The Perfect Perspective

Any photographer, no matter the experience level, knows perspective is the difference between a good photo and a masterpiece.  When it comes to the perfect shot, no risk is too great, no roadside position too humiliating if the reward is earned.

Normally I am alone in my photography quests but this week, as we all know by now, I had the good company of Ashlie Blake, who matches me in my fearless quest for just the right angle.  Stomping through ant-ridden sands, tip-toing around thorny shrubs, and trying to guess the stampede warning from a wary longhorn.  After all, "no trespassing" signs are just a suggestion, right?

The greatest fun at the end of the day was sifting through all the photo flops and laughing at how we got the shots in the first place.  The uncooperative butterfly, the blooms that knew to wind dance just when the focus was right, and broken window shots that look more like crime scene evidence.

There were the battle scars of the hunt: sun burned necks, dirt-filled shoes, and swollen hands from a palms-first fall into a raspberry patch.  All symptoms of a time-grown friendship

captured both before and behind the lens.

Finally meeting Ashlie in person has been one of the greatest joys in my life. If a picture is worth a thousand words- the story behind it is worth a million more. So if ya catch me smiling at the pics of our 4 day excursion- know that I am simply dreaming of the adventures yet to come.

 

LOVE  &  JOURNEYS

Wildflowers and Antiques

Country explores are fabulous medicine for the soul.  With old fashioned paper, pen, map and camera, Ashlie (Painting Bliss) and I set out to snap some good pics of Texas bluebonnets.  Amongst the blues, pinks, and rustic elegance of small town Texas, we found insta-relationships, heart melting homes, and an unexpected mega antique fair! 

 

 

Despite a dry season, the roadsides were alive with color.  Painted ladies danced from bloom to bloom as buzzing bees tunneled in bluebonnet towers. 

 The breeze so gentle, the hawks drifting circles in the sky, so far from any city it's as if nature pressed the pause button on our busy remotes. 

Today was a day to stop and smell the flowers.  And stop again.  Oh and over there!  Stop again!  Wait!  Back it up! (Ashlie can really fly a car in reverse!) No field or patch was overlooked on the road from New Ulm to Fayetteville!

 

Little did we know that our route to Round Top was taking us right into the heart of Marburger Farm Antique Weeks!  This time of year the fields are alive in sudden tent cities hocking the finest finds of the season. 

 From massive architectural doorways to the tiniest trinket, rust and chippy paint rule the day.  We arrived late in the day but it was perfect timing for us.  No crowds, no lines of people to dodge, just us and the vendors talking shop, reflecting on the day.

 

 
The day was coming to a close as the Texas sky clouded over and one by one the tents wrapped up for the evening.  Ashlie and I had a 2 hour ride back to Houston, the last stretch of what has been a phenomenal four days.  The bluebonnets fading into dusk, the car barreling south, all that was left to do was to celebrate the rarest of birds: true friendship.

LOVE  &  WILDFLOWERS!

 

A Rare Bird Flies South

Images from Papaya Art

 

My Foo Foo bestie, Ashlie Blake, of Painting Bliss, is coming to Texas this weekend!!!!

 

We all have friends- but, if we are lucky, a person comes along with whom you click, you jive, you laugh, you cry, you grow, and you just know this person is a soul mate.  Not the marrying, fall in love, mushy mushy goo goo soul mate- but a friend so close she surely was kin in another life.  

 

I met such a rare bird 7 years ago and she has been my sister ever since.  Ashlie lives in New York, I live in Texas.  With growing families we both have been bound to our home states and our friendship has grown through the internet, phone chat and Skype.  We have never met face to face.  Well folks, that era is about to come to an end!

 

 

Oh there will be an airport ruckus of girlish squeals and peoples' eyes will roll in their doldrums disgust!  There will be late night coffee chats, thrifting marathons in Houston, wildflower romping in Round Top, and beachy fun in High Island!  Oh there will be blogging and a Smash Book project as well!  And who knows what else we will find in the great wide openness of Texas!

 

Ashlie is such a part of my life she is insta-family, my right arm, and my morning cup of joe!  (Insert Hubby's eye roll and snide comment about my foo foo affections HERE!) This weekend marks 7 years in the waiting coming to an end and the dawn of a new chapter in our epic friendship.  And I CANNOT wait another second! 

 

LOVE  &  A NEW ERA!