The first of the dual parade Sunday started out with a sea of white and blue Israeli flags being waved by the thousands of revelers on the parade route on 5th Ave from 55th to 74th Sts. All the members of temples and yeshivas in the tri state area come out to celebrate Israel and the Jewish people of New York City.  This year the parade celebrates its 55th year and the celebration was loud and proud.  As usual, the mounted police signaled the start of the parade and was soon followed by the blowing of the shofar – a large horn blown to signal the people to come together for a special occasion.

     One of the nicest things about the parade is the large homemade banners displayed by the many groups depicting the theme of the parade. This year’s theme was Only in Israel. Banners…

   The second leg of the dual parade day was for one of the more colorful parades so far this year. Billed as the largest celebration outside of the Philippines, the Filipino Independence Day parade got under way on Madison Ave. near 38th St. and made its way down to 25th St. where a large stage was set up for an after parade festival. On  June 12th, 1898, Filipinos proclaimed their independence from Spain and has been a key ally of the US ever since. In this version, there were groups both honoring and decrying the current Filipino President Duterte. Beauty queens were abound with elegant gentlemen dressed in the Spanish style guayaberas.

     One of the best parts of the parade are the native tribal costumes and dance. There is a huge group dance competition each January in the Philippines and the winner is invited to this parade…

Photo prompt June 4 to June 10, 2019:

Miss

Kitty

Sits pretty

Smile on her face

Tom paws on his hips

Wild blue eyes and tight lips

Toto hanging by his claws

He knows Miss Kitty has her flaws

He would fight mighty Tom to the death

He’ll love Miss Kitty to his dying breath.

Beneath the noon Miss Kitty thinks she’ll swoon

If Mighty Tom discovers Toto

They’ll fight and one will be laid low

Suddenly the gutter cracks

Toto looses his grip

Soon he starts to slip

He drops to ground

Miss Kitty

Softly

Sigh.

Welcome to the 162nd round up of the Tuesday Photo Challenge!

You Towered to new heights!! Your posts provided a wide array of towers and towering structures and objects! You certainly expressed your creativity through the photography and words that you brought into your entries. There were some stunning images and some that made me smile, which made it a joy to read each of your blog posts. I hope you enjoy reading each others’ posts as well!

Thank you for another great week of challenge responses!

Here’s an old-style approach to conquering a tower…

This image comes from our vacation to Italy in 2017; in the lovely town of Ostia Antica, we found the papal castle of Julius II, which made for an interesting visit. As there was a slight communication problem, we didn’t get the idea of having to stay outside the castle until…

Welcome to week 163 of the Tuesday Photo Challenge!

After a week of wonderful Tower posts, I thought it might be nice to take a step back into time. The theme of this week is inspired by our vacation in Ireland, as in many locations one felt the gentle tug of days gone by, telling of a time that was very different. With that in mind, your challenge is to portray that which connects you to all things Ancient. As usual, there are many ways to approach the Ancient (I’ll even take Ancient Aliens!), so I’m sure that your creative minds will come up with something interesting!

Have some fun with this theme and don’t let the dust of the ancient settle on you!

This is one of the images that inspired this theme…

This view looks into the Oratory of the Innisfallen Monastery, which…