An Evening of Pitching and Putting

Back in mid-August, we had a nice evening of pitching and putting in the backyard with some of the grandchildren.  This type of thing is always a great opportunity for capturing photos of the grandkids so, naturally, I had a couple of cameras and a few lenses on hand.  While they played, I kept moving around trying to capture the best angles.  

Shooting photos of kids means getting down on my knees or crouching or sitting on the ground but my knees have been painful and swollen since my first bout with COVID-19 so this little informal photo shoot was a bit painful.  Even if I sit on the ground, getting down onto the ground and getting up again is painful.  Kneeling or crouching, however, will put me back on crutches again so I always avoid those two positions.  Still, I refused to resort to shooting photos of kids while looking down on them.  Kids should always be photographed down at their level. 

It was beginning to get dark as the sun set behind the trees but we still had some sun shining through breaks in the trees.  I kept trying to capture photos when the kids were being illuminated by these narrow beams of golden sunlight.

On this particular Sunday evening, Liza, Lukey, Kenzie and Ace were at our house for dinner and it was a beautiful evening for some golf in the backyard on the new putting green.  For a short while, Gee and I had Ace here by himself so I was able to capture a few photos of him playing golf by himself.  I also captured some photos of our gardens on the way back to the putting green.

If I remember correctly, Liza was dropping Lukey and Kenzie here to stay with Gee and me for a few days.  They came for dinner and then Liza and Ace headed back home while Lukey and Kenzie stayed with Gee and Papa.  

It is always pretty buggy at the far back end of our property where the putting green is located and this evening was no different.  The photos don't really capture that but the mosquitoes and flies were still quite active through August.  Labor Day weekend was finally the first weekend that was beautiful and relatively mosquito-free.  So, on this evening, we played in the backyard just long enough to have some fun and get a few good photos.  First, though, are a few photos of the short walk back to the putting green...

Ace got a bit wet playing with the water pump.  He then carried around a garden hose nozzle for the remainder of the evening.  He brought the nozzle back to the putting green and then traded the nozzle for a little toddler-sized golf club...

We had to keep a close eye on Ace because he was definitely more interested in eating the golf ball than putting it into the hole...

Lukey practiced his pitching for a bit...

...and then, finished up each pitch or chip with putting...

As I write this blog entry, I'm just coming off a few exceptionally bad health days.  A few of these days were the worst I've felt in quite a while.  I was experiencing instantaneous dizzy spells, almost passing out, nausea, stomach cramps, and a lot of time spent in the bathroom.  Generally, I felt miserable.  I felt so lousy that I even took another COVID test (which is almost pointless because they are so consistently inaccurate).  It took a few days of emergency medications in addition to all my usual doses of medications to stabilize my health.  And, taking emergency medications means days of grogginess too.  Tonight I was finally feeling well enough to put together this blog entry with a few photos.  I'll proof-read this blog entry in the morning and then publish it.  

Seeing these photos again has been a nice reminder of a nice summer evening spent with Liza and three of the grandchildren.