and show that these particular blossoms seem to be fairly solitary:

This one was snapped inside the conservatory:

I’m no botanist, so if you are curious about what kind of flowers they are, I am unfortunately not able to give you that information. I can say, however, that these are a very, very small sampling of the things to see at Ginter, and if you’re ever in the area, you should definitely stop by.

This week’s Round Robin Photo Challenge is “Holy.” I took a trip a few months ago out to Richmond’s Hollywood Cemetary, a cemetary that dates back to the middle of the 19th century.

Many of the monuments feature elaborate designs, which suggest that many of those laid to rest there had lots of money. Indeed, the cemetary is the final resting place of U.S. presidents James Monroe and John Tyler, Civil War General J.E.B. Stuart, and former Confederate President Jefferson Davis.

There are many depictions of angels throughout the park. I think this one, which sits atop a family’s crypt, is one of my favorites.

It’s an incredible place to walk around and reflect on life, death and rebirth. If you’re ever in Virginia’s capital, and you’re interested in historic places, Hollywood cemetary is definitely a destination to consider.

Now that spring is here, what better time to appreciate new signs of life!

“New Life” is the topic of the latest Round Robin Photo Challenge and was suggested by Sassy of “Sassy’s EYE.”

I happen to like hydrangea bushes. My grandmother had two large hydrangea bushes, one on each side of her porch. These bushes were short but very fat. Each spring, they bloomed with beautiful bluish-purple flowers.

Hydrangeas also bloom in pinks, depending on the acid level in the soil, but I much prefer the blue color. Last summer, I bought a hydrangea bush from a local greenhouse. The instructions indicated that the plants could do well in minimal sunlight, which I thought would be perfect for my patio.

The trouble is, right after winter had really started, I realized that I hadn’t watered the plant lately. When I walked onto the patio, I was met with a potfull of withered, brown, apparently-dead branches. There was no sign of life whatsoever.

Later this month, I was planning on making a trip back to the greenhouse, promising to be more consciencious the next time. The other day, I walked back out onto the patio, and all of a sudden the plant I’d written off for dead but hadn’t yet disposed of proved, as always, that Mother Nature has the last word:

So I have sufficiently watered the hydrangea and I’m hoping for some nice blooms sooner or later. I’ll keep you posted.

I was too late to officially participate in the most recent Round Robin Challenge, “Signs,” but I found a shot during a quick weekend trip home and thought I’d post it anyway.

What kind of sign works best for a drive-in restaurant that serves burgers and fried chicken to go with its stellar soft serve ice cream and shakes?

Naturally, a fifteen-foot high ice cream cone…vanilla with that wonderful chocolate hard-shell coating.

Just looking at it makes me hungry!

The latest Round Robin Photo Challenge is “Silly Animals.”

I’m a dog person. Always have been, always will be. I’ve found that dogs can be a lot like people, especially when they’re sleeping. No one has to show them what a pillow is for: they’re smart enough to have figured that one out on their own with no assistance at all. And if you let them, they’ll take yours happily.

A couple of months after I adopted Zoey, I walked into the bedroom and saw her taking a nap. She was beginning to reach the point of understanding that she was in her “forever home,” as animal shelters like to call it, and was getting more and more comfortable.

She had sprawled out across a body pillow almost as if she had been trying to attain some kind of dramatic effect, and I couldn’t resist snapping her picture. The animal shelter I adopted her from got a copy and they ended up running it in a “success stories” column in their newsletter.

My parents taught me at an early age to love animals, and they’ve always had pets themselves. Their current inside dog is Jesse, who likes to twist himself into odd shapes resembling question marks. I caught him in one of his familiar sleeping positions, comfortably zonked. Even the flash didn’t wake him up!

Those are my picks for “Silly Animals.” Visit the Round Robin Photo Challenge page for links to the other participants!

This time around, it was my turn to come up with the topic for Carly & Karen’s Round Robin Photo Challenge, so I chose “Secrets.”

I recently went exploring around Richmond’s famous Hollywood Cemetery (no connection to Hollywood, California), a fascinating place with very old graves dating back to the early 19th century. More than 1800 Confederate soldiers are buried in this cemetery, as well as three U.S. Presidents.

We’ve all heard the phrase, “taking a secret to the grave.” Eventually, the graves themselves stop telling their tales, when time, weather and mold eventually wear away a gravestone. I’m sure there are records somewhere that indicate exactly who lies beneath this marker. But the absence of that information does make you wonder, doesn’t it?

And I can’t let this “Secrets” challenge go by without a quick trip down memory lane. I’ve always had dogs; my parents got me my first dog when I was almost a year old and we grew up together. She was a collie pup — not the collie pictured here — but a dog that taught me the power of the love of a four-legged friend. Years after that first dog died, I decided I wanted another collie — the one you see pictured below — and at the same time, we also had a Shih Tzu (correctly pronounced as “SHEED-zoo”) as our inside dog.

I walked the Emperor (which is undoubtedly what the Shih Tzu, Koko, considered himself to be) into the backyard one day, and my second collie, Skye, came over to say hello. I managed to snap a quick picture during this passing of some secret. What strikes me so funny is the intense expression on Koko’s face, as if he can’t wait to hear what happened next! This photo, incidentally, hung in the South Carolina State Fair that year — probably 1995 or so. It didn’t win (nor did I expect it to), but at least it went on display.

Here’s that picture, which still hangs on my wall:

Here are the other participants in the Round Robin Photo Challenge. Be sure to visit their journals as well.

Lahoma

Promise

Becky

Dorn

Karen

Betty

Carly

Mary

Sara

Debbie

Renee

Dorn

Celeste

Phinney

Marie

Maryanne

Robin

This month’s Round Robin Photo Challenge topic is “Summer.” When I think of summer, I think of water to beat the hot, humid weather in the South.

I thought of driving to Virginia Beach or Norfolk to locate a quiet, lonely beach and snap some pictures, but then it occurred to me that it’s the middle of the summer and there’s hardly such a thing as a quiet, lonely beach.

In Richmond, the James River is all the rage this time of year. I walked down to James River Park, which has lush trails that eventually lead to the banks of the river itself. When I got there, of course, there were people with coolers sprawled out across the huge rocks that are exposed. Radios played, people laughed and swam, a good time being had by all.

I kept on walking along a trail and came to a secluded area where a line of trees isolate a patch of water. It occurred to me that as much as I like walking along a deserted beach and listening to the roar of the ocean — that’s when I feel closest to God and the most insignificant at the same time — a scene like the one below is really the perfect place: there are a lot of trees, nice, clean air, welcome shade from the hot sun, and tranquil waters with almost no current. The babbling brook downstream of this scene is so quiet that it’s a deep background noise. The primary sound here is silence; not even the radios and boom boxes are able to reach this area.

So this is my summer image: “The Lagoon.”

For more details, visit the home of the Round Robin Photo Challenge, or to visit journals of those who are participating:

1.Betty…My Day My Interests
2. Karen…Musings from Mavarin
3. Carly…Ellipsis
4. Duane…sotto voce
5. Alan…F-Stop
6. Steven…sometimes photoblog
7. Amy…Substance; or lack of
8. Celeste…My Day And Thoughts
9. Trish…A Journey To Peace
10. Mary…Alphawoman’s Blog
11.Robbie…Robbies Ruminations
12. Sassy…Sassys Eye
13. Marie…The Little Things
14. Aunt Nub (Liz)…Aunt Nub’s Empty Head
15. Derek…Picture of the Day
16. Kimberleigh…Life as I live It
17. Kat…From Every Angle
18. Monica…Mamarazzi
19. Danielle…Everybody Knows…
20. Oceanmrc…Midlife Matters