Caw Caw Interpretive Center - A recent visit

Probably the most difficult part of being a photographer is the editing process. It's not that I haven't been taking pictures during the last...holy cow! It's been a year and a half since I posted anything here! Wow. Slacker. But anyway, the editing process—yes, the most tedious part of photography. I just kept snapping away during the past 18 months, but didn't have the space or time to keep up with photo editing.

I have missed sharing some of my pictures. So, I would love to post more during this year, and share some of my adventures with you. We recently took a family trip to a local county park—Caw Caw Interpretive Center. It's one of my favorite places in Charleston. It's part history, part natural history, and part alligator park. On a warm day, you're pretty much guaranteed to see some big ones. It's definitely a gem here in the Lowcountry.

Many people don't like this time of year down here, but it's one of our favorites. The temperatures are cooler, and though the landscape may seem gray and bland, there is still beauty to be found if you just have the eyes to see it. The simplest thing, like a weed or a decaying leaf or even the "fungus among us," speaks to an immense beauty and reflects the intricacies of creation.

Butterfly on flowers

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no; it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
   If this be error and upon me proved,
   I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

--Sonnet 116, Shakespeare

Coastal Carolina

I still can't believe I live here!

Happy Thanksgiving!

A simple reminder, from a simple children's song...

"I'm glad for what I have, that's an easy way to start."

Happy Thanksgiving!

Sunset & Sea Grass

“It isn't Narnia, you know," sobbed Lucy. "It's you. We shan't meet you there. And how can we live, never meeting you?"
"But you shall meet me, dear one," said Aslan.
"Are—are you there too, Sir?" said Edmund.
"I am," said Aslan. "But there I have another name. You must learn to know me by that name. This was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia, that by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there.”

—The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (The Chronicles of Narnia, Book 5) by C.S. Lewis

The sea and everything in it...

"He is the One who made Heaven and earth

The sea and everything in it

He is the One who keeps every promise forever

He gives justice to the oppressed

And sets the prisoners free..."

—From the song "Praise the Lord" sung by Natalie Grant and Laura Story 

(Glory Revealed II) 

Ode to Autumn

Ode to Autumn

by John Keats

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness!

Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;

Conspiring with him how to load and bless

With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;

To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,

And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;

To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells

With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,

And still more, later flowers for the bees,

Until they think warm days will never cease,

For Summer has o'erbrimmed their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?

Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find

Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,

Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;

Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,

Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook

Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers;

And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep

Steady thy laden head across a brook;

Or by a cider-press, with patient look,

Thou watchest the last oozings, hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?

Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, - 

While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day

And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;

Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn

Among the river sallows, borne aloft

Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;

And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;

Hedge-crickets sing, and now with treble soft

The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft;

And gathering swallows twitter in the skies. 

Holy, Holy, Holy

Our church has recently started a brand new arts ministry, and I LOVE the concept! It's meant to be a gathering to encourage arts in the church, and to embrace artists in the community. At the first meeting I was able to attend, I (of course) took my camera. The building we meet in is actually separate from the church sanctuary building, but both are absolutely GORGEOUS!

The church was originally built in 1839, as a Methodist church. It sustained much damage during the Civil War, but was later restored as a Lutheran church. Today, it houses Redeemer Presbyterian Church.

I hope to get more pictures, but these were just some nice architectural details I was able to get in my brief photo safari.

Fun on the Farm

Farms are amazing places! Don't you agree? A couple of years ago, we made a quick stop at a relative's farm, on our way back to Kentucky from Michigan. There's just something magical about old tractors and barns. Maybe it's that they capture a piece of history. Maybe it's because they remind us of simpler days. Maybe it's because we all have this secret desire to reap the benefits of working the land. Regardless, I couldn't resist snapping these shots.

So long summer!

While Shakespeare may have said, "And summer's lease hath all too short a date." I'm just going to have to disagree with the impassioned bard. And here's why I'm looking forward to cooler weather...

Banana Spider
These grow GINORMOUS in size.

But, I will miss seeing more of these guys out my kitchen window. This one posed perfectly for me on our gardenia bush.

Dragonfly

Still, I say, bring on the cooler weather!

A Huge Change...well, at least a very big one

Greetings, once again! It's been a considerable amount of time since I last posted anything here. And trust me...the pictures have been PILING up! It's a daunting prospect to weed through them all, but I'm attempting the nearly impossible.

Since I last posted here, my family has up-and-left the Bluegrass State, and headed for the South Carolina Lowcountry—my DH's job being the reason. Now, we find ourselves in the city formerly known as Charles Towne, steeped in culture, history, and OODLES of photographic inspiration. I'm itching to take off one evening during the golden hour to capture some of the beautiful sites.

But, it was definitely a sad goodbye to our friends (who really are family now) in Lexington. They are a part of us. One of my dear friends posted a quote from C.S. Lewis on her Facebook page, and it got me all choked up. For those of you who know and follow Christ, this will be very meaningful to you:

“In friendship, we think we have chosen our peers. In reality a few years' difference in the dates of our births, a few more miles between certain houses, the choice of one university instead of another...the accident of a topic being raised or not raised at a first meeting--any of these chances might have kept us apart. But, for a Christian, there are, strictly speaking, no chances. A secret master of ceremonies has been at work. Christ, who said to the disciples, 'Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you,' can truly say to every group of Christian friends, 'Ye have not chosen one another but I have chosen you for one another.'― C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

As we cleaned up our home in Lexington, making it ready for the new owners, I kept hoping our poppies would pop open. I just wanted to see them bloom before we left. And sure enough...our last couple of days there, they opened up to display their magnificent, trademark "poppy red" beauty.