PaD Feb 11

We had a heat wave today. Yay!!!!! It's about time. I'm so tired of gray cold days. Today was beautiful. 60 degrees. We went for a drive (well actually the kids wanted pizza for supper) so off to Zeiderelli's we went. On the way is one of our state parks. Over the last few weeks or so men have set up little ice fishing stations on the ice. I think it is so cool, but you wouldn't catch me out there on the ice. I'd be scared it would break through and I'd be an ice cube and gone. Today it was a shock that the men were still out there fishing on the thinning ice. I snapped this picture and loved it immediately (on camera), but then I brought it home and wasn't so thrilled with it. See for yourself:


But then I put it into Lightroom and started to play around with it to make it look the way I saw it. I couldn't get it right. It was taken with my point and shoot so it wasn't as good of quality as it should have been either. So ok, I guess I'm gonna go overboard with the processing (like I always do anyway). Here is the final "painted" over the top version - but I love it.


And then I turned around and saw this little alcove of beauty:

I didn't really do too much to this photo at all. Just upped the contrast and black a little. I thought it was such a pretty little treasure.

PaD Feb 10

I hate that this is going in my blog but the only picture I took today was for Mikey. He loves this truck and today when I went to lunch I saw it so I thought I would snap a picture quick for the boy. So here it is. Looks like a redneck mobile for sure. We have a lot of them around here.

PaD Feb 9

I got to see the most awesome light photographs that I've ever seen before today. There was a gallery showing at the Art's Council today. Charlie and I were intrigued to go to it because it was called "Abandoned America." This guy goes around the country and seeks out places that are abandoned and run down, places like institutions, hospitals, penitentiaries, factories, schools, etc. Some of his photos just gave me the chills. It really makes me think of the style of photography I want to do. There are so many abandoned buildings around here. I just wish I knew how to get permission to go into them.
This photo of one of his framed prints does it no justice. The reflections of the car and of course me should not be there, but you can get the idea of what it might look like in person. Wow!!! He prints all his work on metallic paper which really makes the light pop.


After going to the show we went out for lunch. Here are a couple pictures from lunch.





I printed out the valentines and found the right kind of lollipops that wouldn't bend the pictures too much. What do ya think?

Guest Blogger - Charlie Johnson

As promised earlier in the week i present Charlie as my guest blogger. Don't listen to her - she is a great photographer.

Bobbie....Thanks for inviting me to be your guest today. Now I have a chance to tell you how much you have taught this novice photographer. Prior to B.B. (that's "Before Bobbie") my photography was focused on cats, dogs and flowers. Then you came along. Wow!
You took me with you to places that I would never have considered. You showed me that photographic opportunity can be found in the most....ummmm....scary...I mean unique places!



You taught me to look beyond my flowers and look for other vistas......


You showed me that a tilt of the camera can result in artistic imagery....(My....didn't I practice my tilting! I practiced so much I got dizzy.)




You taught me to always keep my eyes open for the unique...




And you spent hours instructing me not only in using my camera but in the use of Photoshop. Oh my.....me and Levels are just humming along now. I often find that several hours have passed while sitting at my computer and working to improve my photos.


So...for all you have done for me....but most of all for being a wonderful friend.....I'll just sign off with this:


Bobbie, my dear, you've lifted me out
of my photography rut;
I've expanded my knowledge...
But, sadly.....also my butt.


Love, Charlie

But then Charlie and I went to the Old Sled Works for another photostroll and I asked her to add to her guest post, so here is what she had to say about that. I tell ya she is a funny gal!

My eyes are blurred.....my head aches....my right index finger is
permanently curved on the mouse button...my back and neck are bent in
an arthritic "C" toward my monitor. I have not moved from my computer
for three and a half hours! Why? Because Bobbie took me on a photo
shoot in an antique mall. The last hours have been spent trying to
bring artistry to the nine million, curse-laden photos that have been
appearing on my computer. Ohhhh.....why did no one warn me of the
perils of photography and the ensuing physical and mental torture that
striving for that "perfect shot" would bring.

Oh....by the way....did I tell you that today was an absolute blast
and that I enjoyed every minute???

I did! When can we go again?















Wasn't that fun? And you even got to see some pictures of me. Thanks Charlie for being my guest blogger today. We have so much fun together. Oh and I think my Momma will be jealous of the one of me kissing Elvis!!!!! ha, ha, ha.

PaD Feb 8

Here's my cards for the girls for Valentine's Day. They are so cute. Thanks Christina for showing us the idea. You have to imagine a lollipop in the hand of each girl. To finish these cards use an exacto knife or a hole punch and slice or punch a hole on each side of the hand. Then all you have to do is insert the lollipop. I got dum dum lollipops and the stick is just a little too thick so I will have to search for some with skinnier sticks. The larger sticks end up bending the picture and it doesn't lay flat. If I can't find thinner sticks I will use the dum dum's, but hopefully I can find something else. If you would like to make these cards too just use a large aperture like f2.8 or larger and focus on the hand to seperate it from the background.



I will update later in the week with the finished cards.

PaD Feb 7

I waited until the last minute again to take my pictures for the day. Here's Kelsey drawing a really cute picture. She had me draw something too, but I won't say what it is. I'm not good at drawing.






And here is the final masterpiece. I love the little duck pond and the rain coat on the little person. I love little kid drawings.

PaD Feb 6

I have a love hate relationship with this computer of mine. I love that fact that it is so entertaining and that I have computer knowledge enough to use it. I love that I can process pictures in seconds. I love that I met such nice friends on my Family Photography group. There are alot of things I love about my computer. I loved the ease of downloading music. I had a large library of it in my Music Folder. Not any more. Which brings me to why I hate my computer. I ended up getting a virus the other day. I still don't have it back to normal. I don't have the virus anymore, but I can't get some of my programs to work now unless I am in safe mode. Norton Antivirus sucked with this one. I was always a supporter of Norton. This time it let me down. Why didn't it catch my virus when it was coming in? Why don't they have an easy solution for a fix? Then when you go their website and click on chat they want to charge you $95 to try and fix your problem. I didn't do this since I read online that they are no help with this particular virus. Here's the steps I took to rid my computer of this sickness:
Got the virus from downloading music
1. Norton caught it after the fact.
2. Needed Manual removal - couldn't just have the anti-virus program do it
3. Download virus removal tool - ran it and of course it says I don't have the virus. Run the removal tool in safe mode and then it sees it. Removes it.
4. Run Norton again in safe mode and it says I didn't remove it.
5. Delete all music (insert crying here)
6. Run removal tool in safe mode again.
7. Now my Norton won't run in normal mode - only safe mode. My icons for Norton are dead.
8. Thinking Microsoft Windows Service Pack 3 might help I download it and no luck.
9. Now my Outlook Express doesn't work.
10. Knowing it's because of Service Pack 3 I want to roll back to SP2. Worried that it might not work and I don't want to mess up my computer even worse I search online and find many horror stories of people who rolled back from SP3 to SP2. Searched farther and found the correct way to do it.
11. Cross fingers and begin rolling back.
12. Outlook Express works again - YAY!!!!!!
13. Norton still doesn't work.
14. Since I rolled back I need to do all the updates for Service Pack 2 again. This took forever. Thank God for DSL. Wait for updates. Waiting....Waiting....Waiting.
15. So Here I Am. No longer have the virus, but I'm out of all my music and my Norton doesn't work unless I'm in Safe Mode. I wonder how long it will be until I get another virus.
16. Makes me not want to buy Norton again, but what else will protect my computer any better? Any Ideas I would greatly appreciate.

PaD Feb 5

I didn't take a picture all day today until around 6:00 PM. I was taking the girls to their piano lessons and I realized I hadn't taken a picture for my picture a day so I quick got out my point and shoot from my coat pocket and snapped one quick and the darn flash went off. I was driving at the time and wondered what the other cars on the road thought of me. It was pretty funny. If you know me, you know that I don't like flash pictures at all. But when I put this into Lightroom and looked at it I thought it was workable. I think when you look at this photo it looks like you are inside a snow globe looking out. Anyway, here is the only photo I took today:

Pad Feb 4

This is a long post. I had a busy day and since I am writing this for my blog book if you dont want to read I understand. There are also a bunch of pictures to follow. I took so many today and couldn't choose just a couple.
Today I went on a photo stroll with Charlie (who buy the way is gonna be my guest blogger as soon as I get caught up with mine) to the Old Sledworks today. It's an old factory building which used to be a factory that made sleds called "Lightning Guiders". I always thought they were called Lightning Gliders, but I was wrong. Sleds were produced for 85 years in this old factory building. Now the building is a very famous (in our area) antique and craft market. I love going to this place. Inside there are antiques, crafts, and an awesome old time working penny arcade and soda fountain. I think the penny arcarde and old soda fountain are my absolute favorites. We spent lots of time and took a gazillion photos in that part of the building. In the rest of the building is old antiques and newer crafts. I found a steal there too. Something that I've been wanting for a long time. I love old scales and I am a child photographer. I want a baby scale really bad. Well today I found one. I was scared to even look at the price. Woo hoo it was regularly $34 and I was lucky that it was on sale for $19. I was so freakin excited I almost was jumping up and down. Anyway, Charlie and I had a wonderfully fun day and it was a lot of fun taking pictures with her. She is so fun to hang around with. If you would like to look at their site check it out here is there address www.sledworks.com










the old soda fountain


there's even an old camper that seats two people. You can actually eat in it. That's Charlie sitting on the steps to the camper.






Here's some of the many games they have. All are working. Amazing.


Remember when video games were simple?


for the guys, ha, ha (I wish life were this innocent now a days)




And these. I love these. When I was a teenager there was a newstand on the corner of the town I grew up in. They roasted fresh peanuts there and it smelled wonderful. In the back room there were a couple pinball machines that were so fun to play with. One of them was messed up and only needed one quarter to play for hours. I don't think the owner knew about it. Barb, Theresa and I would take our one quarter in there and have fun for the day taking turns playing pinball and racking up millions of points. If we tilted it the fun was over though. These photos reminded me of the pinball machines from when I was a teenager although mine were a little newer.




and just because this place sold things, I thought I better add one more picture of something for sale so you didn't think we hung out in the game room most of the time. (We did.)





Later, I drove home to pick up Mikey and his friend to finally take them bowling. The night before we tried and failed. (read previous post). The boys had a great time as you can see here. They aren't the best bowlers, but they had a ball. Afterwards they played some video games. The quality of these photos are horrible. It's pretty dark in the bowling alley and I didn't want to use flash so I guess I just have to embrace the grain.












almost looks like it's gonna be a strike!


aww shucks. It was close though


some video game fun




Total Concentration


Mikey got two free games for getting a good score. Here's his last game. He didn't do so good on the third one. He was done after this one. When we walked out the door we were greeted with some heavy blowing snow. I didn't get any snow pictures. It was too dark outside.



Once home, we had birthday cake. It was a day late because yesterday I didn't have the right kind of icing. Mikey wanted an orange cake with cream cheese icing. He has eleven candles on his cake and one in the corner for good luck.






Look at those cheeks!