God is...

Before me,
Even as behind,
God is,
And all is well...
~Whittier

pure joy...

This was part of MY Saturday...

I hope yours was at least 1/8 this good!

~ wonder ~

If a child is to keep alive his inborn

sense of wonder...
he needs the companionship
of at least one adult who can share it,
rediscovering with him the joy,
excitement, and mystery
of the world we live in.

~Rachel Carson

~excitement~

~ pure joy ~

other captured creatures...

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, we did manage to capture a few non-lobster creatures while we were trying to catch the quick and elusive legal-size lobsters. I, of course, had my camera with me, and I had to photograph the other creatures we netted as well.

Please note, none of these creatures were harmed in any way. They were merely dragged from their evening swims up onto the dock, shot (ok, photographed) by me, perhaps poked and petted a bit, and then sent back into the ocean on their merry way. I felt like it was an aquatic version of Wild Kingdom -- Marlin Perkins would have been delighted, I think! (ah, I'm probably dating myself here, but we watched that show every Sunday evening when I was a little kid)

And so, here, for your viewing pleasure, I introduce a few Catalina Island ocean creatures....

the ever-present Calico Bass...

our glass bottom boat tour guides say he can be recognized by his "cheap striped sportcoat".

(I caught this one, and though he looks a bit dead, he was perfectly active and fine! I think he was playing possum!)

...oh my goodness! what the heck is that?!?!?

here it is up-close-and-personal...

it's a spider crab.

These are slow-moving and non-aggressive, and I found it quite delightful. I think this one may be old, as I see it has lost one of its back legs and a couple of "toes." It seemed perfectly fine with me touching it and even picking it up. These crabs have hook-shaped hairs on their backs that attract the growth of algae which is used as camoflage.

I see it is a beautiful sky blue color underneath the algae camoflage.

And look at those red toes!

...and this is because I just HAD to pick it up!

(I had the gloves on for the lobster-grabbing.)

See how big it is!!

It was quite heavy, too!

Last, but definitely not least, was my very favorite sea creature we caught--

which, at first, we thought was a sea slug...

it's a sea hare !

I thought this was so cute! It was blobby and squishy and soft with a velvety soft wet skin. A boy who was there when this was brought up said, "It feels like pudding!" That was a most accurate description of the feel of it! If you look closely at its skin, you can see a lovely brown spotted pattern with reddish-pink through it as well. It really was strange and wonderful! (I had seen one of these at our local aquarium, but this one was at least five times bigger than the one they let us touch.)I hope you enjoyed this little "tour of the sea" with me!
I do so love to see the amazing creatures God has made...
so very many strange and delightful and colorful and wild!
I'm glad He's so very creative!!

wild (weird?) and wonderful...

On my recent trip to the Central coast of California, we stopped at one of my very favorite places--a little town called Cambria. Actually, my favorite part of Cambria is Moonstone Beach. It is a wonderful stretch of beach with continuous wave song and several miles of boardwalk as well as the beach itself to walk on. The sand is not really even sand but bazillions (I don't know a higher number!) of teeny tiny stones. The beach has been a rock collector's, treasure hunter's dream for me! Most of the stones are rounded and smooth, unlike any other place I've found, and there are quite wonderful colors --but with a predominance of glorious jade-green colored stones.

This time, however, was quite different. As with most beaches, the beach itself can change drastically from visit to visit --shape, height of tide, condition of the beach. This time the great areas of larger stones which usually keep me occupied for hours (as I sit in the middle of a pile and dig through the layers looking for special and unique stones) were not there. The beach was mostly just the teeny tiny "sand" stones.

We did, however, get to see something a bit wild and weird and, I thought, quite wonderful...

Hmmmmm... Check these out! There were many, many of these little objects strewn across the beach right at the water line where the waves had dropped them.
Animal? Vegetable? Mineral? The sun was striking them so that they appeared to be glowing from within. They were quite beautiful, and I liked to imagine that they were many glowing moonstones on the beach.

But, no... Mineral, they were not. And, upon closer look and a bit of curious poking, I determined that neither were they Vegetable...

I had seen these things before, but not in such abundance. They actually are Animal... a type of jellyfish. They do not have tentacles, and I believe they are a much less developed jelly (a lower life form) than what we're used to seeing.
If you poke them (which, I, of course, HAD to do!), they are very firm, like a piece of hard but pliable rubber. They're not gooey or slimey but smooth and cool. And, if you look closely at them, they've got lovely striations running through them... (the following two and the flower one you can double click on and look at them up really close! they're really quite amazing!!)

(you can also see what I was talking about in regards to the "sand" on this beach)

I think the one below looks sort of like a seashell in shape...

And this one was very cool! It was very 3dimensional and looked sort of like a big blobby bulbous flower of some sort! It even has a few streaks of a pinkish-purple color running through it. (unfortunately, Blogger is turning some of my photos; this one and the following one are sideways)

For all you Heart lovers and seekers, check this out... (imagine it turned 90degrees counter clockwise!)....

And the final one ... obviously a treasure just for ME!!.... (ok, I'll share it with you!)

God has such a great sense of humor, don't you think?! Not only does He create such wild and weird stuff, He dredges it up from the deep, tosses it onto the beach, and gives us a little art show with it! And wraps it all up with LOVE.... Ah, He does delight my heart...

colors and creatures...

I have posted far too many pictures today, so I shall keep mostly silent and let them speak for themselves.... (Blogger has been messing with the rotation of some of my photos, so a few of the bottom ones may seem sideways...because they are!)

Here's to a thousand (0r more) words about the beauty of the beach I reveled in Sunday...

Amazing colors....

...this photo below was the view if you looked away from the ocean for a moment or two...

....brilliant greens of sea moss on the rocks (low tide allowed them to be seen! and in my case, climbed upon!)...

...and look at the textures of this wavy green 'hair'...

...a wonderfully-colorful rock (some sort of green growth on it)

...and a lovely sample of sea weed...

...and now for the creatures...

I love the way this bird is splashing along...

...and now, my very favorites of the day... the anemones...
first a blue-tipped one...

and a greenish one...

look at the long body on this one below! It has tried to camoflage itself a bit by sticking shells to its body! and, if you look closely, you can see that it is bright green in the center with pink tips on its tentacles! talk about your preppy sea anemone! (double clicking on the blue and pink-tipped ones will open them up to see the details)

another blue-tipped one...

Here is one that has closed up because I just had to poke it with my finger! It, too, has tried to disguise itself with shells...

And, the piece de resistance...

my favorite of all--

green with pink tips!!

Let us end the colors and creatures tour with...

a man and his dog...

land creatures enjoying the beach...