Week 28 From The Ground Up

Not real comfortable, kneeling on the gravel along the road. Found a use for my jacket on an 85 day...to kneel on. The State of Illinois must be saving on fuel costs. The right of way hasn't been mowed for a while and even then it was just a couple of passes. That's OK with me. These weeds and wild flowers are within a foot of the pavement. Along with them, The Shrub and corn crop are doing well. The Thistle (which is just to the right of The Shrub) has withered to a brown prickly mass.

Week 27 Half Time Is Over

Much has changed since that cold day the end of December, when I first spotted this Shrub of shrubs. The stark and flowing lines that caught my attention are now consumed by the greenness of summer growth. While I like the lines of the first shot, I much prefer the conditions that I endured today: 85 F, and moderate humidity.

Week 26 Half Way There

Thought I'd take a drive by The Shrub and see how it's doing. It seems to be good. The corn is over head high and The Thistle continues to fade, although there are still some pink blooms on it. Gotta keep going...it's a busy holiday weekend yah know!

Week 25 First Week Of Summer

Almost half way through this project. I'm in no hurry for it to end either. That means cold, snowy stuff. Right now, things are green and growing. We've had quite a steady amount of rain in the last couple of weeks. The corn is almost shoulder high and The Thistle still retains some of it's pink flowers. The Illinois State Highway Department mowed a couple of passes along the road, but not even close to The Shrub.

Week 24 Better Late Than Never

Better Late Than Never.
We left early Saturday for the weekend and never had a chance to post my weekly shot. I took this last week, so it counts. This is looking east, and includes The Thistle and the barn of the farmer who owns the corn field that the shrub is next to.

Week 23 It Won't Be Long

It Won't Be Long
until I won't be able to shoot from this angle and see anything. The corn in the foreground will be head high by the end of June. Also the prolific thistle in the left center with the pink seed heads is coming along "nicely". Growing up on a farm where eradicating these things was a top priority, it is difficult to resist chopping it down. On the other hand, I'm trying not to alter The Shrub's surroundings during this project. I'll leave it alone and if the farmer comes along and mows it down...well that's part of the program.

Week 22 Sunstruck Canopy

I stopped by the shrub just before sunset Friday night. The light filtering through looked like a good scene. The sun flare in the lower right just added to the final result.
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Week 21 A The Shrub neigborhood

An inclusive view of The Shrub. The corn in the lower right corner, is about 8" high. To the lower left is a yellow flowering weed and behind that is a large thistle with some purple and green blooms.

Week 21 B Bloomin' weeds

The shrub has leafed out nicely and is joined by these flowers, which are probably just weeds, but do add some color to the area.

Magnificent Morning Mist

There was a heavy fog when I woke up around 5:15, so I headed out to take advantage of it. My first stop was at The Shrub, just as the sun had risen above the fog bank in the valley.

Week 19 Sunburst

This week I was going to show the proximity of the road closed barricades. Those shots didn't do much for me, so I went with an angle I haven't taken before.

Week 18 Where The Green Grass Grows

...along with The Shrub and various weeds.
Another windy cold day. The State is closing down the highway past here for major construction, so the traffic is a little lighter.

Week 17 Against The Wind

Also against the clouds, but there was a 30 mph wind going on, so that was the memorable factor on this day.

Week 16 Pink Petaled Perch

As I was passing The Shrub on this day, I noticed a grackle perched in it. I'd been hoping to get at least one shot of a bird in it. So here it is.

Week 15 Pink Is A Poppin!

Week 14 It Lives!

Leaf buds have appeared and the grass is greening up. I'm curious to see if the flowing lines of the bare branches, carries over once the leaves fill out the tree.

Week 13 Shub Shots In Paradise

I brought my favorite shrub with me to Florida and introduced it to a nice palm tree just outside of our rented condo. The composite edit might be a little rough, but...hey, I'm on vacation!

Week 12 Deadline Shot

I didn't take any shots of the shrub until mid morning on Saturday. Thus the deadline reference. Not much interesting at the shrub today, nor all week for that matter. March around here is a time of transition. No snow, no green, just brown, and barren. There is grass greening up under the thatch, and it really shows if burned off. This isn't my property, so I'll not be burning it.

Week 11 Winter Persistence

On Wednesday it was sunny and in the 60's. Today; Saturday (of course) it barely broke 30 with snow showers and a persistent wind out of the north.

Week 10 A Religious Experience

I had a difficult time choosing the image for this weeks shrub shot.  On this day, there were scattered storms.  When I got to the shrub, there was a storm to the east and the sun was breaking through in the west.  This gave the dark clouds even more contrast.  I went with this for the rainbow and the Catholic church being highlighted by the sun.

Week 9 Hanging Out With The Family

This week, I've included my mother's farm to the right and my brother's house to the left. Today should be in the mid 40s and it will continue for most of the week. Most of this snow should be gone by the end of next week.

Week 8 A Shrub, A Drift, Upon A Sea Of Snow

We didn't get much snow this week, but what we did get was light and drifted quite a bit in the open areas. It created a more cliff like form this week unlike the more flowing form last time.

Week 7 Not Such A Lonely Shrub After All

I'd just gotten off of work. It ended up snowing a little over an inch. I went in at 6 AM for two hours and spread salt. For some reason, I didn't have much time to do shrub shots this week. I've been working on my photo collection reorganization.

Week 6 Do Ya Get My Drift?

Well it's back to the snow and cold. We had several inches of snow and strong winds earlier this week. I thought I'd post this more overall view this week. In the lower left area, is where I started to climb the embankment. Two steps and I thought better of that idea. I would guess the drifts to be at least 3 feet deep. I should clarify that this was just after sunrise...around 0 degrees Fahrenheit.

Week 5 Someone Trashed My Tree

This ornament was left by another local photographer to let me know he figured out where my mystical shrub was located. He's doing a "52 weeks of the same thing" project, based upon an oak tree. He isn't divulging it's location, challenging his local Flickr friends to find it. Mine was pretty easy, since he goes by it every day and he knew it was within the 5 miles between his house and mine. His on the other hand is somewhere in the county. While I'm not actively trying to find it, I may start carrying "mugshots" of his project tree, just in case I happen across an oak tree of interest.

Week 4 Reaching For The Moon

I'd taken a few shots during the week. It's been cold; single digits for highs, so I had to be desperate or inspired to deal with that for a shot. This was late afternoon on my way home from Durand. When I saw the full moon rising, I knew it had to be in this weeks Shrub Shot. I finally found this angle and cropped the image to focus on the subjects of interest.

Week 3 Leftover Leaf

For this weeks shot, I decided to get in closer and show some of the inner workings of The Shrub. I noticed a couple of leaves still hanging in there, so I thought I'd document one, before it finally lets go of it's grip.

Week 2 Frosty Foliage

On this morning, conditions were right for fog and hoar frost. It covered the windward side of just about everything. I drove around the area taking pictures. On the last leg, heading home, I decided to take more shots of this roadside shrub. There is still quite a bit of snow in the ditch, so I took it from the road shoulder.
I did a little different method of editing on this one. It was after posting this to Flickr, that I decided that this would be my project; to post an image of this taken every week, for a year.

Week 1 Winter Colors

Heading home after a rather fruitless morning, looking for something decent to photograph, I noticed this roadside shrub. There are quite a few of these "weed" trees along the road, but the fluid lines of this one caught my eye. I turned around, went back and took several shots. After some editing, this version is what I had envisioned when I decided to photograph it.