Sara’s Fave Photos

Recently Seattle was blessed with two warm, sunny days. I was so happy to be able to be outside and in a garden space. This was at the Highline Botanical Garden, and yes, that is the blue sky reflecting in the water.

Visit Weekend Reflections for more fascinating and creatively seen visual reflections.

I’ve also tagged this as Best Post of the Week. I love this one!

Hubby has a new hobby, geocaching. He tramps around parks and other public places with his trusty GPS unit, and finds hidden geocaches. It’s sort of interesting, but mainly I tag along for the scenic things I might find. Lake Garrett Park was new to me, and even though the day was cool and quite breezy, the ducks seemed quite happy.

Happy Watery and Outdoor Wednesday! And visit Scenic Sunday and Weekend Reflections while you’re at it.

When I see good light and I have a few minutes, I can’t resist racing to the overlook of Puget Sound near my house to see the view. Yesterday there was a break in the clouds to the west and sure enough, it was beautiful.

Visit Skywatch Friday for more skies seen round the world. Weekend Reflections, Scenic Sunday and Outdoor Wednesday are worth a visit, too.

This view of Mt. Rainier was taken while flying to Arizona a couple of years ago. It fits the Thursday Challenge theme this week: HIGH or LOW (Photos from a different perspective, Photos from the top or bottom of Buildings, Mountains, Towers, Underneath,…).

Do you like this one or the previous post’s photo better, I wonder?

That overlook (elevation approximately 700 feet)  near my house is a view of Puget Sound and Vashon Island, but if you look sharply to the left, there is Mt. Rainier in the distance, perhaps about 40 miles as the crow flies. I do prefer the water view, but sometimes the snowcapped peak of our favorite volcano looks pretty fine. This was a gray day yesterday, but I think it’s impressive, in a Seattle sort of way, anyway.

Visit Watery Wednesday for more water (or ice or snow) views. And try Scenic Sunday for more fascinating scenery.

I am trying a new meme today: Outdoor Wednesday. It looks great with some neat photos for you to browse.

Today I saw rainbows in three locations as I drove around and did errands. You’ve gotta be quick with rainbows; they just won’t wait for you. So while I was driving down this alley in downtown Burien, I stopped the car, leaned my head out the window, and took the shot. I actually like it, even though this type of urban shot isn’t my usual thing. Gotta love rainbows.

Visit Thursday Challenge for more Sky photos, and/or visit Skywatch Friday for even more skies around the world!

It’s cleared up and the sky was showing the change the other evening. This one is SOOC, or straight out of the camera. For more skies around the world, visit Skywatch Friday.

Navigation Note: Now you can always get back to the latest entry here by clicking on the “Sara’s Fave Photos” title in the header, no matter where you’ve wandered in the blog. I invite you to look at the memes or tags on the left, or whatever appeals to you today. Hope you enjoy your visit.

While it has been quite rainy recently, wetness does not necessarily a photograph make. I thought I’d show this one of a delightfully noisy creek in the Quinault Rain Forest, on Washington’s Olympic Peninsula, taken last summer.

Visit Watery Wednesday for more cybermoisture. For fans of scenery, visit Scenic Sunday. And try SOOC, for more straight-out-of-the-camera shots.

There was a break in the clouds late in the afternoon on Sunday so I rushed out to the overlook near my house to see what the water looked like. Scenic!

Visit Scenic Sunday and Watery Wednesday for more intriguing photos. Try Weekend Reflections, too.

This one holds up, after returning a few days later, so I’ve chosen it as Best Post of the Week.

This was taken in the Portland Japanese Garden in May, not now in January, but I thought we could use some spring and sunshine today. Here is Seattle in the real world, all is gray. For more fascinating flowers, visit Today’s Flowers, and be sure to visit Scenic Sunday as well.

Yesterday morning there was a half hour of sunshine, and I got to go out and walk in it. Wonderful! Here is what it looked like from the overlook near my house (elev. 700 feet) as the mist was burning off.

For more skies around the world, visit Skywatch Friday.

This is one of my top faves, from the archives, from when I used to live in Sonoma County, CA, which is about an hour or so north of San Francisco. I came across it and thought I might have taken it at about this time of year, or maybe March. Those huge live oaks are so dramatic when they are bare. Sure gives you that changing weather feeling of early spring.

Visit Scenic Sunday for some lovely views of the world. And this sure is a great shadow shot for Shadow Shot Sunday.

Since this is one of my all-time favorites, I’m tagging it Best Post of the Week.

Also, I’ve fixed the little problem with comments not being available when you click on a category to the left. Now comments are available whenever you click on a page (or should be). Thank you, Marsha Perry of Perry Internet Consulting! She made this blog on a Wordpress template for me, and I am so grateful. What a great addition to my life.

It was sunny for a little bit yesterday so I went out for a walk while it lasted. Here is our active volcano (could blow any time), Mt. Rainier, showing its winter snows. The theme for  Thursday Challenge is “Winter,” so take a look there at some other wintery ideas.

This is a good one for Scenic Sunday as well. And hello, Skywatch Friday folks!

It’s been pretty darn cloudy and wet, and dark, but there is still scenic delight if you hunt for it. OK, it’s subtle, but still lovely. Here’s a recent view of Puget Sound from the Normandy Park cove beach.

For more watery wonders, visit Watery Wednesday. I like the reflections in this one, and if you’d like more of those, visit Weekend Reflections. And find more scenic interest over at Scenic Sunday.

Here’s a view of Puget Sound from Seahurst Park the other day showing a fairly typical sky of our region. The many cloud layers with the dark rainclouds on the way are more appealing to me than straight gray, which is what we have today.

This is another SOOC shot, or straight out of the camera.

Visit Skywatch Friday for more skies seen round the world.

Puget Sound (near Seattle) is huge but quite protected, so even on windy days we don’t get much wave action. I like the sound the little swishing waves make on the pebbly shore. This water shot reflecting the blue sky of a sunny day was captured about two weeks ago.

Visit Watery Wednesday for more cyberwetness, and SOOC for more straight-out-of-the-camera photos.

I took this with the new camera on Christmas Day at Seahurst Park. That sunshine was so welcome.

I’m entering a new meme today, Blue Monday. Check it out.

I guess I wasn’t the only one entranced by the scenery a week or two ago near Pike Place Market in downtown Seattle. The sunset over Puget Sound was pretty darn nice, don’t you think?

For more skies and sunsets, visit Skywatch Friday. And you might like to visit the folks at Scenic Sunday, too, even though we are early for that one.

We were at Normandy Park Cove this weekend. This gull repeatedly swam around, launched itself a foot or two into the air, and dove for dinner. After watching six or eight tries, we had to leave and I do not know if it ever was successful. It was beautiful and inspiring to watch. The crow seemed to be quite interested also.

For more cyberwetness, visit Watery Wednesday.

This huge nest of a bald eagle is in Kent, Washington, near the Green River. The occupants were elsewhere at the moment, but it’s still an amazing sight, to me.

For more skies around the world, visit Skywatch Friday. For more blissful Pinkness, try Pink Saturday.

And have a happy, healthy and lucky New Year!

We went to a new (to us) park nearby in Burien, WA. Hubby has discovered geocaching and of course I wanted to try scenic shots with my new Canon s90 Powershot camera. What do you think? This it totally straight out of the camera (SOOC). I am trying to master the manual controls, a very difficult endeavor. This had the ISO set to 80. I thought I understood cameras and settings from my old SLR film camera days, but these have so very many settings that there seems to be no logic to it.

In any case, check out Watery Wednesday for more cyberwetness. And you can always stop by Scenic Sunday (I’m early, I know) for more scenigasms.

Santa came a bit early and I got a Canon Powershot S90! Here’s a very appropriate photo of the dawn, taken yesterday morning in my backyard, as my first post with the new camera. The only benefit of the days starting so late is I get to see the actual dawn sometimes. Have you guessed I am not naturally an early riser?

It’s going to take me awhile to get comfortable with the manual control features (which were part of the reason I got it) of the new toy. And it’s very small, no bigger than the 3-yr. old Canon point-and-shoot it replaced. Another plus is it does REALLY great in low light indoor situations without a flash, which I prefer in most cases. But so much to learn! I prefer things simple but I am pledged to master this.

Can’t wait to see what it does in the garden with flowers. For that I must wait.

For more skies of happiness and inspiration around the world, visit Skywatch Friday. And have a great holiday.

There’s a Winco grocery store in Renton, not too far away, that not only has great prices but has a parking lot with very sculptural trees and a big sky, too. This was taken last week. We are now entering the darkest week of the year (in the Northern hemisphere, of course), and soon the days will be on the upswing. Let’s hear it for the Solstice!

For more skies seen round the world, visit Skywatch Friday.

And thank you so much for those who clicked through to the Photoblog Awards and left a comment or a vote. I appreciate it so very much. And thank you to everyone for putting up with all that repeated blurb about it! We are done now.

This is from the archives, taken on a fine April day from the famous and beautiful Astoria bridge over the Columbia River.

So many photos, in just three years of digital. I think I’ll never run out of things to post. Visit Skywatch Friday for more skies around the world. Weekend Reflections always features a highly creative set of photos, and visit Scenic Sunday for more scenegasms.

I’ve tagged this Best Post of the Week. It’s a keeper.

PLEASE IGNORE IF READ BEFORE about the 2009 Photoblog Awards. If you like my photos, please vote for this photoblog before Dec. 15 and leave a comment in the link  below. You have to register (name and password only) and then click on the word Vote in the upper left. Thanks very much! Photoblog Awards 2009

I just can’t get over the brilliance of autumn leaves I sometimes see around here. This is a straight-out-of-the camera (SOOC) shot, no Photoshop at all, thank you very much. Sometimes I do tweak just a tiny bit, but rainy skies can be your friend in photography. The even lighting helps get a perfect exposure, even on the Auto setting. I also rarely crop. Compose on the fly, take lots, and hit delete if you don’t like it. Digital rocks!

Visit Ruby Tuesday for more red loveliness, and Color Carnival for more scintillating colors of all kinds.

PLEASE IGNORE IF READ BEFORE about the 2009 Photoblog Awards. If you like my photos, please vote for this photoblog before Dec. 15 and leave a comment in the link  below. You have to register (name and password only) and then click on the word Vote in the upper left. Thanks very much! Photoblog Awards 2009