Spring (happily!)

I can't believe how long it has been since I posted. Shamefully long. What can I say, work and life got in the way.  I don't want to go into the gory details of the long hours in the office, but thankfully a bit of the time keeping me from this blog was spent having fun.  I went rock climbing for the first time, enjoyed some good baseball with friends, started a book club, etc. 

And I had the honor (with my friend Laura) last weekend of being my friend Lauren's wedding photographer (can't wait to share those pics!).  She got married at City Hall and the reception was at Queens County Farm Museum.  What a neat spot, tucked away in the middle of Queens, a little farm with animals and hay rides.

To warm up, so to speak, for the evening of phototaking, I stopped on my way into the farm to take some photos of these tulips.  Oh, tulips! How happy they make me!  They are such a sure sign of spring and the end of cold, dreary winter.

(Queens County Farm Museum, photographed May 2011)

Heading to the Desert...

I have exciting news. I'm headed to New Mexico in a few days to volunteer on a Navajo reservation.  I can't wait to get away from my desk and out into the sun, to meet some great people and do a little good for someone else.  Will have to tell you about it later, because it's way past my bedtime as I type this post.  So just enjoy these photos from my field trip with Meghan to the d.c. botanical gardens in the meantime. 

(d.c. botanical gardens, photographed February 2011)

A walk in the garden continued...

After seeing my last post, my friend Dara commented that the photos were "pretty!" but "also sort of strange," because "orchids are weird-looking."  I can't say I disagree.  Orchids can be quite beautiful but really are odd-looking.  I'd try to espouse on some metaphor or simile with greater life meaning, but I have a headache and am ready for bed.  So you are on your own for that one.  Just enjoy these photos and the orchids' strange beauty.

(U.S. Botanical Gardens, DC, photographed February 2011)

A walk in the garden...

As I mentioned in my last post, I was in d.c. last weekend with my friend Meghan.  It was a sunny but very windy day, so we took shelter at the botanical gardens.  And I took full advantage of the opportunity to take photos of all the amazing flowers, which included several dozen kinds of orchids.  Big ones. Little ones.  Purple with white spots.  White with purple spots.  Ones that looked like dancing fairies, and ones that looked like evil monsters.  It was quite the collection.  Mind you, there are some 20,000 types of orchids, but I think I would run out of space in my memory card if they were all at the botanical gardens in d.c.

(U.S. Botanical Gardens, DC, photographed February 2011)

Dreaming of Spring

As I mentioned in my last post, I spent the long weekend in dc with my dear friend Meghan.  We had a brief reprieve from the cold, dark winter during my visit.  It was sunny and bright, so Meghan and I took to the streets of the district.  Unfortunately, it was also windy, very windy.  Meghan and I had no choice but to take shelter from the fierce gusts.  Luckily, we were right by the U.S. Botanical Garden.  We quickly decided that these greenhouses would not only be a great way to enjoy the sunlight without the blinding wind but also would give Meghan a chance to cross something off of her dc bucket list of things to do.  Oh, and there was free admission!  I love that about dc museums.     

The many gardens full of colorful blossoms and exotic plants would also give me a chance to break my streak of uninspiring days without photography and start taking some photos again.  (Meghan had thought of that, too, as a reason to visit the gardens.  She's such a great friend).  And boy, did I have fun.  It reminded me of visits to the Mitchell Park Domes -- the botanical gardens in Milwaukee -- with my dad during Christmas breaks when I was younger.  We'd go, cameras in hand, to take a break from the cold winters of Wisconsin and practice taking photographs of flowers. 

My love of taking photos of flowers has not waned since those days with my dad.  I took a lot of photos at the U.S. Botanical Gardens with Meghan (ya, expect more posts on flowers), but what I loved about these is the dream-like composition.  Suits my mood, in which I'm dreaming of spring.

(U.S. Botanical Gardens, DC, photographed February 2011)

No W(h)ining

Whine... It's so hot in New York City this weekend.  Unbearably hot.  Too hot really to do anything but sit in a nice cool and dark apartment and drink a chilled bottle of vinho verde.  (Yup, am still plugging this wine.  Seriously, you have to try it).

When Laura and I were in Portugal, we not only drank our fair share of vinho verde, we also visited wine and port country.  We drove our car through the hills overlooking the Douro River, which are populated by countless quintas, each touting rows and rows of grape vines.  We stopped at one, where they grow the grapes used in fonesca port.  The day was hot, the sun was baking as we combed through the seemingly endless rows of vines, but our sweet reward was several glasses of port waiting for us to sip in a lovely air-conditioned tasting parlor. 

Oh, and the opportunity to take some neat photos was a fun treat as well.

(Quinta do Panascal, Portugal, photographed in June 2010)

Flor!

 As you may be noticing based on the steady stream of posts about Portugal, I took a lot of photographs while on vacation.  Traveling with another photographer meant that it was (generally) not annoying if I stopped and snapped a shot whenever something caught my eye.  And, well, lots of things caught my eye.  Like flowers.  I loved these tiny red ones that we saw at a quinta.  They looked like they were made out of crinkly tissue paper - very much like the red tissue paper poppies that the VWF sells in front of stores in remembrance of our veterans.

But this one of the sunflowers is one of my favorite photos of the trip.  I saw these sunflowers at a market in Porto that Laura and I visited one morning and am just so smitten with how the photograph turned out.  I wish every photo I took came out so perfect.

These next two photos were taken at the romantic pousada that Laura and I stayed out while in the Douro River Valley (more on that later!).  The place had a beautiful rose garden out front and, of course, we wandered through it taking photos.

(Portugal, photographed June 2010)

On Vacation...

I'm getting out of town for Memorial Day weekend.  My friend said to me, "don't forget to take pictures."  I laughed.  How could I forget?  In fact, he should have said "please don't take too many photos, please."  Ha!

So I won't be posting for a few days, but I hope to come back with some beautiful photos to share with you.  In the meantime, please enjoy these taken during my trip to St. Lucia a few years back.  Looking at these gets me really excited for this next trip.  I'm *so* ready for more vacation!

(St. Lucia, photographed July 2007)

Into the Wild

I told you in my last couple posts that I took a lot of photos at camp on Saturday.  Don't worry, I won't show them all to you.  I don't want to bore you.  This will be my last camp-related post for the time being, promise. 

Let me tell you something though, as someone who lives in Brooklyn and works in Manhattan, I don't often get out into the wild (and yes, you can consider this part of New Jersey where Trail Blazers camp is located as "the wild." I practically didn't even have cell phone reception.).  But I love being outside, far away from the city, where the air is fresher and the world a whole lot quieter.   Even though it was cold and wet (meaning I got very muddy while we were hiking and mountain biking), it was a perfect day at camp.  I returned to the city refreshed and reinvigorated.

(Trail Blazers Camp, photographed April 2010)