Garden Recommendations

Asking for help does not come easy for me. I think that is largely due to my German/Italian heritage. If you are physically and mentally capable, you figure it out and do it yourself. This is why I will probably never have a cleaning lady. When I do ask for help it is because I need something hung on the wall, that usually doesn't go all that well.

But, last week I reached out and asked for recommendations on FB for local flower farms where I could go photograph. I know this seems such a low hurdle in the help-asking arena, but for me it was still hard. I have Google at my fingertips, and with my many years of wandering, I should be able to figure it out. What I have learned though is that people want to help.  Within 24 hours, I had three awesome recommendations.

The flower farm was for Exercise 36 in the book Shooting with Soul. You are probably tired of reading about this book every time I post, but I need this book and these exercises to get out of my daily rut. Without the book, my wanderings are limited to walks with the puppy at the beach, in the woods, at the park, and downtown. Wash, rinse, and repeat. I need my brain and my eyes to be challenged to look for something new, to think new thoughts, and to get out with my big camera by myself.

Now if you have the book and look at Exercise 36, you might wonder what am I talking about - going to a flower farm? The lesson instructs you to buy fresh flowers, arrange them and photograph them in your home. I will get to that this winter when there is nothing to do outside. I am choosing to follow just the last couple sentences: "Then, with input from all of your senses, take photos that infuse your images with your thoughts and feelings. Repeat as needed throughout the year."

As I said I received three recommendations, and I plan to explore them all, but I started with the one closest to my house. Sunrise is at 6:43 and I wanted early morning light, but I didn't want to leave the house at five o'clock. Plus my recommendation came from the wife of the owner of the wholesale garden I was going to.

The funny thing is, more than a decade ago, I actually worked in these display gardens for a few summers. I worked for a friend who was contracted to maintain the large gardens. I haven't been back in many years. Some of it felt familiar, but a lot of it felt so different. It was the perfect combination of comfort and exciting new discoveries.

This week, I also started a new art class from Laly Mille - Soulful Abstracts. One of the first exercises we had to do was find images on Pinterest based on questions about ourselves.  My finds were the color palette I expected, although I feel my green color is more clearly defined now, what did surprise me was how dark and moody a lot of the images were. That dark moody feeling definitely influenced my photography at the garden. I might be in love. I looked at everything with a completely new perspective.

This is going to be a really good class for my art and my photography.