Belleville IL

Mural Bridge

I love public art projects and all of the murals that are popping up around our town’s Main Street thanks to the Belleville Mural Project, as well as the other, unaffiliated projects that have been inspired by it. I saw this one for the first time when we went downtown for Oktoberfest, and I love it, not only because it’s of one of our area’s most famous bridges, but also because the car parked in front of the building looks like it’s about to drive right across the river!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Today is my birthday!

It wouldn’t be a celebration for me if I didn’t get to hang out with Roald:

Apparently Grimace is celebrating his birthday right now, too, so Ryan went out and got me a special birthday shake…it was surprisingly good!

We watched a couple of my favorite movies today, including Cars, which I’ve been thinking about ever since we went to Disney’s California Adventure. I also wanted to wear my new Miss Candyfloss dress and go somewhere pretty…I picked this spot in downtown Belleville, which has a really fun mural!

The girls made me a beautiful birthday cake for dessert, too!

And a little more Animal Crossing, including a visit from Chickadee:

I had a very nice day, and as always, I’m sad it went by so quickly!

Chickadee Thursday

After we visited the library on Monday, we took a little walk through our downtown, and came across this bright, cheerful door. Of course Chickadee wanted to take a picture in front of it…it’s almost as happy as she is!

A New Ghost Sign?

I realize the ridiculousness of using the word “new” to describe a ghost sign, but this one is new to me…I think? I don’t remember seeing this Estey Piano advertisement on Main Street in downtown Belleville before, so maybe it was covered up until recently. Or maybe it’s been there all along, and I just now noticed it. Could be a fresh sign done in a retro style? At any rate, I really like this one!

The Top Five–Photos of 2022

Since all of my other 2022 in Review “Top Five” photo lists have six photos, this one had to also, right? Right?!? I’ve already looked at food, drinks, desserts, and our trip…these are my favorite photos from the past year that aren’t food or vacation related.

I’ve taken hundreds (thousands?) of photos at the Missouri Botanical Garden over the years, but there was something special about this one featuring Henry Shaw’s final resting place in front of his country house:

This photo taken in downtown St. Louis in May reminded me how much I love an urban environment:

Speaking of urban environments, this spring was the first time I’ve visited the Chicago Water Tower in many, many years, and I discovered just how photogenic it is!

That’s a quality shared by the entire city of Chicago…I loved having a bird’s eye view of the city from the Centennial Wheel!

A little closer to home, I really like the beautiful gingko tree outside of our town library, especially in the fall:

Our town is also especially pretty at Christmas:

That wraps up what ended up being my top 30 photos of the year. In light of all of the fun things we did in 2022, I think I should get at least some credit for keeping the number that low!