It's now been three months with our state's "stay at home" and "safer at home" rules in play. My wife and I have done just that - stayed safe at home. Today is June 14 and the last time I filled my car with gas was March 10.  And except for a brief visit to the dermatologist, I have yet to be in a building other than our house, since March 14.

I am able to work from home, though I do miss the people at the office.  My wife and I feel so fortunate to have a home with privacy, surrounded by wetlands and woods, and we feel grateful to have an income and food on the table.

Our children are adults and each continue to have their jobs, though there can be the expected frustration for them of teaching their children (our grandchildren) at home.  All are healthy at this time, though I do especially worry about my younger son who is a firefighter and paramedic in Cambridge, MA. Bless his heart, he has been doing the grocery shopping for us; though recently we have added Whole Foods delivery via Amazon Prime and curb-side pickup at a local grocery chain store. I also found Amazon Pantry. Seems to me that packages from Amazon are being delivered nearly daily!

Being at home, I found myself after the snow was gone in late April, grabbing my camera and walking around the yard looking for things to photograph. Eventually (April 26) I found my first subject: a rhododendron with a few early buds.

12-100 Olympus zoom at 100mm (200mm equiv)
F4-1/500sec-ISO200
I wish I'd used F8 get the two buds in the lower left (perhaps) in focus.
A lot of what I will post for flowers will be the result of focus stacking.
Keeping at F4, stacking of perhaps 5 images might have done the trick here,
while keeping the background out of focus

Nature is amazing.  Spring of course is a great time to see new life "springing" up all around.  We lack cultivated flowering plants at home, except some irises and rhodondrons. The deer have made sure that everything else has disappeared. But I have been able to find a number of wild plants growing and blooming, and even find weeds of interest and beauty. I have photographed a few little creatures as well.

I have posted a number of backyard photos on Instagram and Facebook. Nevertheless, I thought I would go back through them and place a number of them (and some others) on this blog, perhaps with a bit of explanation. Anyway, it is a project I now have time for.