Faith Hope Love

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I saw this statue at The Garden Hut on Thursday and spent some time pp'ing the shot to B&W.  She looks like she's crying, but I still see Faith Hope Love.

The Yellow Bells or Forsythia are out here now, but I couldn't get a good shot in the drizzle yesterday.

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Raleigh missed the bad weather yesterday although rain arrived overnight and will hang around for a while this weekend.  We HAD Little League tryouts today, but they are going to be rescheduled.  Bummer.

Reaching for the Sun

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Well, I was going to post another shot from The Garden Hut today, but then I took this Star Magnolia picture yesterday at a local park.  I don't know how I got so lucky on this shot with the sharp focus.  Really.  The winds were near 20mph, and the blossoms were blowing all over the place.  Lots of the 100+ shots that I took in 10 minutes time had the petals blown to the far left or far right or the darn flower I was shooting was half blown out of the frame by the time I took the shot.  I'm glad I didn't give up and kept shooting.

Here's a collage of the best six shots which includes the daily shot:

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This camellia is blooming up a storm in my front yard right now with several of it's brothers and sisters.  Love that red!  I snapped this quick shot before the blooms are all gone.

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Madi's dad, Danny, has to put a new liner in the pool before we can swim and play volleyball this summer.  Donnie and I stopped by to check on the progress.  I thought this shot of the engineers discussing the work to be done was kindof cute.

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Maybe I'll post another Garden Hut picture tomorrow...or not.  We did hit 80 yesterday but did not break the 1979 record of 82.

Feeling Springy!

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I stopped in at The Garden Hut yesterday to buy some bird seed. Of course I took some flower pictures while I was there too.  Especially fascinating were all the varieties of helleborus that they had blooming.  I have several varieties in my yard, but they have weak stems and the flowers point downward.  The Garden  Hut had several more compact and stronger stemmed varieties with the flowers reaching for the sky and posing very nicely for my camera.  My daily shot, original below, has a star-shaped flower.

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I couldn't resist changing the background to pink, removing the flower petal on the lower left, and putting some pizzazz in the shot:-)

This helleborus flower in the image below has nice rounded petals and more pink.

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The helleborus flower in the image below is rounded and almost totally pink.

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I want more helleborus for my yard!

Even the witch hazel pictured below was looking great.  I need to check the tree in my yard and see if it's flowering right now too.

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In the green house, I s potted a gazing globe with a rainbow sheen to it.  I couldn't resist taking a SP:-)

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And for my flamingo loving friends, and you know who you are, here's a shot for you!

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I have several other shots that I took yesterday that I really like and will probably share another for my daily tomorrow.

The Beauty of an Orchid

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After I picked up the boys from school yesterday, I took one of the orchids that's blooming on my plant cart outside and too some pics.  The late day sun was warm in both air and color temperature.  I had a good time lying on the driveway, soaking up the sun, and taking about 50 shots from various angles trying to get a good shot.

3 very different shots out of the lot caught my eye, so I did a bit of clean-up work on them and then went back and forth with Donnie trying to figure out which was best.  It's hard when all 3 have very different things that I really like.

I was really drawn to the color adjusted blue background in the shot below.  But, the white center is over exposed:-(  I tried to get it back but couldn't.

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I really liked the longer crop and darker background on the shot below, but the white center is a smidge out of focus.

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So I went with the graduated orange tone background for it's center flower sharpness and color.

Pretty interesting how the shots turned out so different but were taken within 5' of each other in a 10 minute span of time.

Pot of Gold

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I know, I know, it's not even March yet.  I can't help it if the leprechauns have descended upon my house already:-)  It rained all day yesterday, and I didn't take any new pics, so I worked on pp this picture that I took on Sunday. Window decal instead of window cling this time.  I don't really like the screened effect on the Leprechaun, but I thought it was still cute and whimsical enough to share.  The screen is coming off that window!  I never open it anyway.  Screens to me equal bird viewing and picture taking blockers and one at a time they've come down off the windows on my home.  The background is a picture of a gazing globe I took at The Garden Hut some time ago.  I thought it gave a forest feel to the background.  I fooled around with the Darken/Lighten filter in Color Efex Pro too to darken his face and lighten the gold.

Here's the original which I am almost ashamed to share with you:

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Hopefully my daily is at least an improvement over it!

I know at least Carole will enjoy this:-)

I was out with some friends and former coworkers for lunch yesterday. I hadn't seen this group in a few years. Boy was it good to see them! I was too shy to ask for a picture although I am sure that they remember me and my camera and would have humored me. I could just kick myself for not speaking up and insisting on taking one... Note to Self: Be more bold and assertive with the camera!

Reaching for the Sun!

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Here's a daffodil shot from my neighbor's yard (Robert and Linda).  I really like that blue gazing globe that they have and spent a bit of time trying to line up the flowers in some way with it.  Don thinks the white out on the gazing globe is a bit distracting and I agree, but I still like the image.  I had to fix a little over exposure on the daffodil with Color Efex Pro filters.  Here is the original:

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I think the filters did a good job bringing out the best of the shot.  I used the darken/lighten, details enhancer, and I think one other.  I really like Nik's software.

I am working on Leprechaun and St. Patrick's Day stuff in the background but trying to hold back until March 1st at least.

Dinner last night consisted of red beans and rice, broccoli sauteed with onions, sweet potato paties, and bbq chicken legs...oh and a carrot cake not pictures.  The Duncan Hines box mix is not bad at all.  Yum!

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Lovey the Lion

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This post is for Joey who loves lions as his Lovey and Blankie pictured in the shot below taken in September 2009.

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The lion statue in my daily photo greets you when you come to my front door.  In real life, it's maybe 2 feet tall, but he has the pose of formidable foe.  Joey picked up the fallen red camellia blossom a couple of days ago and was very proud of himself when he gave Lovey a pretty flower for his (her) hair.  We won't tell him it's not that masculine, right?  I liked how the red popped in this SC version and decided to share despite the fact that it would be better if Lovey was a lioness:-)

Lovey was pulled out of the background and a texture was applied to just the background (Color Burn) from my Backgrounds and Textures gallery.    I used the Accent Edges filter and I think one other filter to bring out more detail in Lovey.  I darkened the shadows a bit more too.  I wanted the textures to really stand out.

Here's the original:

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I took some daffodil shots yesterday too and will share one of them with you today also:

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