Photography, 8/5/17

Well, I guess it's well past time to blow the dust off this blog! Obviously, a lot has happened and kept us busy in the last year...too much to try to catch up, but let's start off with something easy--just a collection of photos.

You may think my photography hasn't advanced much, and it's not your imagination. I still haven't managed to even get all the way through the user manual for my camera, let alone take that actual photography class I have so often spoken of. There just isn't time for a class yet, and as for what I HAVE read of the manual--well, I don't have the guts to try it out too often. Usually when I'm taking pictures lately, it's in the course of a story for the paper, which means I need fast candids before the presentation/event/performance/class/whatever I'm reporting on is over. There's no chance to redo if I don't get it right, so I leave the camera on auto settings the majority of the time. Sad, but true, and something I still really do hope to address. One day. It just isn't priority right now.

But still, there are pictures now and then worth sharing--especially since I do use the camera now and then when I'm not working and have a little more time to try this and that. Here are some I've set aside because they came out good or interesting or weird or just help to tell a minor story that happened over the past year. It's a rather scattershot collection, but enjoy where possible!

Just one example of the hateful cabbage butterfly caterpillars that completely overran our garden beginning in Spring 2016...and continuing through that whole summer, too, long after all the cabbage, kale, and broccoli were gone. (I'm glad to say, we have seen very few of them this year. Whew!)

A 3D puzzle we spent a Spring 2016 weekend putting together. Pretty intricate!

What's that under the big red Mom-mobile..?

...THIS guy!

Another backyard wildlife encounter. This was on the back deck, but every so often one of these tiny crabs wanders up from the creek and, inexplicably, we actually find them INDOORS.

I've tried and tried to capture a good moon picture. This is one of the better attempts. (more on that to come)

One of the gorgeous Asiatic lilies in my back yard flower bed. It looks fabulous, but I'm always glad I just happened to have planted it at the far end of the yard. When it's in bloom, the stink is overpowering--not flower-y, perfume-y, but just stink. Blechh!

One of my favorite pictures in this group--a layered colony of fungus growing on a dead tree we saw on one of our walks through the preserve last summer.

A single cucumber, a single small watermelon, and a single handful of beans--that's the whole of what I got from last year's garden once the aforementioned hateful caterpillars found it. And again, hallelujah! They did not return this year.

An enormous snapping turtle--another preserve walk find. Look at the moss and grass growing on its back!

 

As always, I love dragonfly pictures--and this time, for the first time, I got a fairly clear shot of a damselfly, too!

Did I mention, those original hateful cabbage butterfly caterpillars were soon joined by several other species of equally hateful ones? This one is commonly called the cross-striped cabbageworm, if you're interested...and yes, it's voracious.

I love this one--taken at around 5am, not a sunset, but a moonset!

Two more moon pics I really like--taken on the same night, just a few minutes apart, with different settings.

A day at the beach, in short panoramic

Same day, same beach--pelicans!

Sunset just outside of downtown Suffolk, near Constant's Wharf. I don't know why, but I like that lamppost.

Same evening, nearly same location, a few minutes apart

Our favorite birdseed raider

That takes care of the piecemeal photos from most of the last year. There are others that go with specific kid stories or events or categories--but they need separate posts. More later!