suns along the Mohawk

A week ago, the Sunday Schenectady Gazette called Sylvie Briber an “ambassador”, who “makes friends for the Stockade” (March 21, 2010, p. E4).  Of course, her Stockade neighbors know that three of the many things that Sylvie does well — in addition to editing The Stockade Spy –are making friends for herself (and her dog Lollipop), singing at church and community events, and baking delicious, professional-looking desserts.  Yesterday, at The Schenectady County Historical Society, Sylvie celebrated the realization of a dream 37 years in the making.

– as always, click on a photo for a larger version and scroll over it for a description –

At an event she called “A Garden Sweet: favorite art songs“, Sylvie presented her first CD, which has the same title.  The new album of “art songs” (poems set to music) features Sylvie’s vocals with piano accompaniment by Karen Ranung, her longtime voice instructor.

– click here for a brief event-calendar description of the event –

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– the flyer for the Garden Sweet event & featured artists Karen Ranung [R] and Sylvie Briber –

Below, you’ll find a small batch of photos taken at the premiere of A Garden Sweet (with my usual disclaimers about a lack of indoor photography skills), plus a few more details about an event that attracted a full-house of Sylvie’s friends and admirers (over 60 people).

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It looks like the biggest snowstorm of the season will be hitting the Stockade this week, lasting from Tuesday February 23, 2010 through Saturday.  So far (noon on Wednesday), it hasn’t inspired a lot of photography by me, but I’m going to post occasional photos over the next few days, as I snap them.  (As always, click on a photo for a larger, sharper version, and scroll over it for a description.)

Like the image at the top of this posting, here are a couple shots from my bedroom window around midnight last night (Tuesday into Wednesday):

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We all awoke to a half-foot of snow on Wednesday morning.  I took a little stroll up Front St., and there really weren’t any especially interesting scenes.  On my way back, I took this one from the corner of Front St. and Washington Avenue, looking south toward the Historical Society, just to chronicle this segment of the storm (and yes, that is a melting snowflake on my camera lens):

Little Devin’s second snowman (click to see his first), was constructed on Thursday, Feb. 18.  It has not stood up too well, having lost all of his accessories, except for a snazzy red scarf.  You can compare for yourself Snowman 2’s jaunty look last week with his state after last night’s snowfall (Tuesday, February 23, which was Devin’s 3rd birthday):

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– Devin with his second snow man and the snowman 6 days later (24 Feb 2010) –

5 P.M. update, Wednesday:

It continued to be gray and dreary this afternoon, making artsy photography a bit difficult.  Happily, Samantha Couture wrote me to say that Aaron and the boys (Arthur & Miles) spent the morning taking advantage of the really good-packing moist snow to make a couple of snowmen (see their early-January SnowFamily here).  That brought me down Cucumber Alley, where I found this pair of snowmen:

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. update (Sat. Feb 27): another view . .

Meanwhile, a Time-Warner crew was hanging out near Front St. and Cucumber Alley, and told me they were taking steps to help prevent trouble over the next few days.  At the same time, our favorite Mail Carrier worked as hard as ever (and is seen below coming out of 23 Washington Ave., the home of Bob and Sylvie Briber, and delivering mail on Front St.):

11:45 P.M., Wednesday:

Thanks to a tip from a snow angel, I found this little snow Cutie, who I am told was lovingly created by Elizabeth and Beth Petta, on the steps at Arthur’s Market:

update: As feared, by Thursday morning, the rain had eroded quite a bit of our SnowCutie, and she was totally gone when checked Saturday morning.

Saturday afternoon, Feb. 27:

Large puddles and poorly-plowed streets were not enough to lure out with my camera on Thursday and Friday.  Our part of the Capital District did not get the brunt of the three-day snowstorm.  But, Saturday began with enough snow in the air to force me to pick up my PowerShot (after a big mug of coffee) and set out a little after 8 A.M. to explore Cucumber Alley and my dead-end block of Washington Ave. along the Mohawk.

At the end of Washington Ave. I discovered this endomorphic snowman (of unknown origin) standing sentry, apparently protecting the neighborhood from whatever danger might come out of misty Riverside Park:

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At 8 A.M. today, there was nothing more ominous in the Park than a sole dogwalker:

As always, the scene was quite photogenic at the Washington Ave. abutment:

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– looking east (above) and west (below) from the Burr Bridge abutment –

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Rapidly running out of energy, I headed to a favorite photo-shoot location — the end of Cucumber Alley — for a final few snaps:

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