Skywatch Friday, Anniversary Clouds

Howdee all.

Yesterday was Our 19th anniversary….Jeff was still sick in bed all day with his tick bite sickness…he is on antibiotics and should be getting better soon.

I walked around the garden most of the day taking photos and learning about the two cameras we purchased recently.

In the evening I went out too photograph with the big Canon. The clouds were filled with light.

I looked up and saw our Anniversary cloud!

Do you see it?

Look for a man and womans face..man on left with glowing eye,cloud filling bottom right is his arm..woman on right him..side view..

they are about to kiss...

My mother couldn't see it…

Jeff saw it immediately and so did my sister Adele.

I love to find things in the clouds…and Yesterday I found a few.

Below is sleeping woman with glowing breasts..tee hee..

This one below is woman with glowing hair blowing a kiss ..is that a little pup behind her head?

A large hole… and above the hole .in the photo below..…two angelic beings looking towards in other in open embrace...

their faces are aglow… I wanted to climb to the castle that is lit up on the hill in the photo

below..

But instead I looked at all the patterns in the sky

Now I suggest you get your head out of these clouds and go look at other

Wonderful skywatch posts.

Just click the link below

New Camera Angst

Howdee all,

This gal is frustrated! 

As most of you know my little camera went swimming and it seemed to recover..except for the zoom mechanism which works when it feels like it, which is not very often lately.

I really liked my little Casio Xlim it was small…fit on my hip in a little holster…I wore it almost every minute….It took decent photos. Digiscoped fairly well with the home made adapter Jeff put together….and it was easy to make videos using windows movie maker because the video files were avi instead of the mov files that most newer cameras have.

Well the little thing didn't want to work so I ordered two cameras. Jeff also needed a new one. I was looking for one with some good zoom..without going to a big SLR.

Canon PowerShot SX10 IS

20x optical zoom

and the

Canon Powershot sx200

12x Optical zoom

Both had Excellent ratings @ Steve's Digicam site

I wanted to like the big Canon with the 20x zoom ..it takes beautiful videos with smooth zooming …Beautiful photos with Macro settings…and I could capture birdies on the feeder from many feet away without digiscoping.

But I found it big…bulky and I kept picking up the smaller Canon to keep with me during the day. 

The little Canons videos are ok. Similar to my casio…...with maybe a bit more noise from the camera itself. I can deal with that I suppose. The zoom doesn't work fully when taking a video…and the files are Mov..larger files… If Want to use windows movie maker the files first need to be converted…Pain!

It takes much more time than the simple drag and drop I did before.

I have not yet found a program that will convert and make videos easily yet.

I just want to be able to put them on utube to share. Which I haven't figured out how to do yet.

My sister Tammy found a software program she likes..I may try that.

Any other ideas for making a easy movie with some effects and transitions that I can upload to Utube…I don't care what format..just ease of use.

The little Canon takes some nice Macro shots.

    I am pleased with most of the still shots.

I have mostly been trying out the macro and super macro modes.

Not bad for a small camera.

Color seems to be good…though I have found that purples are more blue than purple. My little casio was the same. I don't know the reason for that.

 

I have also used the zoom from afar to see if I can capture birds…not bad.

I was quite a bit away from the birds in these photos.

  I think I will most likely be returning the Big Casio and keeping the smaller one. I don't know if the smaller camera will be good for digiscoping..but from what I have  read I think i need a smaller zoom.

So back to the drawing board on a second camera.

Any help or ideas ???????

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So that's what's going on

Between cameras and Jeff's tick bite sickness…

I haven't read blogs or blogged…

I now have to go off on assignment..

My sister wants me to photograph her garden beds ..so she has a record of her

April Flowers.

Pee Dee NWR……. Skywatch Friday

 Howdee all,

This sky watch post comes from Pee Dee National Wildlife Refugee near Wadesboro, NC. 

Jeff and I went on a Birdie outing.  If you want to read about the Bird we saw you can read the previous post.

This sad cloud greeted us as we started the boardwalk.  I don't know why it was so sad.

Poor little thing…

I Tried cheering it up…and eventually it just dissolved into the sky..

The wind picked up and brought in these beautiful white puffs.

  It was another lovely day..the birding was pretty good too!

If you want to see some other beautiful skies from around the world click on the picture below.

Pee Dee NWR, NC.. The Berry Birds are here!

Howdee all,

Yesterday Jeff and I went to Pee Dee NWR. It was a beautiful sunny day but quite windy.

I call this the day of berry birds because the blues and red birdies we saw. Summer Tanagers were singing all over the place, Blue Grosbeaks and Eastern Bluebirds greeted us in the grassy areas, over the water many Indigo buntings called and flew in front of us along the path, We also heard the American Redstart and lots of Cardinals.

I digiscoped this Bluebird..one of many flying around the fields and bluebird nest boxes.

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Killdeer with Babies…they are so tiny.

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A Spotted Sandpiper on the boardwalk

Doing its little bobbing dance.

Look at all these tadpoles...Wow.. ...I took a video clip as well so some of you that might know what kind they are…could give me some more information.

These Zebra Swallowtails were all over the place and I chased them around to try to get a decent photo. I thought the colors were so lovely the baby blue and the strike of red toward the tail. Did you know this early spring form of this butterfly is smaller in size and lighter in color ?

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We had a great time despite the wind.

Today is a gardening and cleaning day for me.

Jeff went for an early morning birdie walk.

I Hope whatever you do today….you find some joy in the simple things!

Home made rocks and other chores

Howdee all,

Today Adele and I worked on her patio..Carthage is in the Sand hills of NC. therefore there are very few rocks to be found. Rather than buy rocks for a patio…Adele likes to make them.

Here Adele starts the process by adding two bags of cement that has gravel in it…with some peat moss.

About Half of that black container of Peat is all that is mixed with the cement.

The consistency is flexible, not too liquid..but thick enough to lift up and put in a form. Here we are using the bottom part of a milk carton to hold the cement.

Then just plot the cement down…play around with the shape and you have a rock. There are many things that you can make with the mixture. 

 Just subject to your imaginationAnd Creativity…

Its allot of fun…and when we are done with the Patio we have several walkways we want to do and a few gardens to border.

After working on the Patio we spread around the Horse Manure that Craigy picked up..in his super cool Blue Truck.

  This is the third truckload…We need at least two more.

Doesn't our Homey look happy near the garden? Look what showed up today…Female Blue Grosbeak..where did male go? He left a week ago.

Indigo bunting was here for two days and we haven't seen him again either. Usually there are at least six of them here at a time…

Rose-breasted Grosbeak was here this morning..but we worked in the Garden near the feeders and I haven't seen him back this afternoon.

All the birdies are arriving at least a week ahead of schedule.  What's that all about?

If you decide to make some rocks..I would love to see your creations..

Hope you all had a wonderful, creative day!