View allAll Photos Tagged TexMex
blue-hour bluebonnets 💙
📷 Captured these blue beauties a few evenings ago when I finally found a decent patch of flowers. It turns out I got super spoiled with the super-bloom two years ago when we moved to Texas. I mean, it was one heck of a first impression, that’s for darn sure. But after a long drought and the warmer air temperatures already creeping in, this year’s bloom is much more scarce — upping the challenge level for those of us who like to enjoy the wildflowers.
It’s all good though, challenges keep the journey from getting stale. 👍
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Beer and Mexican food....bet Los Compadres was a delicious slice of heaven in its prime. It had been abandoned for quite some time when I found it back in 2013.
This post-storm hazy fireball sunset from a few days ago sure was a marvelous one to witness!
📷: The setting sun inches her way below a humidity-hazed horizon layered with tree-covered hills. Captured from a small roadside vista in the Texas hill country. April 2021.
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Just adding a splash of color to the feed with this crowded field of wildflowers... 🌈
I am (im)patiently waiting for scenes like this to be the norm again. I’ve seen a few bluebonnets starting to pop around town these past few days, so it seems the wait may be reallyyy close to being over! 💐
📷: A rainbow palette of spring wildflowers shows off their diverse beauty in the evening sun. Texas Hill Country, March 2019.
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I captured this image a few seasons ago during an afternoon visit to the farm fields in the Texas Hill Country. From the moment we stepped foot onto the farm property, we encountered a variety of butterflies. Monarchs, Queens, Fritillaries, and multiple species of swallowtails — including the beautiful one in this picture, a Pipevine Swallowtail (Battus philenor) — to name a few. This zinnia flower field was particularly bustling with all kinds of pollinator activity. It was amazing to observe. But the flashes of bright metallic blue on the underwings and abdomens of these swallowtails were especially mesmerizing. I patiently waited for one of these blue beauties to sweep down to a red zinnia and after a few chances I was able to successfully capture an image with some rich primary color harmony just as I had envisioned. ❤️💙
Fredericksburg, TX | Oct 2022
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Not the most ideal lighting, but I couldn’t NOT photograph this big guy! 🐂 Spotted while on an overcast afternoon drive around the Texas Hill Country. Captured from the side of the road, with a fence between myself & this beautiful beast (because, trespassing & personal safety & all that jazz...) It sure felt pretty awesome to finally get the chance to have a close-ish peek at a Longhorn, especially considering their legendary symbolism in Texan culture. ⭐️
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Happy first day of Spring and Vernal Equinox, y’all! 🌱
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“Spring passes and one remembers one’s innocence. Summer passes and one remembers one’s exuberance. Autumn passes and one remembers one’s reverence. Winter passes and one remembers one’s perseverance.” — Yoko Ono, Season of Glass.
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📷 Photo captures a Red Admiral butterfly gently kissing the fresh delicate blooms of a Mexican Plum tree. Spring has sprung! 🌸
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[insert inspirational quote here]
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Alright, friends. You’re up! Give me your best inspirational quotes and mantras, your motivational one-liners and stories, your moments of feeling most alive and your onward-driving fuel sources! 💭
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They say motivation, like bathing, doesn’t last — so, we need to repeat it often. I like to believe we can lift each other; that the ripple effect of motivation can be felt beyond our realization. Maybe you can help demonstrate that here. It’s your turn! GO! 👉
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📷 Image captures a magnificent morning sky over the Gulf of Mexico. The sun danced in and out from behind the clouds, glittering the shoreline as the waves gently kissed the sand. 🌊 This is not my current view (although I sure do wish it was!), but experiencing and capturing views like this long serve as motivation for me to trudge onward through this adventure called “life.” 💫
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Sometimes my brain feels so noisy. Here, in the outdoors, it's quiet. A fresh start. A gentle breeze. The beaming faces of flowers.
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Life -- what a trip. Every day I'm alive is a day of knowing less. I feel fortunate to be here. But I sure do wrestle with a lot. (Ahh, the price we pay as conscience human beans.)
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There are times I wish life felt simpler. But if I awoke one day & it was all simple, black & white answers... well, I think I'd miss all of the colors.
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Photo captures full-bloom Greenthread (Thelesperma filifolium) flowers gleam as they dance with the warm Texas sunshine.
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If spiders aren’t your thing...sorry! Spiders normally aren’t so much my jam either. But hear me out for a minute — what if we looked at things a little bit closer, with eyes of curiosity, rather than judgment? What if we tried to find the delicate in the creepy, the intricacies in the rough... the beauty in the messy & uncomfortable?
These large Yellow Garden Spiders (Argiope aurantia) have been a frequent summertime sighting here in central Texas — hanging over trail-heads, under shade trees, along fence-lines. The spider in this image (captured while I was out on an early morning walk) constructed her three-foot-diameter web between the tops of two bushes! While I’m not afraid of these critters, I did find myself looking the other way and walking a bit quicker. 😅 But the lighting offered an opportunity too good to pass up, so I zoomed in to get a closer look and snapped a few photos. I was surprised to see the intricate designs on the spider’s body, the ombré-dipped coloration on all eight legs, and the mind-blowing complexity of the orb web, including the zig-zag stabilimenta centerpiece...
Without curiosity, I would not have seen how beautiful these creatures are. Yes, I am aware that it is a far stretch to equate spiders to beauty, but maybe the concept can also be applied elsewhere in our lives... Stay curious, friends.
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Happy first day of Spring! 💐Happy Vernal Equinox! Happy Aries season! And also, my water bill is due today. 😬
I’m reposting this image and my original caption because it seems appropriate (again, unfortunately) after more tragic, hateful losses in the USA this past week. Springtime calls for great change — bringing light to what was once shadowed; beckoning the cold, bare terrain to grow once again. Over the course of our existence, opportunities for learning and growing seem to always cycle through — so long as we have the courage to feel the discomfort of the growing pains. I truly believe we humans can do better (I mean, I know I am far from perfect), and there is always room for us to grow with the seasons...
#StopHate #StopHate #StopHate
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We live in a colorful world, filled with a wide assortment of pigmentation. From the flowers to the sky, the humans to the skyscrapers — every facet of life is painted with a variety of colors. 🎨 Maybe this is by mistake. Maybe it’s on purpose. ♀️ Either way, this fact is to our good fortune, because to exist in a monotonous world — a world lacking in diversity — sure wouldn’t be as beautiful or interesting... 🤔💭💐
Splash of Paint | 2019
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Just darned good food. Anthony Bourdain, Matthew McCauneghey, locals, hungry travelers and Border Patrol agents have dined here. No frills....just good eats. Opened in 1990 and has gained quite a following. You're welcome to sign the dining room wall or fence. :-)
The power storage area in Galesburg is mostly occupied by older Dash 9s temporarily out of service due to dwindling rail traffic during the pandemic. A few other oddballs are also present, including BNSF 199, a former Texas-Mexican Railway GP60. This unit was rebuilt after a wreck and repainted into BNSF corporate colors, then tagged, primered, and thrown into storage.
From last week, mid-deep-freeze in Central Texas. I took a few mini-adventures around the yard while we passed the time in between huddling around a tiny propane heater and waiting for power to come back on. Clearly, ice-glazed things became my muse, forcing me to slow down and take in all of the small details of the freeze, and leaving me with beautiful souvenirs of what was otherwise a terrible experience. Nothing like Mother Nature to keep you humble about basic necessities. All’s well that ends well. 😅❄️
📷 Image captures some Live Oak (Quercus fusiformis) leaves locked in a frigid suit of ice.
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From last week, mid-deep-freeze in Central Texas. I took a few mini-adventures around the yard while we passed the time in between huddling around a tiny propane heater and waiting for power to come back on. Clearly, ice-glazed things became my muse, forcing me to slow down and take in all of the small details of the freeze, and leaving me with beautiful souvenirs of what was otherwise a terrible experience. Nothing like Mother Nature to keep you humble about basic necessities. All’s well that ends well. 😅❄️
📷 Image captures a close-up of
some crackled ice-glazed Crape Myrtle (Lagerstroemia spp) seed pods.
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Reminder: beauty can be found in unexpected places... ❤️
Exhibit A 💁♀️📷: In a seemingly not-so-photogenic setting, a vivid crimson bird darted into the scene like a firecracker shooting to the sky, creating a bright beautiful display in a space that only moments earlier was bare and bland. 💥
I captured this image while out wildflower stalking this past spring, after complaining about the broken tree and noxious weeds in the background of what was otherwise a beautiful Firewheel field scene. Suddenly, a male Vermillion Flycatcher (Pyrocephalus rubinus) flashed across the landscape, then perched atop the aforementioned tree remains. I held my breath in disbelief — for many years I had fancied the opportunity to see this bird with my own eyes! And here he was, twenty yards in front of me, perched atop the splintery remains of an old dead tree. ♀️ In an excited panic, I pressed the shutter button anyway. He dashed and flittered, dove and bolted, back and forth from his newfound perch and the insect lunch-buffet over the field. A less-flamboyant brownish-gray female also joined in on the feeding frenzy for about ten minutes before they both raced away, disappearing up into the twisted branches of a Southern Live Oak tree. 🌳
And just like that, what I had previously judged harshly as a boring, worthless scene unexpectedly became the setting for quite an exhilarating spectacle! 💫
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Texas Mexican GP38 #859 sits out the weekend at Corpus Christi, TX on 20 March 1994. Unfortunately, this was mostly a weekday railroad and at this time, I could only manage weekends...so this is pretty much the only type of action I saw on this pike. I do like the gritty, grease-soaked engine servicing facility, very reminiscent of the Katy, my favorite Texas road.
🎶 “It’s gonna be a bright, bright, sunshiny day...” 🎶🌻☀️ #TGIF
Does anyone else swing on the mind-bending pendulum of holding two opposing truths at the same time? ...case-in-point: the world feels like a raging dumpster fire right now 🙈, but also, beautiful treasures exist right under our very noses. 💫 Because danggg this ride feels as disorienting as an out-of-control tilt-a-whirl. 😅
On the flip side, here is an image I captured a few weeks ago, and I would like to share it with whoever may need it. A big field of golden sunflowers dancing freely in the warm breeze of a summer evening. A calm moment in an upset world; a dose of hope that the sun is still shining behind the clouds. ⛅️
Stay safe, stay healthy, stay hopeful. 💛
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Larry's opened in 1960 near the banks of the Brazos River on Highway 90A in Richmond. They're still open and serving up wonderful Tex-Mex cuisine! Richmond,Texas. 9.2.2016.
“I must have flowers always, and always.” — Claude Monet #ToujoursEtToujours 💐
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📷 Photo captures a rainbow palette of Texas springtime wildflowers, with a bright red Indian Paintbrush (Castilleja coccinea) at the front and center. There’s no denying the fact that Bluebonnets get most of the attention, and rightfully so, but I think these fluorescent Paintbrushes may be my personal favorite. (Subject to change, because I’m terrible at making firm decisions #LibraProblems)
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