Playing With A Macro Lense

Copyright: Photo by Toni Tona

My husband had a county fair photo contest to judge this weekend. While he was inside all day looking at the photos of others, I was outside making photos of my own.

He left his Macro lens with me. I'm afraid I went a little crazy and it was marvelous. Though, apparently, I did something wrong with the "aperture and didn't have a very wide range of field."  I do believe that is Photographer-Speak for, "Yeah, I could have done better!"

Next time....maybe. 

Copyright: Photo by Toni Tona

It is incredible how the lens catches the subtlest of colors and softens the background.  I'm straining not to lick this photo; it so reminds me of pink lemonade and champagne.

The fair grounds was alive with action and excited voices. Cowboys and 4-H'ers setting up the pens for their livestock, fair workers setting up first aid stations and rest stations and a dozen or so women watching the judging of the quilting entries. (Can I just add, the quilts were so exquisite, it was hard to believe the grinches in the audience were capable of such beauty....smile ladies! Smile!)

I searched out a quiet, shady lawn away from the action. Looking up at the rustling leaves as I laid in the cool grass, I found my tank filling up with peace.  Birds talked to me, the earth welcomed me to stay and listen.

Every now and then, the flowers would call. I would jump up (now you are aware that the phrase "jump up" is a wide stretch of the imagination but I am claiming writer's rights). Camera in hand, I answered the call and was rewarded for my effort.

Copyright: Photo by Toni Tona

Eventually, the judge was relieved of duties. We headed out to the Wildlife Refuge nearby and stalked said wildlife. We shot cranes, hawks, a muscrat building it's den, a flock of over a hundred white pelicans sitting along the bank of the marshes. We flushed out pheasants, a roadrunner and some chubby birds that my husband called "Chuggers" (remember, he was tired from leaning over hundreds of photos all day, so I just agreed with him).

Our cameras were too slow to shoot the pheasants, roadrunner and so-called chuggers or maybe we were too excited to remember to click the buttons.

Kind of nice to put the cameras down now and then and just enjoy the life that surrounds us!

We found a blind where we could sit quietly with our cameras and watch the birds without being noticed. Funny though, the birds made a wide circle far from the blind. Maybe they were thinking how ignorant the photographers are to think that any self-respecting fowl is going to be fooled by a big giant brown building in the middle of yellow and green reeds.

Copyright: Photo by Toni Tona

I discovered, with the help of the macro lens, that daisies petals shimmer in the sunlight with a florescent glow and that cranes make a tent with their wings when they dive for a fish.

Copyright: Photo by Toni Tona

  It was a good day.

Good food, good play, good conversation and wonderful company.

Thank you for a wonderful weekend, my love! 


 Just a little warning to all the little fishies in the west end of the marsh: This guy is a serious fisherman....go east, young minnow, go east.

Copyright: Photo by Toni Tona