My favorite photos of 2011

This is obviously going to be a photo heavy post and if you have a slow connection it could take a while - a long while - to load.

This year was different from previous years. Instead of working on tons of projects, I spent my time what I called "gallivanting" and that means instead of a list of things I accomplished this year, what I have is a list of favorite photos. And oh yeah, I love nature. These photos are pretty much all nature, all the time.

Winter 

I will say one thing for our winter - it makes for some fantastic sunrises and sunsets.

 Spring

Getting any light this time of year is such a rare and precious thing.

Summer

 My longest bout of gallivanting and therefore my largest collection of photos I had to whittle down.

Autumn

My second largest bout of gallivanting.

Winter again

What a wonderful treat this winter was! Blue skies and dry weather for almost a whole month which meant lots of pretty frost and fog.

And a gorgeous Christmas morning sunrise.

This is the year I learned a lot about tricking my camera into doing what I wanted and then got a new camera that can do so much more (hello zoom!). So here's to 2012 and the lovely sights I see through my lens.

Strange skies - winter edition

The weather has been strangely nice (for the most part) lately and we've also been having some strange skies.

Like this - have you ever seen clouds look like this? It looks like some weird wall or rock formation.



Strangely tinted clouds with just a hint of rainbow.


Not really strange skies but when I saw this happening I thought of that saying that goes "shoot for the moon, and if you miss you'll still land among the stars." I think this one is going to land among the stars because they totally missed the moon. ;)


This one will take some creativity (or crazy?) but I saw this cloud and totally thought "ghost." Like it has a huge mouth and his arms are up in the air in spooky moan pose.

No? Just me? Like the cold frosted my brain or I read too many books and it has addled my brain or I just have way too active of an imagination? Oh well.

Rocket Cloud

I was playing in my garden the other evening and heard a crow caw-cawing close by. Thinking it somewhat strange I looked up to find these bizarre streaked clouds going quite a ways across the sky. I wish I had panoramic capabilities on my camera! I've never seen anything quite like it so I snapped happily away. In this shot it looks like that cloud in the corner is moving so fast it has jet streams. :)

Scarlet poppy

I know I keep saying it but I really love my box garden full of flowers. It just delights me more than I can say.

And far and wide, in a scarlet tide, The poppy's bonfire spread.

~Bayard Taylor



Updated July 8th.

I'm always taking close-up photos so here's a shot of my whole box garden. It's probably 4 feet wide by 20 feet long. I used to plant my onions there until the deer decided they LOVED playing "king of the mountain" and kept eating all their tops off. Now it's a nice spot for poppies, daisies, cornflowers and perennial flax.



See more of my poppies [here].
   

Mosaic Monday - out the back

(click image to enlarge)

This is the view out the back of my property - two varieties of apple - yay for blooms! There was only one. single. apple. last year - there's the fence between me and that luscious green field where the adopted mustangs roam...and a creepy llama... and there are the beautiful sunsets in the treeline.

I just love my view out back!

Be sure to visit Little Red House and all the fabulous mosaics!

A Good Friday trip

Since it's Good Friday it's got me thinking about my trip to Israel in 2000. I shared some of the photos for Mosaic Monday but you can't fit them all and you certainly can't see them as well all scrunched together. So sit back and take a little trip without leaving your desk.

Unearthing some architecture near Caesarea.



The Mediterranean.



A Crusader-era building.

The Gothic arches inside.

Sadly I don't remember the details of every photo I took, so some you just get to look at the pretties without me blabbing about it.

An ancient paved road.

Mosaic floor.

A beautiful monastery oasis.

A cave at Qumran.

The Wailing Wall.

Love the flowers!

Walking the ancient streets.

Happy Good Friday.