Wet Glory

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I spent some time yesterday pp'ing this wet morning glory shot that I took on Thursday.  I didn't dislike the original, but I thought I'd see what I could do with it.  The daily has a texture applied in OnOne's PhotoFrame, Orton action from The CoffeeShop Blog that I like so much, plus a simple line border.

I really like this Paranormal frame in PhotoFrame too.  Is it right for a flower, though?  Hmmm....  I decided not to post this version even though there's something quite appealing about it to me.

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This is a B&W version with the Infrared choice picked in PSE.

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And of course the original.

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Looking side by side at two different monitors this morning there is a huge difference in color on the pink/purple of the flower.  No clue what it looks like on your screen:-)

We're off to the NC Transportation Museum for Day Out With Thomas (DOWT) today. Unfortunately, we have heavy fog alerts out and a 50% chance of rain. Drizzle is fine, but please don't pour on us!

Halloween Is the Spookin' Screamin' Trick or Treatin' Time of Year!

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It's wet and very cloudy this AM.  I measure .5 inches of rain over the last few days.  Some areas near me have gotten much more, but in my yard, the impatien pots under the trees are just shy of wilting still.  I just had to get out in the field yesterday AM wet and cloudy or not.  Yesterday, the cloud cover was not so thick, and I was able to get a few shots of wet morning glories and of a web spider web in a neighbor's yard.  As a matter of fact, this is the same spider/web that had the dragonfly a week ago.

I basically did some sort of tinted B&W conversion.  Then I went and shot a spider door 'wreath' that hangs in my house and pulled the spider out of that shot and laid it over the web.  Why does the quick select/grab tool rarely grab what I want...grrr...  Lots of erasing involved.  It puts my hand to sleep.  6 versions later I had the text added and mostly the way I wanted it to be.  We have a plaque bought at K-Mart a few years ago with the saying on it.  The layout seems nice but I'm not entirely satisfied with it.  After 6 tries, though, I'm moving on:-)

I really considered and debated and consulted my little voice on whether or not to post the nice wet web shot below or to post what I know many of you will consider quite an early Halloween posting.  But, it's not use, while some celebrate the first day of fall, at my house, we're gearing up for Halloween in a major way.  You know how kids are...the little kind and the big kind.  So you got the Halloween worked up version of the web. If you use the Smug search engine on my homepage and put in spider, you can see the spooky web shot I did last year and a few other neat web shots I've taken.

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I just wasn't able to get quite the clarity I would have been over the top excited about.  I tried my best.  Sometimes I wish some of you with real gear were standing beside me getting THE shot.

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I have several red-bellied (not red headed - I know it's weird) woodpeckers in my yard each day all year.  They are more elusive than the doves, titmouse, blue jays, cardinals, black-capped chickadees, etc.  This was shot 15' out past my kitchen window and cropped and sharpened and it's nice but not what I'd want.  Of course when the sun is out and it's bright I can never catch them:-)

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You might remember that I told you the workers had gone through the local tobacco fields hand picking the leaves off the plants.  Well, this is what's left behind...think, tall stems with just a few not fully developed leaves.  I suppose if we have no frost until Halloween like usual that the workers may go through one more time and cut off  a few more leaves.  This shot does not quite convey the 'stick' feeling of the field now, but you get the idea.  I was out in this field to get the morning glory pics in the collage below.

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Could this be a page in my calendar next year?  Maybe:-)

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Amber Visions

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Yesterday was just one of those days.  It got to be bedtime, and I hadn't taken many pictures.  I was feeling restless about the stuff going on with my dad's estate, and I ended up going through some boxes of glassware that were passed down from my mother's mother's house.  The connection is that the boxes were at dad's house and now are at my house.  Anyway, there are a few pretty amber pieces in there, and I thought I'd try to light them up and see if there was a macro type shot there.  I came away with three shots that I like and these two:

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and:

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I really like the pattern in the first one, and in the second one, you're seeing another view of the same cup posted in my daily.  The flowers a neat contrast to the grid pattern I think.

Here is a picture showing the pieces I was working with and where I was working with them:-)

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More treasures await me on other days...

Orange Beauties

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Another flower shot taken in a doctor's office parking lot... PP'ed quite a bit.  I think I'm regretting the vignette I added at the last minute:-(

Here's the original:

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I like this shot too, but the green leave in the lower right annoyed me:-(

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Life feels like a blur today...  Too much to do and no time to do things right.

We were at Chick-fil-A for family night last night.  The cow kept getting into pick--up trucks as they went through the drive thru:

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The boys were a riot in this video dancing with the cow...

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Johnny in the garbage can; it's tradition!

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Today's another day:-)

Madi

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A shot I took of Madi inside the red caboose at The Museum of Life and Science in Durham on Sunday.  The light was so lovely and she looked so pretty.

Processed using Perfect Portrait 3 from The CoffeeShop Blog as well as FocalPoint from OnOne and a tad more color adjusting on my own too.

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The kids love for me to wait at the bottom of the fireman pole and take their pictures:-)

R2-D2 Costume - Blast from the Past

I went up into the attic today to get down some more Halloween decorations. One of the things that I brought down was Joey's R2-D2 costume from a few years ago.  You'll remember from over the weekend that Joey really likes Star Wars droids.  This is not a new thing:-)  Well, he went to put R2-D2 on and, well, either R2-D2 shrunk or Joey has grown.  We could barely get the costume on him.

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It even looks pretty small on Madi!

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From 2008, Joey was NOT up to my shoulders in height like he is now.

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Madi and Johnny were sooooo much smaller.

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R2-D2 will be with us for years to come but probably won't be worn as a costume by the kids.  They are getting so big so fast!

Purple Dream and Star Wars Day 2

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Sister photo:

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My daily was taken outside the Magic Wings Butterfly House yesterday.

We had such a good time at The Museum of Life and Science in Durham on Saturday, that we ended up going back on Sunday too.  The kids really wanted to see one of the remote controlled droids, and we heard that they would be there on Sunday.  We weren't disappointed either, R2-C3 (think orange instead of blue R2-D2) was there.  The kids posed for pics with R2-C3 and many of the other characters from the 501st Carolina Garrison too.

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Johnny and Madi were just too cute together yesterday!

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We had the opportunity to watch local actor and stunt coordinator David McClutchey demonstrate and train kids on how to do fight scenes with a sword.  This video is fun.  He had a lot of spunk.  My kids wanted to do this, but time was short and the line of kids was long.  Maybe next year.

For handheld, I got lucky on this butterfly shot in the Magic Wings Butterfly House.

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This set-up that they have to magnify a hornworm on a tobacco leaf is one of Johnny's favorite things at the museum.

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Turn That Frown Upside Down!

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Star Wars at NCMLS

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I sure hope Boba Fett will bring Joey back soon:-)

As we arrived at the Museum of Life and Science in Durham, we were greeted by the Carolina Ghostbuster crew who were very happy to oblige us a photograph.  I had the kids chanting, "Who you gonna call?  Ghostbusters!" as we approached them.  Time to get out the Halloweeen CD for the van which has that song on it!  Also time for the kids to watch the movie for the first time.

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This is my absolute favorite shot of the day, but don't tell the other kids;-)

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I'm not sure what group hosts the green screen shots, but I heard the person running the activity say that he made over 1000 pics yesterday among 10 different backgrounds.  The real version of this pic will be available for download tomorrow.  This is a picture I took of it on the big projection screen in the room and then adjusted for noise and color.

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Now, the main pull of the event is probably all the members of the 501st Carolina Garrison who come dressed in Star Wars attire and pose with the utmost patience over and over again all day to the delight of young Star Wars fans.  I always come away with some great pics of the kids and the characters!

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You're only a kid once, right?  They talked me into these glowing light sticks at the gift shop:-)

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I also got a lot of heartwarming pics of the kids throughout the museum in and out playing.  Since the boys are now with their dad every other weekend, Madi doesn't get to see them quite as often as she used to.  It's such a delight, though, when they're together now.

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It was just shy of 60 yesterday and drizzly for a good part of the day, so sweatshirts were a part of our day when we were outside on the train and walking around Explore the Wild.

The following pics were taken inside the Magic Wings Butterfly House.  I never fail to walk away with some good shots from there.

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Outside the butterfly house...

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An idea for Halloween?  Even moms can have fun too...

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Well, 798 pics later, 229 saved and processed as best as I could, it's a wrap for this year.  Oh wait, they kids want to go back for day 2!  R2D2 was not there yesterday but will be there today.