Into the Woods

There were so many good photos today that it was really hard to choose, so I took my oldest son's advice.  He said, "If this was a contest I'd choose the [landscape] but for your journal, I'd choose the family one."  He's right.  I'm almost done with my 365 and I have very few photos with me in them.  I set up the tripod this afternoon before we set out on our family snowshoe.

The snow was deep and fluffy until we hit the bog.  There we found some slush from the time when in warmed up a bit early in the month.  The sun was bright in the sky which made the snow glisten, but also made the air pretty cold.  Once we were in the woods, it got warmer.  The boys tackled each other and the kids knocked snow off trees, sending showers of snow down on their heads.

I was determined to hit a spot where a line of hemlocks faces west with a meadow lies just beyond them.  I had a photo in mind that needed to be taken as the sun was moving lower in the sky and the light begins to bend.  At that time of day, light really looks amazing through the feathery needles of a hemlock forest.  Alas, I was a little late, but I did find an amazing snowy meadow with rolling mounds where drifts of snow covered bent prairie grasses.  That was my other photo option.

After that last shot, I caught up with the rest of the family who had made it out of the woods.  I noticed that Evan's rosy cheeks had patches of white, which is an indication that he was starting to get frostbite.  We hurried inside and got the kids some hot chocolate.