Glorious Rays of Sun

I enjoy the beauty God has made and I take a lot of photos to record it. Whether clouds, sunsets, animals, fog, ice, trees or more, I love to photograph nature and that's what this blog is about. 

This post is specifically about those glorious rays of the sun that peek through clouds, trees or other things. It can change a regular scene into something special... something mysterious.... something glorious.

I love being up in the early morning to be able to see the sun peek through the trees while the day just gets started. It is peaceful as well as beautiful. Since my family is large and I am kept very busy throughout each day, I love these quiet bits of time to enjoy the beauty of the earth that God has made.

The rays of light are beautiful, whether they go up, down or sideways. They are beautiful through fog, trees, smoke, between houses, around objects and they can transform an ordinary scene into something far more special. 


Do you enjoy the rays of sun? I hope you take time to enjoy the beauty God puts around us. I delight in living in the country now so that we can enjoy it more than ever, although we found LOTS of beauty to enjoy in the city also. We have lived in the country for almost a year now and the time has just flown by. You can read about it at this link:  Living in the Country


Thank you for visiting today. I'd love to hear from you in the comments. If you are interested, I also write another blog called   Gentle Joy Homemaker

Syzygy or Solar Eclipse ... and Storm

The Solar Eclipse of 2017 is now past. The solar eclipse was also a Syzygy - an alignment of 3 celestial objects like the sun, earth and either the moon or a planet. 

We first learned the word Syzygy because we have a game by that name. It has Scrabble-like tiles, but no board. The point is to use up your tiles while building your own crossword, before the others in the game do.... and to get points. We have really enjoyed that game.  

It was fun to experience the day of the eclipse and put it together with the name Syzygy.

 The day started out by clouding over with storm clouds building and lightning flashing. We wondered if we would even see the eclipse.

The kids and I went to a small lake to take pictures as the storm was quite beautiful. We were hoping it would be done by time of the eclipse, but if it wasn't, we still had some nice pictures of the storm.

Shortly before time for the eclipse, the clouds moved away to the horizon where they formed a solid border all the way around. At least the overhead sky was clearing off.

We had our special glasses to view the solar eclipse. We had 2 pairs for 4 of us to share, so we took turns.

It took a bit for me to get used to holding the glasses tightly over the extended lens of my camera while it was on the tripod. I also had trouble finding the sun while doing so as I had to tip my head WAY back and had to be careful not to catch an unexpected glimpse of the eclipse with my eyes unprotected.I was pleased to get a few pictures and some that I really liked.

The clouds started to move in again, so I could only get pictures through the clouds and I did not use  the protective glasses since nothing showed through them.  Still I was able to get the eclipse from about all sides and I was pleased.

The clouds moved in much stronger after this picture and while we had a couple more faint glimpses of the eclipse, this was the last picture that was nice enough to share.  I hadn't expected to care that much about the Eclipse, but it was a great time with some of my kids as we worked hard to get photos. It was very cloudy the rest of the day and I think we may have had some more storms. The weather was rather strange that day.

Here are some of the storm pictures from the morning. There was a LOT of lightning, but I didn't get any pictures of that. The clouds were wonderful to see though... it was windy and stormy.

What a day! We enjoyed it and I hope you did too. Did you see the Eclipse? Did you get tired of all of the "hoopla" over it? We did ... but we were also able to enjoy it.  Thank you for visiting.  I hope you have a great week.  :)  








Other posts you may enjoy:






Lunar Eclipse - Red Moon

Stormy Spring Sky 

LOOK At The Clouds!!! 






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Beautiful Reflections

 Beautiful reflections catch my attention, like this reflected house. The sun on the side of the house, the still water, the early morning... all worked together to create some beautiful reflections.

 I love the colors and shadows of the early morning.... the softer light...  and the peacefulness.

This picture shows the heron and its reflection.......... and also the reflection of the house not shown in the picture.  It seemed to be an interesting way to crop the picture.











The sunrise was beautiful............. and its reflection was amazing! What a blessing to be there and to capture it on my camera.  

I liked the image of only the reflected sunrise... and the plants in the water.

I do enjoy looking for reflections... and I hope you have also enjoyed these.  It was such a beautiful morning and I so enjoyed having the privilege of observing these scenes. 

Which picture is your favorite? 

I hope you have a great week... thank you for visiting.  





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Storm Damage and Flooding

 We have had some storms... some with heavy rain (5" overnight!), some with winds and loss of power and some just loud.

After one storm, there was a lot of tree damage... it was odd in that it looked like the tops of so many trees were twisted off, which may have been a microburst. There were also very strong straight winds. 

This picture has 2 arrows... the one on the left is pointing to a long piece of a tree branch... maybe 2' long x 1 1/2"... and it was stabbed into the ground. I am so thankful no one was there when it went into the ground with such force! 

The arrow on the right points to an area where a tree was in the road. There were trees and power lines down in many places.  Our damage was minimal, especially compared to what others experienced. Our power was out for 6 hours while it was so hot... making it hard to sleep. Oh, how we appreciate the air conditioning more now! Others were without power for longer... even days.

The winds were strong in this storm... the big branches and limbs were hitting the house and windows.... blowing on the roof and banging the roof... and flying to the other side of the house. We enjoy watching storms, but this one was scary.  We ended up having some damage to a roof vent which caused some leaking into the house, but we are thankful. By the way, our windows and even the screens were undamaged! So surprising, since the branches hit the windows.


 There were limbs and branches down... and some trees pulled up by the roots... some onto houses. It was a very violent storm and how thankful we were to be inside our home... and safe. There were leaves and clumps of leaves all over...whole leaves were plastered to the house and vehicles... then I also noticed that there were so many bits of leaves... tips of leaves and I wondered at the power that could tear those leaves to pieces and leave others whole. 


In this picture, you can see the hanging basket... it came through the storm just fine, as did other plants, but then some things were damaged greatly. It was an odd storm. 

Our 2 oldest sons went out in the still rainy aftermath of the storm, during the night and saw trees down, power lines down and they guarded a power line until emergency crews could get there. They also helped to move a tree and debris out of the road. 

 These poor people had much more damage to their house...  what a mess for them.

 Trying to go places was a challenge at times.. water runoff caused flooding... 5" of water overnight needed to go somewhere!

This picture shows the road ending in water... and it also shows that the water had already receded a lot... the debris in the foreground was where the water had been. Wow!

 Yes, there is a road down there under the water.


This looks like a lake... where there had been a wet area with cattails next to the road, but it flooded the area.... clear up near the train tracks. The road went up there, but was flooded at the time. 

 Such a large amount of water. Such amazing power. I am so thankful to know the God who controls the storms.

Do we still like to watch storms? Yes, but we do so with a soberness and marvel at the mighty hand of God.

I have been commenting on earlier posts, that the skies have been amazing this year... the cloud formations are wonderful. It has been a stormy year... yet there is still a wonderful beauty present and I am glad to take pictures of that beauty.  

Have you been seeing storms and damage this year?  Maybe you live in a place that has drought...  there are so many ways that the weather affects our lives. Thank you for visiting. I look forward to reading your comments. :)  I hope you have a good week.

Other posts you may enjoy:

Severe Storm Clouds

Stormy Sky Pictures




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Stormy Sky Pictures

 We have had a lot of storms this year... and we do enjoy watching them.

I had seen a Mackerel sky the day before, which can mean a change in the weather... or storms, so I was expecting a storm.

Some storms are interesting and this one had some wonderful cloud formations. My kids and I went to take pictures of it.

 

The day started out with a beautiful sky, as shown above. We have had lots of great clouds in the sky this season.

By evening, the clouds were  moving fast and there was much turbulence. We do enjoy watching such skies and this one had a very dark color to it.

 In a storm like this, the sky tends to be interesting in all directions as the storm builds.

 There was much lightning and lots of changing clouds. 

We were not the only ones out taking pictures either. It was an impressive sight.

 The lightning lit the sky and highlighted the clouds, making the storm more impressive.

Finally the darkness increased so much and the rain started a little, so we went home. By the time we got home, it was raining extremely hard and we got wet running in to the house.

My husband had stayed home... he thinks we are strange for taking so many pictures, but he enjoys looking at some of them. :) 


 Have you been getting storms? Do you photograph them also? I am so glad the storms don't last, but I can appreciate the power of God evident in them as only He can control such storms. Thank you for visiting my blog today. I hope you have a great week.  :) 


You may also enjoy.....

There's A Storm Coming






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