The prompt was “hot & cold” this week. I wasn’t quite sure how to capture both, so Nancy suggested we each take one word. Mine was hot and her’s was cold. It took quite a few shots of the grill before I got the flame I wanted. It’s quite the opposite of the goodies in her freezer!
Mel posted a challenge of sorts on her blog today. Take the 8th photo from the 8th folder and see what it is. I wasn’t particularly excited by this image. It was taken on August 23, 2008 on a hike on part of the Finger Lakes Trail. I suppose I was interested in the texture of the image.
But two images down was one of my favorite photos of the day so I’ll post it too.
For this image I held my point and shoot down below the flower and shot up. I think I took three or four photos, but this is the only one I left in the folder.
I’ve spent several days celebrating my birthday. When you get older, that’s a very good thing!!! And I’m not really done yet since I’ll be celebrating with one of my best friends on Wednesday. The best gift I got was having Sarah and Adam here this week. We had a lovely time, and a big family get-together on Thursday night with lots of food and a beautiful birthday cake.
The icing appears a bit more blue than lilac in the photograph, but lilac it was to go with the annual Lilac Festival in Highland Park this week and the beautiful flowers Tracy sent me.
Last night we had dinner with our book group and when I got home I had an email from Katie telling me to check the Making Memories blog. What a surprise! I was one of three winners of a lovely package of new product just out by Making Memories.
Last month I won another fabulous prize from Moxie Fab World. The Hello, Sunshine papers from lily bee are just so bright and cheerful. I know I’ll have a lot of fun using them. I’m feeling very lucky these days.
Today Sarah was off leading a retreat in Canandaigua and Matt was working all day so Tracy and I drove to Ithaca. It was a beautiful day for a road trip and we visited some of our favorite places, starting with the Ithaca Farmer’s Market.
We bought quite a few varieties of herbs and a few tomato plants from this stand for our garden. And some rhubarb for rhubarb coffee cake—a favorite of everyone here.
But the market has more than just fruits, vegetables, and plants. There are food and bakery stands. I had a berry scone.
There are pottery stalls, weaving stalls, basketry stalls, and stalls selling homemade food products.
I love the packaging for this Finger Lakes Popcorn!
From there we drove to the Cornell Plantations. I was pretty sure the azaleas and rhododendrons would be in bloom and I wasn’t disappointed.
The dogwoods were beautiful too.
And I was glad to find these beautiful blue flowers for a photography challenge.
On our way back to campus this deer appeared out of the woods and was happy to pose for a photo. We’ve never seen a deer marked quite like this one. He has a neck band and two ear tags.
Our next stop was the book store on campus. I got a new fleece and Matt wanted a set of license plate holders. The Cornell campus is just beautiful.
Our last stop in Ithaca was one of our favorite restaurants. Matt found it when he was there, and the food is always superb.
We did a little shopping at the Waterloo Outlets on the way home and were here by dinner time.
Sarah just arrived home from her retreat which went very well, and tomorrow should be a much quieter day.
Rinda posted some questions about wildflower shots on her blog. Last summer I had the same problems with fields of wildflowers that she had this weekend. The flowers were beautiful, but I couldn’t capture the overall look of it. Individual flower shots were more successful. (Also true for Rinda who has a beautiful shot on her blog.) I remember reading up on it when I got home, and today I looked in two of my “go-to” photography books (Brian Peterson’s Digital Photography Field Guide & Tom Ang’s How To Photography Absolutely Everything) to see what I could find. Neither book had great explanations, but I could tell from looking at the photos that they were taken either at ground level or just above. My neighbor’s front yard is filled with dandelions and wildflowers so I went over to see what I could do. I’m not totally pleased with the outcome, but they are certainly better than anything I took last summer. For the first two photos, I was laying on my stomach at the same level as the flowers. I’m not sure why I couldn’t get more of the flowers in sharp focus. I tried changing my aperture, but it made very little difference.
The next two I took on my knees looking down on top of the flowers. I prefer these shots.
I’d welcome any ideas you have for taking this kind of shot.
One of my volunteer jobs for the past two years has been to chair the Youth Ministry Committee at my church. This is my second round at this post, and it has been quite different since I no longer have kids in the program. The new Youth Director and I have become quite good friends, and when she said she was going on a scouting trip to check out sites for the upcoming Mission and Music trip for youth in June, I volunteered to come along. We had a fabulous day. It was warm and sunny, and we spent the better part of the day at two beautiful lakes: Owasco Lake in Auburn and Skaneateles Lake in Skaneateles. The only other time I’ve been to Auburn was this winter to visit the Seward House and Tiffany Chapel. (It’s the second page on this post where I was catching up with my Christmas Journal.) I had no idea there were such beautiful parks there as well.
Emerson Park on Owasco Lake:
Jane and I were surprised (but pleased) to see this memorial to the women who fought in WW II.
On our way out of town we found a second park and these cute ducks were willing to have their picture taken. I love the markings on the female. Sometimes the females are so dull, but not this one.
And in Skaneateles:
We had a fabulous lunch at the Bluewater Grill: scallop and corn chowder with a grilled smoked turkey and asparagus panini. They were perfect together and just delicious.
The Episcopal church sits right on the lake. It’s a beautiful building.
The red doors were my favorite.
Our kids will be staying at the Presbyterian church across the street. The sanctuary is stunning. The afternoon sun was streaming through their stained glass windows.
I especially liked this one.
Skaneatlees has wonderful shops as well, so after lunch we spent some time browsing (and buying). I was too interested in the shopping to remember to take photos!
I’ve been organizing both in my study and on the computer today, and finally got the photos I’ve taken for Picture Spring edited, posted, and printed for my album. I’m still missing photos for three prompts: “A Heart-shaped World,” “New Point of View,” and “Flirting with Flare.” I actually took photos for two of those prompts but want to redo them. Finding a heart shape in nature is proving a bit challenging. I should go look at the gallery and see what others have found. So here are the photos and prompts I uploaded today:
April 9: Everyday Beauty This one had me stumped for some time, but when I was sweeping the kitchen floor recently, I saw this. I love my red kitchen chairs.
April 16: Out of the Shadows
April 17: Punchy Patterns (About the only punchy patterns I own are my Vera Bradley purses. This is my newest one which makes me very happy.)
April 18: Appreciation–the grass at your feet
April 19: Hidden Messages–this is hardly hidden. It’s hanging on my inspiration board over my desk. I love the “Keep calm and carry on” message and design and this is a similar design. The message is a good one to remember.
April 21: Daily Rounds I took several photos for this one, but decided on the balls I saw at a flea market.
April 22: Burst of Color Hard to beat these lively tulips. I wish they were in my yard, but I found them in the park.
It was another beautiful day here, but the forecast is quite dreary so I decided I’d better get to Highland Park to see the magnolias. I was also looking for some shots to meet the prompts for Picture Spring. We live just a block from Highland Park which was designed by the famous Fredrick Law Olmstead. It is always beautiful, but never more beautiful than in the spring time.
These trees are pretty, but the real prize today were the magnolias. As a group they aren’t particularly lovely as some are already past their prime and some have yet to bloom. Our strange weather pattern this year must account for some of that. I took my Tamron 28-300mm lens with me today. Of the three lens I own, it works the best for macro shots. Some day I would love to have a good dedicated macro lens. But I was pretty pleased with the shots I got today, and had some more fun with the new Pioneer Woman actions.
Nothing done here but a little sharpening.
On this shot I used the Colorize action and reduced to opacity to about 50%.
I ran the Fresh Color action on this one.
This is the Seventies action. It’s really been a lot of fun playing around with these.
The Sunshine action.
Vintage.
Fresh Color.
This is for Picture Spring, the Awakening prompt for April 12. I ran the Colorize action again on this one.
And for today’s prompt: a soft focus. Sadly, my favorite shots don’t match a prompt.
Sorry to overdose you on magnolias, but they are short-lived!
Two of my friends and I have birthdays within six weeks of one another. We decided to celebrate by taking a road trip on Saturday. We drove down the west side of Cayuga Lake, stopped at the Ithaca Farmer’s Market (no great photos), and went on to Aurora. We had lunch at Pumpkin Hill and then visited the shop, grounds, and home at MacKenzie Childs.
Pumpkin Hill is a delightful restaurant.
The inside.
The food is wonderful, and there are so many special touches. Here are the menus.
Karen’s salad came in a colander.
The dessert menu comes on an old rolling pin.
Another group of women were hosting a surprise birthday party. The table and the favors were really lovely.
I’d never been to the MacKenzie Childs Estate. Everything about it is beautiful. I love their products, although they are a bit expensive for my budget.
The shop.
And some photos of the beautiful setting for this place.
And one of the beautiful flowering trees. As you can see, it was a picture-perfect day!
I’ve been working on the last three prompts for Think Spring. The first one for April 6th is one of my all-time least favorite “assignments:” a self-portrait. Tracy gave me a remote controller for my RebelXsi for Christmas so really, I have no excuse. I put the camera on my gorilla pod at one end of the dining room table and sat at the other end. I’m relatively satisfied with the photo, and did some photo editing techniques I learned in Jessica Sprague’s Wacom Tablet course.
The prompt for April 7th was pastels. I really wanted some Easter M&Ms, but couldn’t find any. I settled on some malted chocolate balls.
Then I saw a bottle of Papertrey Ink buttons sitting right in front of me so I scattered them for a photo.
The Pioneer Woman’s actions have just been converted for PSE. I got them uploaded this week so I spent some time playing with them. Here’s the Soft & Faded action.
And the Colorize action:
Today’s prompt was to capture the sparkle of spring. It rained last night, and I found water droplets hanging from leaves on our holly bush. I quickly took a couple of photos before I left for my volunteer job. Unfortunately, I took them quickly and wasn’t happy with the focus on any of them. Tonight at dinner, Matt and I were talking about it. He suggested taking a photo of some water droplets in our old washer tub in the basement. The photo certainly doesn’t qualify for the “sparkle of spring” prompt, but it was fun to do. We’re supposed to get rain again tonight so perhaps tomorrow I will have another chance outside. (Of course to get sparkle, we will also need sunshine. That may take a couple of days if the mete0rologists are correct.)
And the Sephia action from Pioneer Woman:
One of the things I’m enjoying about this class is taking the time to be more observant. Today’s prompt was to get down on ground level and take a photo. I’ve spent a lot more time in our yard this week, and each day new flowers have burst into bloom. I’m seeing them when they are so fresh and new. I’m sure I’ve missed seeing any of it in previous years. Here’s today’s shot of just opened primroses, the first flowers (always) in my perennial bed.
Since I do my Weekly Gratitude pages on Saturdays, I needed to do three when we got back from vacation.
They were all easy to do.
Happy Easter! We had a simply lovely day–a fabulous Easter service and then family dinner with Tracy’s family in Hemlock. The food was wonderful, and it’s always good to have time to catch up with the family.
Today’s prompt was “look up.” Our sky wasn’t very interesting today, but as we went to the car to leave for Hemlock I took this shot of our budding tree. Tonight I decided to play around with a black & white version, but ended up liking the “antique” effect in iPhoto which I then enhanced a bit in PSE. I like the blue sky the best, but it’s fun to play around.
Today’s prompt was to take thirty steps outside and photograph what you found. I found lots more to photograph than I expected. This is the diptych I posted on BPS for class. We’ve never seen our helleborus bloom before. Probably it’s because it’s not warm enough to spend any time outside. Today we even got yard work done that usually is done in mid-May. Sadly, the blooms of the helleborus face downward, but when you turn them over they are just beautiful.
Right next to the helleborus is a brick walk and the pretty blue flowers are popping up all over it.
Walking toward the front yard, are the daffodils. In just one day they’ve gone from bud to full flower.
When we arrived home Wednesday night there were few signs of spring. In just three days, there’s been a wonderful transformation!
It was another amazingly hot day. The thermometer outside our bedroom window registered 90° as we got ready to go out to dinner. We met friends at a lovely restaurant on Consesus Lake and sat outside on the patio. It was just like summer, except for the bare trees. That won’t last long if this keeps up. Our daffodils went from tight buds to full flower in just one day. When I drove past Highland Park this morning you could see the lilacs beginning to bud. The annual Lilac Festival doesn’t begin until May 14th this year, so I’m sure the festival organizers are praying this heat wave will be short-lived. I, on the other hand, am perfectly happy with the warm weather. It was very warm, but certainly did not feel like 90°.
Today’s prompt for Think Spring was to capture the start of your day. I took several different photos, but finally settled on this one of my Eggbeater omelet and a catalog I was browsing while I ate. Tracey Clark took her photo with her wide-angle lens so I got mine out. It hasn’t been on the camera since last summer. It’s good to try new things.
I decided to enroll in Tracey Clark’s Think Spring class at BPS. I’m already glad I did. I really needed some motivation after the trip to take photos, and the inspiration in the class gallery is wonderful. Each day we’ll be getting an email with a photography prompt. Today’s was “Beginnings.” We don’t have much to show for the beginning of spring in our yard, but these lovely little purple flowers magically appear year after year.
