The last couple of weeks have been really cold, well really cold for around here. Even though I grew up further north & should be use to these temps, I am so ready for winter to end already… Around here winter just seems drab & grey to me. We might get snow for a day or two, but then it melts. So I have a hard time finding the beauty in winter, although I am trying. Saturday though was a tiny bit warmer so Ben suggested that we get outside for a bit & take some photos. We headed to a local park that really is more prairie than anything else and walked around, stopping to take photos…

We were both wishing we had actually seen some wildlife on this walk when I glanced towards a field and realized there were deer out there, a herd (?) of 6 deer to be exact! As quickly as possible I switched to the telephoto lens (that is actually technically Ben’s, but he lets me use it:) & traipsed through the mud that minutes earlier I had contemplated walking through for another photo & decided it wasn’t worth it. It was worth it for these shots though as I have never seen so many deer in my life, and it was the first time I have ever seen a buck or a fawn (there were actually a couple of fawns)…

Of course, this city girl had to ask her husband if the buck was dangerous & if he would come after me if I got too close :) (Apparently I am also afraid of chickens, see below for this story.)

Such a wonderful sight & so worth braving the cold for a little bit to get to see this and have a chance to photograph it…

Now the chicken story… On our way home from the park, we took a drive to the fabric store to see if I could find some linen (I am all out & so is the fabric store!). Driving through a neighborhood we spotted in the middle of the city 3 chickens! I guess they must have gotten out of someone’s yard or something? (Is it even legal to keep chickens in the city?) Anyways they seemed perfectly happy to just wander around the sidewalk and I had to jump out of the car to get a couple of photos because it isn’t everyday you see chickens wandering down a sidewalk. The funny part is that when one of them headed towards me, I went running for the car & jumped back inside very quickly! :)

Of course the slightly warmer temps only lasted about a day and now it is back to really cold again:) I am definitely looking forward to summer – warmer temps and longer daylight hours sound lovely right now!

It appears I took a little blog writing/emailing/blog reading break this week… It wasn’t really on purpose just a combination of not feeling great (I feel much better) and having to go and sit a couple of mornings to see if I would have jury duty (thankfully, I didn’t end up having to actually sit on a jury). I am back now though & actually have some photos to share:) Friday I went to the local arboretum & took a few photos and then yesterday Ben & I went to another local park/prairie & both of us took photos. I am still looking through the ones I took yesterday, but will probably post some tomorrow.

Hope everyone had a good weekend! Here is to a good week! :)

Well first, my goodness I can hardly believe how many lovely comments there were on my 2nd blogiversary post! I was totally shocked & very pleasantly surprised at how many of you came out of hiding to say hi. Seriously Ben & I joked about how many comments we thought I would get & we were both totally off, I got way more than either of us expected. Thank you all for your sweet words & if you de-lurked feel free to stay de-lurked, it would make my February! (And with how cold it is, I could use a happy February!)

Anyways, since there were so many comments I decided to pick 4 winners. 1 person will get the pleated bag, 1 person will get the lap blanket, & 2 people will get something small that will remain a surprise for now (in fact it is such a surprise that I haven’t even made anything yet & am not totally sure what I will send. :)

Via Random.org, the winners…

“Here are your random numbers:

51	97	34	75

Timestamp: 2008-02-01 23:35:14 UTC”

So Angela won the purse, Mariah won the lap blanket, and Capello & Amanda were the surprise winners :) Congrats ladies! If you could each send me an email with your address, I will try to get those out to you soon. Thanks again to everyone else who commented, it was really hard to limit the drawing to only 4 people believe me…

The 3 photos in this post are from the snowstorm we had last night… I wandered out this morning to take a few photos in my rainboots (since I don’t own any winter boots) of the freshly fallen snow. All 3 photos were post-processed in Photoshop Lightroom, I just was having too much fun messing around with making & using presets:) (Does anyone else have Lightroom? I am sort of thinking that maybe eventually I will post some of my presets that I use frequently on my website if there is any interest?)

Oh and since it is the beginning of February, I thought I would post a mosaic of my January Project 365 shots… (I am planning on doing this at the end of each month, since I am not sharing every 365 photo on my blog. Although if you want to follow along with the photos I am taking you can visit my 365 flickr set.)

1. :Yawning: Day 1 of 365, 2. :Morning Tea: Day 2 of 365, 3. :Self Portrait: Day 3 of 365, 4. :White: Day 4 of 365, 5. :A nice spot for a nap: Day 5 of 365, 6. :Winter Linen Scarf: Day 6 of 365, 7. :Red: Day 7 of 365, 8. :Library Books: Day 8 of 365, 9. :Pounce: Day 9 of 365, 10. :Self Portrait: Day 10 of 365, 11. :Color: Day 11 of 365, 12. :Color 2: Day 12 of 365, 13. :Pleated Purse Tie: Day 13 of 365, 14. :together: Day 14 of 365, 15. :blanket: Day 15 of 365, 16. :photography books: Day 16 of 365, 17. :Axel: Day 17 of 365