Sucking

Well, day three and I'm already sucking at this NaBloPoMo goal of mine.  (I missed yesterday, in case you weren't keeping track).  Oh well, at least I'm still trying, right?

Today was a busy day.  (as was yesterday, thus the reason I didn't get on here...) I had our very first craft sale to represent PokeBerry Creations, the Etsy shop my sister and I have teamed up on.  It went ok.  I definitely learned a thing or two, which is good.  We made a little money and I left there with some positive feedback (which is always nice to hear!).

Afterwards the boys and I went to Leroy (with Aunt Tiff & Brie) to trick or treat in their neighborhood (yes, a little late, but they postponed it for Hurricane Sandy cleanup).  Alex whined and complained the entire time, but it was a nice treat to be able to trick or treat with Tiff/Brie.  We each usually have our own things going on Halloween night.

Tomorrow is the turkey raffle at our Fire Department.  Another busy day, another busy weekend.  But this is my life and I wouldn't trade it.

I will leave you tonight with something pretty.  Here is a (SOOC, unedited) photo I took tonight of the Leroy Falls.  So peaceful.

Giant Baby Steps

A couple months ago, I bit the bullet and decided to take some ACTION in achieving my dreams.  Sitting back on my laurels and hoping for something to happen wasn't getting me anywhere.  So, I established Dream Big Day (Monday) to give me some concrete time set aside specifically to chisel away at my to do list.  That very first DMD back in August, I decided to start small and upload a photo I had recieved much positive Facebook feedback on to Kodak's Picture of the Day website.

Well it paid off!!  On October 14th, Kodak picked MY picture for their POTD!  I stumbled upon it a couple weeks later and was SO excited to see MY picture staring back at me from their website!

As silly as it sounds, I felt RECOGNIZED for my photography!  It was one of those things on my "bucket list" that I could officially check off.  One (giant!) baby step made...now I can move on to my next "big" thing.  (Whatever that is!)

Since then I've received requests to purchase copies of the print and it spurred enough confidence for me to set up my first THREE photo shoots for families other than MINE!  It's definitely a start!  I have so much to learn, but I have the best support system in the universe so hopefully 2012 will be a BIG year for me and for Queen Among Kings Photography!

Fabulous Chair

Did you figure out my ridiculously easy quiz from earlier today?  

Of course it's a chair.  

I didn't expect it was a hard question.

It's a seat-less, dilapidated, lead-paint peeling, eye-sore of a chair.  

Isn't it FABULOUS?!?! 

I've driven by this chair at a local barn sale for weeks...my brain has been a buzz with excitement for this silly chair, but alas, the barn sale is never open when I drive past so I stare, and drool, and dream.  

Yesterday my husband mentioned his plan to hit this very barn sale so I screamed out my desire to have this chair!

I soon got a text message from him - a photo of my chair with the word "Really?".

Um, yes really.  Why would I NOT want this fabulous chair?  And for only $2?!?!  Absolutely!  

He obviously didn't share my vision.  He couldn't possible know what it was I saw when I looked at this chair.  The intricate design, the bright, weathered color...the love it had endured.

I saw beyond it's desperate need of a paint job, its missing seat, and worn exterior.  I saw a fabulous photo prop.  This is my first photo prop and I can't tell you how excited I am to covet this chair.   

So, I immediately dragged Nate out across our squishy yard to the overgrown field in back and plopped him amongst the weeds by my new treasure.  

Voila!

I give you Fabulous Chair + Handsome (fake smile) Boy.  

I once resisted the urge to buy a beautiful antique typewriter simply because I envisioned taking gorgeous photographs of pudgy babies tapping its keys.  I wanted to capture all its gorgeous intricate details.  I should have just bought it.

*sigh*

Oh well...I sure can't wait to use this chair more.  

Unfortunately, however, I fear my addiction to "photo props" has officially begun.    

It's the Little Things...Before and After

As many of you know, I have been taking a Photoshop class with my good friend, Heidi.  It's been a fantastic opportunity to learn a program I think will be instrumental in my future success as a "good" photographer.  I'll be honest though, for the first couple weeks we struggled.  There wasn't a lot of concrete knowledge being shared and with computer issues and odd teaching styles, we weren't really doing anything we were talking about.  In the last couple weeks that has changed, however.  Finally, this week we learned some basic touch up skills that will prove to be fantastic in my photography moving forward.  You know the scene...you take a great picture but the shadows are a little dark, or there's a misplaced item in the background that's horribly distracting the real focus of the photo.  Those little things that "ruin" an otherwise fantastic shot.  So, last night in Photoshop class we finally got hands on with some tools that make all these minor blips practically a thing of the past!!!  It's a little thing that makes a BIG difference!  So, for today's It's The Little Things Thursday, I thought I'd share a few examples of how a little thing (healing, cloning, and burn and dodge tools) can make a HUGE improvement to some (otherwise) great photos!  

Keep in mind that I'm VERY new (with less than 12 hours of experience under my belt) at these skills so my teacher warned me not to go public with my teachings yet until I had time to hone my abilities.  But as you know, I'm a rebel and he likes to yell at me anyway, so what's different here?!?

 BEFORE : my precious sleeping babe with an obnoxious dog hair obstructing his sweet face...

 

AFTER - Voila!  No dog hair to be seen!  And a brightened and smoothed out his face a little...

BEFORE - my Wordless Wednesday (seen here) from yesterday...the helmet was casting a precarious shadow right over his eyes where his concentration is so keen...

 

And AFTER - I used the "dodge tool" to brighten up the light under his helmet and make his eyes a little more noticeable...This is one of those things that can be easily overdone, but I think for a first attempt it was an improvement...

Anyway, I just wanted to share these fabulous tricks I'm learning!!  Just think of how fabulous I can make my pictures now!!   Stop over to Starts at Eight to share your little things that make this journey through life fun and exciting!

Wordless Wednesday...Duck Crossing

Simple Woman's Daybook...June 22, 2010

FOR TODAY...June 22, 1010

Outside my window...darkness.  It's been a long day but I have a lot to spew before I can go to sleep with a clear mind.

I am thinking...about going back to school for a degree in Photography.  I always wanted to get my Bachelors in Photojournalism but the expense of those classes was very prohibitive when I was younger so I went straight journalism instead.  I got a lot out of that education and while I realize it's not for me, it taught me a lot of skills I still use today.  However, I would like to round it out and focus on the photography aspect.  I love taking pictures and think I have an ounce of natural talent that could really go somewhere if I had formal training and a background in photography.  I took one class in high school but that doesn't count.  I lack so much of the technical background that I feel inept.  I'd like to gain some knowledge to put together with my skills and build my confidence.  My husband is adamantly against it but I don't really care.

I am thankful for...my husband.  Believe it or not.  He's a crotchety "old" fart sometimes but I realized on Father's Day while I was trying to be everything to everyone so he could enjoy the day off that there is a lot that I defer to him on a daily basis.  I'd be lost without him.  I hope he knows that putting up with him is the least I am willing to do to have him in our lives.

From the kitchen...dinner dishes are beckoning.  I started washing them while the boys finished up dinner but as soon as they hear water running they get all excited to join me and play in the water and I wasn't having it so I stopped what I was doing to get baths started and haven't made it back...

I am wearing...t-shirt, comfy pants, socks.  It's actually too hot and sticky for socks but I need to vacuum and the dog hair and crumbs sticking to my feet as I walk around is annoying me so until such time that I get a chance to vacuum, the socks are saving my sanity.

I am remembering...to go to the new office tomorrow.  Today was my first day there and I managed to unpack all my boxes and settle 95% of my things.  The office space isn't horrible.  It's loud and distracting but with my iPod it will be better and hopefully it will settle down some when people are done settling in their own offices.  We shall see...only time will tell!

I am creating...a wish list of things to buy when we get in the new house.  It's getting long.  And expensive.

I am going...to bed as soon as I'm done writing this.  I'm pooped.

I am hoping...to make it through this summer without losing my mind.  I know I will, but there are times when I'm not so certain.

I am hearing...a fan, the dog snoring, kids walking around outside.

Pondering these words..."The secret to happiness is not in doing what one likes to do, but in liking what one has to do" 

My friend, Heidi had this quote as her Facebook status update today and the truth rings very loudly to me today.  Each of us has to make our own happiness and so much of it is about perspective and CHOOSING to be happy doing what we're doing.  I love this!

Around the house...laundry is behind, packing needs to be done, cleaning should be caught up on.  I'm falling behind miserably!

On my mind...a friend of mine is opening a cafe/bakery and asked me to provide her with some photos to put up and sell in her restaurant.  She said she wants to showcase my talents.  How fantastic is that?  I can't even tell you how excited this has me.  If I think about it too much I start questioning myself and that's no good so I'm not sure yet what photos I'll give her but I have a few in mind.  I can't wait to sit down and pick some to print and have framed.  How fun!

Noticing that...the Photography Gods have all been working in my favor this week.  Between the request of my friend above, starting the process to go back to school for a Bachelor's in Photography and being the official Staff Photographer at the golf tournament for work yesterday, I am oozing positive energy. 

One of my favorite things...ice cream.  I sure wish I had some right now.  It's been that kind of  a day!

A few plans for the rest of the week:   Walk 'N Talk, a baby shower at work for Shelby, birthday party for Ava, a weekend together as a family for a change!!  

Here is picture for thought I am sharing...

I took this photo at the Hillside Believe in Kids Golf tournament on June 21, 2010.  I was made "official Staff Photographer" which was so much fun!  I'm not a big golf fan but I still managed to get some good action shots and hopefully was able to capture the feeling of this beautiful day!

10 on 10 : July 2009

Since today is Flashback Friday but it happens to fall on the 10th of the month when I would normally do my 10 on 10, I decided to give this month's 10 on 10 a flashback theme.  Each hour I am to take one photo and my goal is to find nostalgic things that take me back and take photos of THOSE.  So, come with me down memory lane...

This is a photo board I have in my office at work.  It takes me back to when Nathaniel was little (which was just YESTERDAY, wasn't it?!?)  since I haven't updated any of the photos on this board since I started there and he was 6-months-old then!

After work I took the boys out to Geema and Geempa's to let out their dogs (since they were coming home late) and I let the kids (Nate anyway) run around for a while to burn some steam.  While I was there, I saw a lot that took me back.  Like this tree, for example.  I love this tree.  It stands in my parents' front yard and has provided hours of entertainment, solace, and education throughout the years.  It is here where my brother and I would swing from the branches pretending to be Indiana Jones swinging to safety over a pit of snakes.  My sister and I would spend hours perched on the tree's limbs, talking, laughing, and testing our limits as we climbed ever higher to see how close to the top we could get.  I remember finding the shells of cicadas stuck to the bark of the trunk after they had molted and left them behind.  What a lesson in nature that was!  Not too long ago the tree didn't seem to be doing well and my parents talked about having to cut it down.  I was devastated!  This old climbing tree holds a lot of special memories for me and for my whole family.  Miraculously, however, the tree has made a comeback (evidenced by these photos) and will thankfully live to see another day and a few more climbers from the next generation.   

Growing up we spent a lot of weekends in the back woods cutting firewood to heat the house with in the winters.  We each had our jobs.  My Dad cut down the trees and my mom would clean off the branches and make a brush pile of the unusable twigs and smaller branches.  My older brother got to yield an axe on occasion, or make a few well directed cuts with the chainsaw.  I got to mark off the fallen trees with a ruler and a piece of chalk so whoever was cutting would know where to cut so they were uniform in size (that made for easier stacking and helped them fit into the wood stove without a problem) and my sister mostly played out of the way of falling trees and flying wood chips.  We'd chop it up into manageable size pieces and then throw it in the back of my dad's old International and bring it up to the house.  There we would unload it, chop it up into smaller pieces and stack it to dry out before the winter came.  In the down time we'd make playgrounds out of grapevines that were shaped like swings or bounced really well.  Cutting wood was hard work but we all did it as a family and it taught me a lot about working together, spending quality time with those you love, and making the best out of what you have.  

Nathaniel was playing in what I call the "metal playground" (see photo below) when he said, "Oh, Mom!  BEES!"  Having been stung by one late last summer, he knows they are not to be messed around with. But at my Mom and Dad's house they are EVERYWHERE and hard to avoid!  I can't remember a summer growing up when I didn't get at least ONE bee sting.  They were in the ground when you'd mow over them and piss them off...they'd land on my neck or in my hair and I'd reactively pinch them by tilting my head down to my shoulder.  Finding this bee family swarming in a steel pipe in the "metal playground" did not surprise me and I'm just glad Nathaniel knew better than to try and pick up these "bugs" like he does all other "bugs" he finds!!

This is a barn at my parents' house which also houses a lot of flashback memories.  Going way back more than 20 years ago, I'd say, we built that barn (as a family) from the concrete slab to the roof.  My Aunt and Uncle came over to help with a couple of Dad's friends and we cranked that out in no time!  We even got to put our handprints in the cement floor after it was poured, leveled, and started to harden.  When it was new (and empty) we made it into our own personal roller rink.  We used to skate around the downstairs and dreamed about throwing fantastic Halloween parties in there.  As my dad settled in it had tools and old parts to things strewn about.  Then we put on the goat shed off the side where our goats and bunnies lived.  We spent many years trucking back and forth to that barn in the rain, snow, and freezing cold to feed our rabbits, change their water, and hold them.  The rabbits eventually all died and Dad sold the goats off to someone.  I hadn't been in there in quite a while.  Most recently I stop in to find my father when he's working "in the shop".  He added on to the back to make a blacksmith shop for his business.  It's pretty stinky when he's working but I love to watch him hammering out his steel, twisting it, turning it, heating it up again and banging on it until it turns into the beautiful candle holder or wine bottle display rack that he envisioned in his head.  There is also a treasure trove of memories stored on the second floor of that barn: Old dollhouses, kitchen sets that "Santa" brought me when I was 4 years old and ancient play sets that entertained us for hours.  With a weekend to explore up there I can only imagine the memories we'd uncover!

 

A walk down memory lane would not be complete without a glimpse at my childhood listening preferences.  Oh yeah!  NKOTB.  Need I say more?

While looking for something in my basement "junk/scrapbooking room" I found these.  Does anyone even still USE these old 3.5 disks (is that even what they're called?!?)  I don't even think computers have a slot for that size disk anymore!!  Now what good is all that info on those disks?!?

One stack of the thousands (no exaggeration!) of photos I have laying around in my "junk room".  Someday I'll get some of these scanned for future Flashback Friday fun!!

Where to start? Purpose, direction, and dreams...

As is true to my fashion, I've been drafting this next post for days now and have written, re-written, and completely over analyzed what it should say, how it should read, and what overall message I'm trying to send or what direction I'm heading in.  Ultimately, at this late hour, I realize it doesn't really matter.  That, as usual, I've overcomplicated it and in the big picture, no one is noticing and I assure you no one probably even cares.  

So, I shall talk about why I decided to start this blog.  

I've been what I will call a "Blogpie" (Blog Groupie) for some time.  I have a list of various blogs that I frequent daily and am always interested in keeping up with the news, following the updates, and stepping into these other worlds.  I am thrilled and intrigued to stumble upon a new one once in a while and slip mindlessly into someone else's perspective, drama, challenges and day-to-day existence.  It's the peeping Tom in me, I guess.  The same way people like to gawk at accidents, people watch at the Mall, and eavesdrop on strangers in restaurants.  By seeing into the lives of others, I hope to gain insight into how other people live, love, laugh, and yet, still manage to shine through it all.  So, in sharing my own random thoughts, I suppose I am hoping to find some direction, gain some clarity, improve my own perspective, or at the very least open myself up and perhaps as a result, manage to get the ball rolling towards realizing some dreams.  How, might you ask, will a simple little blog accomplish all this?  I have no idea, but anything is possible...right?

I will be honest, many of the blogs I follow are photography blogs, which for the most part leave me feeling part awestruck, and part completely and utterly inadequate.  For this, you see, is my dream.  The aforementioned dream I hope to accomplish someday?   To be a photographer.  A real photographer, not just a (heavily) practicing hobbyist.  And to have a photo blog of my own that people like me would visit, marvel over, and hold in high respect.  Why does this seem so far off?  For starters, I lack the equipment, the knowledge, the training, and most importantly, the confidence.  I do, however, have plenty of passion.  So, as I shape and mold this blog of mine, you will see it grow, I hope, into a forum through which I can share some of my favorite photos and take some leaps and bounds towards achieving this goal.  But mostly, you'll read a lot of my obscure ramblings, hear charming (and most likely redundant) stories of my precious boys, and hopefully gain some insight into who I am, what makes me tick, and where it is I'm headed in this joyride we call life!!  Buckle up and keep your hands inside the cart at all times!  I hope you enjoy the ride!