Christmas lights | lunanista

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Boston, Cee's Photo Challenge, Christmas lights, dahlia, Delight, gratitude, Hawaii, Light, photography, photos, Sunset

“I want to see 3-5 photos, showing us what lights up your life.” This is the challenge from The Hood: MLJ Photos. Cee was participating and inspired me to join this challenge.

I struggle with depression and the darkness of December in Wisconsin can be a challenge of a different kind. Last winter I stumbled across the idea of looking for delight in the light to be found in this darkness. Of course the light of my life is captured in this fun holiday light extravaganza and is the perfect place to start this journey.

lights2 mike caterpillar

We are not big on decorating our house with a lot of Christmas lights, but for the past few years we have gone to these outdoor lights festivals as part of our holiday celebrating. I have enjoyed playing around with trying to capture the lights and with getting interesting effects with photography of lights while on a horse-drawn carriage ride.

If you have been following my blog for any length of time you know that I love flowers. I paint them, doodle them and photograph them. I am learning that natural lighting can be such an asset and can be the upside of insomnia. Now when I can’t sleep on a weekend morning I wake up my husband and we jump in the car to get some early morning photos of beautiful place. I love the earth sculpture labyrinth that was home to this dewy blossom.

dewy dahlia

My younger son is going to college in Boston. The first time we went there with him I fell in love with a lot of the architecture. The library had such fabulous ironwork and I particularly loved these light fixtures.

boston library lamps and flags

On that same trip I took a self-portrait that I was quite happy with and it involved the light fixture in the beautiful old hotel we were staying in.

self portrait in light fixture

Last winter I was so very fortunate to go to Hawaii to see one of my good friends get married. The light in Hawaii was so lovely. I could post 20 photos of it to demonstrate it, however given the limits of this challenge I will only post this one. We were watching for the green flash as the sun went down. I didn’t see it, but certainly enjoyed the time to focus on the sunset. That was one of the things that I really loved. Every night crowds of people stop to watch the sun set. That doesn’t happen in small town Wisconsin. Aloha.

Hawaii 062

What brings you delight? I hope you have a beautiful day.

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Altered books, art journal, Christmas lights, gratitude, photography, snow, upcycling

This first photo is an overview of the fold-out page that I created for the week. One page could not capture all that I am grateful for this week. We have had a LOT of snow. Marq and I celebrated the beginning of the Christmas break and danced in the kitchen to Michael Buble’s rendition of Let it Snow. I entertained myself with our tiny live Christmas tree that may be slightly overburdened with lights. We wrapped up the week with the light display at Green Bay Botanical Garden light show and with dropping off my artwork for the show at Hatch Art House http://hatcharthouse.com/call-for-artists-ecosquared-art-show-2014/.