Melted Dreams

While in Arkansas last week I saw a burned out house on the road to Jon's parents house.

It had happened some time ago and was incredibly difficult to get to due to the debris and over grown weeds. But I managed to get some half way decent shots.

 For some reason I was surprised by the items just left at the house. I think my type A would have cleaned the place up a bit better. But that is just me.

 Beauty amid the ashes.

 Even a playhouse in the back yard was damaged.

 It really hit home how fragile life is. How unimportant the stuff is that we accumulate and put so much importance in. Our families, friends, memories, and characters are so much more important.

Old barn

This is an old barn I found near a railroad trestle. 

There were several no trespassing signs around and a house near by. So I didn't venture much closer.

 

 My dear sweet husband who patiently waits for me to shoot pictures.

Urban Decay Thailand style

If a photographer is into urban decay, than Bangkok is the place to come. They build some beautiful and amazing structures. But apparently maintenance is not something they are familiar with. Because once the building is up, it is then forgotten about. Brand new buildings are surrounded by urban decay.  The building that Laura’s parents are staying in used to be beautiful. It’s obvious by the woodwork and the decorative details that it was a very nice building long ago. But now it is falling down and from the looks of it, there are no plans for upkeep. It’s sad, really.

All of the photos in this group are taken in buildings that are currently being used.
This is not decay to them, it is normal wear and tear.

 These photos were taken on our walk to the floating market.
They were all taken of homes that people were currently living in.

 These pictures were taken of an abandoned duplex that I saw on the bike trip Jon and I took around Muak Lek. What was interesting to me was that one apartment had a regular toilet and the other side had a squat pot.

I'm still sorting through the 2195 pictures I took while in Thailand. 

There will be more urban decay pictures when I'm finished.

Photo Challenge Day 23/Photo Shoot

Something Old

The second half of my photo shoot on Thursday was after I left the burned out house. Sharon had to pick up her child from school. But I had about half an hour before I had to get Dominic. I remembered an old garage on the side of the road. Through the trees you could see parts of what looked like a small house. 

I was going to write a blog post about what I found and decided to wait since it fit the title of the photo challenge today.

This is the garage you can see from the road.

One side of the house. It is a lot bigger than it looks from the road.

Boards on the front of the house. The front has basically decayed much faster than the rest of the house. This allowed me to see into the house without trying to get inside.

Inside the living room.

Outside window.

Photo Shoot

Today was amazing! Several weeks ago I noticed this burned out home from the side of the highway. I had great intentions of driving over to take photos and kept getting side tracked.

I mentioned it to a friend (who is an amazing photographer) and she joined me today.

It was freezing and I had to keep checking on Caitlin who had fallen asleep in the car. But it was so much fun.

The house

The small issue that we sort of ignored. =)

Close ups

My friend Sharon

Exterior shots

 One of my favorites.

The things a photographer will do for a shot. I was trying to get the shot below and wasn't quite tall enough. Sharon saw this bucket. I emptied the water and up-ended it. It was a bit precarious, but worked okay. The shot didn't turn out quite like I'd hoped, but I wasn't going to risk falling enough to play with it.

Hmmm, I don't have a butt in these jeans. Sigh! And I liked those pants. =(

The bucket shot. Not really worth the stress, but interesting.

Contrasts

 Near

 

Far

 So thankful that I wasn't alone in my trespassing. =)

It made it more fun to share my discovery.

Thanks Sharon!

Charleston - Here we come!

I thought about labeling these posts I, II, III, etc. But then I remembered how many pictures I had taken and I wasn't sure that I would be able to count that high in Roman numerals. =)

Jon and I headed down to Charleston on Thursday after he got off work. It's about a 7-8 hour trip so we packed a supper and didn't stop unless we absolutely had to. We wanted to have as much time down there as possible and didn't want to sleep most of Friday away.

When we woke up on Friday morning we decided to take the carriage ride that everyone had recommended and then wing it from there.

Our horse. For some reason I didn't get a better picture of him. Sorry Cooper!

The architecture here is amazing. I love old buildings and Charleston had a ton.

 

The carriage ride was nice. The guide told us quite a bit of history about Charleston, but also gave us ideas for things to do the rest of the time we were there.

After the ride we wandered around the downtown area taking pictures until lunch.

The weather was so beautiful.

 

 We had to take pictures of each other to prove we'd actually been there. =)

 

 

 Battery Park with all of the live oak trees.

 A new little oak tree.

I'm a huge urban decay fan and Charleston was an amazing place to take pictures for this. 

Salt water, age and weather are not friends to buildings.

 

 

 

 Gas light. It was so neat to see them flickering all around town.