a pause in the action.

I was on a roll there for a few days and then... whoops! Sorry, folks. This whole taking pictures every day and posting 5 days a week is harder than it looks. I have plans to make it up to you, but you'll have to wait just a few more days.

| day five of thirty. {lwg}

It's a Friday night. I really should be anywhere but in my office, at the computer, getting lost in Adobe forums. I'm going to post this and walk away. Really, I am. (I think.) There are a bunch of exciting things going on around here, some of which I hope to share with you soon (as in: next week). But for now, you'll just have to trust that I'm trying my hardest to post every (week) day, but if I don't, it's only because my photography/design work is increasing and things are a bit nutty on this side of the computer. Side note to self: be careful what you pray for, He might actually say, "Yes."

Without further adieu, here is installment duo, of {life without glasses}
(and no, I did not misspell the word two, that is Italian, not Spanish)

| day four of thirty. {lwg}

I'm starting a new series in this 30 day assignment. - Life Without Glasses - As I was photographing, I was wondering why I kept being drawn back to blurry, bokeh filled images and then it dawned on me that it might be because without my glasses my vision is very, very poor and therefore, most things I see are a blur of lines and light. So, I'm embarking on a mission to take one picture "without glasses" and one "with glasses" and post them here for you. You can squint and guess all you'd like. The in focus version will be right beside it (or below it!).

[20 points to the person who can identify the restaurant in the last two photos]

| day three of thirty.

[making dinner in the crock pot]

| day two of thirty.

-you can click on it for the bigger version-

| day one of thirty.

Today was day one. I went for a short walk in the middle of a bright day. Not really the time for a lens you want to shoot at an F stop of 1.8. My shutter speed was 4000 at one point. Ha. What was I thinking?

I was thinking I have to do this or else I'll never start. Much like running again. Though I haven't started that yet.



More to follow. Starting out slow. Again, just like running.

| an idea comes to me |

Today I need feedback. Admittedly, I've been a bit out of my groove. My photography groove that is. I had some really awesome sessions over the summer but then things started to get busy, I failed to make it a priority and I wound up here - in 'no new pictures to post' land. So, in an effort to get back at it, I purchased a Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 that I have been salivating over for some time now, which should be arriving on my doorstep TODAY!

According to this lovely screen shot of UPS.com's tracking:



Here's where I need your help. Back in college one of my assignments for Photography II was to shoot a roll of film every day for 30 days. It was quite a daunting task when you consider that it was film that needed developed and processed, not just digitals that could easily be uploaded to a computer for processing. That said, doing it again in digital form should make it all that much easier to accomplish, right? This is what I'm thinking... I take a picture (or pictures) every day for the next month. And every morning I post a picture from the previous day. Not only will this provide you with an active blog to follow, it will keep me focused on refining my photography skills. What do you think? I'm open to other suggestions as well. I just need something that will provide content for this blog as well as push me to becoming the kind of photographer I wish I was.

nursery duties

Here is the culprit.



Towards the end of August I took on the position of Nursery Coordinator at church. That means I'm officially in charge of making sure the Infant, Crawler and Toddler rooms are fully stocked with supplies and staff every Sunday, all three services. Getting them full of kids hasn't been a problem.

A few Sundays ago, the toddler room was especially full (think 14 walkers under the age of 2 with only 3 helpers) so I was checking in to make sure everyone was doing alright. One of the workers came to me with a half chewed name tag (we have name tags and pager numbers that get pinned to the back of every child). "I don't know how she got it off, but now I can't find the safety pin." We pinned a fresh one on the little gummer (my word for toddlers that munch on things until they're a gummy paste) and I helped look around the room a bit, but was quickly distracted with another duty and forgot all about it.

Fast forward to the wee hours of Monday morning. All of a sudden I'm wide awake in bed and all I can think is: "Oh no! We never found that pin!" Of course, I feel I'm solely responsible for this as it happened under my watch and immediately start conjuring up worst case scenarios where the gummy child swallowed said pin and is dying slowly somewhere of a punctured something or other. This kept me awake for some time. I eventually drifted back to sleep but when I woke up as M was getting ready for work, I mumbled out something about a pin and should I call the parents, etc. He nicely assured me I shouldn't worry and told me to go back to sleep.

I went about my day, but in the back of my mind I couldn't stop thinking about the safety pin. The buzzer rang on my dryer as I was contemplating what to do. As I opened the door, something fell onto the ground...

YEP, you guessed it! THE SAFETY PIN. I was washing/drying the nursery bibs and the pin must have fallen into one of the pockets on the front of bibs. I have never in my life been so relieved to see a half eaten name tag and safety pin fall out of my dryer. I was now sure that no child from the nursery was dying of a punctured stomach lining and could happily go about my day.

life. got. busy.

Sometimes life gets busy. I look up and all of a sudden it has been a month since I've posted an entry. It's already half way through October and I'm still not sure where September went. I fear it will be December and I'll still be carving pumpkins at the rate I'm going.

Instead of listing the million and one things that crammed themselves onto our calendar and prevented me from having the time or energy to post, I'll simply share with you a few images from our recent trip to Myrtle Beach, SC.

*note: if you want to go to myrtle beach, early october is the perfect time to do it. the water is still reasonably warm and you practically have the ocean all to yourself.