11 Days, 11 Sunsets

When I was growing up, my mom instilled in me a love of nature. On a family vacation when I was ten she made us pull the car over so many times so that she could take picutres of and drink in the scenery that she earned the nickname "Scenic B". Silly, I know. But for the rest of her life, every time she paused our adventures to stop and marvel at something, we would affectionately remind her, "Scenic B has come out for a spin, mom!"

My personal love of nature is a little more focused than my mom's was. She would stop to eewwww and ahhhhh over just about anything-- farms, oceans, sunsets, sunrises, big trees, little bugs, wildflowers, you name it. But I am mostly drawn to the last hour of the day. As a kid, we would spend a lot of our summers at my grandparents' lakehouse. At the close of each day, the family would circle up in the backyard, sitting in little yellow yard chairs, barefeet snuggled in the cool grass, listening to the water, and wait to see what magical colors combined to make up the sunset that evening. It is my strongest memory as a kid... sitting in that place, waiting, watching, celebrating.

In recent years, I have noticed that 98% of the pictures I take are of these last precious moments of daylight. Even when I travel to the other side of the world and back, most of the photos I end up with are of sunsets, not famous monuments, or street scenes of people. I sense I have picked up my mom's nickname and am carrying it on in her honor. After all, her love of nature was transferred to me at birth.

For the past month, Andy and I have spent a lot of our vacation time on Lake LBJ. Each night, I have sat in the same spot, in the same chair, recreating my childhood memories from my grandparents'. I have my barefeet in the grass, I listen to the water, Andy and I talk about life, and we watch... The diversity of scenes has been awe-inspiring. It is an experience of worship for me: God is the one who turns day into night, and night into day... The Lord is in name! His pallete far exceeds what I could ever imagine. The pictures below are just a sampling of what we've seen... 11 Sunsets in 11 Days. Enjoy!