January 23 Just an hour in the woods ...

Saturday morning:  I wasn't planning to take a walk this morning ... I had stuff to accomplish around the house in preparation for the upcoming visits with Kaity--and later, Emma ... but the SUN was actually SHINING this morning, and I just knew that if I went into the woods, I would find shadows ... everywhere! I decided to give myself ONE hour to snap a few pictures, and then I would get down to the business of my day.

 

I layered up extensively, since it was mighty COLD this morning (17 degrees) and drove out to Rockford. I knew the exact location I wanted to photograph ... I took a LOT of photos in this same spot with different angles, etc. There were other people walking the trails--not many--but a few. For the most part, it was super quiet. No wind. 

I had hoped for deeper snow out here today and was surprised how little there actually was! 

Isn't the ice pretty?

This is the place where I fell in--but since it was of no consequence whatsoever, I won't go into many details. I was trying to get a good picture of this little stream emptying out to the Rogue River and just misjudged how thick the ice was--no worries! The stream wasn't deep and my waterproof boots kept my feet absolutely DRY!

 I love this time of year in the woods. I especially love the shadows and have been studying them from Psalm 91! I am a fast reader and oftentimes I don't make myself THINK about what I am reading unless I stop, get out dictionaries and look up meanings, etc. I love thinking about "resting in the shadow of the Almighty" ... His presence is refreshing shade in the heat of the day ... and just as delightful, chummy shadows in the winter woods. Tree shadows are my very favorite.

Isn't this a gorgeous place?

I "played" with the photo below with my photo program to make it look more like a painting ... I like it!

The hole pictured(below) in the ice was where I broke through the ice--thankfully, I didn't fall down or anything.

These pictures took forever to load and for some reason, they did not load in the correct order. Sigh. That's okay. I took mzny more photos than what I've posted. Some of them will make very nice cards I think. Thankful for this brief hour beauty so close to where I live.