Mother's Day rose.

This beautiful rose was at my work on Mother's Day. I'm still not sure who brought them, but I intend to find out, not only who brought it, but where they got it, because look at it. It is so beautiful and it has lasted so long. None of these pictures give an accurate picture of the color of this rose. It is a beautiful deep red, but, even with flash, I was not able to accurately capture it. Still it is very beautiful.


The night I brought it home. Mother's Day. May 9, 2010.


I put it on this fabric in an attempt to capture the true color. This picture most closely reflects the true color.


A close up to show its beautiful form. Taken 5/17.


Taken 5/18


Taken today, 5/23. It is just now starting to darken around the edges! I have had it for two weeks! It is still in the same water bottle. I haven't added any water.

Big

I thought "big" would be an easy subject, but I ran out of ideas right away. I think I'm just busy right now and not so into blogging. Here are some photos I've taken of big things.

Mount Rainier


The Badlands (Black Hills)


San Francisco


The Moon

April is almost here.

I'm thinking about blogging daily in April. I don't know what the theme will be yet. Not that it matters, because we don't have to stick to it anyway. I'm just saying. I might want to blog daily in April. That's all I have. Here's a few of my favorites of the 217 photos I took yesterday.
Well, I guess it's not a few. It's thirteen. So just pretend I'm still doing Thursday Thirteen and this is for that.

Whatever.

I'm not having any luck today uploading photos for my blog.
I will try tomorrow.
This counts as a post, though.
So here it is.
A post.
For NaBloPoMo.
Here's to you!

I tried again. It said bad request.
Oh well.
You will have to wait another day to see the gilded fish.

I'm working on it.

I am working on a blog. Actually, I'm beginning to see it will have to be several related blogs. I'm going to check in my archives because maybe I already did one on one item that I'm planning on featuring. I planned on having the one ready today, but didn't think it out enough and should have taken the pictures for it in the daylight hours to avoid the glare that occurs when taking it under incandescent lighting.
This is what you get tonight. Pretty much nothing exciting. I'm hoping the next few will make up for this very lame blog.
Maybe I can redeem it with a few of the pictures I've taken over the last few days.
Here you go:

Hail on the trampoline.

Berries at night with flash.

Blue Spruce at night with flash.

Berries with leaves turning color.

Barbed wire on a fence post.

November is almost over. I have enjoyed posting again so much. Maybe I will do next month's themed NabloPoMo assignment.

Coffee. An Addiction.

Another blog brought to you by bullets.

• I seriously need coffee.
• I also seriously hate this keyboard that somehow forces me to post my blog with only a title. A.N.N.O.Y.I.N.G.
• I don't want to make coffee because I want my coffee in the morning to be fresh and not warmed up.
• I don't want to go to McDonald's for coffee because it is too cold outside. (don't laugh at me all you Canadians who live in the land of the truly cold). Besides, I am too tired and I want to go to bed, not get in my car and drive.
• I really don't like instant coffee, but will probably make a cup anyway. Whatever!
• Did I mention I hate this keyboard?

So to make this a little bit better blog, here are some pictures I took while playing with my camera in my kitchen. While you're looking at those, I will go make myself a cup of the dreaded instant coffee.
Enjoy! (especially Chris).
 

Photo editing software.

I took these photos of my daughter's family last year and decided I wanted to take the background out of them. I tried a couple of different features on my photo program. The first one was to "erase" the background.

Here is the original:


Here is my "erased" copy. Obviously, I need a lot more work and finesse to use this feature. Or maybe less things to erase. I'm not steady enough, I think.


The second method was to use the cloning tool, in which you "clone" different parts of the original to fill over the background you didn't want. The original picture had a bookcase, boxes, the birdcages, and stuff sitting by the door. I need more practice at this one, too, but it was fun playing with it.


The twin on the left doesn't really have curly hair, but I cloned her hair from either Rhyan or Isaac, I can't remember. I used the edge of the table to make the floor trim between the wall and the rug. I used a "cutout" plant to put on the table. It's not bad for a first try.

Scanning pictures is like going back in time.

For some reason the boys thought sleeping on the floor in
their clothes was a treat. Keri was just there for a little bit.

Licking the bowl clean.

Like a deer in headlights.

Caught messing with the Christmas tree.

Not sure, but I'm sure it was a game of teasing the baby.
I'm thinking maybe he didn't like the feel of the koosh-ball.

Jeren hiding in the fabric box.

I have no idea why David has a black eye in this picture.

Tired after a long day as a flower girl.

Maybe one of the girls knows what was going on here.

Jeren reading the Sunday ads.

Wordless Wednesday

My wordless Wednesdays are never wordless. Oh well...here are some of my favorite pictures from when the kids were little. Most of them are of Jeren because I need a scanner, so these are what were already in my files. I may have posted some of them before.



Jeren sleeping. Notice he has a binky in his mouth, a cup under his arm and a reserve binky in his hand. He laid down next to the library books so he could read, but never made it that far.





Jeren and Grandpa

What Jeren's sister did to him when she got him out of the tub.

My favorite picture of Sean and David.

My favorite picture of Keri and Jeren. They were my two binky babies. She always used hers correctly, but Jeren always used his upside down.

This picture amuses me. They are waiting for the fire. We forgot to take firewood and were trying to get a fire from stuff we found on the beach.

This is what Sean used to do when you told him to smile.

Jeren and his friend Dennis on the trampoline in the leaves.