Time Flies

Forgive me; this is going to get a little sentimental. Today we attended my daughter’s 5th grade graduation celebration. She’s closing the chapter on her elementary years and moving onto middle school. With most of life’s milestones, I am able to roll over them without much friction, but this one is hitting a little harder than the “first tooth” and the “no training wheels bike ride”. She’s growing up and she is doing a fine job. She is a wonderfully delightful young lady. As a mother I am constantly second guessing my parenting but I have no choice but to trudge onward and continue doing the best I can. She’s taken huge steps towards the independent direction but there are … Read More

Boats and Birds and Hail Storms

The clock was ticking by way too slowly for such a perfect spring Friday afternoon. I got a Facebook message from a dear  friend informing me that he and his family were in town for the weekend and wanted to get together. I told him that I had made plans to join some friends who were planning to camp at Center Lake in Custer State Park. They were eager to join the party and even offered to swoop me and Anna up and give us a ride. It was wonderful to see them again and catch up. Since our last encounter they had welcomed their son (2 and a half) into their lives. He was pure delight and I was so pleased … Read More

Mothers Day

I’m not sure it’s possible to have a better weekend. Aside from it being Mother’s Day weekend, and having a delightfully wonderful daughter and pretty much the best mom on the planet, I also was able to sneak in a hike and wrapped up the weekend with something so unexpectedly amazing I sincerely questioned whether or not I was awake or dreaming. _________________________________ F R I D A Y _________________________________ Anna (my daughter) and I kicked off the weekend with another evening drive out east of town. It was a pretty typical drive, but it did afford us a shower in a decent rain storm and a glimpse of some new-to-this-earth animals who were as fresh as they were cute. … Read More

Cheyenne River and Beyond

I’ve been in the herd of buffalo at the Wild Idea Buffalo Ranch countless times before and it is never anything less than a mind blowing experience. But this weekend I got to experience the herd one on one – just me and them (and a 4 wheeler). I quickly jotted down notes as Jill told me, over the phone, which gates to go through and what direction to go to get to the buffalo. I didn’t really need to, I was so hungry for the experience, it seemed that her words just seared themselves in my brain. I took the long way to the ranch from HWY 79 onto the Lower Spring Creek Road. I stopped to snap a shot or two along … Read More

Happy Birthday Mom!

  I really didn’t wake up this morning thinking I would be out taking pictures of bluebirds… but to be honest, even if wasn’t a snow day, I would have likely found a way to wriggle out of work and go shooting. It was simply breath taking outside. They called a winter weather warning last night, which I instantly shrugged off. I was certain that because I was so sick of snow, it was just going to… not snow. But apparently my desire for the contrary wasn’t enough and the snow gods decided to give us one more dose of the white stuff. It dumped nearly 9 inches while we slept and when we woke up we were gifted yet another snow day. Now, could … Read More

Fly By

Its snowing again… Its April 21st… I’m over it. Yesterday though, was a gift. It was supposed to rain but it held off long enough for the sun to come out and melt off a majority of what we were given earlier in the week. Signs of spring are everywhere, but no where more than with in the mysterious dances of our feathered friends. I took a drive with my mom through the back roads to the north east of us and then a second trip into the woods with my cousin to find the blue birds. I’m not sure why its all about birds right now, but it seems to be regardless of intent. I’m enjoying my time with them though. … Read More

Chasing Meadowlarks

Once again, the question arose; “Do I want to go hills or plains?” this time though, the sky made the decision for me. Usually when I’m facing this decision I am trying to figure out which way to head out of town, but yesterday I was trying to decide which way to drive home from Spearfish. I looked towards the Black Hills and they were covered with grey flat clouds, to the east the sky was broken, brightly contrasted between the deep thick dark blue storm clouds and the bright white where the sun was trying to break through. You could just tell that was where the cool stuff was. I used the GPS on my phone to suggest a … Read More

Magic Ice

Last year, somewhere around the end of March, a group of us ventured out in search of some water to throw our kayaks in. For some reason, we thought Deerfield Lake (the coldest, highest lake in the Black Hills) was the best place to go. First we stopped off at Flag Mountain to stretch our legs and enjoy a good view. There we noticed we could see all the way to the lake and were heartbroken by its very obvious still-frozen-ness. We decided that there was no harm in venturing down there anyway and took the road through Reynolds Prairie and down to the Northwest side of the lake. To our delight, we were greeted with a roughly 6-10 foot ribbon of water … Read More

ART ALLEY: vulnerable beauty, organic creation, endless potential

There is something interesting unfolding in my city right now. Rapid City, South Dakota is a funny place, it isn’t quite big and it isn’t quite small. Within that conundrum we find ourselves with problems that no one has ever really dealt with before. Our current turmoil seems to be bubbling over a (not so) secret gem located in the heart of our downtown: Art Alley. Back in 2003(ish) a group of people decided to combat a vandalism problem in an alley through encouragement. This story was recently told by Dennis Halterman at an Art Ally Guild meeting: (forgive me Dennis, I am paraphrasing because I didn’t take very good notes) “There has always been vandalism back there. I was talking to a gentleman the other day who was telling me … Read More

Ooops…

I dont know about you but I am ready for spring. Its not to say I’m not thoroughly enjoying my adventures out into the elements, but today we had a pretty close brush with vulnerability I could have done with out. When Amy got in the van I simply said, “Hills or Prairie?” To which she replied “prairie.” We decided the best route would be south on HWY 79 and then east on Lower Spring Creek Road. The occasional snow drift across the road didn’t get to bad until we were pretty much all the way out into Nowhere. You see, out there there is not much to block the wind or anything that might get caught up in it. Last week it was dust, this … Read More