Setting Intentions

It seems life is sometimes slow and easy and then other times there’s so much to do! Photographically speaking, this week has been a very busy one. I participated in four different photo groups. Two of them are weekly, one is monthly, and the last one was for this week. Whew! It can be overwhelming sometimes, but I enjoy each one of them.

This week I was able to complete the exercises for all four groups in one trip. I had them all written down and the paper in my pocket so I wouldn’t forget what I was looking for. I thought a good bit, mostly in the middle of the night, about where I could go for a photo walk. I decided to go to Garvan Woodland Gardens which is about an hour’s drive from me. This was the first time I’ve been to the garden by myself, which is strange since I’m always going places by myself. Anyway, I usually go to the garden with my two best friends who happen to be my sister and sister-in-law. We have such fun together laughing, talking, eating, and pointing out what catches our eyes. It’s a splendid place for walking and talking, but this time I needed to be focused on my mission, fulfilling the four exercises!

Mission #1

I’m part of a group on Facebook who are taking a yearlong adventure through Kim Manley Ort’s book ADVENTURES IN SEEING. I’ve taken this class on line with Kim several years ago, but she has recently turned the class into a book; a good book which you can find here. The adventure for this week was to go on a photo walk with set intentions. We were to walk looking for something specific. There were a lot of things I could have focused on at the garden: flowers (not much of challenge in a woodland garden!), animals (there are more in the garden than you think!), water (beautiful waterfalls and creeks abound here!) or landscapes (maybe?). What I finally decided on was to find flowers and rocks together, which was a little bit more of a challenge than flowers or water.

I think I’ll let you scroll through the pictures of what I found. No words are necessary! I’ll meet you at the end.

Kim also suggested in her Facebook post that we keep our eyes open for red. Red is a color that will quickly catch your eye. Here are the shades of red I found in the garden.

There is one other picture I want to add. It’s not a rock or a flower, but it is hard-as-a-rock!! While walking I noticed a lady with two small girls staring into the woods. The girls were excited. The mom was taking pictures. As I approached I asked them what they were looking at. It was five armadillos! I’ve never see a real armadillo other than at the zoo. They are not so pretty, very noisy, and fascinating!

I tried to do each of the four exercise separately so I could concentrate only on it. Exercise number one was completed, now it was time to move on to the next one. To keep this post from going on forever I’ll tell you about the other three exercise in future posts.

“All the technique

in the world doesn’t compensate

for the inability to notice.”

~ Elliott Erwitt