Happy early Easter

Today we celebrated Easter at my dad's house. This is the new dress I got yesterday :)  I just love it!

  I always love a home-cooked meal and my dad never disappoints. We had wonderful meal of a roast, pasta salad, baked beans and grape salad.  Everything was delicious!

It was so nice to see family.  Uncle Bob and cousin Gretchen came from Wausau, and Gretchen brought her baby Graham.  He is soooo sweet.

 

Gretchen, Me, Graham, and Grandma Ginnie

My great aunt and uncle came, as well.

 

After dinner we took a drive to Flemings Rapids. There was a light fog  over the water I was hoping to capture.  I managed to get a shot of two geese as they flew away.

 There was just a little bit of fog.  I think this picture shows how calm it was.

 Well, it's time to go relax and enjoy the rest of the evening.  Tomorrow we head back home and we'll be stopping to see more of my family.

Good night, everyone!

Weekend away

I have been looking forward to going back home to see my family since Christmas. It was a beautiful day on Thursday for the drive. We made it home pretty late so went right to bed to get ready for our weekend of fun.

I spent time photographing all the flowers that were blooming in the house.  It made it feel a little more like spring!

Friday morning we got up early to do a little shopping before my lunch date at 12:30. There is the cutiest shop called Top Drawer Boutique in Phillips, WI, that I would highly recommend you visit.  I found two really cute outfits, a long maxi dress and a reversible skirt. They are perfect for the spring weather coming up!

I have to confess that I have a weakness for shopping at thrift stores.  One of the stops I have to make when we are in Phillips is St. Vincent de Paul. I always seem to find something. I rarely go there looking for anything and, if you ask Mike, we rarely need the things I find :)  This trip was no different.  I got a large serving bowl, two small pudding cups that I'm going to use to photograph food, and a lantern.

After our shopping trip I headed to Harbor View to meet my friend Terese for lunch. We went to high school together many....many...many years ago.  It was great to catch up with her and meet her son.  He is SOOO cute and has the most amazing blue eyes. I'm sorry I didn't get a picture of him, but hopefully next time we get together the snow will be gone :)  There was a family that had flown in and landed their plane on the ice.

I took the long way back to my dad's so I could drive past Flemings Rapids.  The first thing I saw was some bufflehead ducks right along the shore. Unfortunately, after taking two steps towards them, they all flew away.  It was pure luck that they turned and flew right over my head . I continued to walk out on to the bridge when I saw five deer walking out on the ice. They seemed frightened but didn't run away. There were also geese swimming right by the bridge.  It was great to see so much wildlife!

After that I stopped at my grandma's for a quick visit. She has all kinds of jars in the basement and I found an empty one to photograph with only light from a small window in the concrete wall.  I think it turned out pretty well.

Grandma's dog, Janie

Once I got home, I took more pictures of things around the house and we went for a walk.

Then it was supper time. My dad made AMAZING homemade pizza.  

Wow . . . that was one of my longest posts yet, I think!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend :)

First day of spring

I would have loved to take a picture of green grass or something springy, but mother nature decided it's going to be winter for a little longer.

Here are some pictures I took today. My mother-in-law gave me the perfume. I love the scent and the simplicity of the bottle.

I also ordered some washi tape the other week from a website called Pick Your Plum. I warn you now...it's addicting. I have yet to figure out what I'm going to use it for :) I loved the colors and that was what sold me.

I'm very excited because tomorrow my new camera should be arriving!!!! I'm hoping it's nice this weekend so I can get out and get some great shots.

Low Light

Last week I met up with my bride and groom for August at one of the favorite local hangouts, Greene's Pour House. Sara is going to school at Marquette and she and Matt really wanted to watch them play that night, so we met up to talk details and to cheer on the Golden Eagles.

I've been trying to take every opportunity to challenge myself, as you know, so I brought along my camera to see if I could test out some new ideas.

I get a lot of my ideas from Pinterest and then try to implement them. I brought along a cork so see if I could get a different ring shot than normal. The setting was very dark with just pendant lights to work with.  I think it turned out pretty good; I still need to practice, though.

This is my favorite shot of the night; something a little different but very romantic.

Don't worry, we still watched the game, too, but they lost. We still had a great time, talked details, and had a little mini-shoot fun.

I hope everyone has a great weekend!!!

Vintage Find

Last night I was already thinking about my project for today. There is a little back story regarding this project so I'll tell you that first.  Over a year ago I saw an idea in a magazine where uncommon objects were used as bud vases.  The one idea I fell in love with was a glass knob turned upside down and I've been searching and searching to find one at thrift stores, yard sales and ReStore.  I couldn't find one anywhere and didn't really want to just order one off the internet.  It wouldn't seem as special.

In the meantime, my mother had her basement door painted to look like an old weathered door.  It turned out great but something was missing; the modern door knob just doesn't look right.  That began her quest, as well, to find a glass door knob.

A woman I work with is always shopping at the ReStore and loves it.  In fact she's the person who found filing cabinets for me.  Well, the other day she told me of her latest find and yup, you guessed it.  She found a door with glass knobs.  I couldn't believe it!  My sister-in-law was standing by us as we were talking and she asked to see a picture of a glass door knob because she thought she had them all over her house.  Are you kidding me??!!?  I showed her a picture and she said she was pretty positive that some of her doors had the very same knobs.  She said she would bring one in for me.

I was beyond excited today to see if it was, in fact, what I've been looking for.  IT WAS!!!!!  It was even more beautiful in person.  I thanked her over and over and then emailed my mom to show her what I gotten. She got just as excited as me but, unfortunately, it was just the knob and not the whole kit which is what she would need.

I rushed out to buy some flowers just so I could make my vision come to life.  Mike had made me a mini backdrop with some old wood, and everything about it was perfect for my shoot.

                                I had some extra flowers so I put them in a milk glass vase.

I'm beyond happy how these turned out and it's exactly as I had pictured in my mind.

           Plus, how can you go wrong with some bright yellow flowers with spring on its way?!

Close up fun

Today I wanted to play around with some close up shots. I used rings for my first few shots because I need to practice for some upcoming weddings and engagement sessions I have this year. I think they turned out pretty good.

Mikes ring with our wedding date

                     

 

My ring sure needs a good cleaning! Guess I should have thought that before. Oh well :)

 

My tanzanite ring is something I hold dear to my heart as it was given to me by a woman very close to me.

I have also been wanting to get a close up picture of my cats nose. I know...it sounds weird but people take pictures of their babies nose, eyes, and ears right? He was posing all cute so I snapped this one as well.

                                                    And here is his cute little nose :)

 Now I have to think of what my project should be for tomorrow! Hope everyone had a great day :)

New challenge

I've been trying to figure out a better way to keep up on my posting, and I think I found the perfect thing.  I'm going to post a photo a day or maybe a few, but at least one for sure.

Tonight the weather was finally warm enough to take Miss Aayla for a walk. We have a park near our house where she loves to go.  She likes it even better in summer when she can go swimming.

I wanted to challenge myself tonight using my new lens to photograph the seaguls flying.  It was actually harder than I thought.  I'm still getting used to the way the new lens works, but so far I'm really happy with the results.

The new camera I ordered should be here in a few weeks.  I'm so ready for it to be spring so I have greener things to photograph!