Your Life As Art Photography by Pam
Artist & Intuitive | Pamela Zmija
With all the snow out there, as much as I do love it here for Christmas, feeling the blog needed a little uplift with some magical macro and rain drops!
Some girls best friends might be diamonds, however Id take these any day, with my camera in hand of course 😉
Since my kids have been young, I have organized my photos by year and month, as they grew this was the optimal way to organize and know where to find age specific photos.
However now having teens, and more time on my hands, I am thinking I need to shift my storage for my photographic art images. I am thinking, I will go through and pull out all images that aren’t family related and pull them into folders so that when I am looking for Macro, but then I also have a lot of macro bee’s… do I separate them within the macro folder for ease?! I have a lot of Landscape, in all seasons. But then if taking photos of our various tours with family and friends, would that cross into some public photos, yes, should they be organized differently?
I am curious, how you all organize your photos on your computer… would you care to share with me?
My Gunner has always felt like an old soul to me, even the first weekend we had him an brought him to our family cottage, my mom made a comment, its like hes been here before.
He LOVES my den, which is also our “healing room”/my office. He loves the essential oils that I use, he even has his own bedtime blend that he loves as part of his routine. The other day I pulled out my Palo Santo and lit it, he was SO intrigued! Just like the oils (and our previous dog) I always invite to smell but never force on them. He leaned right into the smoke.
Today while in there I held it in front of him, he was totally chill, in the zen mode!
Its interesting, for each dog that comes in my life, Gunner is my 3rd dog, each clearly has come into my life for a reason and this one, hes here for the deeper healing that mama needs.
The Lens-Artists team, as an annual tradition are giving us “one last chance” to share some of our favourites. I am excited to share some images that were not a part of the Lens-Artists challenges this year for me. I am choosing one image a month to share, its challenging during macro season – spring 😉
January
Shoveling the sidewalk with our pup Gunner. He was about 10 months in this photo. Taken with my cell phone.
February
We were early for our daughters hockey game and I felt the creative urge to capture something outside before the girls game.
March
The spring thaw, this river was very swollen and moving quite fast. Standing on the bridge, was very interesting, I felt like I had to brace myself more than once with the water running fast and quite high below.
April
Country roads, we have a lot of Mennonite families in our area.
May
I was driving around town looking for blossoms to photograph, this tree was on someone’s property, not reachable from the road, so I knocked on their door, let her know how much I admired her tree and she fully embraced me wanting to photograph it! Isn’t it beautiful!
June
A bald eagle looking directly at me. As I was down at one of the local parks by the river, I was shooting the birds down on and in the water, when something suddenly caught my eye. I continued shooting. I didn’t realize it was a bald eagle until I was home and processing the images. I remembered a message I had received, “when you see it, you’ll know its me”…
The bald eagle symbolizes spiritual connection, wisdom, strength, and freedom. Spiritually, it represents a bridge between the physical and divine realms, a messenger to the gods, and a symbol of courage and clarity. Seeing a bald eagle can signify the need for a higher perspective, wisdom, or encouragement to take decisive action towards one’s goals. Source Online
July
I found this little dude in the garden, we had fun with my macro lens!
August
The vibrant gorgeous colours of Summer!
September
The bee’s were happily busy well into the warmth of September!
October
We were so blessed in Ontario this fall to have warm weather well into October!
November
The snow has arrived, winter is here!
December
Its been a blessing this year, winter arrived and has stayed! The sunshine was shining brightly through the clouds yesterday morning.
I am grateful to have found these challenges this summer, it was at a time when I was feeling low, in deep grief and losing me. To have a weekly prompt to boost my creativity, has been a beautiful blessing! As I re-read Tina’s message below, I realized, its December 13, its 12 days until Christmas! Wow!
Wishing you all the best for this Christmas holiday season filled with peace, rest and relaxation, yummy food and drinks, and good people. I am excited to be a part of these challenges for 2026! These challenges truly helped pull me back to my blog, something Ive had a deeper desire to do for a while. My blog feels much more authentic to me to share my photographic art vs ‘social media’ platforms.
Cheers to 2026 WordPress Lens-Artists friends!
Tina shared this message, Wishing all of our participants and followers a wonderful holiday season however you celebrate. Your time, attention and commentary throughout the year is very much appreciated We’ll return with our annual Favorite Photos of the Year challenge at noon on Saturday, January 3. Until then, as always please be kind, stay safe and enjoy the adventure.
To learn more about the Lens-Artists Challenge, click here.
It was the perfect rural winter day for the non motorized Christmas parade! The snow was falling, nice big snow flakes.
Its so awesome seeing the horses and snow!
I am joining in on 3 photography and word challenges this morning – Six Word Saturday, Stream of Consciousness Saturday and Weekly Prompts Weekend!
As the volunteers bundle up, they prepare for their usual annual outing of preparing the snowmobile trails for a winter of riding. As they load the trailer they are preparing with stakes, signs and the tools necessary to mark the trails.
Its not usual to be doing this by sled, typically they are not on trails this early, its been well over 5 years since this has happened and its a welcome change. To prepare for winter, to prepare for a successful and enjoyable snowmobile season. Usually the marking happens with 4 wheel ATV + UTV’s however we have been blessed with an abundance of snow.
As they leave in the morning sunshine, its cool, cold without gloves on. My hands were feeling the cold bite of the snow as I grasped a handful to throw for our dog.
Our children my be getting older, but this mama is always prepared to capture the magic in their everyday lives.
Volunteers put in hours of work before the trails are able to be open, before they are even safe for others to be on the trail. Their knowledge and understanding of the land they work, sometimes along with the land owners, to ensure the safety of all – the people riding and the owners, including any crops that might be on the fields.
It felt good getting out in the sunshine as they prepared for their day. Soaking up the beautiful early morning sunshine and running our dog around.
I had mentioned to my husband before they left this morning, if they reached a part of the trail that I could see them from the road, let me know and I will go meet them and get pics. Reminder… when you grab only your camera – be sure there is a card in it! These are from my cell phone. I was initially upset with myself that I did that, my camera and longer lens could have gotten MUCH better photos. However, in that moment, I had my phone. Rather than be ticked off at myself, capture with your phone as they are keeping on the move – and on my way down there, I passed 2 cars in the ditch, ironically at the exact same point but opposite sides of the road. Where we live, where Ive lived my entire life except the years I went to school, we can get a lot of snow and if you aren’t used to driving in it, you could have issues. I personally LOVE driving in the snow we get here and LOVE when we have snow – a true winter season!
4 on sleds marking fields and 2 riding the roads to meet up with them in the SxS. This is where it gets tricky, everyone chomping at the bit to get out on their sleds, we have snow why aren’t the trails open, and now that we have snow and a lot of the volunteers are out marking on sleds, people see the sled marks on the trail and assume – what do we know about assuming… and ride on closed trails – which is both illegal (trespassing) and unsafe as some areas aren’t completely frozen.
If you are a snowmobiler, please tap into your own stream of consciousness and be sure to check the ITG to see what trails ARE open before you ride!
When I planted these two trees, I forgot how close they would eventually grow to the bigger maples. They might be small, but they are uniquely beautiful. Especially blanketed with snow!
Shot this with my RF 85mm macro lens! Even when not shooting macro images, this is sharp! I am super impressed with it! Especially being used to my EF L lenses. I highly recommend this lens!
The trees just look so cozy with their winter blankets on, beautifully covered in snow.
I am happy to say I am finally beginning to feel more like me again! These photo challenges have really helped keep me inspired and better focused (than drifting over to social media). Ive been back on my vitamins now for a few weeks, remembering to use my oils morning and night – starting the diffuser at home when I get up, has been SO key! My morning flowed, even waking earlier at 4am and not falling back asleep until 545 am 😉 I feel a shift today! I know the energy of the past 14 yr cycle also recently ended. That alone is like the deepest breath of fresh air!
This also proves to me, when I do focus on me, it takes less time and I feel so.much.better! ❤
I read this excerpt online this morning, “On December 12th, known as the 12:12 portal, a celestial gate opens, paving the way for monumental change. With the energies of Scorpio, Leo, and Pisces in play, this day invites a thorough detoxification of the mind and spirit, aiding in shedding outdated beliefs and behaviours.” Source Unknown
Curious about the dates today, check out Moon Omens blog!
Shedding outdated beliefs and behaviours… well I can confirm this morning I didn’t succumb to those outdated beliefs and behaviours!
Ive felt pulled to join this challenge with Stupidity Hole and Leanne Cole.
“I once more have the good fortune of hosting this one and, as it’s themed, I’ve chosen “The Space Between”.” Stupidity Hole
One of my favourite places to be, between the trees on the trail!
The sun shining in between the trees, also on the trail.
The trees in between the trees.
Our first time camping, we walked part of this trail. It felt incredible immersed in-between the trees in the forest and have the sun shining in-between the branches.
I was so happy to get this shot on the snowmobile trail last winter. The trail between the trees. Each winter driving by I think of how cool of a photo it would be. I asked my husband to take me on a photo tour and he happened to go this way! Isn’t it awesome!!!
Its been a bit since Ive processed outdoor images to monochrome, I enjoyed this challenge, to find the in-between and process the image to black and white.
Curious about the Monochrome-Madness Challenge – check that out here!
