365 - 29, 30 & 31

Yes, yes, desperation brings me to this. A cool winter evening and a log in the wood stove.

A study in green: aka dinner. Lightly saute'd onion, celery and cabbage. Just add salt & pepper. Delicous! We eat this with cooked rice.... tonight I added a dried thai chili pepper to the rice whilst it was cooking. Yum!

This year, I vowed, to myself and no one else, to take more self-portraits. I despise photos of myself, but, here's January's. I co-opted Harley to be in it with me. Please note, I have taken into consideration his adamant defiance to be in said self-portrait.

I think that's 31 for January.

365 - 28

Lazy Sunday. I worked this morning - bleh. Don't ask why, but this afternoon is all about hanging with my Mister, taking photos of whatever strikes my fancy and drinking a little Syrah.

Its difficult to see, and it might just be me... apres glass of syrah... but this photo struck me as, as, reflective. If you have an eye toward imagination, you can see the sky (blue sky with clouds) reflected in the surface of the wine and in the bubbles.

Could just be me though.

365 - 26 & 27

So, there is a purpose behind the posting of these incredibly boring photos. First, I am desperately in need on photos to complete 31 photos of January and second, well, I had good intentions. Its just that my thoughts and dreams do not always translate through the camera. Harley in the yard. What I was trying to capture is the droplets of water on the branch of the maple tree with Harley as a back drop. Yes, while I realize that is what you see in the photo, its not the artistic magnum opus that I had in my head. And, here another complete falling short of what my minds eye has envisioned. The first shoots fo the tulips, breaking ground, struggling against the January cold. Starting their journey toward spring and the flowers which will ensure propagation. But, what I got, some green shoots, boring. Sigh.... I wonder if Art Wolfe ever has these issues? PS - Art Wolfe is one of my favorite photographers, ever. The man has a talent like very few others.

365 - 22, 23, 24 & 25

Mister built a trellis on the east side of our home. Its beautiful. We plan to plant native honeysuckle on it in the hopes of luring in birds.... specifically humming birds. Wish us luck. I like the geometry of the structure. Water droplets. They fascinate me. Don't ask why. I have no answer for you. Ponder them awhile and you may discover your own fascination with them. What are you fascinated with? I would so love to know. To know I'm not alone in my fascination with, you know, weird things. Odd things. Natural and beautiful things. Oh, there are many more things. But that is for another post, another time.

Ah, pampas grass. Invasive and impossible to destroy. It comes back year after year after year no matter how much you chop out the roots. As children, we would steal the fronds from a neighbor's plant and strap it to our bikes as a sort of flag. Did you ever do that? What kinds of weird things did you do as a child? Things that children today would NEVER consider, NEVER concoct, NEVER dream of.... they've been given computers and game boys and a hundred other forms of dream substitutes. My opinion. Nothing more, nothing less.

Heavens!! So Mister and I are on the search for photographic subjects. I'm short 10 photos for the month! Hello! Its the 31st and I've not taken a photo a day. Trying desperately to catch up. Trying desperately not to berate myself for failing miserably. Trying desperately to start February out fresh. So... we find the husks of the tomatillo plants from last summer. These were amazing little husks of their former selves. Delicate and beautiful and photogenic. The photo does nothing to give you the effect, but its as if the husk of the tomatillo dehydrated itself, the insides have disintegrated, there is nothing left but an exoskeleton. Small globes of woven material. Delicate and intricate and just plain wow.

PS - I simply adore tomatillos. If you have not taken it upon yourself to purchase them and create something delicious, you so totally should. Since discovering them, I truly can't imagine my life without tomatillos. You will not regret it.

365 - 21

As promised, a cat picture.

Its blurry and too dark and too light all at the same time, but I like it.

It feels like sneaking a look at something you might not be supposed to see. Wow, that was voyeuristic, wasn't it.

I think what I mean is, it feels like witnessing something that the subject has no idea you are witnessing. Ok, not better.

Like walking in on an elderly couple holding hands, or witnessing a mother cat nursing her kittens.

Does that make sense?

I sure hope so.

365 - 20

This scrub jay comes, nearly daily, to my deck tree and steals whatever he can find from the barrel. One day he came with, what I presume, was his mate. I can never get the camera out and pointed at him before he flies away. Today, however, I did get the camera out, pointed and the shutter clicked. Unfortunately, the stinking flash was on. So, lots of reflection. But, one more photo done for this month, so I'm good with it.

365 - 19

I apologize: First for the cat pic. Sorry! But I adore my Harley. Second: The quality of the photo. Let's face it, I have no excuse, I needed a photo for yesterday, low light, quite patient cat - but still wasn't going to hold still for a full-on photo session. Yada yada yada. You know the drill. Here's my Harley in my new stocking cap. I *love* stocking caps!! So glad I live in a place where I can wear them for several months of the year. So, 19 photos posted so far, huh. I guess that leaves me to find and or take 12 photos between now and Sunday. Gauntlet retrieved, Challenge accepted!

365 - 18

Sunrise this very morning. SOOC Cropped a bit ... oh, yeah, and its a different photo... still from this morning, just a few minutes later than the first one. You can see the sun is up a bit more... the yellow on the right. (duh - I'm sure you could probably figure that out. Anyway...) and here I played with the contrast and brightness a bit. I'm not sure what I was going for, but, this is the result.

I still prefer SOOC. It just feels more genuine to me. Or maybe, I just don't have the talent to take a mediocre photo and make it amazing.

365 - 14, 15, 16 & 17

Soup: an alkalarian soup Mister and I made recently from THIS book. Or, one of them from that site. We've had a few, intermittent, beautiful days in the last couple weeks. I'm doing my best to be outside when I can. The sky was amazing this day.

A bird house Mister purchased last week and put in our ash tree. We're all about the birds this year. I hope to have photos of hummingbirds for you this year.

And, at the beginning of 2009, I made these one sheet, photo calendars for my group of gal pals. Each month, I put one on the fridge and when that month was over, I put it up on the wall in my 'room' in the house. So, this is all 12 months together. Some of my favorite photos, so far. Yes, this photo of the photos is a bit crappy, but, whatever. Its the idea, right?! Its not as easy as you might think to try to come up with a photo each and every day when its raining and cold and dark outside. ... get prepared for more kitty photos. I've been taking those too.

I'm behind the ball time wise and only a little behind date wise. But, I'll catch up and keep you posted...(hehe).

365 - 13

The ever changing, and yet never changing, view from my office.

Avocados - Did you know... & 365 - 12

Did you know that if you leave the avocado pit in the bowl of guacamole that the guac won't turn brown? Try it. You'll be amazed. Well, I was.

I did not know that until this last year.

I really do like learning new things.

Its a bit grainy, but I like it anyway. I really do need to pack my tripod around and maybe I could improve some shots. Just a thought.

365 - 9, 10 & 11

A few days ago, rain, sitting at my desk, playing with the manual focus on my digital point 'n shoot. *sigh* still longing for the camera of my dreams.

"I never promised you a rose garden...." What I did promise was to regale you with boring photos of my life... or maybe I didn't promise that, but for sure I warned you of it. Lunch yesterday. *B.O.R.I.N.G* And, the ever present on my blog and in my life, sunrise. Beyond beautiful, in my opinion.

I just can not get enough sunrises into my life.

365 - 8

Playing with shutter speeds.

Not good at it,

AT.ALL!

365 - 7

I know, I haven't been posting my photos every day. I just am not making the time to post. I am also having difficulty taking photos every day. My routine is so dad-gum boring. I am taking photos, boring ones, and just plan to post when I have the time to do so. In the light of trying to be less critical of myself, this is going to work out just fine. So long as I am trying to take photos every day and that I end up with 366 photos by the end of the year, I'm good with the process. I hope you will be too.

365 - 4, 5, & 6

I was really trying to get the drops of water to be in focus and the branch(es) of the tree bokeh'd out, but, its more difficult (at least for me) than it seems it should be to get that silly camera of mine to focus where I want it to focus. Really its just lazy on my part. So, this first pic is the water droplet in focus and the second pic is one of the outtakes, that I liked a lot. Notice, drops of water, not so much in focus.

And a bird in a tree. I like the black and white feel of this one even though, it is a color photo. I went for a walk, to the grocery, and on my way, there were so many fun things to photograph and I actually had my camera with me. But, alas, the batteries died after one picture. I was miffed, to say the least.

And tonight, one of the red jalapenos from Mister's plant. He dug it up out of the yard when the weather turned cold and those darned peppers turned red. Who knew?! We called it our Christmas tree this year, you know, because it is green and red.

365 -3

Yesterday, I left work about 1/2 hour earlier than I normally do. The sun was out, it was not raining and the air was crisp and clean. I wanted to go for a walk with Mister. With Winter and rain its difficult to get outside during the week and I really need to be outdoors more often.

It was the perfect situation for taking a photograph. We walked through an area in our neighborhood where there is a community gathering place. All manner of 'art' (I use the term loosely) and carved items and painted intersection asphalt in this spot. As we walked further, we came across a man who had the sweetest chocolate lab puppy, could not have been more than a month or two old, she wanted to come home with me, cute, cute, cute in all the possible puppy ways, and all wiggly to boot.

Do you think I had my camera with me.... no.... no I didn't. Several lost opportunities, but that was ok, I could find something at home to photograph for day 3 of my project 365.

By the time we got home, I had completely forgotten about needing to take a photo. We made dinner, ate dinner, then the phone rang and my lovely sister-in-law wanted a dinner companion. So, I set out with her, figuring I'd have a glass of wine, or maybe even just Pellegrino while she ate. That went by the wayside as we ended up at a place where they just happen to have pretty good martinis. I figured what harm could one martini do. Well, one very dry Grey Goose martini with 3 olives turned in to two and for me that's a lot. Especially on a Thursday night. As I sat there with her, chatting away while she ate her mussells, I realized, "Wow, this would have been a great photo opportunity." Did I have my camera with me. No.

So, long story, but I decided not to beat myself up over missing taking a photo yesterday. I think the project, at least for me, is more about taking lots of photos over a continuous/contiguous(?) period of time (let's say a year). I'll just take two today and all will be right with the world.

One year ago, I would have felt as if I had failed and bagged the entire project on day three. I feel pretty good about where I am, today.

In the event the photo above isn't relatively obvious, it symbolizes my day because, heavens-to-mergatroid, I had two martinis last night! Coffee was a God send this morning.

Have super weekends ya'll!!

Word of the Year

I took a few photos yesterday trying to get one that was clear. I decided that this photo above, which is SOOC (straight out of the camera) (only cropped), was sort of fun. Anyway...

Have you heard about Word of the Year? It seems to be the new black. Everyone's doing it. Well, its around a lot, or at least in the circles I blog stalk. I read about it here at Superhero Journal and here at Boho Photography. I think I've seen it a few other places, but these are the only two that I remember at the moment.

There are websites and worksheets and blogs and all the whatnots all over the interwebs on this topic. Like a lot of things, I ignore new and strange thoughts and ideas until I see them over and over and then I look into them and decide if they are for me or not. This one may be. I know that when I started looking into this, what seemed a very strange word popped into my head - imbue. I thought, well, that makes absolutely no sense at all. I then came across this worksheet to manifest your word. I filled in imbue and all the subsequent answers to the questions made it actually make sense to me. Here it is:

this is taken from dictionary.com im⋅bue  [im-byoo] –verb (used with object), -bued, -bu⋅ing. 1. to impregnate or inspire, as with feelings, opinions, etc.: The new political leader was imbued with the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi. 2. to saturate or impregnate with moisture, color, etc.

Why is this the perfect word for me: I want to be more engaged with my own life.

If embraced, what would change: I would slow down, pay more attention, live in the 'now' instead of "later when things will be more fun"

In what ways am I not living this now: I'm always looking for the more fun thing, the more exciting thing, the better thing that just has to be right around the next corner.

If embodied for a year, how would things look different: I hope to be more relaxed and happy in my own skin and in my own life. It is after all, one I've chosen.

So, there you go. I believe imbue will be my word of the year. True to my own nature, in about 2 weeks (if that) I'll probably forget all about even having a word to embody 2010. But, that's ok. I'm ok with putting it out there into the universe and letting it come back to me in whatever way it is supposed to. Or not.

Project 365 - 2

Here is maybe a perfect example of a photo I would never have posted last year at this time, for this project. Given my intent to not be as critical of myself (and because this photo (had it been in focus) would have been a photo I think I could have *loved*) here it is. Photo #2. A bit blurry - it was windy and just barely light out- those are my excuses and I'm sticking to them - I call it Blue2. It was the morning sky and it was rather amazing. Those clouds in the lower left corner kept churning and churning and looked so much like the ocean rolling. I never really did capture the image I had in my minds eye. As for embodying my day, Today I'm hoping to be as pliable and morphous as the sky was this morning. Churning and at the same time settling into something more smooth and focused. And that's ok.

I am secretly hoping that through repetition and practice and sheer luck I will magically come up with amazing photos each and every day as the year progresses. Time wil tell.

Project 365 - 1

Here goes nothin'! I should probably start out on a more positive note. Ahem...

Here's my first photo of my 2010 project 365. I've decided not to be as harsh on myself as I was last year about this time in connection with a year long photography project. I think I quit last year because I had too high of expectations for each photograph. I felt if they weren't worthy of framing that they weren't worthy of my project and especially not my blog. This year, I'm going a little easier on myself. I plan to try to photograph something each day which embodies that particular day. You may see a few photos of my desk this year, as I spend quite a bit of time sitting at it and some days (well, a lot of days) I just have a difficult time getting past it.

So, there you go. The photo above is my impromptu pedicure I got yesterday. I'm not prone to impromptu pedicures, so this was actually stressful, but in the end, I relaxed and had a great time. (I know!! I'm weird) My friend, whom I went with, chose the color, its not actually black, but purple. So dark a purple that it appears black. Crazee.

Its not easy to discern, but the photo also had Mister's shoe - its the brown blot in the bottom right corner. We were hanging, chillin', conversin' about our day.

This seemed to be what I felt my day meant. Impromptu relaxing and hanging with my Mister.

One day at a time.

Project 365

I'm wondering if I should start another project 365. I started one at the beginning of last year and after about a week, quit. I've been wondering lately how to fulfill some creative energies I have. What I really want to do is bake and cook and try new recipes and then the obligatory eat those recipes and share the deliciousness with you. But, in the light of a difficult, in many ways, 2009, I'm finding it necessary to cut calories and that inevitably means cutting the cooking and experiments. When I watched Julie & Julia recently, I really wanted to start a 365 days of new recipes. That went by the wayside rather quickly. This morning someone asked if I had heard of those 365 day photo projects. We talked for a minute about them and then my mind got to pondering about starting one up again. You will be the first to know about it. In fact as I type this, I'm trying to figure out what to photograph for you. This may be just the thing I need this year. Something external to focus on. Thank you blog friends for tuning in.

2010

How was your New Year's Eve?

Ours was pretty great. Got to hang with wonderful friends, good food, good drinks, fun and games, home and in bed by 1:00. Nothing to complain about.

One of the fun things we did on 12/31/09 was play a game of Jenga.

(photo from the wikipedia website)

You know, the stack of wooden blocks one person pulls one block, then another person pulls a block until the entire tower topples. This Jenga had a twist though. A few years ago, the owner of the Jenga game sat around with a group of friends (it might have even been a new years event) and wrote messages on many of the Jenga blocks. There were messages like, "kiss the host", "bark like a dog", and a good number of blocks also said "take a shot" or "give a shot". You know, an adult drinking game.

I successfully pulled a block from the tower without knocking it over. And proceeded to read the messages written. The message was "what is your philosophy of life".... and "take a shot". I rattled off something unintelligible, took my shot and the game moved on. But, that little message has stuck with me. Gnawed at me a bit. Has made me think things through over the last few days. Obviously, because here I am posting about it.

What is your philosophy of life? And how do you put that into one sentence? How do you pare down the way you try to live your life into one sentence, or maybe two sentences? Let me tell you, its not that easy. I would come up with what I thought was the master sentence, the one that encapsulated 'me' and then, a few minutes or hours later, I would realize I had missed something crucial.

I've narrowed mine down, for now, to this pearl of wisdom (or not): Be true to your heart while keeping others hearts in mind and speak honestly.

So, What is your philosophy of life?