Taming Rugged Acres: Moody Skies Make for Good Pictures

If there's one tidbit I've picked up from all of my hubby's tech-speak on the subject of photography, taking photos with overcast skies results in even lighting and no harsh shadows. If you're taking photos of people, they don't squint, and if taking photos of flowers, the color is even more bright and wonderful.

It's a hot Monday afternoon, but the temperature is dropping slightly, and the skies are darkening. A thunderstorm is eminent. The daylilies have started to bloom. Tonight's dinner, ribeyes grilling on The Big Green Egg, waft across the yard. It's kind of an ideal sensory situation all around. Also a perfect night for some pics and a post.

We lost 3 crape myrtles this winter. The loss was also a gain -- in gardening space, that is. It's now primarily a tomato bed. But part of this is Tyler's garden. He wanted the orange Zinnia and pink petunias.

I asked Tyler to pose next to the yarrow so you could get a sense for how tall it is. It's huge and wonderful. A Mauna Loa daylily is blooming in the foreground; pink shrub roses in the background.

Tyler is enjoying a close-up of daylily Atlanta Full House. At his feet, the purple flowers are cousins of Lamb's Ears, a low-growing perennial that I can't remember the name of... I could dig up the tag I guess. All I remember is that I saw them at Missouri Botanical Gardens last Spring, found them at Lowe's a month later, and immediately snapped them up. I recall they were pricey, but the long-lasting bloom more than makes up for it. I'm loving the rock path that I installed at the end of last summer, with rocks we found on our property.