A Riot of Prickly Pear Blossoms

Cactus Blossom Bouquet

get link Cactus Blossom Bouquet © 2011 Bo Mackison

enter I visited the cactus garden in the Sonora Desert Museum in Tucson Arizona this morning and was quite thrilled to find many cacti in bloom after yesterday;s much needed all day rain. The colors are so bright, all shades of pinks and yellows, that it seems a fitting post for the end of a weekend.

https://bettierose.co.uk/contact/ So, first a crowd of blossoms along the top of a Prickly Pear pad.

Riot of Cactus Color

see url Riot of Cactus Color © 2011 Bo Mackison

Buy Clonazepam Online Overnight And then a riot of color, all the flowers crowded together to make a natural bouquet on this Prickly Pear plant.

Two Blossoms on the Prickly Pear

https://geneticsandfertility.com/bayfront-park/ Two Blossoms on the Prickly Pear © 2011 Bo Mackison

follow link And then two blossoms in full bloom, surrounded by the long stickers of this Prickly Pear.

follow site What a joy it is to see the desert turn green and the flowers begin to bloom after a desert rain. It doesn’t take much rain either –  just slightly more than a quarter of an inch – but the desert knows how to utilize every drop to its advantage. Yesterday’s rain was the first significant rainfall I’ve experienced in Arizona since I arrived in early February.

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http://www.ztpackaging.com/art_requirements/ Bo Mackison is a photographer and owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. She will be returning to Wisconsin in a few days after living in Tucson for the last two months. She’s been exploring Arizona, taking photographs, and blogging about photography, art, and living life “solo.”

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“Solo” in Tucson

Roosevelt Lake in Tonto

follow Roosevelt Lake in Tonto National Forest © 2011 Bo Mackison

https://www.appliquecafeblog.com/recommendations/ I came to Arizona in early February with a place to stay, two art festivals where I had been accepted to exhibit my photography, and ten weeks to discover the desert–and discover how well I could live “solo” in the Southwest.

https://www.completerehabsolutions.com/wheelchair-assessments/ I had bookmarked reference sites on my computer and I had a half-dozen books about Arizona with me. There were hundreds of notations in the margins on places to travel, photographs to consider, adventures to take, galleries to visit.

Get Tramadol Online And I had a page in one of my raggedy journals with a list of goals– some large, some small; some that would take the whole time. (Or a whole lifetime, I was to find out.)

https://hymnsandhome.com/summer/ I had planned on taking one last “explore” today, this being the last full day I’ll be in Arizona “solo”, but the weather isn’t cooperating. Dust storms are not the best conditions for taking photographs, but more important, not the best conditions for me to drive on the Interstate.

go site Plus, now that I have some unexpected quiet time–gusty winds rustling outside not withstanding– I can take a few hours to assess just how well I have spent the last ten weeks, and to draw some conclusions. [If this is too detailed and long for your preferred blog post reading, skim or just enjoy the photographs.]

Tonto National Forest and Roosevelt Lake

source Roosevelt Lake © 2011 Bo Mackison

follow site I’m writing the details out for me. But I’m also writing this for everyone out there who carries a big dream in their heart and soul — a dream that they’ve had for a long time, but a dream that keeps getting returned to the “Maybe Later” shelf or the “I Can’t Do It” closet or the “It’s Too Hard” drawer.

Purchase Xanax Online I pushed away my dream of going to the Southwest and exploring the area “solo” for a long time. I had so many reasons I couldn’t go, it was an exhausting event for me to just examine all of them. Then I gradually discovered I would never live my dream until I stopped dreaming and began planning. And so  I–admittedly, very haphazardly–began writing to-do lists everywhere. By writing down the tiny steps I had to take, I began to get a clearer grasp on how to achieve my dream and I got a bit closer to its realization.

Purchase Xanax Online On weary days, I wrote lists with only a few words: JUST DO IT! The words were motivational, but they didn’t produce much action.

On my better days, I wrote lists with dozens and dozens of steps spread over pages of my notebook, each step building on the last one. Most of these lists I shredded in frustration. (The “I can’t do it” gremlins were screaming in my head, and I was in total agreement that I just wasn’t up to the challenge.) But I hid a couple of the lists in the back of an Arizona Photography book for safe-keeping. Just in case my bravery returned.

Finally, I admitted I couldn’t do all of the planning alone IF I wanted to be successful, that I had a lot to learn before I could embark on my dream, that I couldn’t manage each and every step totally on my own, and that I didn’t have to, either. I realized that I could ask for help and that was a turning point for me.

View from Tonto National Monument

View from Tonto National Monument © 2011 Bo Mackison

And so, at various time during the year long planning process, I enlisted the help of my husband–Sherpa has stood by me for 35 years–through some very good years and some very hard years–and he encouraged me to go for my dream, as did other important people in my life.

This was the first IMPORTANT thing I learned–one doesn’t have to embark on their dream alone. Even if the dream is about “going solo”. One can ask for advice, for help, for encouragement, for a listening ear, for whatever makes the attainment of the goal possible. Perhaps you won’t get what you ask for, perhaps you’ll have to think of an alternative resource or a work-around, but you won’t know until you’ve asked. I asked, and received, plenty of help, and it didn’t lessen the achievement of my dream.

Also, all those tiny lessons one learns during the preparation? It’s all good stuff to stockpile in your dream chest and good stuff to use and re-use when the going gets tough while you are living your dream. Hey, just because you are finally living your dream, it doesn’t mean there won’t be a misstep here and there.

Coming next is Part II: So many goals! Now what do I do?

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Photos are from my trip to Tonto National Forest. Roosevelt Lake is a popular recreational area. The lake was formed when a masonry dam–the oldest such structure in Arizona–was built across the Salt River in 1911. Tonto National Monument is within the National Forest and preserves two ancient cliff dwellings. Unfortunately, when I arrived late on a Tuesday afternoon, the guided tour was booked full for the next days and I was a minute too late to go on the shorter hike. (Last unguided tour must leave by 4:00 pm.)

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. She will soon be returning to Wisconsin after living in Tucson for two months. She’s been exploring Arizona, taking photographs, and blogging about photography, art, and living life “solo.” Now it’s time for her to assess what was accomplished in the last ten weeks.

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Galiuro Sky Islands

Galiuro Sky Islands © 2011 Bo Mackison

Desert on the earth’s floor, mountains above, bright blue skies. Arizona.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. She will soon be returning to Wisconsin after living in Tucson for two months. She’s been taking photographs, and blogging about photography, art, and living life “solo.” And falling in love with southern Arizona.

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Orange Cactus Blooms

Orange Cactus Blooms © 2011 Bo Mackison

A variety of cactus were in bloom at the Boyce Thompson Arboretum in Superior Arizona.

Orange flowers.

Cactus Bouquet

Cactus Bouquet © 2011 Bo Mackison

Red flowers.

Magenta Cactus Bloom

Magenta Cactus Bloom © 2011 Bo Mackison

Pink flowers.

Yellow Hedgehog Bloom

Yellow Hedgehog Bloom © 2011 Bo Mackison

Yellow flowers.

Such lovely flowers on the cactus plants. I’m so glad I had the chance to see the different cacti in bloom before I hit the road for Wisconsin.

 

A Plant of Many Colors

Aloe in Bloom

Aloe in Bloom © 2011 Bo Mackison

I’m down to my last week in Arizona.

And, not that I’ve been procrastinating or anything like that, but I finally accomplished the second to the last goal on my list — a trip to an Arizona attraction that required an overnight stay.

Yesterday I headed to Boyce Thompson Arboretum near Superior, Arizona. The arboretum is almost 3 hours north of where I am staying, and if I had wanted to push, I could have driven there and back in one day. But part of any trip’s appeal is being able to stop along the side of the road for that photograph…and that one…and that one. I know from experience that a three hour drive can easily turn into four or more hours, and I didn’t want to be driving unfamiliar roads through a dark desert on my way home. So I booked a motel room nearby.

I found the overnight a bit more stressful than I expected–probably because it is something I have only done once or twice in my life. I tried to figure out ways to make it easier–checking in while it was still daylight and bringing my things in from the car before I went off to explore the area. Those helped. Even so, I didn’t see everything I had on my list because I wanted to get back to the motel to “feel safer”.  I need more practice with this kind of traveling. I’ll have to return to Globe/Superior and finish the tour next time I’m in the area.

I spent several hours at Boyce Thompson Arboretum.

I’ve been to here before and have always enjoyed the many areas to explore, but on this visit I concentrated mostly on the blooming perennials and a few blooming cactus. The central region of Arizona is much greener than Tucson and the areas south of Tucson, so it was a chance for me to see a bit of Arizona in bloom.

The aloes were a big surprise to me. I’ve don’t recall seeing aloe in bloom, nor did I realize that aloe blooms could be so varied. Makes sense–just something I’d never experienced before. I love these multicolored buds of the aloe in the photo. It seems as if almost every color, in some shade, is represented.

Since today is a mostly cloudy day, I’ll be processing the other photos from Boyce Thompson and the rest of my trip this afternoon. Usually I need to wait to do my photo work in the evening because the studio is too bright and the window coverings are minimal. But today I am appreciating the cloud cover!