As a little girl, I would find myself wandering to my favorite spot.  In the barn, sitting on a hay bale in the warm sunshine with all the animals around me.  In the peace and quiet of all the nature around me, I was at rest.  I would disappear for hours on end, and my mother would come looking for me to bring me back inside.  Outside was where I longed to be.  From summers filled with tadpoles, irrigation adventures, baby chickens, ducks, to cows…these were a few of my favorite things about summer.  The cherished place to land on those beautious warm days was in the hayloft with the big barn door open to the second level.  Sitting on the ledge with my feet hanging over the side as I watched the world from my high perch made breathing easier… Watching my dad as he went through the chores of milking the cow and feeding all of the different animals was my daily vacation.  In fact, I was the first one to bounce out of bed in the morning to go help him with the chores.  And in the evenings, I could be found walking beside him, with my hand in his, to close up the animal pens for the evening, tucking in each of these animal friends that I loved like true, genuine comrades.  There was something about the world slowing down and me getting to watch all the details.  In fact, if I could have stayed there all day, I would have.  I can even remember asking my dad to sleep in the barn with the animals all about.  My poor mother was in a continual battle to try to help me learn how to keep house, sew, clean, cook, and be a lady…all of which I hated.  There were so many more enjoyable things to pay attention to on the farm.  And being indoors was quite simply unacceptable for me.

As I grew into the adult that I am today, I find that the same little girl is at work in my photography.  The capturing of a ‘moment in time’ of God’s incredible creations…  That one image of a dragonfly landing on a branch right in front of me, or the intricacies of the snowflake that has floated down onto my scarf.  These moments of looking at things deliberately and intentionally have transported me back to that lovely, sun-filled barn on a summer day.  The world around me is “My Father’s World”...just like that barn was my father’s world when I was a girl.  

You see, there is so much to be seen in the world!  And I get to slow down, breathe deep, and capture it through my lens.  Have you looked at the beautiful bulb of a raindrop as it slips from the petal of a rose?  Within that raindrop, if you look at just the right angle, you can see a miniature sun sparkling back the reflection of the brilliant sun above one’s head.  You can capture vibrant colors of the massive landscape as the sun coasts around the globe to brighten another’s world.  From large to small, the world is simply incredible!  And it’s all around me if I take the time to simply soak it up.  Just like when I was a kid.  I’d walk around my world with my eyes wide open, soaking in all the amazing things around me.  

I can remember one time when I got so lost in the pond on our farm that we had for our ducks, that once again, my mother came to find me.  You guessed it….I was completely submerged in that nice cold water enjoying all the pollywogs and animals around me.  She had such patience for me, but two hours of getting all covered with pond water wasn’t what she had in mind for her daughter.  I was, for all intense and purposes, hopeless on the “refinement of a lady” scale.  How I must have frustrated her, but I have to say, I couldn’t have been a happier child watching this wild and wonderful world.

When God blessed me with a loving husband and two little boys, I found that I had a new mission.  Yes, I would have to learn to cook, clean, and do those household chores that my mother tried so hard to instill in me.  But I also got the privilege of showing my boys the world around them as they grew up.  I also realized even more profoundly that I was getting to watch the intricacies of my boys growing up!  I got to see their expressions, their reactions, their joy, and yes, even their pain.  This was me, as a mother, slowing down and watching the details of their life being materialized.  Their faces were the most precious ‘pictures’ that I could capture!  I got to capture the journey through their childhood, right beside them!  Watching them explore, discover, create, and breath!  This new level of ‘catching an image’ was more incredible than my previous experiences!  Yes, I know I am using a great deal of exclamation marks, but this was a new adventure!  It was their faces as they grew and learned about the world, just like I had done, that captured my heart.  WIth my camera, I was documenting THEM…

Within this journey, I have come to realize that the most beautiful and amazing details of the world lie in the face of the person on the other side of my lens.  Just like the details of a raindrop, the beauty, seen in the ‘window of the soul’ of that person I get the privilege to photograph, is absolutely amazing!  A person is God’s most valuable creation!  There really is nothing like capturing that moment of peace and joy on a face...  That moment of complete rest and even surprise…  Capturing someone’s most precious moment of proposing to their ‘dream come true’...  This lens captures lifetime stories, inside jokes, secret delights, and the hard-fought-for accomplishments!  Just like the saying goes, “If these walls could talk…”  I say of my camera, “Let’s accurately and faithfully document a bit of the journey of the soul in front of me.  These faces are speaking…”  A person’s journey can be just as stunning as the most beautiful sunset or the brightest rose in the garden!  And I get to capture it!!

So, why photography?  It only makes sense!!  It’s where I can breathe and make sense of the world!  I hope my pictures brings you the same astounding peace that I had when I captured them…

Blessings!