Spring Challenge Day 7

Today is the last day of our Spring Photography Challenge. It has been so much fun for me and I hope you have enjoyed seeing my photos! Here are my last:

 Some more azaleas. I like the lighting in this photo.

The Northern Cardinal, one of my favorite photographic subjects. :)

The last one for the Spring Photography Challenge is.....a frost aster in the sunset. I love the lighting in this one as well.


Okay, so that's it for today. Also I'll be posting a lot more birding posts soon, so look out for them. ;)

Bye for now!

Spring Challnege Day 6

I almost forgot AGAIN! :) Here are my photos:

Tiger swallowtail. Taken with my mom's phone, actually.

A really pretty azalea. The azaleas started blooming unusually early this year. Pretty much everything did.

And that's all for now. Thanks for reading (and looking)!

Spring Challenge Day 5

We're already almost done with the spring photography challenge! It has been so much fun. Here are my photos for day 5:

A cherry tree.

My 8-year-old brother actually took this photo. (I know--I'm surprised too :)

This one I took. It's some azaleas in our backyard.


And I wanted to tell y'all about an amazing nest cam I found at Cornell. It's of a Great Blue Heron nest and it's streaming live 24/7 at http://www.allaboutbirds.org/page.aspx?pid=2433. Go there. It's amazing. There's also a live chat that goes along with the cam. While I was there, Laura Erickson was answering questions on it. It's really cool.

Spring Challenge Day 4

I almost forgot to post today! I've got to do this quick. Here are my photos:

These crocuses are actually blooming right now. I planted them in late December, which was probably a little late.

This is a flower on one of our honey locust trees. The trees are thorny, but the flowers smell like lilac.

Happy spring, everybody!

Spring Challenge Day 3

It's hot outside! Well, as hot as 83 degrees can get, I guess. Maybe I'm just used to the winter. Here are my photos for day 3:

Some of our azaleas in a place in our yard we call 'Azalea Garden'.

A wildflower in our field. Anyone know what it is? Sorry it's upside down... I was trying to be creative. :)

And one more... a cherry blossom. I took a bunch of photos of these. I just can't help it.

Spring Challenge Day 2

It's Monday and it's beautiful outside! We went to see some Indian mounds built by a Mississipian Tribe down by Tupelo, MS today. And we're going to my brother's baseball practice tonight. But in between, I thought I'd post some more photos:

A dogwood bud at sunrise.

One of my dad's cherry trees at a cool angle.

A junco in an unknown kind of bush. Anyone know what kind of bush it is??


Thanks for checking this out!


Happy Trails!

Spring Challenge Day 1

...or two. The Spring Challenge has officially begun! Here are my photos:

Bluets in our field.

A cardinal singing in an unknown species of tree.


More coming tomorrow!

Fun with Picnik!

I finally checked out a sight my friend told me about called Picnik! It is awesome. Check out my blog button in the sidebar. I made that using Picnik. Find out how to use it by following the link 'my friend' that I put in here and clicking on the page 'blog buttons' that you'll see once you follow it. Sadly, Picnik is closing on April 19. So I'm just going to have as much fun with it as I can until then. :) Here are some photos I edited:

 It's so much fun to mess around with it. :)

Mallards look cool in HDR.

The sunrise.

And that's all for now! I'll post tomorrow, so keep an eye out!

Butterflies and Sunrises

I know, the title does sound a little sentimental. But I couldn't think of anything else, so I'll just stick with that. Now the main attraction of my post. The photos.

A pearl crescent butterfly. A little early for butterflies, though.

The sunrise sometime last week. I wish the power line wasn't in the way.

A grackle flock during the same sunrise.

Some neat sunrise clouds. :) I used the 'boost' effect in iPhoto to make it look more colorful.

And that's all for now. To see some great photography, go see my friend Scottish Gal's blog, especially during the week of March 25-31. That's the week of her spring challenge. :)

Happy trails, everybody!

Getting into Spring with Photography

Spring is definitely my favorite season for photography. It brings more of my favorite subjects--birds and flowers! I recently got two new photography books: Nature Photography Workshop by Nat Coalson and The Bird-watcher's Guide to Digital Photography  by David Tipling. Both have been helpful to me, except they expect you to have a DSLR, which I, unfortunately, do not own. But, like I said, both have been helpful and I've taken some pretty good photos with my advanced compact camera. Here are some:

 A peach blossom.

A Cedar Waxwing.

Another Cedar Waxwing.

Flowers on the bush outside my window. Does anyone know what it is?

Pear blossoms.

A male robin.

A male house sparrow.


And that's all for now. I'm saving up photos for Scottish Gal's Spring Challenge, which lasts from March 25--31. It should be fun!