Weekly Header Challenge -- Sepia

It's time for the Weekly Header Challenge!

"Headbanger" Participants

Fishing Guy 

Kathy 

Imac 

Lew

I'm joining the group above for this weekly challenge.

Visit the other participants' blogs to see their entries!

Theme ~ Sepia

Chosen by all of us.

Finally!  Everyone was vying for time on our home computer, and now it's my turn.  Here are my images for this week's theme.  First, the uncropped image I used for my header:

I took this a few years ago, when we had snow (hardly any this past winter!).  I love the vintage look of a tinge of sepia, the lines of the bare trees, and the reflections in the river.

Here's another sepia image of winter snowfall and an evergreen tree just outside our back yard.

One final sepia image, of my 1950s vintage tea kettle I use every day for my morning Irish breakfast tea.  The sepia look goes well with the vintage kettle.

And now, it's about tea time this afternoon!  See you soon!!


Treasuring life's moments,
Christine

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Weekly Header Challenge -- Tell A Story

It's time for the Weekly Header Challenge!

"Headbanger" Participants

Fishing Guy 

Kathy 

Imac 

Lew

I'm joining in the group above for this weekly challenge.

Click on the other participants' blogs to see

what they've come up with!

Theme ~ Tell A Story

Chosen by Kathy.

For Kathy's chosen theme this week, Tell A Story, I tried to choose images that tell a story in and of themselves.  I love event photography--my favorite genre--in which I can use a series of photos to tell the story of the day.  I have plenty of those, but I wanted to challenge myself to use images where each tells its own story.

For my header, I chose a recent image I had used within a Header Challenge blog a few weeks back, but it wasn't a header.  Here is the uncropped image:

The bride and groom are the focus of the story, but there's so much more going on--from the birdseed being thrown, to the event photographer, to a few attendees with their phone cameras out, to the smiles and joy on the faces of the other attendees, to the cars--one of which is the "getaway vehicle--beyond.  I love all the details in this photo, and I think it tells a beautiful story.

Here are the rest of the images I chose this week.  I'll simply caption each image with a title, and let the image tell its own story.

Summer Vacation.

Post-Game.

Gasp!

February.

Guy in the Kitchen.

Those are my photo stories.  I'm going to keep this theme in mind as I go out and about with my camera over the next few weeks, and try to capture stories along the way!

Treasuring life's moments,
Christine

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Project 2012 -- Week 45

Project 2012 -- Week 45

November 4-10

Welcome to my Project 2012 weekly post!  This is my time to look back over the past week, 
choose seven favorite images I've taken, and share them here with you.  
If you have a project you're working on, please leave a comment 
so I can visit your blog and see what you're up to!

This was another restful week, with one big shock at the end--I think my 17-85mm lens is permanently on strike.  After doing a Littles Portrait Session with my 50mm lens, I tried to take some sunset pictures with my 17-85mm, and received an "Error 01" message that the lens was failing to communicate with the camera.  That had happened once or twice recently, but but was always resolved with turning the camera off/on.  I've tried the lens several times since that sunset, and it's a no-go.  It is my kit lens, and the lens I use for everyday shooting--which, as you know, I do a lot of.  Sorry to whine here!  But, I'm about to research getting a new lens, and soon so I can keep up with my skills, my blogs, etc.

Okay, I've ranted and now it's time for pictures!

This first one is not the actual ballot; our county provides sample ballots online, and we printed several out to go over and mark up so we were ready to vote.

[309] Voting Day

[310] First presidential election

Danny (above) was excited to vote in his first presidential election.  He wasn't so excited to learn the next day that every candidate we voted for lost.  We were redistricted into a liberal district, and now have liberals representing us at all levels of government--from local to national.  Welcome to Illinois politics.

I've been "downsizing" my spices, using smaller jars for those spices I use less frequently, in order to make room for all the jars on my little spice rack.  I've still got some jars on the top of the rack, but it's working pretty well so far.

[311] Spice rack

Here's the larger view:

[312] Kitchen spices

I found a bag of Andes mint chunks in the freezer, and figured I'd better make some cookies with them.  This was the recipe on the back of the bag, and they are dee-lish.  (It was a basic chocolate chip recipe, using the mint chunks instead of chips.)

[313] Mint chip cookies

Remember the "M" and "J" letters from my last Project 2012 post?  I stained them and brushed a cost of polyurethane on, and here they are below all set up at the C. home, ready for twin girls!  Yes, the apples are real--I'd rather have real props if I can, and don't they look just lovely?  I can't wait to show you the images from the shoot--I got some beautiful shots!

[314] Portrait props

Right after the above portrait session, I drove over to a nearby park to catch what was going to be a spectacular sunset.  Kit lens on, click the lens--error message.  I already ranted about it above, so no re-hashing it here.  I stuck my 50mm on and captured this shot--still beautiful, though not as wide-angle as I would've liked.

[315] Sunset at the park

All in all, some basic and regular shots this week.  I'm learning to trust the Lord with my photography--both professionally (try shooting natural light on a dark, stormy afternoon in a back living room!) and personally (my all-around kit lens...).  He knows what's best, and I'm trying to trust Him for a solution.

Here's to this upcoming week, for both you and me!  May our cameras be trusty, and our pictures be inspiring.


Treasuring life's moments,
Christine

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Project 2012 -- Week 2

Project 2012

Week 2 -- January 8-14

1.  Take pictures
2.  Share at least one--and up to seven!
(Click on the graphic if you're interested in joining us!)

My favorite photos

It's great when you can run outside in January in a jacket and snap some shots of the early morning frost.  The sun kept peeking out from the clouds, and I kept trying to catch it as I found some autumn leaves stuck in the grass.  The below leaf stayed still enough for me to capture it, and the sun also cooperated for several seconds.  I used my 100mm macro lens at f4.5, but in the editing room I wished I had increased the f-stop to obtain more clarity on the crystals along the leaf's edge.  I still like how the frost looks along the veins.
 

[8] Frost on leaf

The bananas we used to make banana cake.

[9] Ripe!

I love washing dishes.  There is a spiritual truth remembered with every dishload of dirty dishes!  I love getting dirty dishes washed, and seeing the shine as I rinse off the soap.  I'm sure if I were a dish I wouldn't like it--I wouldn't like being dirty, either--nor would I like the stinging soap in my eyes.  But once the dish is rinsed (boy, that water is hot!) and placed in the drain, it dries to a nice, clean shine and is pretty to look at again.  Oh, wait, sorry!  I digressed--back to the below photo...

As I was washing dishes this particular evening, I placed the soapy dishes on the counter to my left, then rinsing off several at a time.  I washed and placed the bowl, then washed and stuck the fork in the bowl.  When I looked over, the fork was slowly bobbing up and down, perfectly balanced.  So of course I grabbed my camera!

[10] Perfect balance

Who ever would have guessed that we would be playing Frisbee in the middle of January?!?  I love the setting sun and the sun flare in this shot as my boys throw the Frisbee around.

[11] January Frisbee

Later, as the sun set, I was hoping for a sunset similar to this one.  I was in the same spot, too!  But the clouds disappeared along with the sun, and I was left with a rather mundane sunset.  (All sunsets are beautiful.)  When I turned toward the east, I saw wispy clouds turning purple behind this tree.

[12] Tree silhouette

The day after we played at the park, we got our first measurable snow!  I ran out in it to take a fence row shot.  I used my 100mm macro again, at f8.  I had to set the ISO to 400 to get a halfway decent shutter speed (1/200 sec.) so I could hand-hold my Ellie.

[13] Snow on fence

Aaaaand, the next day, it was back to a typical Chicagoland morning in January, grabbing shovels to dig out the driveway.  Danny single-handedly shoveled the whole thing, too!

[14] Shoveling

I hope you got some good shots this past week.  I can't wait to see them!

Treasuring life's moments,
Christine

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