Skokie Lagoons before Winter

Since I hadn't photographed anything for about a week I biked down to the

 Skokie Lagoons yesterday to get some landscape shots. The sky was 

overcast and the trees were barren, and it looked like the end of fall and

 the beginning of winter. There weren't any leaves or birds, and everything

 looked much more dead than it did a few weeks ago. A bunch of people

 were fishing though, so there was probably more life in the water.

I recently read about the "Rule of Thirds" and so I wanted to try it out 

with landscapes. The top photo turned out much bleaker than I intended

 and the log doesn't add much, but the bottom photo captures the 

barrenness of the trees well enough. 

Winnetka

Taken in November 2011