Spread Your Wings and Prepare to Fly...

...for you have become a butterfly.

Yeah, that's a line from a Mariah Carey song, I just finished watching tonight's episode of American Idol and since it's still quite early, might as well make a quick post before calling it a night.

It's my first time to join Nature Footstep's "Winged" meme, a small meme (for now) for everything that has wings (wait, does that include angels?) and is something I am thankful of seeing (thank you, Gemma Wiseman for providing a long list of memes) - now I have a home for the winged creatures I have photographed during my travels and everyday adventures.

It was April last year when I last traveled to Vigan City in the province of Ilocos Sur, and whenever possible, I do visit Baluarte, a haven for different animals. One of the places I love visiting there is the Butterfly Sanctuary (for all the obvious reasons) and this particular trip has been a blessing to me because I was able to take pictures of butterflies. I am using a "bigger" camera now, still point and shoot, but the lens was bigger than the old one I used, so it was slightly more difficult to take pictures of the butterflies as close as possible without scaring and/or distracting them. Still, having a few pictures worthy of keeping is something to treasure.

This was originally taken in color; I edited the image using GIMP using two steps: desaturate (I chose "luminosity") and an action called "Soft Effect Lite." It's the first time I used that action, another yey for me as far as using GIMP is concerned. It gives me such joy discovering new things, as well as reminiscing past memories.

Biggest joy? Updating this blog again.