Picture Perfect May–Color 2

Hello, PINK!

My second entry into the Picture Perfect photo challenge for May. :)

I can do a third entry but it’s late and I want to think about #3 so ta ta for now.

Picture Perfect May–Color!

Ah yes, another photo challenge.  This one is monthly which my brain likes.  No pressure.  Phew!  This month’s theme is color and as luck would have it I ended up at a nursery today on a little photo outing with my BFF (that’s best friend forever if you don’t speak text").  I think maybe I got a photo or two that involve color.  Perhaps this one:

Orange is my favorite.

Click on the button and join up.  It’s fun, I promise.

Good To WOW Week 17–Growth

Just a real quick post, just found out I’m a table hostess for my church’s mother/daughter tea on Saturday and needless to say I’m a little overwhelmed with everything that suddenly needs to be done.  Yikes!  But earlier today I did have a chance to play with my favorite of the six photos I took the other day.  Just the basics for this one, opened in ACR but didn’t do too much there, adjusted levels and curves slightly and added a high pass filter and that’s all.

Here’s the original:

 

And here’s with the edits:

I like how you can see the fuzz on the stem and leaves (which of course aren’t as clear on the web version, but still).  :)

Let’s go see what others have done with their edits.

Sweet Shot Tuesday

Here is my sweet shot for Tuesday.

I am still new enough at photography that when I take a photo with all manual settings and it turns out well it feels really good.  As it is with this photo which I took on Friday while walking to the bus stop to pick up Gabe after school.  This is straight out of the camera as well, not even so much as a levels adjustment.  Not to say it can’t be improved but that it’s just a particularly sweet shot to me that it turned out as well as it did to begin with.

Please go to My 3 Barbarians and enjoy more sweet shots!

Texture Tuesday

Gave myself permission to sit down tonight for a while and texture the heck out of a photo .  And texture I did.  First I snapped a shot of my tea and cake. 

Then I ate the cake. 

Then I played with the photo.  Brightened it, desaturated it a LOT, then brushed over the flower on the cup and the cake to bring back some of the color, texturized it with Kim’s “chamomile” and “major grunge” textures and lastly brushed over the tea cup and cake to eliminate some of the texture there and viola!

Remember, you can click on the photo to view it larger.  And also remember that you can go to Kim’s website and check out the other lovely texture photos there.  And you can enter your own photo.  And if you don’t know how Kim will teach you, she rocks!

Good to WOW Week 17–Growth

After a busy week with not much time or interest in spending time with my camera I snuck outside yesterday for just a few minutes to take advantage of the sunny afternoon.  I thought I might get out today to spend some more time really thinking about what I was doing but it’s a good thing I took these on Sunday because it rained all day today.  Yay for not procrastinating for once!  Here’s my take on “growth”:

Those are ALL of the photos I took.  All six of them.  They are six of my cucumber starts that Gideon and I planted a few weeks ago.  We are going to put a small raised bed in the yard for these and some tomatoes, carrots, pumpkins and maybe one or two others.  Until then I am desperately trying to keep these away from Zion’s darn cat.  She keeps jumping up to where I have them and stealing them.  Last night Zion found one of them in the hallway ripped out of it’s dirt and with teeth marks in the leaves.  Grrr.

I digress.

Go check out the entries at Jill Sampter’s blog AND leave those folks some encouragement.  They have some really nice photos.  :)

Good For A Laugh

Today Rob and I taught in Children’s Church.  For our church that is for the 3-5 year old group and it takes place during the main service.  Nearing the end of the service one of the ushers cracked the door and brought in the elements for Communion.  Rob and I picked a cup of juice and a piece of cracker and turned to each other to take a moment when we heard Zion from all the way across the room.

She urgently blurts in a hushed and very serious tone “Don’t drink the juice.  It’s blood!”

It’s Gideon’s Happy Birthday.

“It’s Gideon’s Happy Birthday” has been Gideon’s mantra the last few days.  It is extremely cute.  Especially when you realize that it is what he is calling the birthday card he got from his Grandma Marlene.  It has Lightning McQueen on it and he’s been carrying it around since and if you ask him about it he holds it up proudly and says “It’s Gideon’s Happy Birthday.”  Not his birthday card.  His “happy birthday”.  *sigh*  Adorable.

Tonight when we said bedtime prayers we each said something we are like about Gideon and I had to say to I love his enthusiasm.  Every little thing is worthy of a celebration to Gideon.  He loves Lightning McQueen plain ol’ potato chips and bacon (he had that for lunch).  He is absolutely not at all interesting in potty training but loves to make his own Ego waffles and with a little assistance makes some killer scrambled eggs.  What a nut.

So today we celebrated his birth three years ago, such a beautiful, joyful addition to our family.

And maybe a little bit mischievous.

Zion helped me decorate the cake.  And her face.

The cake was a homemade chocolate, my first layer cake usually I do sheet cakes.  I also couldn’t find one of Gideon’s smaller McQueen cars to use.  Until after the party of course.

Isaac loves to hit up our dress up bin when he comes to play.

Matthew acted as a substitute daddy to Elias for a while since he was bored with me and Rob was busy at the barbecue.

Rob picked up How To Train Your Dragon from the Redbox last night and we loved it so we put it on during the party.

And it was a gorgeous day so the kids got to play outside for a while.

Gideon only tolerated my taking his picture for a minute and then he kept saying “No more, Mama! No more!”

On to presents:

Art supplies, yay!

His very own Cars helmet though it doesn’t quite register why he might be getting a helmet.

He also got a Lightning McQueen racetrack and a stuffed Timmy lamb (lower left corner).

And that would be why we gave him the helmet.

Zion helps Gideon take his first ride.

Elias thinks he’s quite big enough to go for a ride too.

He’s got his helmet and his Timmy NOW he’s really ready to go for a ride.

Though the track was a big pain for me to put together the kids had a great time with it.

Time for cake!

And this is when I realized I completely failed as a mother.  Gideon had no idea what to do with the candle.  Even when we tried to show him his teeny little puff of breath between his teeth stood no chance of even making the flame flicker.  Isaac stepped up to help though otherwise I think we’d still be waiting for him to blow out the candle.

And the party is over but I thought I’d tease you with a shot of that yummy cake.  Oh so good.

Texture Tue…er, Wednesday?

A day late but not a dollar short.  I’m rather pleased with how this turned out.  Zion was in a dress-up sort of mood today so I took advantage and shot a few pictures.  We just got back from Bible study so I thought I’d get the pics off my camera and play around a bit. 

Here’s the original:

Here’s my edit:

This is with a levels adjustment, a little desaturation of the colors, Kim’s “sweettreat” texture on soft light at 87% and Kim’s “serendipity” texture on overlay at 70% and that’s it.  My pretty little fairy is a little more dreamy now.  I like it.  Go ahead, click on the picture and make it bigger, it’s even better. :)

Came back and did a second one.  I love the wistful (is that the word I’m looking for?) nature of this one:

This one is also using “sweettreat” and “serendipity” but I added a layer of “sweettart” in between and desaturized the colors even more.

Now click on the button to go to Kim’s site and check out more Texture Tuesday offerings.

At pretty much the last minute I also decided to put this up on My 3 Boybarian’s Sweet Shot Tuesday.  It’s been a busy week and I haven’t been feeling well so the fact that I decided to do on Friday something I should have done Tuesday shouldn’t surprise me.  It takes that long for my brain to make a decision right now.  ;)

Characters

My kids are such characters.  They just crack me up all day long.  Gideon for instance, seemed to believe that one must first crack a plastic Easter egg before it would open so you can get the goodies out.

Gideon “cracking” eggs

And this is how Zion asks if she can have a cookie.

Zion asks for a cookie.

Elias won’t be left out either.  He got a kick out of his first ride in a Home Depot racecar cart the other day.

Sorry if the sound isn’t great, these were taken on my iPhone.  Still, you get the point.  Such characters!

Good to WOW Week 16–Family/Friends

I feel entirely unprepared to post this week.  It feels like I’ve hardly had time with the camera lately though I know that not to be true.  Maybe I feel unprepared because I didn’t look ahead and shoot something specifically for this week’s theme.  Yeah.  I think that’s it.  Not that it’s necessary but it’s nice when I can post something I’ve been thoughtful about.  I’ve got a few to put up though.  The first three are Rob’s homecoming after being in Guam for almost three weeks. 

Getting tackled right after stepping in the door.  Had to shoot farther away than I would have liked just so I didn’t miss it.

Giving hugs and kisses.  (Sadly, I managed to cut Gabe off, darn it!)

Lifting Gideon up for a great big hug.

This one was Easter morning just before leaving for church.  It’s no where near technically perfect.  I didn’t notice the red blanket was hanging off the corner of the couch and a bunch off stuff on the coffee table snuck into the frame but I can’t resist the moment that Zion and Gideon are sharing.  It draws me in.  I don’t even know what they are cracking up about but it must be hilarious.  Elias is totally focused on me and Gabe is off in La La Land.  How utterly typical of all of them.  That’s why I love it, it’s so them.

Click on the button to go to Jill Sampter’s blog to see more or to participate.