Mosquito Hill

 The mosquitoes have taken over my backyard

so I've decided to go for a walk in the woods where they're even worse!

This is my favorite trail at the appropriately named

Mosquito Hill Nature Center, no irony there.

The Polar Vortex has been visiting us again, I really hope it isn't going to become a regular thing.

It's not really an issue in the summer but it leaves things looking a bit gloomy.

The view from the top, featuring our current completely overcast skies.

A carpet of May Apple on top of the hill, and time for another application of Deep Woods Off.

The trails wind through a hard wood forest of primarily birch, maple and oak.

It was on these trails I first decided to start taking pictures.

My husband, Nick has been a photographer for years. He taught college classes and

even won some awards. One day he put away all of his fancy equipment

and built himself a pinhole camera from a cereal box. 

He started taking pictures on our walks and it took him forever!

The constant stopping and fiddling with the tripod and the long exposure times meant a

lot of standing around for me. Now I didn't want to discourage him from something

he so obviously loved doing, so I decided to take photos too.

One day I grabbed the point and shoot camera I keep in my purse for

documenting birthdays and graduations and started taking pictures too.

Now it really takes us a long time to walk up the hill. 

Mosquito Hill was a farm many years ago. On the usually sunny side,

at the bottom of the hill where there were once fields, a prairie has been planted.

The Frog Pond. I'm guessing this is the source of the mosquito supply.

There's an oxbow lake on the edge of the prairie and like the forest

its a different experience from day to day, season to season. There's always

something new to see even with the mosquitoes out in force.