Month: August 2011

We were on vacation with my family last week.  Mornings were a sweet time (unless you were trying to sleep past 6AM).  We enjoyed waffles, cereal and these two fierce pirates – argh!

I was sitting with my boy and found myself distracted by the mess around me.  Shouldn’t I be picking up shoes or folding laundry?  This image came to my mind.  I was thinking about when something becomes so messy it is no longer useful.  

I do like a neat house, I just don’t have one.  When I think about how neat is things need to be I think, “Less time looking for socks – more time going for walks.”  I like to keep things orderly enough that I don’t spend much time searching for necessary things (keys, wallet, socks…)  

My girls let things pile up in their room so much that they stop playing there.  Then, I say, “You’re room needs to be cleaned.”  After the moans are done and the drawers and trash bags are full, they look around and say, “This is much better!” Then they start playing in their room again.

So, there I was sitting with my boy, looking at the mess.  We played for awhile and then I climbed over some toys and got out my camera.

Taking ShapeOh, summer.  This one has been so hot.  I want to be enjoying it.  I remember bundling up the kids in the winter to go out for a fewer minutes than it took to get bundled and I think, “Enjoy this.”  But, most of the time, I’m wiping sweat off my baby or me and not enjoying it.  

I do love the water though.  It’s a wonderful, changeable subject.  And we’re out playing in it every day.

One of the unexpected benefits of my 100 mm lens is that I don’t need to get as close to the water to get a picture of it.  I have had to protect the camera from an errant spray or two but mostly it makes water photos easier.

A photo like this calls for a fast shutter speed (1/1250) and a lot of failures. Fortunately, my boy was so happy to have the hose on that he hardly noticed me.

I was talking to a photographer friend about my pictures and said, “I don’t know if my photographs are good or if I just love them because I love the people in them.”  He said, “Does it matter?”

This is a photo of two people I love dearly and my favorite photo from the hundreds I took last week.  

We were away last week at a church camp that I’ve been going to almost every year since I was eight.  The tall boy is my nephew.  When he was little, like my Cotton Top, he came to camp with us.  And now look how long he is and how kind.  

Sometimes the choice between black and white or color is easy.  Other times, it’s a toss up.  This was one of those cases. Here is the color version:

When I used film and developed and printed my photographs, I almost always used black and white film.  It was much easier to process.  I didn’t have the choice of seeing the same image in black and white or color.  Now, I love having a choice and sometimes not choosing. 

I have to remind myself to take pictures of something other than this little face from time to time. I’m smitten. I did try a few other things this week but nothing out shined this one.