The Pink Full Moon

I love me a full moon. Something about its light casting shadows in the middle of night and dimly lighting up the darkest shadow just enough for the eye can see shrouds the full moon event with mystery and beauty. I have several full moon memories etched in my brain - of course they all embody adventure, amazement with a sprinkle of romanticism. So when a special full moon event lines up with clear skies, I get out to watch it unfold.

Last night - the full Pink Moon rose right at dusk, almost directly to the east. In my geekiness, I looked up the moonrise time and direction. I used the website, timeanddate.com to get all the details to be prepared. Armed with the data - moonrise at 19:03 CDT, rising at 93degrees (that's just a smidge south of directly east). I even used the compass on my watch to make sure I had a decent line of sight.

I drove to an area of town that is fairly undeveloped and waited. The weather couldn't be nicer with a gentle, warm breeze blowing from the west.

The moon emerged shyly from the treeline, softly hued:


It indeed turned pinker as it rose

Note - I was originally annoyed when this walker came into the path of my photo. Then I realized she was pink like the moon, so I took the photo instead of waiting.




Even high above the trees, it retained its pink hue.


It was a beautiful event, something to take one's mind off the current events, the physical distancing from our friends and family; for that I am grateful our weather conditions allowed me to take in and create another moon memory.

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The Bloodmoon Supermoon Eclipse

Yeah, I know the Internet has exploded with photos of Sunday's Harvest moon, Super moon, Eclipse and Blood moon all rolled into one. Since this post will be published Tuesday, I am sorely late with my images since many started popping up almost in real time. For me, two days later is as fast as it gets!

I spent most of Sunday up in Chicago, enjoying a day of shopping with my daughter and with overcast skies lingering as we drove home, I wasn't expecting to see much of anything in the sky. But I caught a glimpse of a silver glow through the new bathroom window (something new, since we recently upgraded from obscure glass block to real windows) and found that the clouds had parted away to a crystal clear prairie sky. A full moon was in the sky, the center of the night's show.

Initially, I went outside to casually watch the shadow make its way across, slowly consuming the bright orb. At the request of my daughter, I tried to take a photo with my iPhone (big fail), then decided to get the DSLR out. Then I got out the tripod and spent the next hour and a half in the cul-de-sac taking photos.


Photos processed in Lightroom, combined into the composite photo using Photoshop Elements

The close ups are not tack sharp, as I had exceeded the limits of available light, but these were the best I could do with my equipment. It would be nice if hubby had more experience with the telescope and I had experience taking photos through the telescope, but those are learnings for a future time.

Overall, it was a very nice way to spend an evening - under the blood red moon. I feel fortunate to have experienced it all.

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