Shuttered.

I admit it: I have a thing for shutters. Especially exterior ones that really work. Lucky for me, living in an area that has seen European settlement for the past 300 years means there are a goodly number of extant shutters. Most are so layered in decades of paint I doubt they actually work anymore (given the increasing frequency of hurricanes, the home owners might want to look into that...) but they did at one time--they weren't just there for looks like most shutters are today.

I am particularly drawn to the "shutter dogs"--the hardware that holds the shutter open against the building. There are only so many colors and hinges that are used on shutters, but the shutter dogs seem to vary quite a lot.

These are from two buildings. The green-on-white are on the Cresse-Holmes house that houses the Cape May County Historical Museum's collection of artifacts. The green-on-yellow are the book bindery in Historic Cold Spring Village.

All photos taken with a Lensbaby Sweet 35 optic.

I'm dying here... (More spiders!)

The spiders in my yard this year are killing me. So many, so fantastic! I don't know if I'm spending more time looking or if the yard is now mature enough to support them. Probably both.

This one literally dropped out of a tree to the deck right in front of me. Oh, my...

And then I found another one.

I've spent too much time comparing the photos but although incredibly similar I believe they may be two individuals. No ID yet.

And then this handsome male (one of a few cases in the spider world where the boys are pretty spiffy themselves) appeared on the top of an iris leaf in the container pond. After snapping a few slightly blurry photos (I was leaning out the door trying to keep cats in and mosquitos out, twisting the leaf around because he was being particularly shy) I made sure he was over dry land so he didn't miss a jump and land in the water.

These are just the jumping spiders; the orb weavers are out in great variety as well. More to come! Apologies to all arachnophobes. (Don't worry, I only take photos of the beautiful ones; some spiders even make me go Eeewww...)