roses

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...please join me in ... lighting a candle... saying a prayer... sending healing thoughts
... and surrounding my friend, Allegra, with white light...
Allegra is a wonderful, delightful, caring soul that I met thru her blog... and she is gravely ill.
...please also send warm, and caring thoughts to her husband and family...


see more here...


*photo by Elaine A. Russell

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As part of the bi-weekly photo prompt put on by Susan Tuttle and Chrysti Hydeck, the word for this week of the ECHO Project-- is Whisper. My partner, Brenda Seaholm-Wampler, provided the photo of the beautiful angel statue with the quote from the Talmud. Mine is the rose.

It got me thinking about the word "whisper." According to Webster's... whisper means: to speak softly with little or no vibration of the vocal cords, especially to avoid being overheard.
But being a romantic... I like to think of the word whisper in terms of ....whispering on the wind... to whisper to your soul.... and such.

And so I got to thinking about the things that whisper and speak to my soul....



...the gorgeous skies and cloud formations here in the southwest.....



... bodies of water.... especially ones with gorgeous lily pads (like this one at the ABQ Botanical Gardens)



....snow.... breezes..... rain..... the smell of dirt when it's wet...



... snuggling with my baby girl Sabrina.... who has been enjoying the extra nap time...




...and some great music by Basia...


(...all photos by Elaine A. Russell)

at the gardens



photos by Elaine A. Russell


So -- yesterday, the hubby and I decided to take a stroll at the Rio Grande Botanical Gardens (http://www.cabq.gov/biopark/garden/). We haven't been to it in years, and it seemed like a "weekend" thing to do. Seeing as I overslept, we ended up going mid-afternoon... and only had a couple of hours at the park. I had intended to see the aquariums, but we ended up spending our alotted time exclusively in the gardens.

There is alot more garden area than I remember, and alot of it seems relatively new. It is fabulous. We strolled through the Children's Fantasy gardens (led by 2 very enthusiastic young boys), through the Sasebo Japanese gardens, the Mediteranean gardens, the rose gardens (my mother-in-law would've loved this), the Heritage Farm and gardens (my parent's would've loved this), and the cactus gardens of the southwest.

Having just a simple Kodak camera now... I was a little worried about getting the kind of shots I would like. However, my little "koda" surprised me. Of course, it won't take the macro shots that I would like.. but it is turning out to be a really nice little camera. As I get them re-sized into more accessable pics, I will load them onto my FlickR link to the side --->

We stayed until closing (5pm) ... then we went for supper at El Patio. The hubby and I have eaten lunch there many times... and it is a nice dependable place to get quality New Mexican faire. I had the huervos, and he had the chicken burrito plate. yuuuuuuuuuuuuuum. http://elpatiodealbuquerque.com/