Brookside Lights - December 2013

Brookside Gardens is having their ‘Garden of Lights’ display through January 5th. We went this past weekend while the weather was balmy (in the 60s). There was a crowd but we managed to get a parking place before the lots filled up. The lights include lots of flowers

 

Some insects (praying mantis and butterfly are pictured but there was a bee hive and ants too)

A rainbow with intermittent rain clouds and lightning

A giraffe (and other animals like lions, pigs, frogs, peacocks and turtles)

Imaginary beings (the one pictured looks like a crazy bird to me…there is also a sea serpent with baby sea serpent too)

And outlines of trees with lights.

In the conservatory there is a model train display which I posted about earlier (here). The model of the ‘facilities’ below was one of additions to that display this year!

Brookside Gardens - December 2013

Brookside Gardens is the place for an evening walk through garden themed lights in December. I was there on a cold but sunny day when snow was still on the ground. The conservatory was lush with tropical plants (star fruit, bird of paradise, poinsettias, and bananas) and the model train display.

Outside, the dragon of lights looked relatively tame in the brightness of day and snow clung to the evergreens - and on some of the artificial flowers created with lights. There was a black squirrel sorting through the leaf litter. The Children’s Garden was cherry with colored lights on the white picket fence - but it was too cold to stay for long. There were very few people in the outdoors of the garden and the ones that were moved quickly along the path. It was a day for a brisk walk - or none at all.

3 Free eBooks - October 2013

It’s time again for the monthly post about eBooks that are freely available on the Internet. The three below are my favorites for October 2013.

Mollhausen, Balduin. Reisen in die Felsengebirge Nord-Amerikas Bd. 1. Leipzig: H. Constenoble. 1861. Available from the Internet Archive here. The images of the desert southwest that were published in 1861 are full of plants that are (mostly) realistically portrayed. 

 Macbeth-Evans Glass Company. Shades and Globes. Pittsburgh: Bartlett-Orr Press. 1912. Available from the Internet Archive here. This catalog from the early 1900s has some appealing ‘shades and globes’ for light fixtures that would not look out of place in a home today. I like the iridescent glass and the pattern of the one I clipped for this post.

Wittmack, L. Gartenflora Bd. 42. Berlin: Verlag von Paul Parey. 1893. Available from Internet Archive here. I am still savoring the volumes of Gartenflora ---- going through a few more each month. The chrysanthemum was one of my favorite images from October.

Gleanings of the Week Ending June 8, 2013

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Chameleon eye - A colorful and informative ‘image of the day’ from The Scientist

City Lights - An article from The Architects Newspaper about light in urban design. Appealing but counter to the idea that dark skies are nice too.

Do your hair and fingernails grow after death? - The short answer is ‘no’ but there may be a reason they appear to

Slow Motion Hummingbirds - Video of hummingbirds at a feeder

Costa Rica's Self-Sustaining Tree House Community - A community of tree houses complete with indoor plumbing and zip lines

Bees in the bush working hard! - Photos of insects coming to a wildflower south of Nairobi (hint: more than bees) from National Geographic

Mapping the Great Indoors - A microbiologist/ecologist looks at what is growing inside an ordinary house.

Finger Knitting ….and Tents - Reminds me of day camp projects from many years ago.

Real animals that you didn’t know existed - How many of these have you heard about before?

What’s so Great About a World Flight Paths Map? - Comments about a visualization by Michael Markieta (showing the visualization too)

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #43 - My favorite in this batch is the very first one. The bright pink of the flowers and the yellow of the bird really stand out.