Friday Night Photos: Flowers Blooming in My Front Yard
I’ve been trying to take lots of photos to practice my photography, and on Friday nights I share some of them with Kalyn’s Kitchen readers; hopefully entertaining even if they aren’t always that technically good. This week I gave an update on my vegetable garden, but the photos tonight are some I took a few weeks ago of the flowers in my front yard. This spiky pink flower is Bee Balm, one of my favorite flowers, but actually an herb that supposedly has a flavor similar to oregano. I haven’t tasted it, but I love this flower and have several colors of it.
On the west side of my front yard there’s a flower border with Yarrow, Bee Balm, and Mountain Sage growing in a row.
If you stand on my front steps and look to the left, you’ll see this row of lillies and daisies. There’s also a few other types of flowers growing here in front of the porch, but they’re overshadowed by the lilies and daisies!
Here’s a closer view of the lilies, which I planted about four years ago when I decided to splurge on some new perennials. They’ve been lovely every year.
Finally, another view of the Yarrow, which is a flower I love even though I really hate the smell. When the blooms fade, I have to force myself to prune them so they’ll bloom again in the fall.Email This Recipe To Me!
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22 Comments on “Friday Night Photos: Flowers Blooming in My Front Yard”
Jeanne, I do know about f-stops, just happened to not choose low enough ones for these shots I guess.
Gorgeous flowers – I particularly like those lillies.
As for sharpening up the focus – I think all you really need to do to add more impact to the photos is focus on a particular point and use a shallow depth of field (a low f-stop number), rather than just autofocusing on the whole scene. If talk of f-stops gives you the heebies, using either a macro lens or a normal lens but zoomed in will give you a shallow depth of field. That way you can photograph, say, a white daisy in focus, with a blurred pink background of lillies behind it. Don’t necessarily need a tripod – just shoot on a sunny day! Flowers are also a great way to practise your manual focusing.
I don’t see a lot of pretty flowers in my ‘hood. I guess it is the weather and lack of rain. Lovely to see such pretty colours.
Thanks again everyone.
Colleen, I’m using autofocus, sigh. So this probably means I have to take my tripod out to the garden?
You have some lovely compositions. I think sharpening the focus would really make the photos pop more.
I wish I had the dedication to produce such a beautiful flower garden!
Your monarda is stunningly beautiful, Kalyn! (And of course, the rest of the garden is lovely as well.) I tried to get monarda to grow in my garden for several years. It just didn’t want to survive the winter (even though it does just fine in many other nearby gardens)
The last year that I made the attempt, the flowers were disappointingly magenta, in spite of the fact that the label said they would be crimson. And of course, THOSE plants did survive the next winter. And the subsequent one as well. And the next, each summer their incorrectly (as far as I’m concerned) coloured blossoms mocking me. And then we had a particularly odd winter with freeze thaw freeze thaw deepfreeze and those one died as well. And I’m evil. I was glad.
I haven’t tried growing it again….
-Elizabeth
(I don’t remember what it tasted like either…)
Beautiful flowers and photos!
Your yard must be a sanctuary for you, Kalyn. Thanks for sharing the beauty.
impressive!! =O lovely photos … My favourites are the lilies and daisies. How nice to have such a blooming flower garden – u can have beautiful fresh cut flowers on the dining table everyday ^^
These lillies look stunning. I had not seen them in this colour yet.
They’re all beautiful, Kalyn! I also practice taking photos of flowers; unfortunately, it’s been so hot here that nothing in my yard is blooming. Your yard is really lovely.
your flowers are quite lovely! thanks so much for sharing them.
I love these flower photos. You’ve reminded me to put in some yarrow. Did you know they also come in shades of pink?
I’m glad everyone likes the flowers. I do love them, although I tend to neglect them in favor of the vegetable garden.
Lydia, these photos were shot with a Canon 28-105 zoom lens. This is my newest lens, good for kind of all purpose shooting.
What lens did you use to shoot the flowers? I often practice my photo skills, especially with the macro lens, on my garden, too.
wowow, the flowers look sooooo pretty
Thanks so much for sharing your flowers. I love the lilies! You’ve reminded me to take some pictures of my own gardens. 🙂
I love your flowers they are beautiful and I really love your raised beds. I love seeing all the produce. I moved from Georgia 8 years ago to UK. It just doesn’t have the climate here to produce what I was used to so I will live through yours…….and drool. Thanks for some great photos.
Sherrie
Beautiful!
Paz
Those flowers refreshes my mind when i saw ur blog in the morning.Lovely looking flowers.Who told u tat urn’t a good photographer?…really u r a good photographer.Anyway i can smell ur flowers frm here.
Very nice, Kalyn. Last year I learned that yarrow attracts beneficial insects, so it is good to have it around.
What a beautiful and colourful garden you have, Kalyn 🙂