Janet Brien's photos with the keyword: glow

(+6 insets!) My Last Presentation (for this trip) From William Tugman State Park I've gotten to share so many pictures from our visit--in fact, there were too many wonderful finds to process! This lush, beautiful area was just brimming with photo opportunities and I hope that you've gotten the general idea of this pretty park. It was such a nice place to stay, relax, and enjoy forest and lake views. Happily, we will be back this year so I'll be taking brand new pictures! My favorite parks all have wonderful morning walks that take me away from other campers and allow me to enjoy the solitude of nature and a pretty trail that follows the meandering contours through forest and alongside lakes, rivers, or out to an ocean beach. I dearly love getting the chance to explore different terrain and its flora and fauna. However, I enjoy strolling through campgrounds too, glimpsing the individual campsite stories and the temporary residents. It's a unique opportunity to see people out on vacation--from a single person to multiple families--including their pets and all of the stuff they bring with them. I'm quite the recluse but fascinated by people and their behavior so I love having the chance to see folks doing their thing as I walk by and soak up the details. My Main Picture I found this backlit dandelion peering out at Eel Lake one morning and knew it would be a fun picture to share--and I was right! :) I got lucky with that lens flare in the sea of bokeh, which shows the nine shutter blades of my 100mm 2.8L macro lens! Today's Insets The first pair of pictures show a side and front view of a lemon-colored Monkey Flower, and if you look closely at the front view you'll see a tiny insect crawling along the right-side edge! The second pair of pictures features a Yellowjacket Wasp feasting on the nectar of a Queen Anne's Lace. Next is a fossil-like image that shows a leaf that was once wet and stuck to the mud. The mud then dried and people walked over this leaf, slowly breaking off bits as it disintegrated and became one with the hard clay path. I couldn't stop looking at this whenever I passed by and finally got a picture to share. I'm so glad because I think it's so cool! Finally, a parting trail picture which shows a pair of red cedar trees shading the path. I hope everyone is doing well with vaccinations on the horizon. For us, it looks like JULY unfortunately but no worries--we're staying safe and being careful! Take care and stay warm and dry! Explored on 3/3/21; highest placement #3.

(2 Insets above!) Brrrr...it's really starting to get cold around here! I got up several times during the night to turn up my floor heater which was being very stubborn. It didn't want to budge from 64°F/18°C. I'd turn up the heater with the aim of warming up to about 68°F/20°C. The next time I woke up I'd check the temperature and it would only be one degree warmer, ARGH! Personally I don't mind. In fact, there are few things more wonderful than burrowing under a luxurious pile of blankets. But I do worry about Pumpkin getting chilly. Her cage, which hangs from the ceiling, is covered with towels at night to keep the heat in, and she sleeps in her fleece-lined Happy Hut, AND she's covered with extremely warm down feathers, but I still worry about her feeling the least bit cold. So the heater and I waged war all night long and when my darling little peeper woke me up at 5 till 7am, it was FINALLY sitting at 68°F/20°C. MEH! It was raining this morning but nothing about it was inviting today. Looking out at the murky, steel-grey sky, I made sure to bundle up extra warmly before I went out. The thermometer read 34°F/1°C but it sure felt a lot colder to me. I stretched inside, grabbed my umbrella and went out for my walk. I was pleasantly surprised to find that is was wonderful outside, with autumn smells and a nice pattering of rain on my umbrella. Enjoying my walk up and down our road, I kept track of my laps by moving white pebbles from one rock slab to the other. I couldn't help thinking about yesterday morning's visitor. Guess who stopped by to leave another outrageously RUDE calling card? ON ONE OF MY ROCK SLABS, no less! I stood goggling at what I saw, totally aghast. Just imagine if people did that to one another to establish territory...totally unacceptable! I couldn't stop laughing and as I sent the fox poos flying off into the grass in all directions. "You're a BAD FOX! You're a VERY BAD FOX! And now I'm going to send you into the CORN FIELD!" (I love that episode of the classic Twilight Zone with Billy Mummy and use that quote whenever I can! ) Off I go down the road...and then...why..."IT'S SNOWING!!! IT'S SNOWING!!!!" I began to sing the words and laughed out loud, "IT'S SNOWING! IT'S SNOWING!!!" It was not possible to keep my inner child from giggling, singing and bouncing up and down as we looked out at the world around us. The world had grown quiet now, as the rain turned to snow and fell in fat blobs to melt instantly upon touching the ground. What a wondrous thing to see this remarkable change before my eyes. The temperature was just not cold enough to keep forming snow though. But for a few magical moments, the snow drifted down, changing back and forth from rain to snow and back again. Such a joy. This experience will never get old to me because I was born and raised in San Francisco. For about 40 years of my life I lived in the City and around the Bay Area, where the weather is so consistently...BORING. San Francisco rarely gets very hot or very cold, so I wanted dearly to live in a place with actual seasons. As I felt the rain drops again patter on my umbrella, I smiled with gratefully because I loved experiencing this so much. Today's picture is a lovely flake of manzanita bark glowing in the afternoon sun. I saw this as I was heading back down the Upper Table Rock trail a few weeks back. Have you ever seen manzanita trees before? They have the most wonderful, silky smooth bark, and every year they shed the last year's layer to expose the new layer. The skin flakes off in beautiful curls and fun shapes that are wonderful to see and hold in your hand. (I will include some insets for you to get a better view!) Pam, does manzanita grow where you live? I imagine you hugging your resident trees like I do, sitting in branches from time to time and appreciating their beauty. I bet you would have fun discovering the little clumps of moss that form at the bases sometimes or in the divots that form here and there. These lovely trees would surely put a smile on your face. I hope you are doing well today and I am sending my love and healing energy to you! Explored on 12/2/18, highest placement, #3.

This is what I consider a very special image. I remember walking into my front garden and seeing a pink glow down near the ground as the sun was just rising over the hillside. I dropped down into a crouch to stare in rapt amazement at this beautiful little poppy, appreciating the wonderful show it was putting on. The four pink translucent petals overlapped one another and created four darker spots in the shape of an X...how cool is that? I ran inside and returned with my camera so that I could attempt to capture this moment, hoping it would be as pretty as what I saw. Often those special moments cannot be reproduced, that special something just eluding the camera. But today I got lucky and can show you this breathtaking scene. There are five others doing this project with me, and if you'd like to jump in, we'd love to have you! You can catch up when you can! :) 1-10 Project Buddies Chrissy Valfal (Valerie) Jenny McIntyre Rachel Lynne Explored on August 19, 2014. Highest placement, #2.

(15 more pictures in notes on the image, all are clickable! Enjoy the show!) One of our first wildflowers is the bright and cheerful Buttercup! I discovered that we have several species here, but this one, the Western Buttercup, is the most common. Every year I end up taking far too many pictures of these pretty little flowers, and though I tried to resist this year, I simply could not refuse when I saw the light glowing through the petals of this gorgeous little blossom! Please be sure to roll your mouse over this picture to see the show of many clickable pictures of the buttercups I've photographed previously! They are such a wonderful subject! :) Explored on ipernity on April 1, 2014. Highest placement, #4.

This feather proves that imperfections can make a more interesting subject! Though worn and a bit ragged, it's interesting to look at, and the sun shines through the gaps and glows through the solid parts, creating a wonderful shape to appreciate. I wonder what kind of bird it came from, such a lovely pattern on it! :)

This is an image of a philodendron leaf that had fallen off the plant and was held up to show the sun shining through, causing it to glow! Here's a tip for all of you! The next time you're out taking nature pictures, try getting down where you can see the underside of a leaf...you'll probably be surprised how it glows!

[best appreciated at full size against black] Do you find yourself stunned at the effect that sunlight has when it shines through leaves and plants? The glowing qualities are mesmerizing to me, and the effect is different for everything! And, depending on where you point your camera, you can get wonderful lens flares to add to the wonderful glow of your subject. On this afternoon, I was heading up our road back to my house, when I turned my head and saw this grass, perfectly lit by the sun. I hoped that my angle would also include a nice flare in the golden light. I hope you like the result! :) This image was taken in February, 2012.

[best appreciated at full size against black] Here is another picture of the group of mushrooms I found down at the Rogue River a month or so ago. Have you ever noticed that I have no species facts or information about my mushrooms? This is because mushrooms are so impossible for me to identify. I don't know how people do it. So many mushrooms look identical to me, and then I found out that many mushrooms can only be identified by looking at them under a microscope!! That's insane!! However, I am fascinated by them, so hopefully I'll be able to get a book that identifies mushrooms of Oregon so I can tell you what they are! For now, this is "Lampus Mushroomus"! :D :D This image was taken in February, 2012.

[best appreciated at full size against black] This is one of my favorite pictures of the group of mushrooms I found down at the Rogue River a month or so ago. I had a bit of fun breaking the border with one of the mushrooms, I think it adds a bit of drama to this glowing pair! :) This image was taken in February, 2012. Explored on April 12th, 2012.

I found these beauties back in February when Steve and I went down to a trail by the Rogue River. They were growing out of an old log laying by the side of the trail. Although they appear to be quite large, The larger of these two was only about 1/2" tall! I thnk they are one of the coolest looking mushrooms I've found! This picture is a good example of how light can really help an image. Compare to the pictures below...look at how much nicer they look with light glowing through the caps and stems! Still, I thought this was nice enough to show because of the mushroom detail and handsome bokeh. My favorite of the group is either #2 or #4, but #3 turned out nicely too! Do you have a preference?

This afternoon I took the dogs out with me into our smaller meadow, and it was such a beautiful day. Warm, breezy, wonderful, perfect, the smell of warm grass was so nice, I wanted to stay out there for hours! The dogs had such fun, I laughed at their antics whenever I looked up to see what they were up to! For me, there were endless beautiful flowers to take pictures of, but I couldn't keep away from these stunning blossoms, called "Common Vetch", but hardly common when it comes to being beautiful! :) Carolyn Gold Heilbrun (January 13, 1926 – October 9, 2003) was an American academic and prolific feminist author of both important academic studies and popular mystery novels under the pen name of Amanda Cross. Wikipedia: Carolyn Gold Heilbrun

This is another favorite image that I captured when Steve and I visited my friend Elizabeth and her husband Richard for a wonderful dinner party with new friends. She has literally thousands of daffodils on her property, and these were growing next to her pond. The light of the setting sun on the water was truly magical!