9 Days until Christmas

You wouldn't know it if you came by my house. 

This weekend I finally decided I should probably break out the boxes and at least decorate the tree. 

As of today is not finished yet.  It needs a garland. 

Maybe tonight [grin]

I find it hard to get motivated to decorate when we are not spending Christmas at home.

I took the girls to my sister's house to take some pictures with their tree. 

She is a little more organized than I am. 

Her tree goes up, without fail, the Friday after Thanksgiving.

Do you like their outfits? 

I got them

HERE. 

I love them! 

My husband?  ... not so much [grin]

I got the above Aged effect playing around with a trial version of Adobe Photoshop Lightroom. 

I want that program!  Maybe I'll write Santa about it!

Autumn Leaves

Green leaves,

Yellow leaves,

Red leaves, and brown,

Falling,

Falling,

Blanketing the town.

Oak leaves,

Maple leaves,

Apple leaves, and pear,

Falling,

Whispering,

“Autumn’s in the air!”

Big leaves,

Little leaves,

Pointed leaves, and round,

Falling,

Nestling,

Carpeting the ground.

by Leland B. Jacobs

Say Cheese!

I wanted to share some of the pictures I took this weekend. For my birthday, my husband and girls got me THIS new lens for my camera. This Saturday, after church I played a little with it. The girls were not really in the mood for a photo shoot so it only lasted about 5 minutes but look at the pictures!

This lens is incredible! It is what they call a Prime Lens or Fixed Lens. That means you cannot zoom you have to actually move and compose your shot in the viewfinder. It takes a lot of getting used to not being able to zoom, but I think I love it!

These are straight out of the camera.  I shot them in AV (Aperture Mode), left the focus in automatic and did not adjust anything else. I am pretty happy with how they turned out.

I then decided to try to play with the f-number. The smaller the number the shallower the depth of field and results in that nice blurry background while the subject is clear. Look at the difference between the two pictures. The top one is with a higher f-number and the bottom one with the lower one.

I was so excited to figure it out! Unfortunately, my darling subjects decided I had taken enough shots and stopped cooperating, so I was not able to keep experimenting.  Maybe next time!

A Warm Fall Afternoon

Today we had a gorgeous day! It was sunny and warm. I spent much of it indoors but was able to "air" the house by turning off the heat and opening the windows. It's great to get some "natural" air running through the house specially when we know that soon we will close the windows and endure winter for several long months.

After I picked up the girls from school I decided to have a little photo shoot. I wanted the girls to wear something fallish looking in the orange or browns. Unfortunately they did not have anything like that, so we settled for purple. It was very warm so the sweaters and hats and scarves are just for looks, they really could have worn shorts and t-shirts.





I love taking pictures about an hour before sunset, the light is so great! It makes me wish I had a better camera than the little point and shoot I own. However, I think these still turned out pretty good.

Afternoon Fun: Spontaneous Photo Shoot

Had some fun with Natalie yesterday afternoon with this impromptu photo shoot. It all started with her wanting to give me a makeover with her princess makeup. Then decided she wanted to dress up for the occasion with her Cinderella dress. She looked so cute I suggested instead I give her a makeover and do her hair. She obliged and then was more than happy to pose for pictures.