Heart Ornaments....

These are my favorite ornaments. I think its because #1, my grandma gave them to me and #2 the way they catch the light and sparkle. Unfortunately many were broken this year due to the CED incident and my two year old throwing them at the fireplace :(

Big Boy birthday pics...

These are from my nephews birthday. I wish I had time to keep playing around with photoshop, but one must sleep at least a little bit. I was playing with some actions I forgot about (downloaded from the Pioneer Woman blog). Let me know what you think. I used her "Vintage" action and adjusted according to my taste, and then did the same with her "Boost" action.

Before:

After:


Before:


After:


I'll post more later...just throwing these up while I had the chance (which is seldom these days).

(Still catching up....) Pics from FMG

These are taken at "my little piece of heaven" as I like to call it and think of it. I have a membership there and we try to go every week or so. Its amazingly beautiful. There are so many things to do and see there: Sculpture parks, waterfalls, indoor tropical forest, outdoor amphitheater, huge children's garden complete with tree house, just to name a few things. Anyhow...many, many of my weekly pics are from here. Here's a few:












A cool sculpture by Jaume Plensa

Looking a little ghostlike from another view...






An awesome harvest moon that night. Pic doesn't do it justice...

Fall pics....just in time for winter....

I took these exactly a month ago, actually when I took the pic from the last post but I just never get around to posting these ones. I was also trying to take pics of my nephews for my sis, so I didn't get as many of my kids as I'd hoped. They were all a little too rambunctious that day.



































Kaedon was not incredibly cooperative.

Yeah I'm a looser with this blog so far....

Just not getting enough time these days to take enough pics let alone post them. But I will keep trying.

Here's one I took yesterday out the car window actually and finally had time to play and download to the computer today.


I ran a watercolor filter on this one, but you really can't tell that much of a difference unless you look click on it to enlarge it. I wish it came out sharper but alas, I was driving. I'm finding that I like the watercolor look for that predicament, then the sharpness isn't necessary and actually adds to the artsy look sometimes.

Sunset pics from our vacation this past weekend:

These are a few sunset pics over Lime Lake from Saturday morning. I was leaving the cabin with the kids to head out in search of the cabin/family in our group of friends serving breakfast and when we opened the door, both kids said "Wow". It was pretty sweet. I of course grabbed my camera and send the kids on their way.







More pics to come....

From last week:

I just loved the sweet feel of these with the subtle presence of my daughter in the window...


I wish I could have really captured how cute this little tree house/fort was though.

Getting started...

So for a while now I've wanted to find a place to just post pictures and explore and play with my photography endeavors. It gets so time consuming to post pictures SO many places for various people to see. I hope this blog will help keep me motivated to snap pics everyday and strive for creativity and a wider range of experience. I've been contemplating starting my own 365 (a photo a day) project for some time now. I just worry that I won't keep up with it. I've been trying without officially posting them and I do, ok...but there are definitely days I just don't have time to pull out the camera. I think the biggest thing for me is to make sure I TAKE a camera with me wherever I go. With two great cameras plus a camera phone, I shouldn't have an excuse.

So some background info on me:

My first "aha" experience that sucked me into photography and started a desire to get more creative started in 1993 on a missions trip to Israel. Obviously there was much to capture and soak in and the efforts to capture the essence of each place and experience was just a natural desire. I was borrowing a nice 35mm camera from my dad. I don't even remember the make or model, but it had a little zoom lens and that made it extra fun for me. I was mostly used to disposable or cheap 110 film cameras. (Ack, I'm feeling old). A year after Israel, I was privileged enough to take a trip sailing on the Caribbean in a 35ft Catamaran sailboat. Again, I was drawn to capture the beauty around me with a little more creativity than your average snapshot. Now...I can't say I was very *good* at it back then, and I still have far, far to go. But I've been gradually learning. My interest was re-sparked with the addition of children into my life and alas they are the main subjects in probably 75%+ of my photos now.

My newest "baby" is a Canon Digital Rebel 450D/XSi.

I was previously (and still am) using a Fuji Finepix S9100. Its a fixed lens, high end P&S with lots of features and the bonus of video function too. Until I get more lenses for the Canon, I'm still finding myself going back to the wide variety this camera has to offer. However, you can't beat the DOF and crispness the Canon offers over the P&S either.

I've taken a fair amount of photos/portraits...mostly of kids for friends and family but lately I've been more in a "nature" mode. Fall is my favorite outside "portrait" season. I'm a sucker for all the rich warm colors and Michigan is a great place for that in September and October. So we will see where this blog takes me. Hopefully it will challenge me to do more and do it better and maybe even keep some others interested in photography along the way.