It’s raining mama!
It’s raining here in Michigan. In January. Complete with thunder and lightening, which is kind of different for around here in mid-winter. But we have nothing to worry about, no storm arrives that we haven’t been warned.
Loudly and often.
Yes indeed, we have a Storm Sheltie, and she barks to announce rain on the roof no matter the season. I wouldn’t want to be caught in a storm without one.
Good job Katie-girl.
Katie here!
What you say? You just heard from me? You wonder if mama is even doing anything interesting? Well, according to me, the princess, she is not.
Besides! It’s my tenth birthday!
That’s double digits people! It’s a big deal and I’ve been looking forward to it for months! (OK, for moments, but in dog years that’s the same as months.)
There should be cake! And treats and balloons and guests and party hats! And gifts. Lots and lots of gifts.
But instead mama got me this.
Not my color mama!
I hate it. I can’t see through it, it flops over my eyes, and it’s not my color. Everybody knows that my color is pink. This thing is not pink. And even the bandage on my leg is blue instead of pink.
Obviously a grievous error.
Mama put me back in the clear cone that the vet gave me. I like it better cause I can see stuff coming at me. Like a treat. Not that I’ve seen any birthday treats. But just in case I’m ready.
This is not my favorite thing either mama!
Also it makes an awesome snow scoop.
Mama says I’m really tired and since I’m on pain meds we should probably celebrate my birthday once this whole cone thing is done. What’s a couple weeks anyway she says? Just about a trillion dog years…but whatever mama.
I need a nap but mama says I have to stay awake long enough to tell you that the thing on my leg that the vet took off was just a wart and nothing to worry about.
So now I have to wear this lovely cone of shame for two whole weeks! Sigh. I’m not very good at being a patient. I ask to go outside and then make mama or daddy walk around and around my path without actually doing anything. I mean what do they think? I can’t sniff for a good spot wearing this ridiculous headgear. But then they took it off so I could sniff and I still won’t do anything. I like to make them nuts. Especially when it’s so cold outside and the wind is blowing so hard.
And last night I made mama sleep on the floor next to me. Mostly I didn’t need her but it was nice to push up against her when I woke up scared in the middle of the night. I’m glad she was there. And just cause she did that I let her sleep all the way until 6 a.m. this morning.
Maybe I’ll let her sleep till 6:15 a.m. tomorrow. We’ll see how I’m feeling. Could go either way.
Meanwhile, I expect a big celebration of my birthday after this stupid cone is gone. I’m starting to gather my list of demands now. A princess has to be ready, don’t you know.
Katie here, signing out – thank you all for all your good thoughts and prayers when I went under the knife. I know they made a big difference, and they certainly made mama feel better.
Sending you all sheltie hugs and kisses. And if you need a cone, I have a spare.
My snow scoop.
“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.
“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.
“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.
Used to be full. Will be again.
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.
.
Sunday’s moon.
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.
Many of you know that I love the photographic work of Snap Happy Gal. If you study her images you’ll note that the sky is often a big part of the picture; her clouds low and robust, the light always mesmerizing. I can spot her work on Facebook even before I check to see who posted.
Sky is a big deal to me too. So on my drive up to Northport yesterday I noticed when the heavy dark clouds rolled in as I navigated morning rush hour through Flint. And how they rolled and twisted as I reached the flat land near Bay City.
Farmland anticipates rain.
I couldn’t help myself. I had to get off the freeway and see what I could catch. I thought to myself as I drove the back roads – “This is a Snap Happy sky.”
There’s a big lake just past Grayling and it always catches my attention. This trip was no exception as the clouds kept rolling in. I had to stop.
Dark and stormy Lake Margrethe
And so it was, and continues to be this morning, here on the big lake. Lake Michigan swells quietly beneath an ominous sky, caught between summer and autumn.
Summer leaves reluctantly.
Living in a wide open space you can watch the weather approaching. It’s almost like watching it on radar, the way the clouds move across the water. But it’s better than radar because you can actually feel the changes — you’re surrounded, as if you’re sitting in the biggest 360 degree 3D movie theater in the world.
A clear blue sky would be boring.
I think it’s possible we’ll have clouds for all three days of my visit. Some people might be sad at the lack of sun and blue sky.
Me? I’m thinking this is going to be cool!
Evening quiets.
I’m so impressed by Snap Happy Gal’s Photography of life in the north, especially her night shots of the stars, that I’ve been trying to figure out how to do it myself.
I messed around with night photography when I was up in Northport last December; by watching YouTube videos I figured out how to use my camera’s manual settings, change the ISO, the aperture, the shutter speed. It was below zero the night I spent an hour out on the beach trying to capture the sky, but I didn’t notice the cold. It was just so much fun being out there.
I haven’t tried it since, and of course now I’ve forgotten how to do any of it, so I watched the videos again, set my camera on manual, and headed out to camp in the backyard last night. I have too much light where I live to see the sky in as much detail as you’d see in the north woods, but I was more curious about the process and the color of the light than I was the number of stars.
I set my alarm for 3:00 a.m. and settled in to sleep. Nothing doing. So I read for awhile and tried to sleep again. Nope. I surfed the web on my phone for a bit and finally nodded off about midnight.
At 3:00 the phone gently nudged me awake and I stumbled out into the yard with my tripod and camera, pointed the lens at the sky and pushed the shutter.
Turns out I’m still way too pink.
Anybody up there?
I figured it would be this way as I didn’t investigate white balance, something Heather (the Snap Happy One up north) suggested after my first foray into night photography.
Never know what I’m pointing at.
Still, I stayed awake a couple more hours thinking about the problem and listening to the bugs, frogs, freeway and occasional snorting white tailed dear. I also watched the stars slide across the sky through the roof of my tent. I didn’t really mind being awake. It was a beautiful night.
So today I studied white balance, read a few articles, watched a video, and I’ve adjusted my camera’s white balance setting. I’m hoping for one more clear night so I can camp out in the backyard again. I figure the worst thing that happens is that the photos are still too pink and I have to study some more.
But I’ll get another nice night under the stars out of it and that’s OK with me.
Change Is Hard 