Janet Brien's photos with the keyword: frost

(+2 insets) (view large for super details!) So Happy ipernity is Back! Wow, that was a LONG TIME to be away from ipernity...it will be interesting to learn all of the details behind the massive shutdown. I hope all of you have been ok! Since I need to run out for a while, I'm going to post the text I had prepared for this picture and insets! YAY!!! WE'RE BACK!!! Freezing is a Big NOPE For Morning Walks! Holy cow, it's most definitely not warm outside! 26F/-3.3C is just WAY TOO COLD for me! I've drawn the line--any temperature below 30F/-1.1C and I'm not going outside. Seriously, it just takes a few minutes of exposure, even bundled up, and I'm a total popsicle! Then it takes ages to warm up again. Yes, I could dress in snow gear but then I feel like a bloated tick and instead of being able to march happily up and down the driveway, I'm shuffling along without freedom of movement. It's not so much my legs as my arms and hands which get bound up, and I cannot exercise properly when so bundled up. I guess on days like this, I'll need to hop on our orbital trainer for exercise unless I go out later if it warms up to a comfortable temperature. LOL, you may think I'm a big baby about the cold, but if you are thin and/or predisposed to getting cold extremities--which includes a huge portion of the female population--you'll know exactly how I feel! My Electric Blanket is Wonderful! By the way, you might remember that I ordered a heated blanket a few weeks back. What an absolute slice of heaven! I've never had one before and it's such a treat! My parents had a couple when I was growing up but the blankets were musty, worn out fleece and the wires inside were stiff. I remember them either not working or getting too hot and my parents threw them out at some point because they were a fire hazard. Mine is velvety soft, silvery grey and has wires inside which aren't very noticeable at all. Reviews mentioned it getting too hot for some--the control box too--so I unplug it after use, but I haven't had any problems with it. It's so cuddly and perfect that I've only allowed Steve to pet it but I can't bear to share it with him! I'm mean! :D Today's Pictures I took these frosty pictures a while back and it's wonderful to have a perfect time to post them! The main picture shows frost on some nails and charred wood from a fire a few years back. My insets include two pictures: one shows frost on the edge of a piece of metal and the other is a frost-covered stem protruding from our ice-covered seasonal pond. Take care of yourselves, everyone! It's cold, miserable, and it's a perfect opportunity to catch the flu or worse! Thank you all for the lovely comments, visits and favorites you've left for my pictures. My globe-trotting visits to your photo streams has been great fun and full of inspiration, beauty and amazing sights. Keep up the AWESOME! :) Explored on 12/03/20; highest placement #8.

(+4 insets) (please view large!) :) It may be springtime but that doesn't mean the end of freezing cold mornings. I popped out of bed today with a resounding "BRRRRR!!!" I'd set my space heater too low since it's been a lot warmer lately--turning it up was the first thing I did. Cold inside meant it was REALLY cold outside. With all the windows (even double-paned), my bedroom gives a very good indication of the temperature, cold or hot. The thermometer read just 33 degrees but I know it had been colder because frost was melting and dripping from the eaves. I found patches of frost on my walk too and on the gate I admired lovely frozen droplets before the sun made them go away. Since it started off so cold I thought it would be a perfect opportunity to share some frosty pictures! My main picture shows our front gate with frosty frozen droplets. I got this image on a particularly cold day and the frost was just incredible! I'm also including some other frozen droplet pictures for you to see! :) Pam, I had fun looking through your frosty images and ended up picking your Birdbath Ice Flower which is a perfect name! The lovely formations are such a joy to look at up close and personal. So cool. I hope your day was warmer than ours, 60 degrees isn't very cold but it was too chilly to be outside without a jacket! *MANY HUGS*!!! Explored on 3/25/19, highest placement, #6.

(+1 inset) (view large for frosty goodness!) Such a murky, frostless day...blustery, cold, foggy, and then storm clouds moving in and rain coming down. NOT a day to be outside I've decided. My resolve to deal with frozen feet and hands has waned and since there was no frost to drag me outside, I am foregoing my exercise today. Sometimes I just don't feel like it and that's ok. I used to beat myself up when I didn't do my usual exercise but I've finally allowed that it's ok from time to time. Every weekend when I visit contacts to appreciate their photos and leave comments, I find many pictures for the group, "Saturday Self Challenge." Each week I think to myself, "OH THAT LOOKS LIKE FUN!" However, I am already in two groups that require my attention and input—Macro Monday 2.0 and Happy Fence Friday. (And of course the whole reason I got back into photography...my daily Pictures for Pam!) I have watched and considered and have decided that this commitment should be fine, so I applied and was accepted to the group today, hooray!! :) The week's challenge is "Sharp Focus" and funny enough, I've got perhaps 2 billion pictures that fall under that category! Specifically though, the rules request a new picture taken in the past week, posted today (my time zone's Saturday). Well, that takes the number down to a very scant 500-1000 pictures, heh. LOL, I don't usually take so many pictures per week but I was out twice for frosty pictures and my Macro Monday mishap meant that I did that project twice. So I did take a LOT of pictures this week. Today's image is one of the stars from my super frosty outing a couple of days ago. I almost added it as an inset for yesterday's post but it deserves the center stage, so here you go! Crazy frost crystals in sharp focus! I've also included a very frosty bolt that's bristling with crystals! Pam, I thought it would be fun to find a picture in your photo stream that would be a good entry for "Sharp Focus" and I found this glowing, fiery red and green macro of Autumn-Hued Grape Leaves that I loved. The first one has incredible crispness that show fine vein detail which is like a stained glass window. Absolutely beautiful. The other picture, Autumn-Hued Grape Leaves, Part 2 shows the whole leaf and is brimming with lovely, sharp detail and stunning light. They are both outstanding pictures which make me swoon in delight! Sending another virtual cup of warm soup your way! *BIG HUGGGGZZZZ*!!! Explored on 2/24/19, highest placement, #1.

(+1 insets!) (please view large!) :) Yesterday was an amazing day of frosty delights outside and I had such a great time taking pictures. However, when I looked at them on my computer I was pretty annoyed at the number of garbage shots. Motion blur and bad focus choice were the worst problems and I mentioned in my post yesterday that the next time I go out, I'll take a monopod with me to help with stabilization. I knew that today might have some frost but if so it wasn't going to be a big show like yesterday. Still, macro + frost of any kind = sparkly goodness so I crossed my fingers for any kind of frost! Happily, we did get some. And, it was just as predicted--only a little bit. Combined with the fact that today was forecast to be bright and sunny all day, I didn't have a moment to lose if I hoped to get frosty pictures. I made a bee-line to the burned shed and hoped for the best. I immediately checked out an old car seat that had been left behind the shed. It had disintegrated to a skeleton of rusty springs and coils--what a wonderful subject for macro photography! Yesterday I took about 30 pictures. Exactly ONE of them turned out well enough to share but I really wanted a little bit more depth of field so I could show off more of that amazing frost. I was so annoyed but at least I could try again today. Sadly there was so little frost on the springs that it merely looks like some salt granules but I got a bunch of good pictures this time and my main image is my favorite. You'll see yesterday's frostier image as an inset. Maybe it's better? Pam, just for fun I typed in "seat" on your photo stream since I was showing springs from an old car seat. What a surprise to find a hit! You took a really neat picture of a wrought iron garden seat caked with snow! Thinking about the fun fractals and filtery things you like so much, seems to me this seat picture would look really cool in a design. :) I hope that you and your day was like ours was--sunny and beautiful! *BIG HUGS* from southern Oregon! :)

(+ 2 insets) The forecast promised a very cold morning and I crossed my fingers for frost before I went to sleep last night. Just because it's cold enough for frost does not mean it will be frosty! However, I had a good feeling that it would be fabulous this morning and I was right! Peeking outside after hopping out of bed, I was rewarded by a sparking shimmer on everything! Pumpkin and I were both very impressed and talked about it at length while I took my shower. Ok well, maybe Pumpkin only laughed at me and whistled with the water sounds but I'd like to think she was suitably moved by the frosty world outside! :) I spent about 45 minutes taking pictures and I was so happy I'd prepared my camera beforehand. All I needed to do was dive into my warm clothes and bounce outside and right into a glimmering wonderland! Some of the subjects that I captured were metal screws, nails, wire, barbs, hinges, springs...the mail box, frozen droplets on the mail box, leaves, wasp galls, ice at the edge of the pond, frosty weeds poking out of the pond...the list goes on and on! Let's just say I came back to the house with over 400 pictures so you get the general idea! My feeling is that we won't have a lot more frosty days so if I want pictures, today's going to be one of my last chances! I was so excited to look over my pictures and boy did I get a BUNCH of winners! I also got a LOT of garbage shots. Ugh. I may need to take a monopod with me because I was got so many blurry pictures. A flash can definitely help capture an image without blur but it's not a miracle-worker. The smaller the subject, the harder it is to get a crisp picture by hand-holding your camera. MEH! It's a good thing that I took multiples along with aperture sets of each subject. Sometimes I'd get 9 garbage pictures and only one good one! And unfortunately, I failed completely on some very nice subjects. Better luck next time, right? And I can't cry too hard...I got several dozen nice pictures that I'll need to process! This is my day to post my Happy Fence Friday picture so I looked through this morning's photo shoot I and found one that would work just fine! It's barbed fencing wire that's wrapped around a post. The frost isn't very prominent but I really liked the colors and interesting visual. It was on the outside of our property next to our gate and the red color caught my eye. I've also included an inset of the entire width of the wire wrapped around the post...plus a guest I didn't notice until I saw it on the computer! Finally, I have another picture of frosty barbed wire that I took a few weeks ago. :) Pam, I did a look-see for "frost" on your photo stream and found a series of frosty artwork that you'd created. I especially like your Frost Flowers Circle Scope which is marvelous eye candy! (Steve loved it too!) By the way, it was fun to read about what you'd done for jobs. I have many times wondered if it would be fun to work as a dental hygienist but a technician would be more interesting I'm sure. Not at all surprised that you designed jewelry and done graphic design as well--you have a wonderful eye! And of course, I can see gardening being a big draw, it's great fun! *BIG HUGS* MY DEAR!!! Explored on 2/22/19, highest placement, #1.

(+4 insets!) (view large!) :) Holy Toledo it's cold out there today, YIKES!! A mere 27.6°F/-2.4°C--that's the coldest it's been all winter! Maybe that's not Polar Vortex Cold , but my fingers and toes have a prominent opinion about it: One Lap is the Limit! Heh…I managed to get up to the top of our hill for a lovely sunrise picture with my phone and down to the front gate to grab our garbage can (pick-up was this morning at 0'dark hundred). There I saw a pool of water that froze in several stages. The appearance reminded me of white malachite and out came my phone for another picture! Then it was up the drive with the garbage can, the handle burning cold through my gloves into my complaining hands and then I flung myself into the house and became one with the heater to warm my hands up. (You can see an inset of the pool of water along with another frozen pool I photographed a while back with a neat formation) What the heck's the deal with extremely low temperatures?! It's just crazy how fast cold can affect you if the temperature is low enough. This begs the intellectual question: how much more does the temperature affect us when things become extreme? What I mean to say is, there's basically no difference to us when the change is in our comfort range, say 60-70°F/15.5-21°C. Big deal, who cares…we can tell there's a change but it doesn't really matter. But as we get further away from our comfort zone, how much more does this mean? For instance, does the difference between 30 degrees and 29 degrees affect us 1%, 5%, 10%, etc. Do lower numbers make this difference more extreme? Does 10 degrees and 9 degrees affect us 5%, 10%, 20%? I should look this up. I bet there is a difference because 27 degrees is FIERCELY COLD and 30 degrees is not NEARLY as cold to me. I found a partial answer! It depends a lot on how much fat you have stored on your body and how well-adjusted you are to that temperature. So, someone who has more padding is going to be much more comfortable in the cold than a lean, athletic person. I didn't find the exact answer I was looking for but I did find a very interesting article that talks about what it feels like to be in -50 degrees vs. -20 degrees. My opinion: I would like to NOT be in those temperatures, thank you very much! :D I was kind of surprised the frogs weren't singing since they seem to enjoy these ridiculously cold temperatures. However, all was quiet down at the pond this morning. In amusement, I pictured froggy popsicles, each with a "ribbit" ready to go but their vocal sacks were frozen so no noise came out. Give them time…it should warm up to 32 degrees down there soon enough and they'll be able to squeak something out! LOL. Tenacious little buddies. :) Since it's so cold AND because it's the day to post my Happy Fence Friday pictures, I'm sharing an image of a very frosty fence, featuring a gossamer necklace touched by Jack Frost. This I found on our deer fencing a month or so back when we had a lovely day of heavy frost. I'm also sharing another frosty barbed-wire picture from my photo shoot last week. :) Pam, can you remember the coldest weather you've walked around in? One year it got down to 8 degrees I think, and venturing outside was a very shocking experience. We wanted to know what it felt like… and then we didn't! Out…and yep, that's REALLY COLD…and inside again! :D What about you? For me, it's a struggle because I know the photography opportunities are amazing the colder it gets but there really is a potential danger of frostbite. I hope you've never been in a situation where frostbite was a real issue for you. I've been lucky in that regard but I've also never been stuck in a place that's too cold and I can't get out of it. Sending a nice, warm *HUGGGGGG* your way on this very cold day! :D Explored on 2/8/19, highest placement, #1.

(+2 insets!) Oh my, it’s really cooling down around here! I stepped out to a thermometer which read 29 degrees—wow! But paired with the freezing weather, the world was gleaming with brilliant sunshine this morning. My poor toes did NOT appreciate me crunching up and down our road today, but that’s what heaters are for afterwards! :) On my first trip down to the gate I couldn’t help checking in on the sporophyte villages that live at the tops of each of the brick posts which hold our gate. Clumps of moss are scattered here and there on the tops and sides of the bricks and most clumps have many cool sporophytes to see. In fact, some of my finest sporophyte images come from the villagers who live here so I love peeking at them from time to time to say hello and see how they are doing. Staring nose-close, I found a marvelous frost formation next to a pair of aged sporophytes and pulled back, my internal arguments flaring. “It’s too cold!” “That’s a special sight, it needs to be photographed!” “My fingers will freeze!” *rumblings from my toes below* “Hey, what about us? We’re already frozen!” “When will I see a frost formation like that again?” Silence in my mind and then, “Yeah, it’s true. We need to take a picture of that.” At the top of the hill I saw that the fog cloaking the Table Rocks was especially beautiful, with a sheen of gold lighting up the fog and warming the valley’s sides. I couldn’t resist marching to the top of the hill for a few phone snaps before getting my camera and making my way back down to the gate. After many photos of the “frost bush” next to the sporophytes, I glanced down into the weeds next to the gate. There was a coil of old, rusty barbed wire fencing that had been sitting abandoned, since long before we moved here. I’d been meaning to try for some frost pictures and as I was right there, I took the opportunity to photograph that too. Not long after, the painful bite from the merciless cold forced me to stop and I trudged back to the house to return my camera and continue for a few more laps of exercise. I was really happy to discover that I got a nice picture of the “frost bush” and also some really neat barbed wire pictures too. This being the day that I put up a picture for Happy Fence Friday, it was excellent timing for posting an image that I took today! (You can see insets of the frost “bush” and also an atmospheric picture of our fence and mail box I got a couple of days ago.) Pam, do you guys hate barbed wire as much as we do? When we got here there was barbed wire strung up everywhere. It’s taken me a long time but I’ve got it all removed. Every once in a while, though, I’ll find stray strands here and there or an abandoned coil. It’s awful. The only thing I like about barbed wire is the cool pictures it can produce. Meh! I hope you are having a nice day! *HUGZZZZ!* Explored on 2/1/19, highest placement, #1.

(+5 insets!) (Please view large!) Today I'm taking a break from my San Anselmo photography because it's Macro Monday and the theme didn't happen down there: frost! I was really excited when I saw the theme because I am so crazy about this subject! I could see a potential problem though. We aren't having a usual frigid winter and our days are often too warm for frost. With that in mind I figured I'd be using an image from my last frosty photo adventure. I crossed my fingers though and hoped it would be frosty during the weekend when I usually do my Macro Monday photography. Saturday was a bust--it turned out to be a low of about 40 and even though it wasn't frosty, it was a genuinely beautiful day. It was super for Steve because he was working on our deck and it was very comfortable working conditions. Sunday rolled around and I was encouraged by the chilly temperature of about 35 degrees on our porch. Walking down our road, I could see there was the slightest dusting of frost in some shady areas but that was about all. I was discouraged and thought I'd be wasting my time trying to find reasonable frosty images. Then I realized how silly I was being. Hello? I have a macro lens! And that means frosted sugar on everything! I marched up the hill, into the house, grabbed my camera and flash setup, popped on my knee pads and out I went, making a beeline towards a frosty spot I saw in our meadow. Silly me indeed! It took about two seconds to find a frosty leaf…then another…and ok, well I went completely crazy. About 45 minutes later and some 350 pictures, I finally stopped and went back into the house to copy my pictures over. So many interesting and pretty frosty things! Droplets from melted frost…cool shadows on frosty leaves…thorny leaves with frost…acorns and caps and wasp galls with frost…oh my, how do I pick? Oh, and I couldn't resist pictures of light shining through leaves…they are just so pretty. I ended up processing 6 for today, you'll see 5 insets to view as well! The moral of the day: Don't be a defeatist! Open your eyes and you will find what you are looking for…and perhaps too much of what you're looking for! :D Pam, I looked to see what frosty images you had in your photo stream and I was delighted that you have taken some very pretty shots! I especially liked your Jack Frost picture! It's fun to look at frost on cooler or warmed days because the frost can sometimes appear quite different. The feathery frost in your picture is so pretty and something I admire on the windows and roofs of our cars whenever it's cold enough! Here's hoping that you're staying warm and comfy today my dear! *BIG HUGS!!!!!* Explored on 1/15/19, highest placement, #1.

(+2 insets) It's the first day after Winter Solstice and it's already so much lighter out! Ok, not really. LOL, but it is very encouraging to know that the days are now getting longer. I shouldn't complain. After all, parts of Canada, Norway, Greenland, as well as the North and South poles, experience between several weeks and a couple of months where the sun doesn't come up at all! No thank you! When I looked outside this morning, I knew it was going to be really cold. Twinkling back at me, I was excited to see that the meadow was gleaming white with frost! What a nice change. It has been uncharacteristically mild this winter, with few days of frost and not as much rain as normal either. However, today was going to be a "normal" December day. When I headed out for my walk, the freezing cold bit into me instantly, yikes! I wasn't surprised to see it was a mere 26°F/-3.333°C degrees. In fact, no matter how fast I walked today, my extremities refused to do anything but get colder! That's really saying something because the walk up our driveway will really get your heart pumping if you don't dawdle. The grade (steepness) from the main road up to the base of our steep hill is about 15-20° degrees with a spot that's about 25° degrees. Plus, I'm out there for an hour and fifteen minutes of continuous hiking. That's cold! Incidentally, I bet this question has crossed some of your minds: "If you live in such a pretty area, why do you confine yourself to walking up and down your driveway?" The fact is, I love to walk around our lovely 3 miles/4.8km "block" and I used to do this every day. The problem is that it's much more flat and thus, not as good for exercise. It's an obvious difference in terms of exertion and personally, if I'm going to exercise, I'd like to get the most bang for my buck! After I got back inside today, I became one with our heater for the next 20 minutes until I was all fluffy and warm again. Then I got a hot cup of tea and fairly purred up to our "game room", where Steve and I have our computers. Later Steve went on his walk and returned to the house afterwards in utter amazement...he had on two sweaters, a scarf, a coat, a hat and thick gloves and he didn't take off a single thing during his whole hour! In honor of today's ridiculously cold temperatures, I'm sharing a picture of a frosted white Oak acorn cap. I captured this image a few weeks ago when we had one of those perfect frosts with lovely crystals all over everything. (Today's frost was lovely but not quite as dramatic.) I've also included another frost picture, frost covering a barrel with a puncture in the side. Pam, I wonder what the weather is like where you live. Do you get beautiful frosts? I hope that you're keeping warm and dry and getting lots of loving attention from friends and family. Happy holidays my dear! Here's to feeling better every day! :) Explored on 12/23/18, highest placement, #1.

(3 inset pictures) (please view against black to see the wonderful frosty details!) This morning started with a truly stunning sunrise with lovely light and beautiful clouds in the sky. I took pictures with my phone a few minute apart and added them as notes so you can see too! (It turned out that today's sunset was just as spectacular so I included that picture too!) As I went on my walk today, I kept stopping and drinking in the lovely view. I reflected on the post I wrote about why we chose this place and reveled in our lucky find. It may be too hot during the summer but the rest of the year is so divine! I am very touched by the response to my story yesterday and I wish that I could give all of you hugs. It has taken a very long time to come to terms with such terrible loss. It is frustrating that I can't really talk about this to most people. They understand that it's sad to lose trees, but unless you have a connection to nature, people just don't really get it. They immediately focus on the loss of our shop. I gave up trying to talk about how I really feel, until now. Thank you, everyone, for giving me a place to voice my pain and express my deep sorrow for the loss of the countless souls up on the hill. It means more than you can know. *many many hugs all around* Today is Happy Fence Friday (btw it's 5:40pm here in Oregon!) and this gives me the opportunity to share one of the frost pictures I got a few days ago! I managed to get a whole bunch of winners but for today, I'm featuring a white Oak leaf that was caught in the mesh fencing around one of our gardens. Pam, I hope you enjoy the sunrise and sunset pictures too…while I stood and stared at these wondrous sights, I thought about you and hoped that you are enjoying some lovely sunrises and sunsets too! Explored on 12/9/18, highest placement, #7.

Summer has ended and the mornings are starting to get chilly. It won't be too long before we begin to get frost again, and I can't wait! This is what a pine needle looks like when it has frost on it! I captured this unusual frost formation back in 2013 when I was working on my 356 Project! :)

We are approaching the first of September, which means our hottest days this season will soon be past...THANK GOODNESS! My favorite times of year here in southern Oregon are Spring, Fall and Winter, and it won't be more than a month or so before we'll start getting frosty mornings again! Here is a frost-encrusted blackberry cane, complete with a thorn, just in case you thought it would be nice to touch those lovely crystals! :) It will never fail to amaze me how detailed and beautiful frost is when you get a close look at it! :)

Frost is amazing at a macro level. Depending on what it's forming on, it can look totally different. Also, it can be a very unusual sight on something unexpected, like this pine cone, for instance. Here is a close-up of crystals that formed on the edge with pretty bokeh sparkling in the background.

I was born and raised in San Francisco which has a very consistent range of temperatures that don't get extremely hot or very cold. That's one of the things I love so much about living in southern Oregon. We get a bit of snow and several months of frost! It's very interesting to see how frost forms on different surfaces, but the most dramatic tends to be frost on anything metal. I think that may be because metal retains cold so solidly and offers the right kind of surface for fantastic formations like these!

Frost on barbed wire is such fun to photograph! The sparkling frost dissolves into starry bokeh, the crisp frost crystals are so sharp and yet "furry" looking, and if you should get lucky, the colorful rust on the barbed wire makes a perfect contrast! And of course, you have a natural leading line of the wire to guide the eye. What's not to love?! :) Explored on 5/25/16. Highest placement #24.

The year 2013 was a special one because that was when I decided to do my 365 photography project. I'd thought about it a lot before I committed to this challenge because I didn't want to fail. I was successful but I didn't expect to end up with so many pictures I was happy with. In fact, I wasn't able to show lots of the ones I finished, and there were and are still hundreds that need my attention. It was during the year that I became unhappy that I had so many unfinished pictures which really deserved to see the light of day. And now, every day I post a picture for my 366 Archive project, it makes me so happy! Here is a picture I took in January that year, a beautiful mushroom covered in frost in lovely morning light!

It's the third week of February and this morning we woke up to a world of frost! What a perfect opportunity to share a frosty image from my archives! On this extremely cold December morning in 2013, the frost formed wonderful crystals, and this rusty screw was positively covered with it!

One of the wonderful things about living in southern Oregon is experiencing four distinct seasons. I was born and raised in San Francisco, and it's about the same temperature year-round. So for me, frost and snow are amazing to see and naturally, frost is a favorite subject to photograph. This is a close-up of the tines on a strand of rusted barbed wire that I captured in November 2013.