Buzz's Marina in Ridge, MD

I am adding a photo of Buzz’s Marina to my collection of St. Mary’s County photographs, taken on a lovely autumn day last fall. Owned by Mike and Christy, their Marina is located on St. Jerome’s Creek, just off route 5 in Ridge, MD. They offer quite a few services to local customers including boat storage, boat slips, a boat ramp, gas, a camp store and camper storage. We have visited a number of times and can state that they are very friendly, can help you with boating and fishing information and are convenient for visitors to Point Lookout and Southern St. Mary’s County. For more information, visit their website at http://www.buzzsmarina.com/ . Merchandise and photos of Buzz's Marina can be purchased from Calm Reflections at http://calmreflections.dotphoto.com/

Hawaii blog 2 Jellyfish Dance

The Maui Ocean Center had some interesting exhibits including lots of sharks fed by a diver, a 750,000 gallon acrylic tunnel to walk through, sea turtles and a tank full of black lit jellyfish. (featured below) We enjoyed our visit very much.

Hawaii blog 1 Maui

I haven’t shared much for a few weeks, with good reason. Jim and I went to Hawaii with 8 days notice to 4 islands to fill in places we hadn’t seen. We had some wonderful adventures and saw some lovely beaches, colorful flowers, friendly folks, rare birds and awe inspiring cliffs. I have lots of photos to share. We visited several of the beaches in West Maui. I just love palm studded beaches! It is hard to find a beach with the palm trees where you want them.

Pet photography

On our trip to Great Falls I met a beautiful Siberian Husky named Mishka, the Russian equivalent of Teddy Bear. I asked her owner if I could take some photos. The dogs fur was sooo soft. I’m learning that it takes a lot of patience to photograph pets, but I usually come up with something worthwhile. I also need a lot of help from the owner to help keep the pet interested or still enough to photograph.

Great Blue Heron at Great Falls

I saw several Great Blue Herons at Great Falls National Park this weekend. I’m determined to get some good photos of them. They hang around our yard from time to time making noisy comments to the world. Grooonk! They are such graceful birds, with such a nasty voice. To see the bird with a fish, visit my facebook page. Just look for Calm Reflections Photography.

Buy Local video on YouTube

I attended the Small Independent Business Round Table on April 12th a met a few more local business people. A few local business people shared ways they became creative to attract new business, such as selling lower priced affordable items, going out of their way to buy what people want with good customer service and creating a new service (boat tours to see lighthouses).

I was surprised to learn that Maryland has the highest median household income in the country, even though places like New York and Los Angeles are far richer. St. Mary's County has the second highest growth rate in the State (after Calvert County) and the youngest population. We may be spending less here, but a lot of other places are worse.

We were encouraged to put a Buy Local sticker on our car. (See my previous blog.) Here is a link to the new Buy Local video.

Southern Maryland Give Camp Volunteers

I took some photos about Southern Maryland Give Camp as a favor to my friend, Theresa. Then I wrote an article for The Bay Net to spread the word since it seemed like a worthwhile cause. They had 102 technical volunteers donate their weekend to make new websites and fix existing sites for 19 non-profit organizations. Do you have any idea how much money it saved those nonprofits? (roughly $393,000 according to Jim Pendarvis organizer of the weekend event) And the volunteers had a blast. To view Give Camp pictures and read my article visit my website special page.