Weekly Photo Challenge: Habit

I haven’t answered the WordPress photo challenge in a while, but this one seemed like a way to boost creativity and to remind me of what I should and should not be doing to keep myself healthy.
I really try to be in the habit of using this at least every other day for strength, toning and pure mental stability:
And, being the 40something woman that I am, another healthy habit I have tried to incorporate into my daily routine is taking at least one of these:
But, as a mother of three who tries to keep awake to write and read and, function, for better or for worse, this is the only daily habit, that I wish I would quit, that sticks:
It’s a good thing I never smoked.
Happy Weekend!
Weekly Photo Challenge: The Golden Hour
As the sun sets on this day, I will add this photo post to my blog, inspired by the Weekly Photo Challenge. Taken mid-June around sunset in Pittsford, NY while walking along the Erie Canal. In the foreground, my youngest enjoys an ice cream cone. The Erie Canal was a big part of our life in NY and we will miss it very much.
First Photo Challenge for 2013: Resolved

Happy New Year!
now, if you could hear me say this to you from behind my stuffed nose it would sound more like “Habby Dew Year.”
I have yet to have a healthy day in 2013.
Before I can start on this year’s goals: decluttering and cleaning my home to get it ready to sell, going to the gym at least three times per week, I resolve to get HEALTHY!
That’s why my answer to this photo challenge is this:
This is a bowl of eucalyptus leaves I pulled off a bouquet recently purchased at Trader Joes. I mixed it with some dried lavender from this year’s garden, plus some Kosher salt. I poured boiling water over it and voila! A home spa remedy that will hopefully relieve my misery.
Before I do anything else this year, I resolve to get healthy again!
Weekly Photo Challenge: Wrong
As the Commercial goes, everyone loves Marineland.
Everyone but me. I think it’s WRONG.
This blog post was inspired by the blog Platform 9 3/4 after the blogger’s visit to the very sad and neglected animals in “The Guindy National Park” in Chennai, India. The blogger was outraged at the sorry conditions where the animals lived, the weak looking monkeys and birds kept in small cages, unable to fly.
I felt the same sad way when I visited Niagara Falls’ biggest attraction, Marineland.
Marineland, famed for its 450 foot Skyscreamer ride, can’t decide whether it is a zoo, an aquarium, or an amusement park. Maybe it should skip the first two and stick to the rides.
The park has a lot of marine life but clearly they are exploited for the entertainment and not an educational value. When we visited the beluga tank, for example, it was small and bare inside, with one small ball for the belugas to play with. There was no visible literature about how beluga populations have been hurt by whaling, fishing, and motor boats.
That is why I posted this picture in the photo challenge: wrong.
Weekly Photo Challenge: Growth

This week’s photo challenge was an easy one.
These are sunflowers in my spot in the Brighton Community Garden. Just 10 weeks ago, they were seeds in a packet.
Hiding in all this growth is my youngest child, my baby. I know every parent says this, but I can’t believe how much he’s grown, and how much he will grow and change after his first summer at sleep-away camp.
Photo Challenge: Today
In answer to today’s Photo Challenge: Today, I snapped this on my iTouch: a long-overdue wet day in Rochester. Umbrella dripping, some items left out to dry in vain. Soaked barbecue cover. Green shade garden in the background.
Weekly Photo Challenge: Hands
Okay, I’ve got to get my hands back in the soil of my garden, but I’ve got to respond to this week’s photo Challenge: Hands.
When I think of hands, I think generations. And nothing depicts generation-to-generation as young hands next to older ones.
Here is a photo of my mom holding my youngest when he was just nine days old: