Pixelated F-Stops: Rural Plains

Last weekend was my cousin's wedding. Considering that the bride, the groom and both sides of my family are from the same small 30 square miles of countryside it wasn't much of a stretch figuring out where the nuptials were taking place. At 5pm on Saturday, in a small 90 year-old clap board church a half mile off the oil road on a bit flat of prairie (but to the left of the town's baseball diamond) there was a short Lutheran ceremony (and by short I mean less than a half hour) before the festivities got underway. Considering that everyone and their dog was going to be in town for the wedding I went down a few days early to laze around, catch up on the gossip and soak up the rolling hills of the river and cattle country.



Don't let me fool you, I am not a country OR a farm girl. I am most decidedly "from town". I don't really understand the day to day work involved in a rural lifestyle, but I do understand the grander pattern and pace of country living. In fact I probably understand it just enough to know why it's so special and why in the early summer and fall of each year I crave to visit my family just as much as their farms. I love the open space and the general quietness of their homes. And there is just something about a lot of sky and grass, dotted with a few cattle that is oh, so welcoming. All in all it was a nice trip.

The Wild Roses decided to cooperate with the bride and open during the week of her wedding, adding even more pink to the bridal palette.

Old barn have always dotted the landscape and make for a very Walt Whitman-esque scene.