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What does one do while driving thousands of miles and, as has happened the last two days, busting on storm chases? Take a few pictures. I wish I’d taken more, but so much time is consumed by actually getting from one place to another. The freakin’ distances out here are massive. Anyway, check out the photos.

I recently had the chance to take some photos of my friend Heidi and her beautiful little boy, Ryan, who was on the cusp of his second birthday. It’s fun finding that moment of joy and capturing it on camera, but I love all the expressions that cross a child’s face, including the grumpy ones. I wonder what I was thinking at that age. Probably, “Can I have a cookie?” I added a few photos to that gallery this weekend when I dropped by Ryan’s birthday party.

 

At another party, at a lovely location along the Indian River Lagoon, I shot a few photos of friends and their kids. We have furry children (dogs), so it was fun to see the real kids playing among the rocks, stalking one another with Nerf guns and making s’mores. All of that marshmallow-roasting is enough to make a girl nostalgic.

 

The weather has been gorgeous here in Florida, but I’m waiting for the pattern to change out west so I can hit the road for my annual storm-chasing trip. After last week’s violent tornadoes, the atmosphere seems to be taking a breather.

We just got back from a trip to South Florida, where I made my first visit to Butterfly World. I was interested in both the passion flower collection and, naturally, the butterflies. It exceeded my expectations. The humdrum lobby gave nothing away, but as soon as we entered the first exhibit, we were surrounded by clouds of fluttering butterflies, which weaved among the colorful flowers and around the heads of guests as if – as one visitor put it – they were dreaming. Or I was dreaming, maybe. I took a lot of photos, so I can prove it wasn’t a dream. They are kept in a series of linked, screened houses so they don’t escape. Other, similar houses hold hummingbirds and other feathered creatures. There’s also a creepy bug museum and the amazing passion flowers, though I wish more of them had been blooming. Still, their delicate complexity continues to fascinate me. I recently wrote a story about passion flowers, most of which are native to South America, and learned there are about 600 types. See the gallery.

This is why I love taking photos of animals: They are constantly moving, so a great photo feels like a rare event (not unlike taking photos of children). They are full of life and personality. If they look you in the lens, it’s always a moment. And they and their people are fun!  A couple of months ago I went to a herding trial at Judith Kelly’s Asher-Dell Farm in Malabar, Florida, and I had the opportunity to shoot the trainers putting the dogs (and the sheep) through their paces. The dog in the photo was taking no nonsense from these sheep.