Our oldest granddaughter just returned from spending several days and nights at Lake Powell, Utah with her BFF and family.
While they were there she was able to capture some lightning with her IPhone!
She generously said I could share them with you.
Even the sheet lightning was spectacular!
Someday…someday I hope to get a photo or two…until then, those of you who capture the lightning BRAVO! A Job Well Done!
Your friend on a western Colorado farm,
Linda
We were heading into town one day last week and came to the stop in the road which takes us to the bypass; thus on into town…
OOPS! Someone lost a huge straw bale.
Terry says straw is very slick and hard to stay stable on a load….I think this photo agrees with his statement! 🙂
Your friend on a western Colorado farm,
Linda
Around four o’clock yesterday afternoon a wind-fretted bundle of clouds blew in churning the air into a seething angry mess!
The little hummingbirds started feeding in a desperate and determined manner.
Suddenly the wind shifted moved west, then north, and finally east, where it slammed into our area with a vengeance untold
Dropping rain in torrent, flattening anything which stood in it’s path.
Then in swirl of angst the wind-fretted rain moved on…drenching everything in it’s path.
By evening the sun started disappearing; sending slivers of gold and silver among the slate colored clouds.
This morning is clear and bright, although very muddy! The smells of warming corn stalks and the heady scent of Four O’clocks fill the air. Along with the chirps and clicks and the buzz of many little wings as the hummers fill their tummies.
Your friend on a western Colorado farm,
Linda
We took a wee ride in the late evening air…
The crescent moon gliding through patches of simmering clouds —gradually gave way to clouds; gathered and darkened—- promising rain somewhere—either where we were driving or in the distance
Although, the clouds were gray and low; the drops of rain stayed off as we started back home.
Then the miracle appeared!
The sun shining between a slit in the clouds scattered in the west
A partial rainbow or a sundog (omen of cooler weather to arrive in three days). I wasn’t sure which one: sundog or rainbow…I did not care! To me it was beautiful!
Then the sun sank…
Turning the rain-filled western sky into a matching set of colors!
From my world to your heart!
Linda
The last two days we enjoyed rain showers…sometimes the rain rode the sky in the morning
Or kissed the earth on a mid-night wind
At points the rain came in wild and untamed—
Cooling down the earth, so at one point we lived within a cloud
The moisture from the warm earth rising up to meet the cool air…fog –a most glorious and unusual gift in the high mountain desert!
Then yesterday the clouds all scuttered away on high wind, neither seen or felt here on on our little part of the earth
Walking among the flowers I could feel the Magic of the Old Ones
It’s still here, clinging to the earth…
Lifting us up for a heartbeat
(The Red Day-lily is a gift from Marianne )
In the shadows of ancient clouds.
From my world to your heart,
Linda
Terry came in from making waste ditches…(see the mud) announced that it’s so muddy he was having trouble.
Totally frustrated he called John Deer to order parts for his cultivator (which had broken down just before he finished this years cultivation)
Yes, they had them on stock.
“Okay! I be right there.” he hung up the phone, asked me if I wanted to run to Montrose…
Well, not at this time….Linky and I were waiting for her BFF to show-up so they could head out to http://www.lakepowell.com/rv-camping/bullfrog-rv-campground/ for the week.
“Alright, I think I need a vacation…everything is going wrong right now.”
“How about a little ride in the go-fast car?” I asked, with a smile on my face.
“Yes, Grandpa! That’s a vacation!” and young girl’s voice chimed in.
“Sounds good to me!” he replied.
Your friend on a western Colorado farm,
Linda
This year’s pinto bean field..almost weeded! Almost!
I don’t have much time left…the feelers are starting to grow shut!
That’s okay…I’m tired of weeding that huge field.
The ears are starting to form now…within each one is a tiny kernel of corn!
Summer…MY TIME!
Your friend on a western Colorado farm
Linda
Joe Cooper sent me a series of lightening photos he took with his IPhone and
Instructions on how to ‘capture lightning’ with your smartphone.
Hi Linda.
I use an iPhone, and this is what works for me.
Take a video of the thunderstorms, that way you’ll surely catch a good bolt of lightning at some point.
Then play that back on your phone. Pause it when you see a good bolt. There should be a scroll bar of your video at the bottom of your screen.
You can move that video forward and back frame by frame by touching the scrollbar of the video at the bottom. And while it is staying in pause mode, you might be able to find a good shot of a lightning bolt.
Once you have a good frame of what you would like for a picture, touch the screen again, but off to the side, so it does not come out of pause mode. This should remove the menus and show only the picture on the screen.
Then by pressing the home– then the power button — in quick, but not hurried fashion, it takes a screenshot picture.
After reading your post the other day I thought about it in relation to a thunderstorm that I had shot on video just a few days before. So I tried it, and it works.
The light at the bottom is the street light in front of our neighbors house.
This was a thunderhead of a storm at least 20 miles to the south of us, going like crazy. It was a clear sky above us. And there was not a sound coming from all the lightning!
Hope all is well, and good to hear Boomer is well.
Joe
Then in a couple of days he wrote:
“Staying downtown Chicago tonight, at friend of my wife’s. Caught this one.
Joe
How cool this all is! Thanks, Joe! Now those of us who have IPhones, can maybe get some good shots of lightening.
I think I’m going to try this on my regular camera to see if it might work the same way. One never knows!
Your friend on a western Colorado farm
Linda
The corn is starting to tassel out…
And baby ears of corn starting to form
The pinto beans are shooting feelers (last year’s photo–I lost this years somehow—I’ve been weeding the 16 acres early morning and late evening. Once the rows grow shut anything nasty growing out there—corn, cockleburs, ragweed, Pigweed, yellow sticker weed, scotch thistle….gets to grow. Not a good thing, but how it is.
My yard is doing
Great! The new railroad ties beds are softening up and looking ever so much better
The air smells lush and rich– full of sweetness
Summer — I can’t ask for anything more!
Your friend on a western Colorado farm,
Linda
Yesterday afternoon a slight cooling rain arrived
The air, the moisture…the whole experience was just lovely. I sat outside and watched the shower dampen the earth.
It was bliss.
Later that evening (Wednesday) around 9:30 an electrical storm arrived on the western rim of our world…Lightning flickered and slashed across the Uncompahgre (Un-come-pah-gray…accent on the pah) Plateau. Tiny booms of thunder rolled across the forest and into the canyons.
As time wore on, I thought possibly the hammer of this amazing electric storm would continue across the Plateau missing us.
By 11:30 the Crack of thunder had reached the Roubioux Canyon, which lays right below our mesa.
Sheet lightning split the clouds, while cloud to ground jagged lightning splintered the heaping massive clouds.
Thunder and lightening overwhelmed our part of the earth, causing our great trees to tremble in fear. (Boomer and both cats were so close to me I couldn’t walk. When I went outside to try to take photos they looked at me like I was crazy and stayed inside. 🙂 )
Try as I might I could NOT get a good photo of lightning! The great sheets of shimmering sheet lightning did not turn out very well either. The sky to ground lightning (although very bright and overwhelming) turned into a blur on the photo.
Gradually the thunder, the lightening, and what rain there might have been, moved on…heading toward the east.
Leaving all of us a little breathless.
Your friend on a western Colorado farm,
Linda
Life on a Colorado Farm 