Do What You Love and Do It Often

This is not meant to be boastful,

but I am reasonably good at a lot of things.

I love the challenge of learning something new.

I'm persistent.

I'm meticulous.

I'm patient.

If something intrigues me, I will go the distance

until I figure out how to do it

or until I understand it.

It is at that point that I often lose interest.

The initial thrill is gone.

I move on.

Photography is the only thing that has been a constant.

I guess I would call it my passion.

I couldn't imagine my life without my camera.

If I'm feeling worried or restless,  I often grab my camera and go outside, not knowing what I will end up focusing on.

Do you know how long it took me to get a clear, close-up picture of a busy ant?

I was laying on the ground with my macro lens, trying to hold it steady and prepare for the moment when the ant crawled out of the crack in the rock.

I love this shot I took after a downpour the other day!  Macro lens again, on a tripod,  focused on the chrome part of the car door handle.  The green and pink color was my shirt.  There were MANY mediocre attempts that day of water droplets on many other things,  but this was the winner.

This is the sunset over Rockville, CT last week.  I was walking the dogs after dinner and noticed some dramatic clouds in the sky.  Vance was waiting to go for ice cream with me, but I made him drive to the tower in Rockville for a few pictures before dessert.  Wow!

Sometimes I overlook shots until I look back a few months later.  This was taken in the spring when I was out one night shooting sunset pictures.  The color was gone, but I saw the moon and one twinkling star in the sky.

I calmed myself last week by shooting bees on flowers for over an hour.  I kept only a handful of images.  I think bees are definitely busier than ants, flitting from one flower to the next in seconds.

It was so exciting to capture this picture of a bee in flight last spring!

Taking pictures while kayaking is especially challenging due to the movement of the boat.  Somehow I managed to get this shot of the inside of a yellow pond lily with two teeny flies on the petal! 

On the same kayaking trip,  I spent quite a while trying to capture this fluffy seed drifting on the surface of the water.

Water also opens up the possibility of reflections.  This heron was definitely keeping an eye on me as I glided closer!

I paddled through a sea of lily pads to get to the right side of these lovely lilies to capture their reflection.

Crystal Lake had never looked so beautiful as it did at sunrise this spring morning.  I had to lay down on the dock to get close to the water to get this breathtaking reflection of the sky in the lake.  Look at that water line!

The early morning light makes any scene sooo much better!

I was driving around town with my camera when I got this picture of my favorite barn!  The plants you see in the foreground are the mums they sell every year in the fall.

I felt kinda bad intruding on these newborns in the nest, but they were impossible to resist.

The momma kept a watchful eye on me from afar.

These are the same babies the day before the nest was empty.

Lastly,  this little songbird was chattering very loudly as it perched on my garden fence!

I LOVE photography.

A Big Lesson from a Tiny Thing

Everyone has seen one of these.  

If you've seen one, you've seen thousands.

During my morning walk,  I've been noticing teeny tiny acorns - many of them - on the sidewalk under a lot of the oak trees.

Every day as I walked, I would remember to wear shorts with pockets so I could collect them.  Everyone loves tiny versions of things!  (I plan to make felted acorns with the caps.)

As I continued to collect them, I wanted to know why.

Why are they so little?

After doing some searching online,
I came up with the answer.

Have you ever made a change in your life
and then see something that is a "sign"
that validates your choice or decision? 

It may spur you to continue on the path you've chosen

or just give you a sense of peace
that you are doing the right thing?

That's what these tiny acorns did for me.

I discovered the reason for their size (or lack of size).

According to Dr. Francis Gouin, whose column "The Plant Doctor is In" appears in the Bay Weekly in Annapolis, Maryland,

"Its flowers have produced more acorns than the tree can carry. Thus the tree is thinning its acorn population. Heavy acorn production does not happen often. However, this spring there was a heavy pollen release and ideal conditions for flowers to be pollinated. When the tree produces too many acorns, it thins itself so that the remaining acorns will grow larger. In horticultural terminology it is called pre-drop."

I found this fascinating because over the summer,
I too have put on more weight than my body
is comfortable with.
I have been attempting
to rid myself of the excess weight
that is not good for me.

I wish it was as easy as dropping some premature acorns,

but it needs to be done for my health and happiness.

In about a month and a half,  I have walked and biked
and kept a detailed food log.
I am now feeling much better after dropping 11 pounds.

I have few more to go,
but I feel good about reaching my goal. 

We live in a world of excess.
Our homes are filled with so much stuff
we don't really need anymore.
Our closets are filled with clothes
that are never worn
and things that no longer
have a purpose in our lives.

So in addition to shedding excess body weight,
I've been making many trips
to Goodwill and Big Brothers & Sisters.

And I've been making some easy money
selling things on Craigslist.

This has been the common theme in my life lately.

We are weighed down by so many things.

It feels so good to have less.

But the oak tree knew it all along.

I Had a Hard Time Sleeping Last Night

My sleep was very restless last night.

You know what it's like -

 when you have something important to do the next day 

 and you don't want to oversleep

so you
just
keep
waking
up

all
night
long.

Then I woke up really early and was wide awake.

That's how my day began.

Only I don't have anything at all going on today.

Adam does.

Today is his first day teaching.

Eleventh grade American History.

In the Bronx.

Instead of staying in bed, 

fighting to go back to sleep for another hour,  

I got up, put on my shorts and t-shirt, grabbed my camera,

and headed to a spot in a nearby neighborhood

to watch the sun come up.

I have no doubt that Adam will be a fabulous teacher.  

He has the intelligence and the work ethic.

Most of all, he has the heart.

He knows the kind of teacher he DOESN'T want to be.

He has a vision of the kind of teacher he wants to be. 

He loves the subject he's teaching,
but more than that, he cares about the kids.
He understands that there may be so much more
going on in their lives besides his history class.

And that sometimes the best opportunities for teaching happen

outside of the classroom. 

He has a willingness to reflect on why things went the way they did - both on the good days and the bad days.   He has enough ego 

to survive the hard days and enough humility to remember 

it's not about him.  He will learn from the kids as much (if not more)

than they will learn from him.

As I write this,  Adam's first school day is coming to an end.

His dad and I can't wait to hear about how it went.

Just as we love hearing stories of Kerry's days as a nurse,

we look forward to following Adam's development as a teacher.

As I was taking the next picture,  I was thinking of the birds

as Adam's students.  Watching the teacher attentively,

trying to get an idea of the

kind of teacher he will be.

Little do they know,  he will be much more than

they could ever imagine!

I Want the Real Thing or Nothing At All

So often when something is amazing you will find copies of it - knockoffs, generics, fakes.

Sometimes they are acceptable substitutes.

More often than not,  we reject the imitations.

We yearn for something better. 

We just want "the real thing".

I discovered today that this is true of the animal kingdom as well.

This is a cat toy that can be seen on the floor of our house.

I always wondered how people come up with ideas for cat toys.

Do they just stick a bunch of feathers on something to make it alluring to felines?

This morning, as I was headed to the basement to change a load of laundry, I discovered another cat toy on the landing.

It was smaller than the one above.  I didn't remember buying it.

I picked it up and came to the realization this was no "fake".

It was, indeed, the real thing.

I haven't found any evidence of a slaughter inside my house,

so I assume this toy was "made" outside and brought inside

as a toy.

Sorry Maddie.

Please keep these playthings outside.

First Day of School

Today was the first day of school for Annie, my youngest and only child still in school.  I don't have the opportunity to take the traditional "first day of school" pictures anymore,  but I visited Annie last week in Rochester and we got a picture together.

Adam is not in school anymore,  but today is also the "first day of school" for him too.  Only now he's now on the other side of the desk.  He began his first career job today as an 11th grade teacher of American History in the Bronx.  The students aren't arriving until next week,  but I was excited to get a picture from Adam today.  This is his classroom!

It's so beautiful!  Love the hardwood floor!

Today also marks the beginning of a new season of blogging!  I don't write a whole lot during the summer, but I'm ready to get back to it now!

This summer has been filled with lots of fun and some heartache.

In June, I had the pleasure of going to NYC with my good friend, Linda, to take engagement photos of her daughter, Katie, and her fiance, Keith.

And just a few weeks ago, we attended their wedding!

I had these little guests in my yard for a few weeks!

Vance and I joined the crowd WAY TOO MANY evenings at Kloter's Ice Cream Barn.

I biked MANY miles around town this summer - this cheery field of sunflowers never failed to make me smile.

I brushed LOTS of fur off Sami and Halle!

I traveled to Alaska for Emily and Joe's gorgeous wedding!

We watched the fireworks on July 4th in Rochester!

Vance and I explored a few CT lakes - him with a fishing pole and me with a camera.

We said hello and good-bye to Jerome, Annie's first cat.  Her friends had this sketch made for her in his memory.  It now is framed and hanging on her wall in her apartment.

On the topic of grand-cats,  Fletcher went under the knife to have a huge polyp removed from his ear.

We are hoping this will be a permanent fix for his recurrent ear infections.

A week in Lake George with the entire family was perfect!  The full moon made for a beautiful sky at night!

Giving Annie a taste of my favorite mixed drinks of old - Sombreros and Toasted Almonds, among others.

Having Adam home for much of the summer was a treat for us, especially Sami!

Now we're empty-nesters once again.

There's no sadness in this.

  We look forward to frequent calls from the kids 

and excited to hear about their lives.  

We love when they make the time to come home for a visit.  

We also enjoy visiting them.

But we're not new to this.  We enjoy each other's company 

and spend a lot of quality time together.

It's nice.