Day 95 - 7/14/07

Today I decided to photograph a little visitor we had on the front of our house this afternoon.

Day 94 - 7/13/07

Back to frustration with DOF for me!! I just don't know what I'm doing wrong, and I can't find my camera manual to look for ways to adjust anything else.

above: -1.7EV, F8.0, ISO 200

above: -2.0EV, F5.0, ISO 200

Day 93 - 7/12/07

I think I might have figured out part of my DOF problem. The auto-focus on the camera was set on "metering" - whatever that means. I switched it to "spot" and was able to get these two shots.

Settings for above photo: 0EV, F3.7, ISO 200

Settings for above photo: 0EV, F8.0, ISO 200

Day 92 - 7/11/07

All of these were taken within 15 minutes of each other. I am posting them in the order the pictures were taken, and they are all SOOC.

There was a storm front moving through last night and these clouds were just amazing - to me at least.

I love clouds, so I am always glad when there are neat cloud formations to photograph.

Day 91 - 7/10/07

Giving up on DOF for today. Just way too frustrated with it at the moment.

I decided to post a silly picture of DH & I today. This was taken on Saturday at my cousin's wedding. I had asked my sister to take a picture of us, and it's always hard to get DH to settle down and take a nice picture. We were actually about to kiss - if she'd have snapped a second or two later she'd have gotten us kissing.

We had tried to find someplace with less going on in the background (I didn't want to be in front of the window) but it was a very small room and there really was no other option.

Day 90 - 7/9/07

We went to a baseball game yesterday as part of my sister's birthday. One of the first things that Haleigh wanted to do was get her face painted. So her dad took her to have it done. The artist did a great job, but I am always amazed when I see face paint so close to a child's eyes.

Plus it was quite hot and humid and the paint never fully dried, so every time she touched her face it smeared a little. Top that off with her getting upset enough to cry a few times, and by the time we left this butterfly wasn't nearly so fancy.

Day 89 - 7/8/07

Birthday candles - yum!

It was my sister's 26th birthday today. We had a very full, busy day. After all of that, we went back to the house for cake and ice cream. After the candles are blown out, they have to be licked clean of frosting!

Haleigh was only too happy to help.

Day 88 - 7/7/07

One of my cousins got married today. There are always a ton of photos to take at a wedding, and unless the conditions are perfect, it's hard to get a great photo.

This one is a little blurry, but the lighting made it very difficult to get one that WASN'T blurry during the ceremony.

Day 87 - 7/6/07

I made this baseball dress for Haleigh to wear to games. It's very cute, if I do say so myself. The bloomers are made out of two bandanas, and actually only the ruffles are visible when she wears the outfit. I just wanted them to show for the picture, so I pinned them to the dress kinda low.


Below: closer view of the fabric used for the dress.

Day 83 - 7/2/07

Here's what I did today: I cut my hair!

I had been wanting to cut my hair for a while and today I did it. I waited longer than I usually would have after making such a decision, because my SIL had requested that I have long hair for her wedding. She wanted all of us girls to be able to have updos for the wedding.

I'm donating the braid to Locks of Love.

Day 81 - 6/30/07

A dress I made to sell.

It's a navy blue dress, and since I am a Detroit Tigers fan, I firmly believe that navy and orange go very well together. So, I added orange rick rack to the collar and hem of the dress.

Sorry about the busy background - I didn't even think about that until just now.

Day 80 - 6/29/07

Another Sunset. They're just too good to skip taking pictures of them!

This one was a little later, and is therefore slightly darker, than yesterday's.

Day 79 - 6/28/07

We have had some AMAZING sunsets lately.

Day 76 - 6/25/07

Aunt Kittie.

She had surgery today to remove her stomach and spleen because she has stomach cancer. To say that I am worried is an understatement.

Day 75 - 6/24/07

My mum's aunt & uncle celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary this year. Their anniversary was June 15. The celebration was today.

Not only is Black & White one of the themes for this week, I wanted a few in B&W for the vintage feel of it - all of their wedding photos are in B&W.

This is Uncle Gary & Aunt Kittie, right before they began cutting the cake.

Day 74 - 6/23/07

To quote DH: "Budweiser in the making."

This is a field of barley. It is very close to being ready to harvest. Since barley hops are used to brew beer, he's not all that far off in his statement.

We pass this field nearly every day on our way to and from town. This year it is going to be ready much earlier than it usually would be, because we have had a hot, dry spring.

Day 71 - 6/20/07

For this one I used an automatic setting on my camera for beach scenes. It is set up so that the water still looks blue and the sky and water do not moosh into each other. I think it came out really pretty. The water looks better on the screen than it did in real life!

Here's what this automatic setting amounts to:
-0.7 EV, ISO 64, F4.0, and something I'm not sure of at 500 (shutter speed, maybe?).

I really need to pull out my camera manual and find out what that setting is.

Day 70 - 6/19/07

The water was splashing in really interesting patterns when I decided to take the photo, but by the time I actually took it, the water had settled down and was just sort of rolling around the rocks.

I did get one little bitty splash though. Yay for my little bitty splash.

I don't remember if I used an automatic camera setting for this one or not, but here are the stats:
-0.7 EV, ISO 64, F4.0, unknown setting 250.
Chances are good I was in my beach setting, since the EV, ISO, and F are all the same as my other beach photos.

Day 69 - 6/18/07

My future SIL walking her dog, Goliath.

I think she has said that Goliath is a Siberian Husky, but he looks more like an Alaskan Malamute to me. For one thing, he's got 2 brown eyes, and most Huskies have 2 blue eyes - it's rare for a Husky to have 2 brown eyes, although one brown and one blue are fairly common. For another, he's bigger than your average Husky, and Mals are often mistaken for large Huskies.

But, since Goliath is Laura's dog, I'll take her word for it that he's a Husky.

Day 68 - 6/17/07

I just love this photo.

My niece Haleigh playing with the door in our hotel room. It actually connected two rooms, but it also fit perfectly to create a door for the little closet that she is standing in. It didn't latch as a closet door, simply covered the opening.

Day 67 - 6/16/07

Cheating a little since I did not take this photo, I am IN this photo (and I'll be using these wedding photos most of this week, so cheating a little in that respect also). I'm on the far left.

One of the hazards of being in a wedding is that you don't get to take any photos during the wedding or the festivities afterwards.

It was, however, taken with my camera, by DH's aunt. She did very well considering that I had to show her how to turn the camera on, focus, and snap the photos.

When I told her to just shoot in auto mode, she looked at me like I had suddenly sprouted an extra head. So I made sure the camera was set on auto and showed her what button to push, then told her she was all set. At that point I looked up and realized that I was about to be late for my entrance, so I grabbed my bouquet and made a run for it!

Day 66 - 6/15/07

Rehearsal kiddos.

These were the children in the wedding. For reasons unknown to me, Austin (the older boy) was called a "Junior Groomsman" although IMO he is much too young (5 years old) for that designation. The other two kids are both two years old, and they were the Ring Bearer (Jake) and Flower Girl (Kayden).

I wonder if they thought it would be odd to have two ring bearers and only one flower girl?

I didn't think to ask.

Here's another as they passed by me. For the rehearsal, I was able to carry my camera with me. I get a kick out of the fact that it looks as if Jake has completely disappeared, although you can just see his little bare feet and even though it looks as if Austin is swinging a free hand, that is actually Jake's hand and arm. Austin did an excellent job of holding both of their hands until he was told to let go.

Both of the little ones did much better at the rehearsal than they did at the ceremony, but that's to be expected when they're that young.

Day 65 - 6/14/07

For this one I was playing with the different manual settings on my camera, seeing what I could get to come out. I actually think I did pretty well.

This little cutie is named Hailey.

I took this is A mode (aperture priority), which is my current favorite mode to use. The other settings were ISO 64, F6.3, -1.7EV. No flash, and something is set at 640 but I can't quite figure out what that might be (sorry, I can fiddle with it and set it to look pretty, but I can't tell you what all of my functions are!)

Day 61 - 6/10/07

My cousin Emil and his little sister, Susan. She wanted him to come climb a tree with her and he wanted to sit there and talk with his guests. Today was his graduation open house/going away party.

Emil graduated from high school on June 3. On June 21, he will head off to Missouri to enter Basic Training for the Army. After Basic Training, he will have another year or so of training for his specialty: Combat Medic.

We are all very proud of him - our family has a long military history and we are proud to have it continue. That doesn't stop us from worrying about him - there is a war on, after all.

Day 53 - 6/2/07

What happens when the action is done:


The lighting on this one is a little weird because I took it with no flash. I didn't want to use the flash or turn on any additional lights because I didn't want to wake her up. The more I look at it though, the more I like it because it has something of a dreamy look to it.

Day 52 - 6/1/07

According to my favorite three-year-old, keychain flashlights are so cool that they can lock and unlock cars. She loved this light on my keychain (we had to stop her from shining it towards people because she inevitably hit others in the eye with the light) and every time we went out to get in the car, she wanted to hold the keys to unlock it, and she always did it with this pink flashlight. Then, when we got out of the car, she had to lock it, again with the flashlight. Her thought was that the light had to come on to make it work, since our car doesn't beep like hers does.

(Truth be told, we don't lock that car, which is why she never realized that she wasn't really unlocking or locking it)

Day 51 - 5/31/07

For today's "action" shot: SLIDING.

This is a photo of my niece at the park. She just loved the slides. It was tricky to time it so I'd get her and not an empty slide because the slide was enclosed and she shot down it so fast that she nearly came right off the end every time.

Day 45 - 5/25/07

In Michigan, Spring means that the birds come back!

I took this one of a bird (maybe a female Blue Jay?) that was sitting on our cable wire when I came home from work. As I got out of the car I heard some cheeping chatter, and I looked up to see her sitting there. I went into the house and got my camera, and was pleasantly surprised to see her still there when I came back to the door. Not willing to push my luck, I took this through the door. As I was trying to set up for a second shot, she flew away - it's almost as if she was saying, "One's enough!"

Day 41- 5/21/07

Spring means flowers! These grow in our lawn if we let it go more than a week without cutting it. Whether we can do that without the grass getting too tall and our landlord complaining about it depends a lot on the weather.

Day 40 - 5/20/07

This is a project that I am making for a friend's new baby. I let myself get a little behind though - the baby was born at the end of March. And, since she lives in Australia, it's going to take a little while to get to her anyway.

The sad thing is, I had it completely finished except for the feet and the personalization before the baby was born - it's taken me this long to get the feet on it because I suddenly got very busy in April & May!

Day 37 - 5/17/07

Today my photo is fairly boring. It is within the liquid theme though.

Today it's just my bottle of water. The big deal about it is that I am proud of myself for drinking this instead of soda - a big downfall of mine.

I played around with it a little bit just to make it seem a little more interesting (to myself, anyway).

Day 36 - 5/16/07

I didn't quite get the shot I wanted for this picture, but I did get one that was still good. To get what I wanted, I would have needed to be working without a flash, but when I turned the flash off the entire thing was too dark. What I really liked about it was when I saw the light from the window coming through the drink, the color was really neat. As it is, my picture is more of condensation than anything else.


It still came out okay, it just wasn't 100% what I wanted it to be. It was hard to focus as well, because I was zooming in so much. I had to focus on the edge of the glass to get the entire thing to sharpen up.

Day 35 - 5/15/07

Bubbles!!

I was actually trying to get a picture of the water as it flowed in to the washing machine (it's laundry day), but none of those turned out. The washer filled up faster than I thought it would! But, there are still a lot of pretty bubbles, and bubbles are at least part liquid.

Day 34 - 5/14/07

Well, I did it. I managed to incorporate this week's theme (liquid) into what I had already planned for today (baseball).

There is a new minor league team in the next town over. This is their first season in town, and today we went to our first game there. We had a really good time. We commented that it's possible that the minor league games are more fun to attend than the major league games, because there is a lot more action and a lot more to notice and pay attention to. Plus, it gives us a chance to speculate on who will move on and who will probably stay at this level.

Sadly, our team lost 4-5.

Today's photos were taken before the game, while they were watering the dirt to keep the dust down. Aside from cropping, these are all SOOC.

I love this one - it looks as if the guy with the hose is aiming for the player squatting in shallow right field.

Another shot of the watering near second base.