Bambi?

 At Hurricane Ridge, the deer were coming out to play. This little guy was so cute, with his little antlers starting to bud out. 

Unfortunately, the deer were not afraid of the people/cars, which is quite dangerous.

Peonies!

This is incredibly late, but The Boyfriend bought me flowers! About a month ago. Heh. 

These pink peonies were beautiful and smelled wonderful. They made my little dorm room a nice little slice of heaven. Or at least smell like a field of flowers. Anyways, they were much needed during my finals, so I greatly appreciated them. And of course, took pictures of them too!

This is where they lived on my windowsill! They were a wonderful burst of color, as you can see.

I loved how the petals had choppy, uneven edges.

It's like a cacophony of  petals!

It had been forever since I received flowers, and I loved how he surprised me with them :)

It's beginning to feel a lot like...Spring!

It is finally feeling like Spring here!

Well, sorta. Last week was all sun and no clouds, so everyone on campus broke out the shorts and dresses. We all soaked up the sun, and got sunburnt and no homework done. But hey, when the sun comes out, we all emerge from our winter caves in Seattle. It is a holiday in itself.

But then of course, this weekend it poured (perhaps to make up for the suddenly nice weather?). So hey. It's April showers.

But here are some shots I took during those hot, muggy days (I'm a wimp in heat).

These first two were taken during a walk with The Boyfriend. The walk ended up lasting quite long, but the scenery was really pretty (if a bit hot...heh). We walked around a neighborhood nearby campus.

I know this second picture is technically the same composition of a previous one from Easter, but I couldn't resist. I really like the pattern of the shadows from the petals. And I think this new one turned out better than the first :)

You really know it's spring when ducklings come out to swim! This is in Drumheller fountain.

Because it was sunny for such a long stretch with no rain (3 days, oh my! haha), every slight breeze jostled off seeds from the trees on campus. I'm not sure what tree these are from, but they covered all the sidewalks and gutters. As you can see in the background of the last picture.

I didn't see that car in the background!! Oh well.

Have a wonderful week!

Happy Easter and Sun!

Yesterday was beautiful for Easter. Blue skies and warm(ish) weather. I've been swamped with studying for exams, but even I(!) took a few hours off to see a movie with a friend on Saturday and have Easter brunch with my family on Sunday.

Unfortunately it looks like we're right back to grey skies right now. Boo.

But in taking full advantage of our short burst of nice weather, I went on a walk with The Boyfriend around the neighborhood. I promised I wouldn't take a lot of pictures, so here is just one picture. I love it when the flowers start blooming. The sun lit up these petals with a nice orange glow.

An Ode to Rain, and Pictures of Snow

I love the sound of the rain. When it patters against the windows in a gust of wind, and each droplet slides down to tumble off the sash.

It was raining hard last night, with rivers running along the sidewalks, and people running with their heads bowed down. I loved it. Rain is my favorite type of weather.

I've written bad poetry about it :)

But rain is also hard to take a picture of. So here's some snow from a hike I took recently.

My brother invited me along on a hike with a few friends, and we went up the Mt. Washington trail near Mt. Baker, just off exit 41. That trail is a killer. It is practically straight up a mountain. But once we got to the snow about a third the way up, it was totally worth it. I've never hiked in snow before, and after this, I would totally do it again. It was so satisfying to crunch along in the snow, and walk among the trees with blankets of snow on their branches. Along the rocks there were curtains of icicles. We crossed a few streams cutting through the snow, its water glimmering in the sunlight. (But don't get me wrong, it was cold. Very, very, why-didn't-I-wear-gloves cold).

I was recovering from a cold, so the whole experience was a bit muddled with the it's-a-bit-hard-to-breathe-feeling of pressure in my head. But it was still absolutely magical. 

We had lunch at this part where the trail leveled off (finally) into a snow meadow, and this is where I took a few pictures. Just a few, though because it was cold. So. Cold.

Hope everyone is staying warm!

Lonely bench on a day of love

For Valentine's Day, The Boyfriend and I walked around the arboretum by our university. It was a nice walk (he was kind of cold, so he will probably say otherwise, haha). He set a limit on the number of photos I could take, so most of my photos are of us/him (hey, it's Valentine's Day, and he's very attractive...I can't help it.). But here's one that's not him, though the content is perhaps a bit ironic given the day's theme.

The lonely bench overlooking the hillside.

The weather was a bit wonky (um, Seattle, anyone?) where there was a blanket of clouds with the sun shining at the same time. That's what is causing the light playing over the bench and the grass. 

Have a wonderful day!

Snow!

So. Funny story. 

My friend sent me a picture of the snow at her college's campus (she lives in another city), and I was saying (read: complaining) about how it is supposed to snow here and yet the weather has only got the cold-as-balls part down. Guess what she replied? Look outside. Oh.

Yep. It's snowing outside.

I've been studying in my room, ensconced with my five weeks of class notes and a stack of flashcards. And apparently oblivious to the fluffy white stuff  falling from the sky. And sticking. Apparently I've been studying too hard.

But nevertheless, I abandoned my studies for a few hours to make dinner and take some pictures (not necessarily in that order. And yes, hours, plural. What can I say, I'm a slow eater...). Here are a few.

I really like the composition of this picture, but I'm not too fond of the yellow-tinge from the street lights. (Yellow snow is never good. Mantra for every snow camping trip.)

I over-exposed this one a bit, but I kind of like how it turned out. The blurry light adds an ethereal glow that adds to the magical feeling of snow everywhere. And as you can see, there was almost no one out here. And  you know it's a college campus because that student is jay-walking. :)

This is the Elm tree my dorm is named after. It is shadowed from the lights, so there wasn't much I could do about lighting. But the ashen-white look of some of the branches reminds me of the tree on Minas Tirith (Lord of the Rings fans anyone? No? Okay.).

It's too bad I couldn't get the whole tree in the frame (I tried. I really did) but I do like the background. It keeps it from being too dreary (as you can see in the top, the grey sky).

Have a safe night! Let's all hope the city doesn't go crazy tomorrow morning. We're notorious for losing our minds with just a hint of snow. It's hilariously embarrassing.

Summer: Leavenworth

Hello! It is near freezing here, and supposed to snow on Saturday. But heck, what better time to look back at summer? I love winter, all bundled up by the fire with tea, but sometimes summer sounds really good. Like right now when my dorm room refuses to budge above 66.5 degrees F. Boo.

I found these lovely pictures from when I went to Leavenworth last summer. When I was little (and gas was cheaper), my family would hop into the car for an impromptu drive, and often find ourselves 3 hours away, in Leavenworth. It is a quaint little Bavarian village, known for its friendly atmosphere, trails in the summer, and skiing in the winter. 

I had never been to Leavenworth during the summer (for some unknown reason, since summertime is by far the warmest and the prettiest...)... and this was a wonderful opportunity. Usually my family's trips to Leavenworth are more along the lines of "passing through Leavenworth" or "dinner in Leavenworth," so this was the first time we were here to actually spend some time exploring it. I looked up trails to possibly hike, and found events that were in town during our stay.

In the end, we went on three hikes, two with the whole family, and one with just my brother and I. We also went to an outdoor play, which was absolutely beautiful, though I don't have any pictures from it, unfortunately.

The first hike was around Blackbird Lake. It was a nice family hike, but still afforded some lovely views. 

    

This was one of my favorite views (and picture) from the hike. This is the Wenatchee River, and as as you can see, the weather was beautiful. I like the dip of the mountains and the clouds leading you off into the distance in the center of the picture.

I really liked the pure-white-ness (now a valid word and description) of this flower, though unfortunately my camera seemed to lose the details in the center.

We passed these kids having some fun in the water. The boy was very enthusiastic about acting out a scene in his imagination, while his sister was a little more cautious about the water.

Our second hike was just The Brother and me. I'll be posting a separate post about that one, in an effort to keep this from being a gigantic post, and because that hike in itself was one of my favorite memories from summer.

The last hike was a short nature trail:

It was a combination of trees, a river, a plain, and mountains. Here, you can see three of the four. I thought the little cloud in the dip of the mountain made for an interesting composition. Now that I look at it, it reminds me of the Eye of Sauron. Any Lord of the Rings fans?

Hope everyone is staying warm!

Autumn 2013

We're going to step back a few months to the colors of autumn. If nature is going to give us such beautiful colors, we must take advantage of them, right? Even if it's a few months late...

These pictures were taken on a walk with The Boyfriend a crisp afternoon. And by crisp, I mean really really cold and overcast. That's my city's definition, at least. :)

There was this row of trees across the lake we were walking around, and I really liked the differing colors. They weren't uniform at all, which lent it to such an interesting painting. Since it was so far away, I tried to keep some foreground in the picture.

Apparently mycology is very popular here in the Pacific Northwest. Unfortunately, I know nothing about mushrooms except what I find in Fred Meyers, but this was an interesting mushroom we found in the grass. It looks like a mini table.  I liked the texture of the broken parts.

So here is that row of trees from the first picture. They are even more pretty close up.

 

More mushrooms! I like these ones even more than the first. You can almost imagine what the inverted mushroom cap feels like; the sift tickle of the gills against your fingertip...

And an obligatory "leaves of fall" picture.

Hope you enjoyed autumn!

Winter Nature

My family went to a nature garden in Vancouver, B.C. in December. It was wonderful (we love gardens like this, and they had plants from all over the world; everything blooms and grows at different times).

This is a Lebanon Pine Cedar tree. I loved the bark, and the way the needles grow. They grow exactly opposite each other, in small bunches.

This black squirrel was small, black, and fluffy. It was quite cute, and stood still for awhile while I got a picture of it amongst all the fallen leaves.

Destination: Home

Hello! Yes, I'm back. I spent the last 4 months in a wonderful state of mind, and this allowed the blog to slide. I would apologize, but the past few months were amazing and so I'm not sad. I was simply busy enjoying life. However, now it is the new year, and I have a wonderfully persistent boyfriend who has been encouraging me to post more pictures here. So let's start with these!

Also, I realized that I think it makes more sense for descriptions/introductions of the pictures to be written before presenting the picture. Does it? And I'm trying out the text flush to the left. Just fyi. Anyways, onwards:

One of my good friends was in town for perhaps the last time (she moves around a lot, and my hometown is a bit out of the way), so one of my friends and I took her sightseeing and touring around the city. Honestly, this was the first time I've ever been a tourist in my city, so it was quite exciting. We all had a lot of fun together, and with the city.

It was a bit overcast (in other words, a real Seattle day) but not too cold. We started down at the Waterfront, where the new "Great Wheel" was just put in a few years ago. I'm not sure why, as I'm not entirely sure it's stable or safe (it's tall, metal, and on a pier in an earthquake zone...does this not raise red flags for anyone else?). However, the Sound was quite calm, and offered a really nice reflection. One of our iconic ferries was coming back as well. If you've never been on a ferry, please ride one. You don't even need a car. It's so much fun. And if you take it at sunset, it is beautiful.

And of course we had to go to Space Needle. By this time, we were being spoiled by the sun which decided to grace us with its presence. It made for a beautiful blue sky, and very very cold temperatures (there's always a trade off, isn't there?). We actually went up the Space Needle, which was really fun. As "locals" it was fun to point out our neighborhoods (my friend even found her house).

I really like that in this picture below, you can see all the trees surrounding and framing the Needle. I find it representative of Seattle, which is ridiculously eco-friendly, and the balance of the city with nature (Washington is the Evergreen state).

I also like the composition of the clouds and blue sky. It is quite pretty, and draws your eye up the Needle.

We went a few other places as well, but I couldn't let my friend leave without showing her this gorgeous view of the city skyline. The lights at night are beautiful, and this is my favorite lookout point. The light was a bit green/yellow, due to the clouds coming back in and oppressing all the light. But nonetheless, it is still quite lovely. I love our skyline.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful start to 2014!

The cutest demon bird ever

Exactly what the title of my post says: This is the cutest little demon-looking bird ever. It is an owl, but I don't remember the exact name of it.

Look at the eyes! It is clearly plotting something nefarious.

But he fluffiness factor is totally killing the ability to believe it is evil.

That is the worst kind. They are all cute and fluffy and the evilness sneaks up on you too late!

Farmer's market

Hello, summer has been so busy, and I've been taking summer classes so I haven't had as much time as I would like to take and post pictures.Gray cement buildings can only be so photogenic :P

But, I finally got out into the sun today on a trip to my neighborhood's farmer's market. I love the variety of produce and array of colors! Here are some pictures of the colors:

I love the colors of kale. You think they are just a bland green when you hear the name. But it turns out to be bleached turquoise with the edges and veins a sneaky shade of purple. The cool frosty color reminds me of winter. I am in love with the look of kale.

Red chili peppers!

Have you ever seen colored carrots? I think they look cute! All the pastel colors running into each other....

Recording the beauty of long-stemmed flowers

Hello all! My family had a lovely visitor who is friends with my brother from college stay with us. She is in the coast guard, and needed a place to stay for a few days, so we opened up our house to her, and in return, she gave us some lovely long-stemmed flowers! I'm not sure what kind they are, but they are beautiful! This is the first time I've ever seen any long-stemmed anything! I might have to treat myself to some later on in the winter when things tend to look a little gray around here....

Here's any interesting fact: in Russia and many other Eastern countries, it is considered rude to give an even number of flowers. I believe that this gesture has something to do with death or bad wishes. I also know that in flower arrangement, it is best to use an odd number of flowers so that the eye can find a place to rest and look at instead of peering between two flowers or something. So our visitor (who is well-traveled) gave us five long stemmed flowers. 

I thought they deserved to become photographic evidence of beauty :)

I couldn't get all five in the picture, but I thought I would try to show their long stems. Aren't the colors beautiful together? And the petals really are this rich deep pink.

The underside of the petals are equally interesting

The rest of these pictures were all taken in the filtered sunlight in my dining room. They turned out rather well with nice shadows!

I love the little detail of the fluted ends of the petals and how the light highlights them!

Have a nice day! It is supposed to be up in the 80s here (this is considered boiling where I live :P )