Wednesday, September 30, 2015

9/30/15

Well, it's the last day of September.  Autumn is here as we are having cooler temps now which is quite nice.  I stayed up the other night, past my bedtime, watching and photographing the eclipse.  We had a perfect clear sky and who knows what can happen in 18 years when the next one is supposed to occur so I decided I needed to take my chance.  It took me a bit to come up with this compilation of images I got that night.  I was pretty happy with what I was able to capture.  When the moon was fully covered in the middle images I was pleased to be able to capture that and the color of it which everyone is referring to as a "Blood Moon".  Those exposures were done at 3 seconds.  Most of the moon shots were done at 1/250 of a second so as not to blow out the detail in the moon.  This image to see the best detail is best viewed large by clicking on it.  :-)


Tuesday, September 29, 2015

9/29/15

Well, looks like we are going to be cooling off for a while.  Highs in the low 70s and even 60s for the weekend.  That will be different.  I saw this grass on Saturday at a friends house.  I loved the dainty stems and the shape of the seed heads.  It's called Sea Oats Grass and I need to find some to plant this next year.  I loved the way the light was hitting it from the rear and almost making them seem to glow.  I took out the original background on this which was just blurry grass and put it on a black background which I thought enhanced it a bit.


Monday, September 28, 2015

9/28/15

I stayed up last night and watched and photographed the eclipse.  I hope I was able to get good shots because I am tired today.  :-)  It was quite cool looking anyway.  A while back, on the last night we were in Minnesota, I was able to witness another cool night time event.  We were driving back from dinner with relatives and we saw the Northern Lights glowing in the sky.  I did not have a tripod so I used the car as a support.  I got a fairly good shot out of that.  When we got back to where we camp, I headed out with a Tripod and went in a field and got this image.  It is a long exposure image and as it was photographing, the bright part that is in the lower middle was moving across and I thought it was cool how the camera caught it.  The lights were so beautiful to watch and were that lovely green color.  It's enhanced just a bit in the photo.



Sunday, September 27, 2015

9/27/15

So my railroading image goes back to our trip to Minnesota where we got to visit a friend's house who had recently purchased a new large scale locomotive.  This one was built by the same person who built his other two very detailed locomotives.  It is styled after the William Crook locomotive which is an American Type 4-4-0 wheel arrangement.  This one had very nice detailing as well and was quite fun to operate as I was allowed to a bit later in the day.   He runs his locomotives on wood and they smell very nice while you are running.  :-)



Saturday, September 26, 2015

9/26/15

This is from and evening back in June out on the Konza Prairie.  It's a 2 shot panoramic image of some storm clouds to the southwest moving in that made of an interesting sky.  Of course it's best viewed larger by clicking on it.  :-)


Friday, September 25, 2015

9/25/15

Well the rain has been quite spotty.  One part of town gets a downpour and at my house only sprinkles.  I shared this image for my 26 week Black and White Project over on Google+.  This is for week 20!  That means only about 12 more weeks left of this year!  Wow it is going quickly.  The image this week was to show the theme of Leading Lines.  I had forgotten the project was due this week until a couple of nights ago so I was looking through images I had taken the last 2 weeks to see if I had anything and I found this.  I shot this last Saturday.  It was hanging on our garage while I was working outside that morning and was in lovely shape so I started photographing it.  The spider didn't stay in the center when I got close and I was actually kind of OK with that as I am not fond of spiders.  LOL  Anyway, i thought it worked well for the theme so here it is.  :-)


Thursday, September 24, 2015

9/24/15

Today started out very dreary, a good day to stay in bed and sleep except that I have a pesky job.  :-)  It has been raining in other parts of town but not at my house much.  That is annoying as well.  Ah well.  Today's shot is from the bike trip on the Mickelson Trail in South Dakota of some happy Daisies growing alongside the stream that the trail ran along for the most part.



Wednesday, September 23, 2015

9/23/15

Welcome to Autumn here in the US!  It will be winter before we know it.  Sigh.  I have been doing a lot of whining about the heat but I really don't want winter to come.  Anyway, enough of that, on to the photo.  So this is from my trip to South Dakota and the Black Hills.  This is another of the waterfalls located in Spearfish Canyon and is called Roughlock Falls.  It is located very close to Spearfish Falls, basically in walking distance.  This falls was quite lovely with the main falls developing into two other branching falls.  It was flowing quite nicely in July due to the rain the area had received.  This is a one second exposure.


Tuesday, September 22, 2015

9/22/15

So we have to have another fairly warm day before Autumn is officially here.  I had a neat lightening storm to watch in the west this morning from my window at work too.  :-)  I haven't shared a bird image in a while.  This is a group of birds that were hanging out in the Mock Orange bush one day in late winter.  I'm not very good with my birds but I think they are mostly House Finches.  As always, if you click on the image it will enlarge so you can view the birds better.


Monday, September 21, 2015

9/21/15

What a dreary morning we had today.  I decided to share something colorful because of it.  This is another image from the Huff N Puff Hot Air Balloon Event I got to attend.  Was it just last weekend?  Seems like an age ago.  Anyway, this is from earlier in the evening than the other image.  The propane burners were going on these 2 balloons as they were being inflated for the Balloon Glow portion of the event which was just beautiful.  So colorful and lovely to see.  



Sunday, September 20, 2015

9/20/15

A beautiful day here in Kansas again!  This is an older image from Steamfest in Owosso, Michigan that I was able to attend a few years back.  This locomotive was there and you could pay to operate it for a certain period of time.  I did not do it because I had fired on a locomotive very similar to it in Minnesota but I did take photos of it.  :-)  This is a Tank style locomotive which means it carries it's water over the boiler on the locomotive itself.  It is owned by the Gramling Locomotive works in Indiana and they have a website called Have Engine, Will Travel.  They have 2 different locomotives right now that they will truck to an event and run them like they did to this one in Michigan.  Kind of cool.  As you can see I had a bit of fun with the processing on this one.


Saturday, September 19, 2015

9/19/15

A lovely cool morning and weekend ahead.  Nice!  The weather lately has been very good for these types of mushrooms to grow and others as well.  I see these popping up all over in people's lawns and such.  They are fairly large too, this one was at least 8 inches tall if not larger.  I decided to process it in monochrome with a copper tint and thought it brought out the textures well.


Friday, September 18, 2015

9/18/15

I had wanted to find a sunflower field this year but did not when I was out looking.  The day I was to be leaving for Minnesota a friend told me of a couple she had seen on some travels the day before.  When I returned from MN I headed out to find them.  It was later in the year than is optimal for them but one of them still had some life in it.  I took this image of a Common Fritillary Butterfly enjoying one of the blooms from the field as well!.  :-)


Thursday, September 17, 2015

9/17/15

Well, started out the day with a lovely thunderstorm and some pretty intense lightning.  I had just got to work and was in my car and a flash of lightning appeared in front of me and almost immediately the crack of thunder so that was close!  Quite awakening.  :-)  Anyway, my image for today is from a few weekends ago while I was out photographing Thistle wildflowers.  I was able to capture a bee in flight.  It's actually a Bumble Bee butt as it was off to find another bloom.  :-)


Wednesday, September 16, 2015

9/16/15

Well, summer is still staying pretty warm.  Tonight isn't even supposed to get cool and I hate that.  Ah well, as I mentioned, I'll soon be whining that it's too cold out.  So this goes back to June when these wildflowers were in bloom.  These are Daisy Fleabanes out on Konza Prairie and it was a very good year for them.  This field was just filled with them and made a lovely image I thought.  


Tuesday, September 15, 2015

9/15/15

So I was able to check off one more thing on my Bucket List this past weekend when I went to the Huff N Puff event in Topeka, KS.  I had always wanted to see and photograph a Hot Air Balloon.  I had seen them before but never up close and never where I was able to get a shot.  So Saturday evening, I was still in Topeka because of doing some steamy stuff.  That evening the balloons were supposed to fly again and as there was not much wind at all I thought it was probably a good chance to see one.  Sure enough, shortly after I arrived at a spot near where they were they began to take off.  It was lovely to watch.  The one on the left had it's burner going making it glow a bit.  I liked seeing them and it would probably be cool to ride in one but not sure I could ever do that so seeing them was good enough for me!  :-)


Monday, September 14, 2015

9/14/15

Well, heading back into the heat this week.  I was kind of hoping we were done with that but we aren't.  This past weekend was quite lovely.  So I mentioned that I got to do something neat a couple days ago and here is an image from that.  I went to the Huff N Puff Hot Air Balloon Meet Up in Topeka, KS on Friday evening.  Unfortunately the wind was too strong for them to fly that evening, it was 10 mph which I found funny as that is nothing for Kansas most days.  Anyway, they did what they call a Glow Event which was very beautiful.  In the evening they inflate the balloons and then use their burners to make them glow.  It was like balloon fireworks and very lovely to see.


Sunday, September 13, 2015

9/13/15

We're having a lovely weekend here in Kansas.  I see that later in the week it is supposed to hit the 90s again. This image is from a lovely cool day in South Dakota while we were riding the Black Hills Central Railroad.  The Hills were all covered in clouds and mist and looked quite lovely.  It was a nice day for a train ride and eventually the mist lifted.


Saturday, September 12, 2015

9/12/15

Posting late today.  I was off doing steamy stuff and getting to see something I thought was pretty cool and hope I got good shots of it to share.  If I did you will see later this week.  :-)  For today's image, due to our recent weather we have had quite a lot of mushrooms growing in the area.  Due to the rain and cool weather, they were pretty large too.  This one was in our backyard and was at least  inches in diameter, the largest of this type I have ever seen I think.  The hubster saw it growing in the backyard and saved it and told me about it because he thought I would want to photograph it.  He was right.  :-)


Friday, September 11, 2015

9/11/15

Well, it cooled down nicely.  This image, my B&W project this week was long exposure and as always you can view that image by clicking on my photo on the right side of the Blog in the About Me Section.  I took this image this past weekend at Rollag, MN.  This is Gunderson Pond on the grounds of the Steam Threshers Reunion.  I loved the color of the lights on the pond but I think the stars stand out better in the B&W version.  They both have their strong points.


Thursday, September 10, 2015

9/10/15

My Sedum is beginning to bloom again.  I hope it is as popular with the Butterflies as it was last year.  This is an image from last year of several Painted Lady Butterflies and a blurry Honey Bee enjoying the blooms.


Wednesday, September 9, 2015

9/9/15

Back in Kansas and back to a bit cooler weather than when we left and while we were gone for sure so that's nice.  This is from a day in June out on the Konza Prairie and one of my favorite wildflowers.  This is a Cobaea Penstemon and are quite lovely and this was a good year for them.


Tuesday, September 8, 2015

9/8/15

Well it's travel day for me so thought I would share a travel photo.  I wish we were going by plane but have a long drive ahead.  This image is another from the formation flying during the annual Bi-plane Fly-in held in Junction City in June.  As you can see one of these is not like the other but it made a nice formation.


Monday, September 7, 2015

9/7/15

Happy Labor Day to those in the US and happy Monday to all!  This is a macro image of an orange Damselfly that I took in Minnesota in June.  I had never seen one of this color before.  This is my last day of working on the locomotives here in the land of steam.  It went by fast.  It's finally nice and cool and sunny so a great way to end.


Sunday, September 6, 2015

9/6/15

Hello from the land of steam!  I am at the Western Minnesota Steam Threshers Reunion and this image is of the locomotive I am lucky enough to get a shift to fire on.  I took this image yesterday morning while I was waiting to get breakfast before my shift began.  I actually took this with my phone and then did a bit of processing of course.  :-)  This is ex Soo Line locomotive 353 and is quite the popular attraction here on the show grounds.



Saturday, September 5, 2015

9/5/15

A very busy day today.  Haven't had any time to relax till now.  Got to participate in and observe a few things today.  I was able to take this image while I was working on the locomotive today.  We were on our way to the station and the fire and water were good so I was able to take a moment and snap a photo.  I actually took this with my phone as well and it did a pretty decent job even though we were moving along and I was a little unsteady.  This is the Horse Power are of the Western Minnesota Steam Threshers Reunion.  


Friday, September 4, 2015

9/4/15

Well, another hot and muggy day in Minnesota.  Busy one too now that the show is starting.  I wanted to share this image of my neighbor's Honeysuckle that was blooming quite profusely the other day.  I shot this macro image of a few of the blooms.  It was smelling quite nice.


Thursday, September 3, 2015

9/3/15

This is an older image of a bird I see up here in Minnesota fairly often.  I actually got this image out in Colorado though.  Since then I have found out that we have them in Kansas too.  Who knew!  LOL  This is a Cormorant and there is a lake named for them near here and a town.  I was able to catch it in flight and in focus!


Wednesday, September 2, 2015

9/2/15

Well, Minnesota is not much cooler than Kansas right now.  Not ideal for doing steam related activities but at least it's not raining yet.  I had a nice day doing some large scale steam activities so hopefully will have a photo to share on Sunday of that.  In the mean time here is a photo from last summer of a little Skipper butterfly on a Marigold flower.


Tuesday, September 1, 2015

9/1/15

Well, August is done and Fall will be on the way soon.  Today is travel day so this will post while we are driving.  I love technology.  :-)  This is a close up of a lovely red sunflower that I planted last year.  I didn't plant any this year and miss them, I didn't even get a sunflower volunteer this year like I always do.  I won't make that mistake again, Zinnias either which I didn't get planted.  A friend told me about a couple of sunflower fields south of here.  Hope they are still nice by the time I can get there and photograph them.