My feathered friends...

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
and never stops at all.

And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chilliest land
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.


As a lover of nature, I have to admit that one of my favorite things about being outdoors comes in the form of birds. My great, great Grandmother was an avid birdwatcher, and I have grown up with a great appreciation for them. Not only are they beautiful to watch, but they are about the only things that can wake up me before the sun rises and get away with it.

I have had birds as pets before, and known numerous people who have owned birds, and for a few summers, I had the wonderful opportunity to work briefly with a Falconer at an annual Renaissance Faire in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Since moving to Washington, one of my favorite things about the place has been the massive population of seagulls.

Long story short, I have a great appreciation and love for all of the different types of birds in the world. There are so many to see and photograph, and they aren't the easiest creatures to capture, but when you do snap a clean shot of one and look back through your photos, you can't help but feel happy about it all. :)


Sometimes you only get the opportunity to see specific animals in a zoo when you grow up in Central Oklahoma, but that doesn't have to take away from the detail of their pretty feathers and faces. I loved these two, and they were very well taken care of.


I LOVE owls. Snowy owls in particular. I had an amazing experience with an owl at my old home in Ada, Oklahoma. I was outside late at night, having just gotten home from a night spent at my sister's house. I lived alone at the time, and my dad had worried about me doing so, so he parked his old truck in my driveway to make the house look more occupied. I was trying to get into the house through the side door next to the driveway, and the motion sensor light just would NOT come on. I scrambled with my keys and tried to see in the dark before I heard a strange swooshing, following by a heavy clanging sound on the truck. Only when I whipped around did the light come on, and I found myself face to face with an owl, perched on the truck, staring at me. I'd never seen one in that area of Oklahoma. He was absolutely stunning, and I only have the mental image to go with it, but ever since that moment, looking into that bird's eyes, I have had an even deeper fondness for owls than I had before.


Bald eagles. Absolutely gorgeous creatures. Prior to Washington, I mostly saw them in pictures. Even Oklahoma zoos didn't have these beautiful beasties. Now, every once in a while, you spot one in the sky, or in fields off the sides of the highways, or even in trees close to the roads if you know where to look. I snapped pictures of this big guy when Judd and I took a trip to the Nooksack River one day. The picture doesn't do him justice, but I'm proud of it all the same. He was huge, regal, and awe-inspiring, and I never wanted to leave him. I could have taken thousands of photos of his face and never grown tired of it. The photos I did take upset me at first, because my camera had been on a soft focus setting the entire time and I hadn't noticed. I was so carried away snapping a mental picture that I couldn't properly focus on the permanent ones. When a friend said that the bird was gorgeous but the photos were....eh...not so much...my heart sank a bit because it meant the world to me to photograph these birds. I have to take the experience as a whole, and not focus so much on the end result. I will live here for a long time, and will have more opportunities with better cameras in time, but one person's critique doesn't have to ruin the main point, and that is that a goal was reached. I photographed bald eagles for the first time and massively enjoyed myself.


This cute little bird was snapped back in Oklahoma. I love the slight little aura he seems to be giving off. My old yard was full of trees and was quite spacious, despite being surrounded by neighbors on a dead end street. The lot was quiet, and you could feel at peace outside despite being in town. I have always imagined myself living in the middle of nowhere, with no neighbors. That house provided that feeling, but you had the added comfort of knowing that people were close by if you happened to need them. I loved venturing outside and snapping photos of the little birds as they visited my trees. They were much more welcome visitors than the squirrels.


This photo isn't perfect by any means, but I still like it a lot. This duck sat with me at Lake Padden here in Bellingham for about an hour, just cleaning his feathers, sipping drinks from the lake, and looking over his wing at me from time to time before finally wading out into the water and away from our little patch of sand we'd shared. My family spent one summer raising ducks, and we often used to raise abandoned baby cottontail rabbits that we found in our yard, releasing them once they seemed able to take care of themselves. Since that summer with our own ducks, I have always loved them. We released our batch at a local park, and for years, I would search for and feed my old duck with all of the other park visitors.


This is Valkyrie. She is the Harris hawk that I got to help showcase for back to back summers at the Ren Faire. Her story was incredibly sweet. She had been captured by some people, who attempted to keep her as a pet. When this was proving to be an incredible failure, she came into the hands of my Falconer friend, Bob. For years, he helped her recuperate and attempted to release her into the wild. For over 10 years now, she has been released and has always returned to Bob and his family and refuses to go away permanently, despite their attempts and urging for her to return to the wild. She has become a bit of a permanent fixture at the Castle of Muskogee Ren Faire, where she is known as Lady Valkyrie. She's absolutely gorgeous, and I'll never forget that piercing gaze.


This crane was a popular local back at Wintersmith Park, in Ada. I have countless pictures of him and a few friends. This picture makes me smile the most. He was way out in the middle of the lake, just wading around with his long, graceful legs, looking absolutely serene. I imagine he still keeps other hobby photographers company. I see many of his cousins here in Bellingham. :)

Like this guy:




Woodpeckers are another bird I have never been very lucky with when it comes to capturing them, until this photo. Judd and I were out for a small hike one afternoon near Larrabee State Park, when we kept hearing him and couldn't locate him. After looking for a while, we finally came upon him and his brilliant red mohawk, just going to town on the bark of the tree. I remember hearing these birds a lot in Arkansas when I spent summers there. The forest areas of Bellingham remind me a lot of my summers at my grandparents' house, running around in the woods without any concept of time.


And last but not least are my favorite local hooligans. I have never seen such ridiculous birds in all of my life. I guess you could technically label them as pests of sorts, but I view them as quirky, eccentric birds and they make me laugh a lot. They are literally EVERYWHERE. Judd refers to them as "rats with wings", and he rather enjoys telling his personal story where he witnessed one attempting to snatch a baby bottle from a single mother. I take more pictures of these guys at Boulevard Park in Fairhaven than anything else. They just make me smile, and something that can do that for you is never a bad thing. :)

One more gull photo for the road. I hope you guys enjoyed the bird pics. :)

Those transcendent moments of awe.

I know we've all had those moments of "awe", where something happens that simply puts a smile on your face, no matter what kind of day or moment you are having. Sometimes, it can totally change your entire day for the better. I have been lucky enough to have my camera on me for such moments.



I love this picture. Ladybugs have always represented the type of insects I do enjoy, and those are few and far between. They innocently mind their own business, and they look so pleasing to the eye, and sometimes, they drop in to give you special attention. Growing up, I always made wishes on ladybugs, and then set them free. They have always managed to make me happy, but for this particular picture, I had been having a rough day. I'd gotten news from a friend that her father had passed away days before, so during that week, things were rough as I reminisced and felt pain for her situation. This ladybug popped in and stayed with me during a good chunk of my walk to the bus station. My ipod had run out of battery power, and I was alone in my sad thoughts, until my visitor decided to pop in and make things feel okay for a while.



This was my first winter snow as a resident of Bellingham, Washington. At this point in time, I've been here for well over a year, but at that point, I had just moved from Oklahoma, where white (or in this case, blue) winters just don't happen very much. I mostly got the chance to play in snow during the few winter snows we had, or the random ice storm or trips to snowy peaks in Colorado or various other places. I remember looking out of the back glass door in my new apartment, and just wanting to tear up at the beauty of falling snow. My childhood dream was to move to Alaska and see gorgeous snowfall all of the time and view mountains in the distance. I have things like that now, just in a different state that I have become extremely fond of. That first snow remains one of the most beautiful things to me. I remember the phone call with my mother about it. She'd grown up in Oregon and loved snowfalls like these just as much as I loved the idea of them.



In case you don't recognize him, this is Daniel Johns, lead singer of the Australian band Silverchair. I have been a fan for many, many years. By the time this concert rolled around, I had been waiting over 13 years to see them live. When they first stepped out on that stage, Daniel in particular, I realized that it was very real, he was very real, and the voice I'd invested so much time enjoying was literally 5 feet away from me on a stage. I was also standing next to one of the best friends I have ever had in my life. The entire experience can easily go into my top ten favorite life experiences ever. Music is such an important thing to me, and Silverchair's wide range of music has always been a part of my life, it seems. The fact that he is insanely beautiful helped my jaw drop as well. People can definitely inspire awe, and he is a force to be reckoned with. I can still hear his raw, live guitar ringing in my ears.



This photo means the world to me. It may look like a simple couch to anybody else, but that, to me, is the exact view you had when sitting on my Grandparent's couch in Arkansas, where I spent countless summers that helped shape me into who I am today. Looking at that photo is a direct connection back to my childhood. I look at it, and I know once again what it's like to look to my right and see my GrandDad in his chair, watching his normal television programs. My mother would be in the chair next to his, separated by a small table, cluttered with his numerous tv remotes and newspaper clippings. I can still hear their conversations, and feel like I can reach out and touch them. That afghan and it's bright colors always made me happy, despite it's scratchy feeling and years of wear and tear. The photo meant a lot when I first took it. I wanted to capture the spirit of that house for a day when it's inhabitants were no longer around. It's safe to say that I have done that, and managed to awe myself with my foresight.



One more before I sign off and go to eat dinner with the love of my life. :) This photo represents a moment of awareness for me. It was a beautiful Oklahoma day, and Judd took me out to his parents house to play around on the property for a while. They had a good chunk of land with ponds and plenty of fields. I was taking silly pictures of the pack of dogs that followed us out on the four wheeler, and had been taking tons of photos of the trees and flowers and horses, and then I caught this one. He was sitting by one of the ponds, killing time while I snapped away on my camera. I tend to take tons of photos, so he took a moment for himself. I was feeling particularly happy, and then this sight caught my eye. I often stole that shirt he was wearing to sleep in, and you can see just how curly his hair is, and he just makes a beautiful backdrop to those wildflowers to me. Everything in the moment dawned on me, and I felt safe and happy about EVERYTHING. Going on 7 years, I can still look at him and feel this way, and I'm beyond grateful to have him in my life.