Thanksgiving Balloons from Above

A rather different vantage point for the Macy's Thanksgiving parade courtesy of my friend Jo Paley who lives very high up and can look down on 5th Avenue.

Jo took all the photos.

She looked down on Candy canes

and the Pillsbury doughboy

not to mention NYPD horses followed by

the trusty clean up crew!

Snoopy and Woodstock are my favorites.

Well done, Macy's

even if Spidey is a little scary!

Thanksgiving

This is a post to file under 'sometimes other places' (see blog sub head)

Also under memory and thankfulness.

 all photos courtesy of Claudia Schmid

Here is the cottage where I spent summer holidays long ago. I never went there in November but my daughter went recently. Ah, the wonders of Instagram!

Here it is straight on with different color paint than I recall and a different gate.

Here are some cows waiting to produce milk for clotted cream - at least I hope so.

Here is St. Winnow the other side of the Fowey River. We used to take the canoe there and wander in the churchyard.

Here is a beach on the north shore with a stream meandering through it - how perfect for feats of engineering!

How people are dwarfed by the wide Atlantic beach...

Blue

It has been a remarkably dry fall.

The skies are mostly blue and clear - all the better for plane spotting. Yesterday afternoon on 15th St.

and the other day in the early evening when the sun's rays hit the plane's belly.

Some pretty evening skies

and such clear day ones.

 This was taken this morning

and this one on Long Island on Monday - a pin oak with lots of leaves left.

The silver birches near our apartment are at that interim stages of only a few leaves.

Brooklyn on Saturday

and the ferry back to Manhattan.

Now a few random blue pics...

Poster person on 22nd Street

an egg plant on white paper that managed to seem blue by contrast

and some berries that are more blackish than blue-ish but I rather like them.

On a quite different note, my friend Frances' etsy shop FoakleyArts is up and running. She is the most astounding knitter and her hats and scarves are works of art in themselves -quite breathtaking in their complexity.

Seth Apter and The Mixed-Media Artist

It's always exciting when a friend's book comes out  - especially when people you know are featured in it.  Double excitement. So I rushed up to Barnes and Noble this morning and snapped up

the last remaining copy of the mixed-media artist: Art Tips, Tricks, Secrets and Dreams From Over 40 Amazing Artists by my chum Seth Apter. (North Light Books). Seth's infectious enthusiasm, gift for friendship, and acute attention to detail make this both a 'how to' book, a celebration of creativity, and...

the book features the work of Elizabeth Bunsen - one of the most creative people on the planet - who does magical things with all sorts of mundane objects -and

my husband, Robert Schmid, whose work is entirely different.

"Sleep" robertschmid.com

These are but two of the many artists who shared their work, techniques and dreams with Seth.  The book is such fun and so full of useful things and thoughts that it will make you rush out and do something wildly creative yourself. At least I hope so.

ps Seth will be signing copies of the book this evening FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 15th at

 Ink Pad  7th Avenue at 13th St. See you there!

Haunted Chelsea

All these photos were taken this morning on my early walk with the dog.

As befits an older part of the city, one feels there must be tales to be told. Here is the roof of the seminary where Clement Moore once worked.

Here is a little independent bookshop.

I turn down 21st St to discover that I'm being watched.

And the raven pecks at the skeleton's mouth.

The window is blank

the basement is dank.

Here is my favorite house, now sadly overgrown, waiting for me to trim back the bushes...

Here a big pumpkin swallows a little one.

Happy Halloween

Veggies etc

Em was right, I really can't keep away....

Autumn is so stunningly abundant and thrilling. I think I must be very old to be thrilled by vegetation - but I am. So there. The top left of this collage is drying up beach vines on Long Island. The other pictures are from Union Square where the food addicts congregate.

A plethora of pumpkins and gourds - each prettier than the next.

For some reason the green leafy things reminded me of 'under the sea' and curling billows and froth...

Look at the savoy's wrinkles.

Look at the 'hats' on the eggplants - especially the black ones at the top.

Back to frothy and purple and green...

Pears have such a very satisfactory shape.

These poor, sad, speckly, funny unsprayed apples have lots of charm...

as do the Winesaps I bought home.

Urban fruits from roof garden. October....roses, lavender and dill.

My other blog is here.

Fort Tryon Park and the Cloisters

I know this blog is officially finished...but yesterday's glorious weather prompted an excursion to the northernmost part of Manhattan. 

The pictures have an oddly fuzzy look since I managed to inadvertently turn the knob to some 'artsy' setting. However you will get the general effect...

Fort Tryon Park, high above the Hudson, has lovely herbaceous borders.

And masses of the autumn anemone-like plant whose name I have managed to mislay...

Not to mention hydrangeas.

At the Cloisters the salvia blazes,  the Thomas Tallis Motet soars in the background

and a few first yellow leaves fall.

This is the nearest thing to Europe on the island of Manhattan.

Bliss.