Category Archives: Nature
Spring in Bloom
Spring is finally starting to show her lovely face! I’ve missed seeing the leaves on the trees. While winter was fun, the warm weather will be a welcome relief!
Project 52 | Week 12 | Pastel
Welcome to week 12 of Project 52! It’s so hard to believe that we are nearing the end of our third month of the project! This year is going by far too quickly. After a mild winter, which was still cold for us having just come from Hawaii, it’s amazing how quickly spring has appeared. Literally, overnight these tiny little wild flowers showed up in our back yard, which excited me because I didn’t think I’d come up with much for pastel.
I decided that this week, after a conversation in our group, that I’d pull out my 85 1.2 and make myself use it. With active boys, it’s not always the most practical lens to have out for every day use because I find it can be a tad bit on the slow side to focus. I figured the flowers would be a safe bet to try practice with it. So, while the boys were playing Star Wars on the patio, I was playing with my camera in the back yard. I love the dreamy quality it creates. I even got one of the boys and the dog to slow down long enough to use it on them as well. Lesson learned: leave the lens on the camera and just use it!
And, last but not least, the sky tonight was simply amazing. Living in Hawaii spoiled me with sunsets. Literally, every day we got to see the most amazing sunsets over the mountains. Living here has been hard because I miss those sunsets and the warm light. Tonight was a bit of a treat because I haven’t seen the sky this pretty in quite some time. It was almost as if the sun were saying, “Get ready, here I come!” I pulled out my wide angle lens to try to get as much as possible. The pinks were stunning. One thing is those darn trees and houses sure do get in the way!
Now head on over and check out the fabulous Melinda Meredith Photography HERE and see her wonderful pastel! Make sure to come back next week when the theme is “album cover.” Any suggestions on that one are greatly appreciated! Have a GREAT week!
10 on 10 | March Edition
Welcome to the March edition of 10 on 10! This month I decided to highlight the second day of our trip the Lake Placid for the Bobsled World Championships.
It was a wonderful weekend full of snow and plenty of world class athletic competition ending with the US winning Gold!
1. I used a similar photo for my Project 52 last week. I processed this one a little differently with Topaz Adjust. This was taken through the hotel window, creating the dancing bokeh, which is actually from the dirt on the window. Having lived in Hawaii for two and a half years and getting to see the sun set behind the mountains every day, I found it very comforting to be able to watch the sun come up over the mountains.
2. My super cool dudes all geared up and looking cool for the competition.
3. Steve Holcomb and the winning crew pushing off the “Night Train” for their first run of the day. Pictures truly do not do these athletes justice. They are the size of linebackers, running while pushing a bobsled the size of a bathtub on ice, and then quickly jumping in said sled before it goes barreling down the ice. Having seen several accidents over the course of the two days, let there be no doubt, this is a dangerous sport.
4. A view of Whiteface Mountain from the top of the bobsled run.
5. This was the happiest this guy was the entire time, trying to ring a giant cowbell one of the team USA bobsledders brought out. Couldn’t get a clear shot of him because of everything going on around and the fact that he would not stop moving.
6. Team USA wins GOLD! Pretty amazed with this shot because I was a good distance away and was able to crop the photo in without losing too much of the quality.
7. The World Championship Trophy before it was presented to team USA.
8. USA! USA! USA!
9. The top of Whiteface Mountain. Simply beautiful.
10. The Ausable River at the entrance to Whiteface Mountain. Processed with Topaz Adjust.
Now head over to the talented Ginger Haddock | Casper, Wyoming to explore her 10 on 10! See you next month!
Project 52 | Week 10 | Memories
Welcome to week 10 of Project 52! So hard to believe we are in double digits. I swear, this year is flying by! The theme this week is memories. I toyed with the idea of going in to my archives and pulling up something from there, but instead, I went with more photos from our trip to Lake Placid. There are too many not to share! (and, if you’d like to see more, check back tomorrow when day two of our time there will be featured for my March 10 on 10!).
I often joke that our boys have been to more museums and seen more things in their five short years than most people do their entire lives. But, I think it’s so important to take advantage of the things you have around you to expose children to a variety of experiences. Come to think of it, I need to generate a list of everything they’ve done, so when they get older and have a bucket list I can tell them which things they can go ahead and cross off! Examples: hike Diamond Head, go up in a glider, meet the Blue Angels, meet an Olympian, touch an Olympic Gold Medal…. I also believe that photographs can help keep those memories alive for them. As a military brat myself, photos were always a way of staying connected with people and places. It’s crazy to think that my little guys will have lived in four states during their first five years of life. They will have been able to do some pretty amazing things because of this, but, at the same time, I look forward to being in one place with them for longer than two years.
So when they are older and ask to go to a world championship event, we can tell them that they got to go to the bobsled world championships in 2012 and saw USA win gold!
One of the highlights of the event was seeing the women’s bobsled that had been wrapped in honor of the firefighters who lost their lives on Sept. 11. The sled helped to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Sept. 11 this season. The sled also had the names of the HMH 363 Red Lions crew that flew a flag for the bobsled team on Sept. 11. One of the pilots is a dear friend and our boys godfather and the squadron commanding officer. Several of the men’s bobsled team are also members of the Army, so there is a strong connection there between the athletes and the military. In addition to honoring the fallen firefighters, the team also displayed a plaque to honor the Red Lions crew that perished on Jan. 19 in Afghanistan. The crash was a huge loss to our helicopter community, and it was very touching to see them honored in such a way.
Now head on over to the talented Melinda Meredith Photography and check out what she’s been working on for memories. Join us next week when we share “green with envy.”
Project 52 | Week 9 | Alone
It’s Project 52 time! This week we are tackling our interpretations of “alone.” I must admit that I had a hard time with this one initially because I am never alone!
This past weekend we drove up to Lake Placid for the Boblsed World Championships. After a rather disappointing Massachusetts winter, it was fun to go somewhere where there was already snow on the ground. And, an added bonus was it snowed for two days solid! Lake Placid is a sleepy little town. It’s hard for me to imagine how this tiny place hosted the Olympics in 1980. There isn’t a lot there now, so I’m sure there was even less then. One of the wonderful things about the area, though, are the views. I miss the mountains of Hawaii, and I find mountains in general to be comforting. There is something about them that makes you feel so small–helps put things in perspective.
After watching two days of exciting bobsled races–US won gold–we headed to the top of Whiteface Mountain via the ski gondola. While we are not skiers, going to the top of the mountain to just look was amazing. There is something so peaceful to me about looking out over the vast view. So, while I was with my family, in these small moments I was able to just stand and take in the wonder of it all.
If you look closely, you can see tiny little skiers going alone down the next highest peak.
I was able to capture some sunrise photos each morning in the quiet before anyone else woke up. The first one was taken through the hotel window and created the fun bokeh from the sun and dirt on the window. For the second, I braved the cold and opened the balcony door to get a clear shot of the sunrise.
I simply love seeing the sun rise or set behind the face of a mountain.
And, last but not least, we were walking back to our hotel one night after dinner when I got a glimpse of this couple walking alone down the street.
Now head on over to the fabulous Melinda Meredith Photography and check out what she’s been working on for alone. Join us next week when we share “memories.”
