Valentine Romance

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With all the beautiful flower captures that Susan at Wilde Life Photography has been posting lately, I just had to go out and buy a bouquet.  I have been eyeing flowers for a week and finally saw a bunch that I really liked.  I had a heart-shaped vase in mind to put them in and a red felt background to set them in front of.

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I didn't have a lot of time to work on pp'ing, so I went with the tight crop and using an out of focus shot for the background/framing.

With Valentine's Day quickly approaching, and thinking of the sisterhoodofthebras, I also took this image:

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I may play with the flowers some more if I get a chance.  Meanwhile, they sure look nice on my kitchen table.

Donnie and I went to a stump burning at the Kidd's house (Madi) last night.  Danny has been working to get rid of this sweetgum tree stump for 3 months now and finally decided to light it on fire last night.  The tree died a few years ago and then they had it cut down.  The stump remained and was taking up valuable garden space.  Danny started digging out around it, tried to have it pulled out with a chain/vehicle, and used various other techniques, and it just would not budge.  Kindof reminded me of the book That Stump Must Go!

A great book by the way.  We have a copy.  Here are some pictures of the stump on fire.  It was huge, and the fire was hot underneath it when we left for the night.  I hear this AM that the stump is tipped over.  Woo hoo!  I'll have to get a daytime picture!

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Gotta be a Deere!

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As I've cut across town this week from Donnie's house on my way to the boys' school in the afternoon, I've passed this barn and been studying the light and angle that I thought would make for a good shot.  This location just happens to be less than a quarter mile from yesterday's green barn.  I guess this is the week to make stops on that stretch of road.  Anyway, I had a few minutes yesterday afternoon when the light was late and warm, and I stopped to grab these images.  I was a good girl and got out my tripod so my HDR shots would be more sharp.  The green barn HDR was hand held and not as sharp as I wanted.  I'm sure some folks thought I was nuts out there along the fence line with my camera but oh well.  I took shots from the side and rotated around to the front taking more and then zoomed in on the John Deere tractor to take even more.  I ended up liking the tractor shot better than any of the barn shots.  Oh well.  Gotta love a John Deere, right?!?

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We're supposed to actually feel like winter here this weekend.  I'll be staying warm and looking for cozy photo ops!

Little Green Barn

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I was telling Photofreak the other day that NC has a lot more green barns than red barns.  I always admire the red barn shots she posts in her daily gallery.  My daily today is one of the green barns I see locally so often.  Many of these are used to dry tobacco.  I'm not sure what the purpose of this one is.  I just liked the trees around it and the dirt road going past it.  As I took the shots, I noticed my shadow getting into them.  I was able to take some without it yet I liked the ones that contained it too.  I thought my daily capture might be a good addition to Paula's shadow challenge.  This is an HDR image where I tried not to overdo it.  There was a tiny white building off in the distance, and I cloned it out because I felt it was distracting.  I was parked at the end of a driveway to take this shot.  It was one of those times where the dogs on all the adjoining properties went nuts.  One owner came out, studied that odd girl taking pictures of what I surmise was his barn, and then went back in.  Whew...  And, yes, the background image is a close-up of the barn itself.

Here's the original:

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Here's one of the shots without the shadow:

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I stopped at a swampy area yesterday that I pass on the to/from school run each day.  I was pleased to see a hawk and get the opportunity to photograph not only him but his mate.  I think these are red-shouldered hawks vs. the red-tailed hawks that I so often see.  All of these images were done on with my Canon SX40 HS with a digital zoom of approx. an 840mm equivalent.  Although the images are not really print quality, I sure did enjoy watching these beautiful birds!

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Here's the  swamp area in HDR:

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At another location, I spotted this old homestead that never would be visible in the summer when the leaves are on the trees.

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I want to go closer and explore really bad, but there's a no trespassing sign.  However, there's a name and number on the sign, so maybe I'll call and ask permission.  Better do it quick before the trees leaf out!

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Hermit Thrush

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My daily post is a picture of a Hermit Thrush.  I've seen this type of  bird in my yard before during other winters, but in particular, I noticed that this bird showed up 3-4 days ago.  I got lucky tonight, and he/she sat in the food dish for a solid 10 minutes while I prepared dinner.  It was pretty easy to capture some shots although the light was low.  My favorite is the one I posted which unfortunately has good detail but I cropped off the tail.  I'll share this one as my second favorite. The detail is less sharp, but the pose and the whole bird being in the frame are a plus. That whitish line is a fence post way at the back of the yard  that I wish was missing from the shot too!

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I took a really neat shot with a shadow today, and it's all I can do to wait to post it tomorrow for Paula's challenge!

The Cylinder

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Today's daily is a desperation shot.  It was cloudy all day yesterday and Donnie and I watched the movie The Double which we liked and then I was busy doing bills and other paperwork as well as helping the kids with their homework.  I just never saw a photo op until it was late in the evening and I noticed that 3 stackable tealight holders that I bought a few weeks ago at the thrift store looked pretty and decided to take some pics of them lit up by my 'mood' lights.  I rarely have a real light on at night...just various Christmas and party lights.  I didn't even have to move the holders to take the shots:-)  The holders are pink, green, and orange, but you can't really see those colors in the shots.  I did shots from the side as well as looking down into them:

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You know how I like glass and color.  I just couldn't resist.

In regular light:

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Maybe they will appear again as a daily next time actually used as tealight holders:-)

Not sure if I really like the original image on the background image or not.  I really do like the background image, though:

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I decided to go with the Robot/Space Valentine's Day card templates from Wal-Mart for the boys' cards this year.  I printed a test copy and then told them to print more when I saw how cute they were.  Joey said he really liked that Johnny got the robot and he got the spaceship.

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Trying to come up with good daily shots as best as I can during the colder winter months when outside flower and bug shots are hard to come up with and landscape scenes are often lack luster.

Delicate Pink Waterdrops

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We had a very cloudy and rainy weekend.  Yesterday morning, I decided to take the tripod outside to take some pics.  I've posted a pink camellia for my daily.  My helleborus is blooming very nicely:

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My helpers prepared lasagna for our Super Bowl meal.  There is sausage and hamburger in it browned with onions and mushrooms.  I used Hunts Tomato Sauce (2-15oz.) and Diced Tomatoes (1-15oz.) along with seasonings for the sauce (sugar, chicken broth, oregano, basil, garlic salt, Nature's Own Seasoning).  There's shredded cheese as well as ricotta cheese mixed with egg and parsley.  I steer away from Parmesan, but you could add that too.  Oh, and yes, the stealth health spinach leaves which the boys will actually eat.  They wilt nicely as the lasagna cooks.  I use the noodles you have to cook as much of an annoyance as that is.  It gives me a good excuse to use my pasta pot.  My only problem is that I can't seem to prepare a pan any smaller than 16X20.  Leftovers anyone?

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I'm working on Valentine's Day cards for the boys to give out at school too.  This is one possible one that I made for Johnny:

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The original was taken at Wal-Mart:

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And the background is an out of focus shot near the Hellborus that I tinted pink.  I used a heart brush set too.  I'm not sure if this card will be the one or not.  I've got a few days before I have to print them.

At home last night we did a photo shoot with our Valentine's Day teddy bears which also yielded some possible card images:

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Wal-Mart has some card templates that have rocket ships and robots on them.  I might just go with those and the pics above.  We'll see.

Valentine's Day Cards

I repackaged all the Valentine's Day cards that I've created this past week to print as 4X6 cards.  Just in case anyone is interested, they'll print on SmugMug for 99 cents each plus shipping for the order.  The watermark does not print...that's just to protect the online images.  I explored the new Price List option that SmugMug has and how to roll out changes to individual photos and/or galleries.  Neat!  I'll be printing some for the boys to give out at school.  We'll also be taking their Valentine's Day holiday portraits today and printing some of them too.

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Happy Birthday Donnie!

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We celebrated Donnie's birthday a day early with a special birthday dinner last night.  The kids decorated the driveway with very sweet messages done in chalk to welcome his arrival.  I fixed NY Strip Steaks, asparagus, PW's Roasted Potato Wedges, salad, sauteed onions and squash, and of course for the finale his favorite...a carrot cake from Stick Boy Bread Company.

I gave him 4X6 prints taken over the past 3 months of all the fun things we'd done and some Alabama Crimson Tide logo items.

There was a special card too:

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He was such a good sport about the homemade paper Birthday Boy hat:-)

Here's a cute video with the boys singing Happy Birthday:

The cake had special star candles and other candles that had colored flames.  It was pretty and everyone was patient while I got the picture and angle I wanted.

For someone that means so much to me and who has been there for me during all my struggles in the past year, I definitely wanted to let Donnie know how much he's appreciated and loved.  I think if you ask him if he had a good birthday he'll give a resounding yes.  Here's to  many more wonderful celebrations in our future birthday and otherwise.