Goodbye 2012! A Year in Pictures…

2012 wasn’t a bad year, but it certainly wasn’t the best year I’ve even had.  Even numbered years seem to be less successful for me, and odd numbered years seem to be a little better.  I’m excited for 2013.

In 2012, I finally got my yard done and started a garden…

I went to the Renaissance Fair, and saw a really great rainbow.

I went to a counseling conference in San Francisco, walked around, and got some great pictures.

I did quite a bit of hiking. I love the desert!

We drove to Payson to watch the solar eclipse. It was a lot of fun.

More hiking. I impressed myself with this picture.

I grew some really big cucumbers.

I learned to shoot.

We had some phenomenal lightning storms.

I went home to PA and visited family.

We got rained out of camping, and went to Jerome for the weekend instead.

… and I got a couple of great kaleidoscopes.

We painted our bathroom and hallway.

We painted our loft…

And I started a major project, repainting and updating some cabinets.

All in all, it’s been a good year. I’m looking forward to an even better 2013. Happy New Year, everyone… Stay safe!

Ring of Fire Eclipse

Last night, my husband and I made the journey to Northern Arizona, to Meteor Crater in Winslow Arizona, to see the Ring of Fire Eclipse.  University of Arizona students were there, selling special glasses to watch the eclipse.  Really, they were polarized sunglasses so dark that when you put them on, you couldn’t see anything at all until you looked at the sun.  It was really cool.  I’ve been around for other eclipses, but never really looked at one before, and it wasn’t what I expected.

I expected a bit more drama, thought it would get dark as the moon blocked the sun, but that didn’t happen.  The moon and sun passed one another as the sun set, and if I hadn’t had on my special glasses, I wouldn’t have known anything at all happened.

All in all, it was a lot of fun, and I’m glad we made the trip.  Here’s probably my best photo of the actual eclipse, taken with my camera through my sunglasses.

This photo was taken without a filter, pointed into the sun.  As you can see, it doesn’t look like anything is happening.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you’re interested in the complete photo collection of my adventures, you can take a look at my Facebook page, Doree Weller, as I’ll be importing them there.  Last but not least, if you want to see some good pictures of the eclipse, click this link and it will take you to a news page about the event.

E is For Exercise

I know, it’s a dirty word.  It’s not really my favorite one either.  I love being active, but I hate exercise.  (I’ll tell you a secret… being active is exercise… shhh!)

Over the past few months, a good friend of mine lost quite a few inches around his middle just by walking every day.  He got a pedometer and set a goal for 10,000 steps a day.  He had such great success with it that I decided to try it.

On Monday, I did just fine.  I had a few appointments, and since I had time to kill, so I went and walked around the mall, avoiding all the people trying to sell me stuff.  By Tuesday, I realized that in order to walk 10,000 steps a day, I had to stop in the middle of my day in order to go walking.  I’m way too busy for that!

Yesterday was my first day back to work for the week, and I decided that instead of setting an arbitrary goal, I was just going to try to be more active.  Instead of sitting around half the morning until it was time to go to work, I got up right after I finished my coffee and blogging and went out into my beautiful yard.  Midway through the workday, I had some time so my partner and I went walking for a bit.  Lo and behold, I hit 12,000 steps for the day.

What’s the moral of this story?  I don’t know that there’s a moral, per se.  What I do know is that the more active I am, the easier it is to be active.  If I get up off my duff first thing in the morning and do stuff, I have more time, more energy, and am more active.  If I sit around half the morning, very little gets done.

(We’re just not going to call what I do “exercise.”)

Here’s a picture from my back door.  Pretty, isn’t it?  Though you can’t hear it, birds are singing, but it’s otherwise pretty quiet.

Photos and Real Life

I love taking pictures.  I annoy most people with how often I want to stop and take pictures.  When I go hiking, I could take my camera along every time.  There’s always something new to see, or something old to see in a different way.  I love taking pictures of people, but also the sky, a cactus, a flower, or just an interesting rock.

Facebook has allowed me to become a voyeur.  I steal my friends’ photos.  If they have a great wildlife picture, a great landscape, or just a cool picture of themselves or their child, I download it and keep it for my own.

My office has pictures and quotes hung everywhere.  On the walls, on the doors.  I’d have some on the floor if I didn’t have pets.  I don’t know what it is about pictures that moves me so.  Maybe it’s the same thing as writing a story.  In that moment, in that instant, I’m seeing something in a way that no one has ever seen before.

Photos never quite capture the reality.  When I look at a picture, there always seems to be something missing, which makes picture taking bittersweet.  On one hand, being able to capture the moment is so very important to me, even if I only capture a shadow of what I saw.  It’s a shame, though, because I’d like to be able to share that one perfect moment with others.  We can never capture perfection though, and maybe we never should.  Perhaps it’s the quest for perfection that makes us all continue to challenge ourselves, to learn, and grow.