Snow Globe?

 

This is a Japanese paper plant, the variety is Snow Globe. This one lives in the lathe house at the JC Raulston Arboretum.  They say this plant helps remove gaseous formaldehyde in the air.  Might be useful as well as ornamental...

sky view

Happy New Year's Eve.  It feels good to say goodbye to 2017!

Backyard visitor

I could hear this guy calling early in the morning, and then later on he showed up in our backyard.  We think he might be a young Cooper's Hawk.

Sunbeam Bench

This bench sits outside the hardware store on White Street in Wake Forest.  Someone is always hanging out around there.  It seems like an old time gathering place.

Millbrook Exchange Park

I'm not sure what it is, It looks patriotic, with stars and stripes.

Popsicle anyone?

Looks like it was melting, but it was about 30 degrees when I took this picture.  This sculpture sits next to a parking lot on White Street in Wake Forest.

Merry Christmas

Olaf the snowman has had a hard time this Christmas.  He broke free of his moorings on a breezy day, but he's back now to wish everyone a Merry Christmas!!!

Happy Christmas Eve

Even Mickey is in the holiday spirit.

Little Blue Truck

This truck was sitting outside a shop on White Street in Wake Forest.  It was giving a ride to a few of the goat  herd.

  The rooster was keeping guard on them all.

Ho Ho

I don't know why I think this is so clever.  The lights are just strung out on some bushes, but I think the HO HO is cute.

The stuff of nightmares

What little girl wouldn't want a stuffed Unicorn head hanging on her bedroom wall?  Big game trophy hunting taken to an extreme?  We found these for sale in the toy department at Target.  Really???

Haunted woods?

This path looked like a scene from Once Upon A Time.  No I don't think it's haunted or enchanted.  It winds around the tennis courts in Millbrook Exchange Park, in the middle of North Raleigh.

Wake Forest Murals

White Street in Wake Forest is a quaint old fashioned downtown in a city that is growing without limits. These murals on the walls of two of the buildings represent the history of the town.  On White Street they've preserved the old style even with condos and housing developments springing up elsewhere in the city.

The train still runs right through the center of town.

Twisted tree

I've been trying to figure out how this tree trunk grew this way.  I'm thinking there must have been a strong vine twisted tightly around it as it grew???

Stone chapel

This is the bell tower of a church at the corner of Main street and Holding in Wake Forest.  It appears to house two different missions.  One is a non-denominational community chapel (Here), the other is the Wake Forest Christian Church. (Here).  How would that work?  Sunday morning services, with one, and wedding venue with the other?

Big Belly

It seems that anything can go solar.  This is Big Belly, a solar trash compactor.  And why not!

Blowing in the wind

On a cold windy day, the Sweeties Candy Shop had their bubble machine going.  We followed the bubbles to the shop on White Street.  Laurence Welk would have been proud.

Christmas blowups

There are a lot of different blow up Christmas decorations.  This one is a bit different.  

Red Wolf

The Red Wolf is considered the rarest of wolves.  In 1980 they were declared extinct in the wild.  (see here) A preservation program has brought them back  to about 100 individuals, all in North Carolina, and a reintroduction program has been going since 1987.  Now, our senator Tom Tillis is asking the US Fish and Wildlife service to terminate the program (see here).

This mama wolf and her pups live at the NC Museum of Life and Science.  This last summer the pups dug under the fence and were on the loose on the Museum grounds for a week or so.   Maybe they're sneaky enough to survive despite everything...

Sunset with stripes

The lines in the picture are contrails, but they were going in the same direction as the clouds so it looked like a striped sky.

Christmas Rooster

Seems like everyone is getting into the spirit.  This is the rooster ouside City Barbeque here in North Raleigh.  

First snow

It's not sticking, in fact it's melting as it lands.  But we are having our first snow!

Leaves revisited

The leaves are deep!

Fall leaves

The leaves are on the ground now.  Piles and piles of leaves!  Raleigh has a big monster vacuum truck that comes around once a year and sucks up all the leaves on the curb.  So people rake the leaves onto the curb for weeks before the machine comes around.  Hopefully it won't get windy.

Ugly play animals

Somehow all of the bouncy animals for kids to play on in parks are always ugly.  It's hard to figure out what they're supposed to be.  I think this is a frog, but that's just because of it's color.  

Or this one...I think it's a squirrel.

Shell fungus

To me this very small fungus growing on a dead tree reminds me of a shell.  Both of these pictures were taking the same day at Forest Ridge Park.

End of Old 98

Highway 98 was created in 1934, in Wake county it was called Durham road.  In 1981, the Army Corps of Engineers opened Falls Lake, a dammed up portion of the Neuse River, and Highway 98 was cut off by Falls Lake.  Here, the end of Old 98 has become a hiking/biking trail in Forest Ridge Park. 

You can still see part of the highway pavement on the trail.

As I looked across the lake from the end of the road, I think you can see where it must have continued at the other side.

Fall Cardinal

As bright as he is, this cardinal was overshadowed by the fall colors.

More decorations

This house has much more decorous decorations, basically ribbons wreaths and spot lights.  They must turn off the spot lights when they go to bed or the lights would keep them up all night.

Christmas lights revisited

It's very hard to take pictures of lights at night.  This is the same Christmas display as yesterday's post, but instead of trying to hold still, I just moved the camera on purpose.  

Christmas lights

Some neighbors really love Christmas.  This house is decorated complete with a tree playing Christmas carols.  They do turn the display off later in the evening.  I'm sure the next door neighbors appreciate that.