Uncategorized | Change Is Hard

November 24, 2016
by dawnkinster 13 Comments

Happy Thanksgiving!

Katie here. I’d like to take this opportunity while my mama is away to thank all of you for reading my blog. Well, it’s actually her blog, but I know for sure that your favorite posts are mine!

She and I have loved meeting so many of you in person, and we hope to meet even more of you someday soon! In the meantime I hope you have a wonderful day and a fantastic weekend with family and friends.

Thank you everybody!!

Mama will be home soon. I’m pretty sure she won’t be mad that I hijacked her blog cause I did it just to say thank you to all our readers!

Happy Thanksgiving everybody!

And how can she ever be mad at me? I’m just so darn cute!

Anyway…Mama and I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday!

Hope she brings me some turkey!

November 23, 2016
by dawnkinster 7 Comments

3 quote challenge – Day 3

“Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky.” — Rabindranath Tagore

The sky over Katie’s park.

For me there’s nothing more spectacular to photograph than the sky. Sure there are beautiful oceans and spectacular mountains, gorgeous open farmers’ fields and the intense fall color of the deep woods.

And of course there’s Katie.

Good morning mama!

But always, always there is the sky turning colors beyond description morning and evening, huge, always changing. Accenting a beautiful tree with a puffy cloud, hanging low, heavy with stars above the ocean, outshining the sun with brilliant hues.

Sunset over Lake Michigan.

Sometimes I think I’d like to live in a little house in the middle of a big woods. And then, as I’m walking the dog under the dark, starry sky, I know that I’ll always want to live in a place where I can see the sky in all it’s immense splendor.

I’ve been challenged by Carol over at Wandering of an Elusive Mind to post a quote each day for three days. This is the last post of that challenge but I’m finding I sort of like finding quotes to add to photos. So don’t be surprised if you see more going forward.

Change isn’t always hard.

A foggy morning greets the sun.

November 22, 2016
by dawnkinster 17 Comments

3 Quote Challenge: Day 2

“In every change, in every falling leaf there is some pain, some beauty. And that’s the way new leaves grow. – – Amit Ray

My favorite tree.

I was challenged by Carol over at Wanderings of an Elusive Mind to post quotes for three days. If you’d like to play along we’d love to have you!

I have a young ginko tree in my backyard. Every year the leaves turn a wonderful yellow color and hang on long after most of the maple trees have released their leaves to the wind.

Golden ginko

And every fall I wake up one morning and find all the leaves huddled like a life ring of gold around the base of the tree. After a hard frost all the leaves drop at once.

It must be an amazing site, to see all that gold come fluttering down at once. It would be magical.

This year I kept track of the weather, determined to see my tree shed it’s summer clothes.

Darn!

But I missed it again. I guess it’s shy and only disrobes in the dark. Next year I’m going to have to camp out and keep watch all night, become a tree paparazzi.

If I capture the image I’ll share it with you. Next year for sure.

Mama makes me sit in these leaves every year.

November 21, 2016
by dawnkinster 6 Comments

3 Quote Challenge: Day 1

“There is a plan and a purpose, a value to every life, no matter what its location, age, gender, or disability. — Sharron Angle

I’ve been nominated by Carol at Wanderings of an Illusive Mind. (For a smile and a look at something beautiful, go check out her blog header…she paints with alcohol inks and the horse you’ll find there is stunning!)

Life here is pretty busy at the moment, though I suppose it’s busy everywhere now that the holidays are upon us. Here in the US the combination of politics and holidays don’t seem to go together very well, especially this year.

But I don’t want to talk about that.

I’d rather talk about the value of a life, regardless of the age or location of a person. Especially because of the age and location of a person.

Our elderly family member is settling into a new home, one she wishes she didn’t have to accept. She lived in her own apartment until she was 101 ; that’s longer than most of us will ever live alone. But her legs and her heart just aren’t strong enough for her to live alone any longer.

She knew that someday she’d have to move into a nursing home. Still, now that the time has come, it’s hard.

It’s hard on those of us watching her struggle with emotions as we struggle with ours. It’s hard telling her over and over that she can’t go home again. It’s hard to listen to her voicing her objections to her new location. And it’s hard to leave her there after each visit.

It’s hard to tell her the sky is a brilliant blue and the air is warm and see her sad eyes at the realization she can’t see out the window on the other side of her shared room. It’s hard to listen to her talk about the noises made by other residents at night without having an acceptable resolution. To think about her never having her favorite cinnamon raisin toast again because there’s nowhere to toast it for her. To realize that her space is too small to give her fresh flowers, that she never gets fresh fruits with a meal, that she can no longer enjoy the company of her bird. That she enjoys no privacy at all.

Mostly it’s hard for her.

I believe her life still has value, regardless of the age she has attained and regardless of where she now finds her physical self. And I believe that somehow we need to find a way to make her feel valuable again. Because right now she’s not feeling like she matters to much of anyone at all.

And that’s not right.

Change is hard.

Charlie misses his mom.

November 18, 2016
by dawnkinster 14 Comments

Holding time still

Used to be full. Will be again.

This morning I walked out of the gym wearing shorts, probably the last time I’ll be able to do that for awhile. After all, it’s mid-November. And though today we hit a record high of 72 degrees (22.22 Celsius) I know this weekend we’ll get cold rain, maybe even a bit of snow.

After the frost.

As I left the gym, moving out into the warm sunshine, I wished that it could stay this warm and sunny until next spring. Then I noticed the business next door was playing the Trans-Siberian Orchestra’s Carol of the Bells. Loudly. The music was rolling out the open door and I was reminded that Christmas is right around the corner.

End of season colors.

Time is marching on whether I like it or not.

I remember my mom wanting to stop time when we were growing up. She was already mourning our youth before we moved away. Sometimes I do the same, and I certainly hear other parents voice that sentiment.

Autumn morning light.

But time slides away and before you know it the holidays are here, and then the next year, and the one after that. Years fly by, seasons even faster. The sun sets on today before I realize it’s potential. I want it all to slow down.

Unless it’s snowing. If it’s snowing then time needs to scream forward into spring.

Seriously.

Hanging onto fall.

November 16, 2016
by dawnkinster 8 Comments

Wordless Wednesday – change is hard

November 14, 2016
by dawnkinster 17 Comments

Stalking the super moon

Sunday’s moon.

Let’s just call this a good lesson in what not to do while trying to get that perfect shot of a huge moon rising up from the pumpkin patch. Oh wait. That’s a different story.

The super moon sort of snuck up on me, even though we’d been told about it daily for at least a week. Suddenly it was Sunday and I hadn’t looked up any instructions on how to shoot a great image. I figured I’d wing it, using things I’d learned about shooting stars.

Moving up into Sunday’s sky

Right. Never wing something that only occurs every 18 years. Especially when you’re already 60. I never did get it right, though, while messing with white balance I did get a gray image that was pretty sharp.

Different white balance on Sunday night.

So Sunday night I went home and read some articles online. I put the manual settings into the camera prior to heading out into the dark. I had good intentions.

A little cloudy Monday evening.

Monday evening the moon came up more than 45 minutes later than Sunday night. Plus the library was open, so there were lots of parking lot lights to contend with. AND the moon came up much further to the north on Monday.

So far to the north that at first we thought it had been obscured by clouds, and we packed stuff up and headed to the car. During the walk down the hill I glanced over my shoulder and saw it, right above the library!

Super moon over library.

I tried a lot of different shutter speeds and found out that the faster it moved the sharper the image when it was just the moon.

Golden orange moon Monday night.

The clouds shifted, moved over the moon, then moved again setting it free. The moon grew more golden, though it still came out orange in my camera.

It was a dark and cloudy night.

I tried and tried to get a true color, trying all the white balance options, but though I got one shot that was more black and grey, otherwise they were just shades of orange. Eventually the moon was high and my fingers were cold, so I gave up and went home. Some of the images are nice, but none of them are what I actually saw.

Clouds move in.

So more lessons must be learned, more studying needs to be done. And I need another clear night with a beautiful moon so that I can try it again.

I can’t say the evenings were total failures — after all I got to spend two nights under a beautiful super moon.

Really, I can’t complain.

Goodnight moon.

November 14, 2016
by dawnkinster 16 Comments

Finding color in all the right places

Katie here. So it’s mid-November, the leaves are pretty much gone from the trees and it’s getting cold. I like the cold unless it’s rain. I don’t appreciate my mama making me walk through cold rain to do my business, but I like snow. I don’t know why mama doesn’t. She’s silly, my mama.

Hey mama! Wait up!

Anyway.

We don’t have snow here yet, but I’m having fun anyway. This weekend my mama took me to meet my friend Deuce and his mom Karen and we got to walk in beautiful Bloomer Park!

My friend Deuce and me.

Even though most of the leaves were gone, we still found a ton of color. The down side is that the moms made us pose next to every single leaf. I swear. Every. Single. Leaf.