Introducing Tina Etherton
Hi Everyone,
If you follow me on social media, you may have seen that my summer collection, Feathered Friends, will be releasing this Saturday, July 9th. This collection is a collaborative effort between myself and my friend and nature photographer, Tina Etherton.
I am honored to be doing this collection with the help of Tina’s amazing photos.
So I’m going to hand this post over to my talented friend, so she can give you her story in her own words. Oh and the link to Tina’s Facebook page is HERE.
Tina Etherton
“Take time to breathe in God’s goodness each day and take delight in the treasures He has laid right before our eyes!”
If you’re reading this backdrop story of how my love for photography began, thank you for taking the time. I am honored that Connie chose to include paintings of my photos in her Summer Collection, Feathered Friends. We both hope you enjoy this collection of God’s beautiful creation as much as we enjoyed capturing it through lens and on canvas.
As many of us can relate, Covid changed and challenged most or all of our lives in one way or another. During the early pandemic days of shut down and slow down, I embraced my love for bike riding and took the time to really appreciate God’s beautiful creation.
My favorite place to ride became the picturesque Furman campus around Swan Lake. It was there that I discovered my passion for photography, particularly my “Feathered Friends.“ Two of my favorite species to photograph were the beautiful and statuesque Great Blue Heron, and a pair of majestic Australian Black Swans, who later added cygnets that graced the lake with their presence as well. My love for them and my passion for capturing them through my lens grew as I continued to visit weekly.
Fast forward a few months, on January 15th of this year we became “landlords” to a Bluebird couple that showed up at our residence and decided to live in the birdhouse we had put up a year prior. On January 17th, my world as I knew it came to an abrupt halt when I had my own personal collision with Covid. Four weeks post Covid I began having symptoms that would leave me homebound for several months. I was later diagnosed with long haul Covid.
It was during this difficult season that my Bluebirds, who I named Beau and Bella, became my blessings and daily dose of medicine as I watched their sweet little love story unfold just outside of my living room window. They have since grown their family by 8 and have more on the way. Needless to say, my camera lens fell in love with them!
You can go to my Facebook page to see their story and the many photos that I’ve taken of my beautiful, “Blues” along with photos of the Great Blue Heron and the Australian Black Swans. I hope they’ll bring you as much joy as they have brought to me!
Thank you so much for sharing your story, Tina. And thanks to you, the readers. I hope you will check out the collection on Saturday, and if you haven’t signed up yet, please go to conniewyatt.com and sign up for a chance to win a print from the collection. There will be other giveaways down the road as well. If you are signed up, you’ll receive a newsletter with a sneak peak of a couple of pieces on Thursday as well as other exciting news!
Sending my best,
Connie
