a visit to a new park

this past weekend michael was sick with a stomach bug and the hubby was nursing two broken ribs. the weather was really nice - bright, sunny and temperatures in the 60s, so blake and i decided to leave the sickies at home and head out for some fresh air. a new park opened late last summer near our house and i'd been wanting to check it out...so off we went.

the land on which the park sits used to be a working farm in the 1940s and a cattle pasture in the 1990s. today the park consists of some restored farm buildings, a grove of hugh pecan trees, a pond, plenty of open meadows, 3 miles of walking trails and a beautiful stone ribbon wall.

first we checked out the pond...



and then the grove of pecan trees. look how big they are...



and i love the stone wall...



but all blake wanted to do was look for a stick to shoot imaginary bad guys with...



he found one he was really excited about...



and headed straight to the stone wall for cover.



here he is explaining to me that if i put him in the tree he can see more bad guys...



so up he went to "save us".



he was having so much fun - 100% boy and all imagination...





and then when he got shot himself i decided it might be time to go. he agreed only after i told him yes, he could bring the "stick-gun" home too...



it was a really great park and is now definitely on my list of favorites. i bet it is gorgeous in the spring and summer with everything in full bloom...definitely a be-back!!

photochallenge wrap up, month 2

i'm participating in a year long challenge at photochallenge.org and the month 2 challenge finished this past saturday (feb 20th). i posted the first month challenge photos here and in today's post i'd like to share my photos from month 2.

the theme for month 2 was natural landscape. for this particular challenge the definition of natural landscape was "one that is unaffected by human activity". so the goal was to find location(s) that appear to have not been touched by human hands. and i don't mind saying that when i first read this challenge, i thought it was going to be a little difficult for me for two reasons. first, in north carolina in the middle of winter everything is pretty much just brown. but it did happen to snow here in the plast four weeks so that mixed it up a bit. and second, i typically do not take landscape type photos. i generally like to zoom in, fill the frame with my subject and get as much of the finer detials as i can. so this was indeed a stretch for me. but then again, stretching is why i signed up for this challenge! overall i'm very happy with the four photos i submitted. there's definitley a lot of brown, but i find them all very peaceful looking scenes...

week 1 - carolina forest



week 2 - carolina forest 2. how many shades of brown do you see?



week 3 - some of the white stuff. can you see the beaver damn?



week 4 - carolina lakefront. i really like the sun "flare" in this one.

the theme for month 3 is signs and i've already got some location/ideas swirling around in my head. you can check out the details here and it's not to late to jump in and participate!

snow, snow, snow

it started snowing here on friday night and we ended up with about eight inches before all was said and done. for those of us here in north carolina that's a big deal as it doesn't happen all that often. the boys were really excited when it started on friday evening and they both got up saturday (and sunday for that matter) ready to head outside! i just wanted to share some pictures from our weekend. enjoy!

he stayed busy making snowballs....



shoveling snow....



hauling snow in his dump truck....



and carrying "icebergs".



and he stayed busy trying to sneak up on everyone and plummet them with snowballs....



even though he was told to stop again....



and again....



and again.



then he ended up face first in the snow and when we decided he was ok, we explained to him the concept of karma ;-)

photochallenge wrap up, month 1

a couple of weeks ago i talked about participating in the year long challenge at photochallenge.org - the original post is here. since the first month has wrapped up (it officially ended january 23rd), i wanted to share my photos here on leaf puddles and airplane stars. i plan to do the same at the end of every month to keep you posted on my progress...

the theme for january was resolution. these are the photos i took and posted - my take on the this theme....

play more.



shed. shed some weight. shed the clutter around me. shed the bad habits.



eat more fresh.



walk my ass off - literally.



the theme for february is natural landscapes. this should definitely be challenging since i have no plans to travel this month and the landscapes around these parts are pretty bare and brown in february.....

project 365 - photos i would have missed

i'm well into my fourth week of my project 365 for 2010 and i thought it might be a good idea to post some photos from my 2009 project 365 album. i talked a little bit about this project here, but probably the most important thing this project did for me was getting me in the habit of taking my camera with me everywhere. everywhere...i hardly ever leave home without it now. and i don't even carry it in my camera bag anymore - i just carry it in my purse. in my purse its more accessible and i'm much more likely to pull it out.

as i was going through my 2009 album i realized that some of the pictures in the album that were my favorites also happen to be photos that i could have never captured had i not been in the habit of having my camera with me. below are eight of them and perhaps they can be the inspiration for one of your 2010 picture-of-the-day....



i snapped this photo on my way home from work on evening last january. i was stopped at a stop light and glanced in my rear view mirror and this is what i saw....because my camera sitting beside my on the passenger seat in my purse i was able to grab it and take this picture.



i snapped this photo on saturday morning when my parents came up for a visit. we all decided to go to the mall and this was taken as we were walking across the parking lot. i watched from behind as blake coordinated the holding of both hands and was so glad i got that little moment captured....



my three guys after lunch on sunday. we had just finished and decided to walk around the corner to see if the ice cream shop was open. i love this picture because i rarely get them all three in the same shot....



this was another in-the-car-stopped-at-a-stoplight shot. we happened to look over and see this little dog riding on a motorcycle. needless to say the boys thought this was hilarious and continued to talk about it for days afterward....



another one of my favorites from this project....i was taking my boys for a haircut in the downtown area of our town. we were walking down the sidewalk with the afternoon sun at our backs and i looked down and saw our shadows, pulled out my camera and snapped away!



this one was snapped at the grocery store. again because i had my camera out i snapped this shot of both of them in one of those vechicle carts that i hate pushing through the aisles at the grocery store...but it keeps them occupied and quite for a few minutes....



this photo was from our local ymca family night...all three of my guys in a relay race!



and this is a photo i snapped at our local petsmart when michael and i went to buy him some fish. he had just asked the sales associate how you tell the difference between a girl fish and a boy fish and the associate is doing his best to point out the differences....

ten things thursday is back!

i stopped these thursday posts during the holidays but have decided to bring them back!! and today's ten things thursday post is really a top ten list. i was looking through my photos from 2009 and decided to pull out ten of my favorites that i hadn't already shared here. now this was no easy task because i took and saved over 4000 pictures in 2009. so here they are in no particular order....enjoy!

this is a favorite for several reasons....i hardly ever get a photo of the two of them both looking at the camera at the same time....this photo reminds me of the horrible hair cuts we had to give them because one of them got lice and i couldn't handle the thought of little critters running around their heads and only being able to use the lice shampoo once a week....it reminds me of a time when they could both fit in a target cart....and it reminds me that i had just told them "raise your hand if you want to go to mcdonalds for dinner"....we always play that game....



sunflowers are my favorite flower and this one was grown in my aunt kathy's garden last summer. i love the details and the bright colors in this photo....



this is a favorite for obvious reasons.....i can't look at this photo and not laugh!



i took this photo in march 2009 when michael and i visited washington dc. we went to arlington national cemetary in virginia and watched the changing of the guard ceremony at the tomb of the unknown solider.



this photo was taken at the north carolina zoo in asheboro, nc last spring. michael, blake and their cousin kacey were watching the sea lions swim and play. i love the colors in this one too.



this is my hubby...sitting on the beach in south carolina during our summer vacation....



blake at the fair in october. he was so excited to be riding all the rides and i snapped this picture while we were riding one together. i love all the busy stuff in the background and his bright blue eyes shining with excitement.



another one of blake playing in the pool at our resort in myrtle beach. he loved the pool and could play for hours in the kiddie pool with his little cowboy horses.....



i snapped this photo of michael during one of our visits to the state capitol in downtown raleigh. he looks so grown up in this picture.....much older than five....



another photo i snapped during our trip to washington dc. i took this one as the sun was setting and we were starting out on a nightime bus tour of the city.....

scrapbooking and photography in 2010

happy new year!! even though i started the new year a little under the weather, 2010 has started out pretty well thanks to some big news from a very sick friend yesterday. i'm continuing to pray for her and her little family, but i see nothing but healthy good times in their future!! i love you sweet friend!

and i know i haven't posted the last three days of my 25 days of december album but i have had some printing issues around here lately and haven't gotten a chance to get things together and ready for posting....but it is almost complete and the last pages will be posted soon!

in other news....i have set three big scrapbooking and photography goals for 2010.....all of which i'm happy to say that i've already gotten a head start on! this is of course in addition to all the million other projects i have ongoing - remember this post?

#1 i definitely want to continue doing a photo-a-day project for 2010. i did one for 2009 and i think it is a great way to document my/our everyday stories. not all the pictures i took were first rate, but my photography skills did improve. and yes, there were some days that i did not feel like taking a picture, but i did anyway. and yes i did get behind with the journaling but i caught up. and now that it is complete - all together in one album - i love it. and get this - my husband even sat down with the album the other night - looked at all the pictures, read the journaling, and proceeded to make comments like "look how much they changed in one year", "i forgot about that", "look at those haircuts", etc. that alone made it totally worth it! i've started capturing my photos and am up to date on the journaling (i started on december 28th because my weeks run monday to sunday), but i'm not quite sure how i'm going to put everything together yet. still thinking about that one and will keep you posted.

in a effort to improve my photography skills and my creativity i went in search of some photo challenges for 2010. i wanted something that was not as frequent as a photo-a-day, but something a little more challenging in terms of creativity. there are a lot of great challenges on the web and many, many resources. below are some of the ones i found most helpful....

2010 photography weekly challenges at two peas

7 photography projects to jump start your creativity

photo projects - why you should participate

flickr project groups

photochallenge.org

so after looking through all these links and deciding what i thought was managable on top of everything else, i decided on two photography challenges for 2010.....

#2 the 2010 photochallenge at photochallenge.org is a yearly challenge where you shoot one photo each week for a particular theme that changes every four weeks. the first theme for jan 01 through jan 23 is resolution. all images are added to the photochallange.org pool on flickr. i really like the fact that you can interpret these themes any way you like. and here is my first photo for week 01....

resolution: play more


#3 and the second photography challenge i'm going to undertake this year is called project rainbow. i actually found this challenge on flickr and thought it would be really fun (and i remember reading about it on photojojo also but can't find it now...)....basically you take photos that contain the colors red, yellow, pink, green, orange, purple and blue. twenty of each. in no particular order and again the subject is up to you. and again added to the flickr pool. this one just sounds fun to me. some colors will definitely be easier than others....i'm thinking pink might be a little tough for me! and again, i've added my first picture to the flickr pool....see below.

Red #1


what are you plans for 2010? are you doing any creative projects? want to join me in mine? all you need is a camera and a computer!