Beauty, they say, is in the eye of the beholder.

But it takes a special “I” to notice it, capture it and share it with the world for posterity.

That, in a nutshell, has been the role of the photographer for decades, which has been challenged since the invention of the smartphone.

But for those truly in love with purposefully recording fleeting moments, the passion for photography has not subsided.

For Waverly’s Lisa Ellingworth, the passage of time has only motivated her love for photography more than she ever imagined.

She found that passion for creativity later in life.

In a sense, discovering it – and then acting on it with determination and dedication–came as a surprise for her.

In fact, she may have had it on the inside for many years, but didn’t have the headspace to dive into it, let alone pursue it.

When it eventually surfaced about a couple of years ago, and prodded her to focus on it, and then embrace it, Lisa knew that photography was her thing.

By that time, she and her husband, Jon, the pastor at St. John Lutheran Church, had raised their three daughters and that new chapter in life may have given her the extra impetus she needed to explore her creativity.

Lisa’s story is uplifting as it shows how one can find meaning in passionate pursuits at any stage of life and work on developing their gifts.

For most of her career, Lisa had worked in floral design, working in a dozen flower shops over the past 30 years.

She first started in flower delivery as a high school student, working through a co-op class at what was then Anthony’s Biet Shyben on Main Street in her hometown of Morton, Illinois, a town comparable to Waverly in its midwestern feel and size.

“I needed a job and that lady needed help and she hired me and I walked to school from the flower shop.”

Lisa graduated from Morton High School in 1986, and a month later, with the money from her flower delivery job, she bought an orange 1972 Volkswagen Beetle.

“I loved the color,” she said.

She loved working with flowers, so in 1989 she enrolled at the American Floral Arts School in Chicago to learn more about how to process fresh flowers and how to arrange them in compelling designs.

In between classes, Lisa worked at flower shops in the area, and for two years, even ran her own business out of her house called, “As you like it.”

She mainly did flower arrangements for weddings, Christmas and home decorations, but in 1998 when her husband, Jon, wanted to go to seminary school, she put her business on hold, and the family headed to Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana, so Jon could become an ordained pastor.

Twenty-four years later, in the summer of 2022, Lisa discovered the photography program at Hawkeye Community College and eventually returned to school, but with a new mission: to glean more information about photography.

“I never had any intention of graduating,” she said.

But when one of her professors, Doug Benton, advised her to complete the program because the courses are sequenced and therefore she would learn a lot, she listened.

So she enrolled full time in the fall of 2022, and her schooling in the art of photography began.

Reflecting on her decision, just as she is about to deliver the commencement address at her graduation in May, as one of the two commencement speakers, Lisa said that in making it and in becoming a non traditional student, she looked up to her mother, Shelby, as inspiration. Shelby graduated from nursing school the same year Lisa graduated from high school, achieving a lifelong dream.

That connection is more visible to Lisa in retrospect, as at the time she didn’t realize the challenges her mother had overcome to return to school after a long hiatus.

Why photography?

About eight months prior to enrolling at Hawkeye, Lisa had started taking online photography classes from an Iowa photographer, Mark Stoltenberg.

“I started learning a lot and I wanted to learn more,” she said.

In the process, she gained enough confidence to enter a few contests.

Affirmation came first from the Hawkeye Student Art Show last spring. For it, she submitted an image called “Moon in Progress”, a timelapse of the moon she had taken on Feb. 5, 2023 in Ames, where she had gone to visit her oldest daughter, Ada.

“I just knew when the moon rose and there was no cloud cover, it was the perfect conditions,” she said.

Lisa set up her tripod and camera and took shots every 90 seconds of the full moon as it rose. Then she blended the images in Photoshop.

The outcome of that work, which she called “Moon in Progress,” placed second in the show, and was purchased by the school, quite the honor.

“Moon in Progress” also caught the eye of the judges at the Iowa State Fair in August, where it placed second in a category called “Anything Goes.”

Lisa then entered the Iconic Iowa photography contest hosted by PBS, which is part of the Iconic America series.

At the Waverly Library, where the local pictures were displayed in August, another image Lisa had taken, this one of a barn by the Waverly Airport, was voted the most iconic. It was also picked as cover of the book, “Iconic Iowa Snapshots by Iowans,” which will be used as a fundraiser for Iowa PBS station.

Another image she took that summer, this one of Waverly Cruise Night, ended up as the cover of the Waverly Chamber of Commerce Visitors Guide. The popular event in the summer draws classic car lovers up and down Bremer Avenue for good times every fourth Thursday of the summer months.

“My intention was to capture the essence of the car cruise,” she said.

Meanwhile, all these successes have boosted Lisa’s confidence, and two weeks ago, she registered her own business called Wandering Ivy, with a tagline, “The go-to photographer who comes to you.”

The name comes from what photographers like to do, i.e. “wander” and the word Ivy is a reference to a nickname her old friends know her by. She will focus on portraiture and fine art photography.

“I had affirmation, what I was loving to do was being affirmed by others,” she said. “I have no hesitation about moving forward as a new business owner, I look forward to creating beautiful portraits of seniors and families.”