Alaska Bound!

We will be in Alaska for the next two weeks! I am scheduling a few posts of some photos from previous Alaska trips to publish while I’m gone. We’ll be seeing our Alaska family for the first time in a year and a half; their youngest, Henry is now 10 1/2 and Miles is a teenager- 13 1/2! AND we will be celebrating our 50th anniversary!

Here is where we’ll be celebrating- Homer, Alaska!

Heavenly

Last night we went out to grab a quick salad before settling down to rewatch one of our favorite Brit TV series- Scott and Bailey (we just can’t seem to get enough of these fascinating characters!). After dinner, the sky put on an amazing display for us, complete with God-beams highlighting Granite Mountain! I managed to capture several shots with my iPhone through the windshield as we drove towards home.

After we had been home for a bit, we heard the pitter patter of gentle rain, which had been predicted for earlier in the day. We ran outside and watched, and, unfortunately, the rain stopped after about ten minutes. The drought here is getting scary- our lakes are drying up and there are wildfires burning. In fact, it is likely that the some of the clouds and haze behind the mountains in this photo are actually smoke.

Calm

We spent a few days in California this last weekend, and I was able to get out on the beach with my camera for a couple hours. Watching the waves always brings me peace, and this time I decided I would only use slow shutter speeds and a bit of intentional camera movement to convey that feeling in my photos. Although I’ve used these techniques before, this was the first shoot where I ONLY used them. The results were mixed, but here is a quick edit of a gull in flight, which I hope captures the peace and calm I was feeling as I took the photo.

Peek-a-boo

While everyone around us was watching the hummingbirds at the feeders, I happened to turn around and spot this little guy on the pole behind the group. He looked at me, I looked at him. He was very cute! My bird app tells me he was a white-breasted nuthatch.