New Painting

I started working on a new painting. I'm not sure where this one is going yet:

Superstitions Hike

My mom and I went hiking in the superstitions on Thursday. The weather was amazing! 

My mom looking at a dead saguaro.

Ever since I was a little kid, we've always looked for saguaros with downturned arms. You're supposed to meditate in between them and they're supposed to create an energy vortex. This saguaro was particularly cool because it's downturned arms were so long that they almost touched the ground. It's rare to see them with downturned arms and I've never seen one with arms this long.

They arms were so close to the ground that I had a good opportunity to get a macro shot of the top of one.

This picture gives a good size perspective. This is what a hiking outfit in the desert looks like if you have really fair skin: Long sleeve shirt (or loads of greasy sunscreen applied every two hours), Camelback (well, that's for any skin tone really lol), SPF rated floppy hat (or loads of greasy sunscreen in your scalp...eww). I know it's geeky, but I didn't get a suburn lol. Yes, in Phoenix you need sunscreen in the middle of the winter.

So pretty. I love the grass.

Mom posing in front of the mountain.

The view part way up the mountain.

The mountain up close.

I'm fascinated by the one lone tree on the ridge.

A desert wildflower.

Panorama view from the mountain.

Painting Progress

I finished my painting! I made a video about it:




Here are those pictures up close:

 

 

Full Moon

On Saturday, Bill and I went exploring and took some pictures in the Superstition Mountains and Canyon Lake:

Canyon Lake

Me

Bill

One of those cool days when you can see the full moon during daylight.

I did some photo editing on this one ;)

A dying saguaro.

Close up.

Flat Iron Peak of the Superstition Mountains in the late afternoon sun.

A dying ocotillo.

Chollas in the sunset.

This one makes me think of...

Look! Grass in the Desert!

See the deer?

Psychedelic saguaro.

 

I loved the silhouettes of these two saguaros.