Here’s a beautiful old farmhouse and barn south of Gallatin, Missouri on State Hwy 13. It’s always sad to me to see these old parts of Americana disappear into the sunset, sometimes never to be seen again, which is why I have preserved so many of them in this blog and in my Barns! Barns! Barns! flickr photostream.

You’re welcome to visit my Barns! Barns! Barns! photostream in flickr where you can register for free and upload your own photos of old barns, farm houses and other farm-related items. There are currently 799 members and 7,086 photographs and growing. If you love barns, you’ll love this website!

Last Friday afternoon I decided to go for a ride around the countryside and remembered to take along my camera just in case I found something that . . . well . . . I liked. And what I liked the most, at least on this day, were old barns and farm houses in a state of disrepair, and I wasn’t disappointed. Here is one old barn that has definitely seen better days.

You’re welcome to visit my Barns! Barns! Barns! photostream in flickr where you can register for free and upload your own photos of old barns, farm houses and other farm-related items. There are currently 770 members and over 6,300 photographs and growing. If you love barns, you’ll love this website!

Old barns are one of my favorite things to take photographs of. They are what made America great—albeit the farmers had something to do with it. While this barn is still in use, there are so many relics that have fallen into disrepair and many have fallen to the ground. This particular barn is in Daviess County, Missour,

Link back to Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Houses and/or Barns

You’re welcome to visit my Barns! Barns! Barns! photostream in flickr where you can register for free and upload your own photos of old barns, farm houses and other farm-related items. There are currently 501 members and over 3,000 photographs and growing. If you love barns, you’ll love this website!

This is the home of my dear friends in rural Iowa. In their 90s, and not getting around like they used to, yet they’re always bright with sunny dispositions. In keeping with this, they welcome their mailman with bright and sunny flowers (mailbox off screen to the left).

Comments are welcome.

Link back to Weekly Photo Challenge: On Top

You’re welcome to come visit my Barns! Barns! Barns! photostream in flickr where you can upload your own photos of old barns, farm houses and other related items.

©2013 Cris Coleman All Rights Reserved

Thursday I went about the farm with my camera, determined to find something to take a photograph of. There wasn’t much of a photographic nature, everything wearing a coat of brown, left over from fall.

But I was determined and just started shooting away at everything that looked just a bit different. I walked around a farm pond and started taking photographs of reflections in the water, as it wasn’t otherwise very photogenic.

Imagine my surprise, when the next day the new photo challenge was Reflections. So, I uploaded my photographs to the computer and started looking through them and came across a number of these reflection ones.

And here they are. I hope you enjoy them.

Comments are welcome.

You’re welcome to come visit my Barns! Barns! Barns! photostream in flickr where you can upload your own photos of old barns, farm houses and other related items.

Link back to Weekly Photo Challenge: Reflections

©2014 Cris Coleman All Rights Reserved

©2014 Cris Coleman All Rights Reserved

©2014 Cris Coleman All Rights Reserved

©2014 Cris Coleman All Rights Reserved

Finally, looking down upon a stream that borders the property.

©2014 Cris Coleman All Rights Reserved

Lonely and forlorn am I,
No longer used I am,
Empty except for mice
And other little critters;
But still I stand proud.

Though somewhat less
Than once I was,
Still reaching skyward,
Ready to receive
The hay in my loft
That will never come;
But still I stand proud.

Left alone and abandoned,
Still I understand
That time goes on
And so do people,
Yet I must stay;
But still I stand proud.

©2013 Cris Coleman All Rights Reserved

Link back to Tuesday’s A to Z challenge: “B”

Here are a few photos I took earlier this year while out looking for things to photograph. I hope you like them. Feel free to LIKE them. Hee. Hee.

Here’s a couple of shots of a creek a few miles away from my home. Don’t know why I took them—just playing around.

©2012 Cris Coleman All Rights Reserved

Reflections-1 by cris Coleman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at https://fstopfantasy.wordpress.com/2012/12/01/weekly-photo-challenge-reflections/

©2012 Cris Coleman All Rights Reserved

Reflections-3 by cris Coleman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at https://fstopfantasy.wordpress.com/2012/12/01/weekly-photo-challenge-reflections/.

Here’s a shot of the same creek in the opposite direction. Notice the little dinosaur sticking its head up on the left, central portion of the photograph.

©2012 Cris Coleman All Rights Reserved

Reflections-2 by cris Coleman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at https://fstopfantasy.wordpress.com/2012/12/01/weekly-photo-challenge-reflections/

I’m a semi-fan of impressionistic art, depending on who the artist is, such as Money, I mean, Monet, Manet, Renoir, and so forth. Obviously, the impressionism here is in the reflection, not on the land . . . but I knew you knew that.

Personally, I think people went into impressionism because 1) they needed glasses and saw everything blurry and fuzzy; and/or 2) they couldn’t draw faces very well.

Impressionistic Reflections-1 by cris Coleman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at https://fstopfantasy.wordpress.com/2012/12/01/weekly-photo-challenge-reflections/

Impressionistic Reflections-2 by cris Coleman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at https://fstopfantasy.wordpress.com/2012/12/01/weekly-photo-challenge-reflections/.

©2011 Cris Coleman

Winter Fantasy by Cris Coleman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Ever since I moved eastward from Sacramento, California in 1970, I’ve been confronted with a yearly challenge: winter!

Winter in Sacramento can be described, at worst, as minimal:

1. Minimally cold (mid-30s would be a cold winter).
2. No snow (a few snowflakes once in the fifteen years I lived there).
3. No sleet (but fog was pea-soup thick).

In Missouri, winter can be described as:

1. Cold, although this year, so far, it has been positively delightful, compared to past winters, except for one short blizzard and one week of really cold, but not below zero, temperature.
2. Blizzardy from time to time.
3. Ice storms, a little less frequent than blizzards.
4. Snow, snow, snow, although this year, except for the one short-lived blizzard, has been really nice, a virtual heat wave, comparatively.
5. Slippery roads from time to time, made worse by having to drive on them throughout the night when they’re at their worse.
6. Fog here too, although generally not pea-soup thick, but sometimes.

Still, there is hope beyond winter, and this winter has been particularly hopeful. So far.

(Regarding the photo: I told you I liked reflections.)