Photo Friday: Take A Picture

This time of year is when my husband and I usually do a winter getaway. 2021 was going to be our year to visit Kauai. We got no further than choosing a hotel when Covid struck and we abandoned all plans. Hopefully, some day! In lieu of vacation photos this year, I decided to show you some trip pictures from around my home. I'm all about recycling what we have and repurposing items, so all the frames in these photos are actually decades old. A few of these projects I did years ago, but some of them I did last year when I was Covid-bored. I apologize for the poor quality of some of these pictures; it was hard to not get either a glare from windows/lighting and/or a reflection of me taking the picture.

These first two photos are hanging in our home office. The frames previously were in the hall of our last house and were navy blue with Pier 1 fruit bowl prints (a gift; not something I'd have chosen!) I spray painted the frames black and used photos I took in 2004 when we took the kids out west for the first time. I've learned after each trip to the Grand Canyon that it's just not easy to take a decent photo, especially on a sunny day.

We also went to Sedona on that trip and my favorite memory was the night sky. I felt it was the first time I had ever truly seen the constellations. We had dinner that night at a funky little restaurant called the Red Planet Diner. Unfortunately, it's no longer in business.

This is my favorite! My husband painted this frame to match some bookshelves he had made for Middle Child many years ago at the old house. She had put a drawing she'd made of the Cheetah Girls in the frame. I found the perfect picture to match the frame and our guest bedroom; this is the walk way between the Breakers and the main drag in Palm Beach, Florida. My husband and I spent the morning before our flight home wandering the gardens along this path back in 2015.

More frames in our home office. These two frames used to hold my husband's college diplomas that he had professionally framed for his first job. I think after he left that job he thought it was tacky, so they sat in a closet for decades. I enlarged some prints from our Utah national park trip of 2010. This is a slot canyon (inside looking out) that we discovered outside Boulder, Utah in the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. It was very cool being the only people inside of it and one of those hidden gems.

This is a tiny waterfall along the Emerald Pool Trail in Zion National Park. It's hard for me to choose a favorite national park, but Zion is definitely the most beautiful.

This frame and mat hung in the tiny family room of our old house before we built an addition. It held a watercolor of Colonial Williamsburg from our 2nd Anniversary trip. I recently had this photo I took in Maui in 2016 blown up because I thought the colors matched the mat nicely. It's the view from our hotel looking out onto the Pacific Ocean in the morning. So gorgeous! It now hangs in the hall outside our master bath.

This hangs across from the Maui photo. It also used to hold a watercolor from Williamsburg of the King's Arm Tavern where we had our anniversary dinner, so special memories. Now it's a photo of my husband and me outside V. Sattui Winery in Napa in 2017. An employee was walking by and kindly volunteered to take the picture.

This is another frame that hung in Middle Child's bedroom when she was a youngster. I think it contained a cartoon cat. It now holds a photo I took in 2017 the last time we were in Sonoma, California. We enjoyed a glass of wine on that porch at Arrowood Winery. The view from the porch is of the rolling vineyards. It was an idyllic June day.

Do you have any vacation photos hanging in your house?