Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.

Tag Archives: summer


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Some of my favorites

I’ve been camping, two different camp sites, six nights total. My goal was to figure out more about night sky photography…

This is at the top of a very long, very steep sand dune. There are signs at the top warning people not to run down because it’s so difficult to get back up. There’s a $3,000 fee to get rescued. Still, a whole cross country running team was climbing back up when I was there.

…but of course I didn’t sit around all day just waiting for it to get dark.

I saw lots of pretty stuff way up in northern Michigan. I took fewer photos than I would normally because I was looking for things I hadn’t shot before.

On a quick hike in the tip of Michigan’s little finger the sun hit these maple leaves and mesmerized me.

Sill….sometimes I couldn’t help myself, even if I’d seen it, shot it, and filed it before.

But today I think I’ll just share with you my four favorite images from this trip.

The tart cherry trees are still heavy with ripe fruit. I caught these red coated trees, standing with military precision, and had to go back for this shot. I walked down a long farmer’s lane, hoping not to get kicked off his land, and as I got halfway to my target I found a field filed with wildflowers. So I pushed my way into the middle of that field and shot the flowers in front of the trees. This image made me smile really wide, even before I saw it on a larger screen.

None of them were the image I was hoping to get, but that’s still out there and I’ll try again.

One evening I went up to the Mackinaw Bridge. I hadn’t been successful getting the stars, so I figured I’d concentrate on the bridge lit up. It was a wonderful evening. This was 15 seconds, F22, ISO 100.

That’s one of the fun things about photography, there’s always something more to accomplish.

My campsite at the Pigeon River Forest. I was too scared to wander away from my tent at night. But it was pretty there too.


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Still smiling

Trent coordinates a smile a week blog post, asking people to share something that’s made them smile each week.

Well, currently I’m in one of my happy places.

Pt. Betsie on a windy wet afternoon.

And it sure makes me smile.

The Coast Guard on patrol.

What made you smile this week? Post about it and link up to Trent’s blog, he’ll recap on Monday.

Lots to smile about this week!


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Trying to find the night sky. Again.

I’m ‘up north’ and the sky is clear and the air is warm and the bugs aren’t bad. Perfect to head out and try to learn more about shooting stars. And there might even be a few shooting stars to boot!

The little lake was calm with families waiting for the sunset on the protected beach away from the big lake.

I went out to North Bar Lake, a place a photographer told me about years ago. I’ve been there a couple of times since, and I figured it might be the perfect place to watch the stars.

I got there way too early, but walked out on the beach anyway, trying to scope out a spot for sunset and star viewing.

Someone’s castle, left from earlier in the day.

There wasn’t much beach to speak off, the Great Lakes are high this year, but I’m not complaining, it feels good to see the lakes full.

Not a lot of sandy beach, but enough to enjoy.

Once I figured out there wasn’t any one particular spot I’d want to be I headed back to the car to read for awhile.

The stairs glow with late afternoon sun.

And then an hour or so later I dragged my towel, camera bag and tripod back out and walked way down the beach away from all the families and groups of kids with their bonfires and set up shop.

The last of the daylight shimmers.

It wasn’t much of anything, last night’s sunset. But it gave me plenty of time to play around, trying to figure stuff out.

Typical sunset pinks up the sky.

Like how to slow down the movement of water.

Add a bit of time to that shutter speed and smooth out the rough edges.

And how to make the most out of that time just after the sun goes down. The pink sky.

Still waiting for those stars.

The blue air.

The blue hour, Lake Michigan style.

But the darn moon, only half a moon at that, was just way too bright.

Moonlight on the big lake.

I tried, because I was getting tired of waiting, to capture the big dipper. Just to see what this camera can do.

Really, the big dipper is in there. Promise.

And then I focused for a minute or two on the group of college kids up the beach and their bonfire.

Don’t know what happened here, but it’s kind of cool, so I’m keeping it.

By 11:15 I was so tired, sitting on the sand, looking for anything to take a picture of, the stars not really showing yet. I finally packed up and headed back to the car, checking along the way for things to shoot.

Can you see the tree and the stars and the fence?

I liked the old tree and the big dipper behind it. Not exactly why I was out there, but still pretty cool.

I sat on the little beach and captured the moon and the kids’ bonfire. And then I headed back to camp.

Can you see the bonfire out there, to the left and lower than the moon?

An hour later, pulling into the campground, the moon was setting, a bright orange crescent putting out much less light. And at my site, almost 12:30 in the morning, there were a ton of stars overhead.

No pictures of any of that…but you can imagine my frustration. And so the quest continues for another night.

A failure, but a fun failure.


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We have babies!

There are two bluebird boxes in our yard. Last spring I cleaned out one of them, but hadn’t gotten to the other one when I noticed bluebirds checking it out, so I left it alone. Turns out the bluebirds went with other options and I sadly acknowledged that we didn’t have any tenants this year.

Warning off the human intruder.

Well, I guess I haven’t been paying attention.

For the past couple of days, whenever I wandered around the backyard there would rise up noisy, agitated chatter from the fringes of the yard. Somewhere up in the oak tree, or over in the hydrangea bush was an angry bird, but I could never quite find it.

Everybody OK in there?

Well, this morning I figured out most of the noise was coming from the bluebird house, the one I never got around to cleaning out. A house wren soon swooped up to sit on the roof and tell me off. I retreated to find my camera while she fed her babies who were screaming for their breakfast.

Heading out to gather more insects.

Once outside with my camera I hid in a tree far away and watched mom and dad fly in with insects for the hungry crew. I don’t know how many babies they have, but in this next shot you can see one of the little ones inside.

Click on this to make it larger so you can see inside the nest box.

My new Michigan bird book says they have two broods a year; this is probably the second and last. I’m guessing they had a batch while we were off traveling earlier in the summer. I’m so happy at least one of our rentals had occupants this summer. I think the world could use a few more wrens and I wish our happy brood success as they venture out into it.

It’s hard work being a parent.

Good luck little ones, it was an honor to be your landlord!

Don’t make me come in there!


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Running toward the race

Three weeks from this Saturday, that’s the day of my 10 mile race, the race I signed up for last winter when it seemed like I had lots and lots of time to go from zero to 10.

Well.

Mile 1, heading down the hill to the woods.

Today I walked and ran 8 miles at a local park. I had a plan and I executed it, so I’m happy even though it took me just over 2 hours to get it done.

My plan was to jog the second quarter mile in each of the eight miles, and then some parts of the other quarters, depending on the terrain (up a hill, walking, down a hill, maybe I’d jog) and the sun (in the shade, jog, in the sun, walk).

The Mile 2 sign sits amid wild flowers.

Sometimes it was hard, especially, for some reason, mile 5 and mile 7. But during my quarter mile jog I’d tell myself I only had to jog one stinking quarter and if I gave up I would have to run another one, so no sense giving up. And I didn’t. And some of the miles, if I felt good, I’d jog the 4th quarter of a mile too.

Just to prove I could.

The miles seemed to go by easier than in past attempts. I guess that’s testimony to getting out there as often as I can, and also because it was cooler today, only 68F (20C) when I started this morning. I think it was in the high 70s (23C) by the time I was finished, but there was a breeze which helped a lot.

A little bit of sunny yellow to make me smile on Mile 3.

The breeze also helped with the big flies that circled my head from mile 3 through the end of the run. I hate those flies, they hurt when they bite, but mostly they’re just annoying. Plus I look stupid trying to run while flinging my arms around over my head.

Looking forward to the shade during Mile 4.

Mostly the flies landed and became entangled in my hair where they buzzed angrily. I didn’t mind that so much because at least they weren’t biting me. But there was one fly obviously not paying attention because he flew into my left eye sometime during mile 6. As I swatted at my eye, I tried not to trip over my feet while moving forward using only one eye. Not a good look, but by then, to be honest, nothing about me was a good look.

A butterfly enjoyed some wildflowers in an open meadow during Mile 5.

Finally slogging my way out of the woods near the beginning of mile 8 I faced that long, sunny, uphill mile to the car. A small family on bikes came out of the woods behind me, the mother warning the two young children on their tiny little bikes that “now we have to go up the big hill.” The little boy, maybe 8, said, as he passed me, “I need to get around this girl, she’s going too slow.” His sister said, “You shouldn’t call an old lady a girl.” The mom said “And you shouldn’t call anyone slow.” I laughed out loud as he looked suspiciously over his shoulder at me as they sped away.

Plenty of mosquitoes back here near this pond during Mile 6.

And while I was on the steepest part of the hill, walking because I smartly ran my 8th quarter mile during a flat section, I caught up to a mother and little girl, maybe 5, pushing their bikes up the hill. Quite a way from the crest the little girl told her mom that she thought she could do it.

Mile 7 was filled with dappled shade.

So, with her mom chanting “You can do it, you can do it,” she got on her bike and muscled her way up to the top. Occasionally she wavered, but then would shout, “I can do it!” and kept pushing on. She made it and I was smiling as wide as her mom as they lit off toward the parking lot.

There’s a bench under that tree, taunting me during Mile 8.

She was shouting the same thoughts I’d been chanting silently during my long run/walk. She just looked cuter doing it.

The pictures here were taken during the walk portions of my 8 miles, one image for each mile, and one for the last quarter mile I went over 8.

Who could resist stopping to capture this, just after the end of mile 8.

Thanks for coming along, it helped to have you rooting for me. I thought a lot about truck stuff while I was out there, thanks for supporting me in those efforts too.

I hope the race goes as well as this 8 miles did.

I can do it!


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Smiling on the run again

I’ve got this road race coming up at the end of August. It seemed like a good idea when I registered and paid the pretty hefty fee months ago. But now August is sneaking up on me and I’ve been away from home for weeks at a time not training.

Oh, I took running clothes with me wherever I went. I’m sure they were quite comfortable sitting nice and secure inside my luggage.

Meanwhile, I need to get back on track. I’ve given myself permission to walk as much of the ten mile race as I need to. I’ve never run the whole thing, and I’ve run this race a bunch of times over the years. But still it would be nice to finish in a reasonable time. At least within the same day. Walking is sooooo slow!

A running friend and I are planning on doing the race together, at least part of it. Funny, we are both worrying about whether or not we can stick with each other. She’s training by running 4 minutes, walking 1 minute. I’m training by running a quarter mile, walking a quarter mile.

I think my run portion likely is about 4 minutes, though I’m not sure. It’s a proven fact that it is impossible to do math in your head while you’re running and this morning I was trying to divide my average time into quarters to get some idea of my pace. I definitely know that my walk portion is way longer than her one minute walk break.

Today I did six miles, at my favorite park, trying to get a feeling for my speed, or lack of it. I tried to find the stopwatch on my phone app, but realized pretty quickly that I can’t actually see my phone apps without my glasses. So I don’t know if I’ll be able to stick with Betty at our race, but I’ll work between now and then to run her style, 4 minutes of running, one minute of walking.

We’ll see how it goes.

Meanwhile, here’s a montage of pretty things I saw on this morning’s run/walk.

So…how does all of this fit Trent’s weekly smile? Well, it felt great to be back at my favorite park, one where I used to run long every Saturday with a multitude of running friends. Lots of beautiful things to see, so I took photos during my quarter mile walks.

During one of those walk breaks a beautiful doe stood just behind a bush, she stared at me, I stared at her. Would have been an amazing photograph, but my phone didn’t have enough storage to take one more image. So she and I just watched each other for a long time. Made my mile 5 extra long, but extra special. So it all balances out.

I think I was smiling the whole six miles. In fact I was so happy to get the six miles done that I pulled into a cupcake place on the way home and bought a lovely lemon creme cupcake.

No I did not!! But I did look longingly at the cupcake place as I drove past. Hope the thought of a lemon cupcake made you smile!

But really, please write a post about what you’ve smiled about this week and link to Trent’s blog. He’ll recap all the smiles next Monday. It’s always good to begin Monday with a bunch of smiles!

Can’t wait to see yours!


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I’ve been waiting mama

Katie here!

I know for a fact you’ve been missing me, cause I haven’t been able to blog for months and months! OK. Weeks. But it feels like forever!

I’m bored mama!

There are a lot of reasons why I haven’t blogged, most of which have to do with the fact I haven’t done anything fun in ages. It’s not fair. Mama has been gallivanting all over the world.

And where did I get to go?

Seriously bored, mama.

I got to go to the kennel, that’s where I got to go! I seriously don’t understand why mama thinks that’s an adventure. I mean, while she was climbing mountains in Norway and the Hill in D.C. I was napping in my cell, um…room at the kennel.

Don’t get me wrong, they treat me fine there, but it’s definitely not an adventure.

I don’t think this is the kennel!

So yesterday, when mama got up early and started hustling around I got sort of nervous and went to hide somewhere, hoping she’d forget I was around. But that never works, and it didn’t work this time either.

A pretty river runs through the park.

I ended up in my crate in the car and we drove for almost an hour. I was definitely nervous when she opened the door, but you know where we were?

We were at Deuce’s house!

This is my friend Deuce!

Boy oh boy, I haven’t seen my buddy Deuce in a long time! This was way better than the kennel!

Being at a park is way more fun then the kennel or the groomer or the vet!

And then we all went, Deuce, his mom and mama and me, to one of his parks! It’s a perfect little park, just my size and it’s all shade.

Deuce and I spent a long time sniffing stuff, he’d be up front doing the scouting for us, then I’d come along and sniff the good stuff that he marked for me. It worked perfectly.

We’ll sit next to each other but we’re not thrilled about the interruption to our sniffing.

Of course along the way the moms had to make us pose for pictures. I swear, I try to use my new deafness as an excuse not to follow directions but darn mama uses hand signals so I end up posing for her.

We saw a couple deer in the park, a mama deer and her baby. My mama only got good pictures of the mama deer, after we moved on we looked back and saw the mama licking the baby’s face. It was so cute, but there was too much brush between us to get a good picture. Mama was still glad she saw it through.

You can see the two, mom and baby, looking at us, even though the photo isn’t in focus.

After we made one tour of the park I still felt good so we walked around it again. This time we noticed the numbers and we found the number 12 for me, cause I’m 12 years old!

Look! They’re celebrating my age!

The vet a couple weeks ago said I looked real good for my age and I have to agree I’m fabulous.

So anyway, that’s my adventure, and I’m grateful to my Aunt Karen, Deuce’s mom, for inviting us over to his park and for being patient when I was a little slow.

Sitting in a spot of sun for mama.

Though to be honest, it wasn’t always my fault. Don’t forget, I had mama attached to me and she has that darn camera that slows her up all the time. She’s always taking these artsy-fartsy pictures.

Mama is fascinated with light.

Frankly, if the focus isn’t me I don’t think it’s worth taking up the pixels.

Am I right or am I right?

Talk later, your park girl Katie.

I think I deserve a treat.