If you enjoy my photos and would like to purchase some, I want to thank you! Simply visit my Zazzle online shop and browse the product offerings. If there’s a photo you would like to purchase but don’t see it in my shop, please contact me by using the Contact form at the bottom of my home page and let me know which photos you are interested in purchasing, and in what format / medium.
I had a hard time picking a photo that would represent the month of October in my 2013 photo calendar. I would have loved to use some pumpkin arrangement but I couldn’t find an existing photo I really, really liked.
After careful consideration, my final pick is this full moon, which I actually captured in May 2012. I think it will do a great job at representing Halloween for the whole month of October.
My 2013 calendar pick for October: a full moon for Halloween
If you enjoy my photos and would like to purchase some, I want to thank you! Simply visit my Zazzle online shop and browse the product offerings. If there’s a photo you would like to purchase but don’t see it in my shop, please contact me by using the Contact form at the bottom of my home page and let me know which photos you are interested in purchasing, and in what format / medium.
If you like to see beautiful fall foliage, San Diego probably is not the right destination for you. Most of the tree leaves either never change colors (think palm trees, eucalyptus, and sage brush) or the few that do just turn yellow, then brown before falling to the ground.
But there’s one tree you can spot here and there that will stand out in Southern California in the fall: the sumac (Rhus Typhina, the non toxic kind). The sumac leaves display various shades of yellow, orange and red and the tree also features grapes of crimson red seeds in between the leaves. I found a great local spot last fall to take pictures of sumac foliage and I’m planning to go back this year for more.
If you enjoy my photos and would like to purchase some, I want to thank you! Simply visit my Zazzle online shop and browse the product offerings. If there’s a photo you would like to purchase but don’t see it in my shop, please contact me by using the Contact form at the bottom of my home page and let me know which photos you are interested in purchasing, and in what format / medium.
I’m warning you right now. The photo I picked for the month of August in my 2013 photo calendar has to be one of my very favorite and I’ll tell you the reason why below. I took it one morning this past August while strolling along at Balboa Park in San Diego. A popular area of the park features a couple of small ponds, which are sparsely covered with white and pink water lilies and populated with a few species of fish, including koi.
My kids were in camp at the Natural History Museum that week and I had a few hours to kill before picking them up that day, so I grabbed my camera bag and walked around the park. There was a nasty heatwave that week, which included a lot of humidity, and my stroll quickly became tedious. There’s nothing worse than sitting still in full blasting heat and sun trying to take a hundred photos of the same thing. I started shooting pictures from different angles, different water lilies (or lily pads if you prefer). Every time I looked at the preview on my camera’s back screen, I wasn’t very excited about what I saw. It seemed the light was too bright and something just wasn’t right. So after a few minutes of frustration, I packed my bags and left, looking for something else to photograph, this time in the shade.
I forgot about these photos for a few weeks, until I pulled the SD card out of my camera to look at some photos I’d taken afterwards. As I was browsing through the files, I noticed the water lilies, so I opened the images. And in the middle of a few good shots, I found this photo of lily pads below. I call it my miracle photo. Why? Because the photo you’re looking at had no work done on it. I didn’t have to recenter it and adjust any of the settings. It literally came out that way. By the way, this never happens (OK, only in the movies!).
So there you have it, the beautiful pink water lilies of San Diego’s Balboa Park is my August 2013 photo pick. Don’t forget you can click on the photo to see a larger view. Enjoy!
My 2013 photo calendar pick for August: the water lilies of San Diego’s Balboa Park
If you enjoy my photos and would like to purchase some, I want to thank you! Simply visit my Zazzle online shop and browse the product offerings. If there’s a photo you would like to purchase but don’t see it in my shop, please contact me by using the Contact form at the bottom of my home page and let me know which photos you are interested in purchasing, and in what format / medium.
San Diego County spreads over 4500 square miles from the ocean to the desert, while going through several mountains, and is home to a tremendous amount of plant and animal species. Some species are native and others have been brought over the past few centuries because they fare well in the local weather.
I’m not very educated when it comes to flower names in the area, unless they come with a name tag. The flower below didn’t but it still gave me the opportunity to take this beautiful picture. I love how the orange petals curl in on this very large flower. I did take this photo in July and I thought it’d make a very colorful choice for my 2013 photo calendar. Thanks to a friend of mine commenting on Facebook, I found out this is called a protea pin cushion flower, and the plant is native to South Africa. Beautiful.
My 2013 calendar pick for July: a protea pin cushion flower
If you enjoy my photos and would like to purchase some, I want to thank you! Simply visit my Zazzle online shop and browse the product offerings. If there’s a photo you would like to purchase but don’t see it in my shop, please contact me by using the Contact form at the bottom of my home page and let me know which photos you are interested in purchasing, and in what format / medium.
This past June, I took my kids on vacation to the small mountain town of Idyllwild in Southern California. 90% of the forests in San Diego County have burned down over the past 10 years so there’s not much greenery to enjoy, something I terribly miss living here. Idyllwild is just two hours away and very green, full of large pine trees, manzanita trees and other local species.
A small creek runs through the town. It must be a pretty good size in the winter and spring but by the time summer comes, the water barely runs. Still, Strawberry Creek is a beautiful place, mostly in the shade, and you can walk the trail right by its side.
Strawberry Creek owns its name to the many, many wild strawberries that grow throughout the town, but it could just as well be named Wild Rose Creek since the area features many wild roses too. And bees love them. They love them so much they don’t mind you taking pictures of them at all. I ended up with several good photos of bees on wild roses, but I picked the one below for my 2013 photo calendar. Of course, I used it for June since it happens to be the time of the year I took this picture. Let me know what you think of it.
My 2013 calendar pick for June: a bee on a wild rose
If you enjoy my photos and would like to purchase some, I want to thank you! Simply visit my Zazzle online shop and browse the product offerings. If there’s a photo you would like to purchase but don’t see it in my shop, please contact me by using the Contact form at the bottom of my home page and let me know which photos you are interested in purchasing, and in what format / medium.
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