Lake Mattamuskeet is kind of a oddity. Situated on the Eastern Coast of North Carolina, it is 18 miles wide, and 7 miles long, but only averages like, 3 feet deep. This is the largest natural lake in North Carolina. This girl from Wisconsin finds this mystifying, as all of our likes are glacial in origin, deeper, and much more plentiful.

Speaking of the origins, nobody knows exactly WHERE this lake came from? Some people think it comes from old whale nesting sites, others say it came from meteorite shrapnel.  Why not dinosaurs? I was a huge dinosaur freak as a kid, and they need nesting sites too… well, if Land Before Time is any indication of reality.

Yea, why couldn’t it be caused by dinosaurs.

This was my first piece on 9 x 12″  pastel paper (white), and I used the site that is good for multiple layers, as well as my new hard chalk and pastel pencils.  I will say that I am not overly impressed with the results. It doesn’t work for how I do pastel (being as sparing as possible. So, this makes the picture look grainy if they zoom in, especially for the dark colors.  I could just be off, since I did this in a more experimental page (this is for a science project).

The lake is home to a wildlife sanctuary, and the island is a critical nesting site to several migratory species. It is also one of the most photographed items at the lake.

This is a gorgeous sunrise over the lake.

What I find to be weird though, the light colors look amazing, and the dark colors are weird and stipply. I am posting this to show that not everything works how I want it to.