153 posts tagged “photography”

My SIL called the other day. he suggested I get together with her friend who is a florist. She is just beginning in the field. I asked if she needed pictures of her arrangements or something, SIL said No, Her arrangements are just so beautiful. I thought you would love to take pictures of them.

This got me thinking a bit. I was thinking that if I took photos of these beautiful flowers and arrangements, I would have to be technically correct, or it would end up looking like a snapshot of beautiful flowers. Don't get me wrong, I love flowers, the colors and shapes are amazing, but my photography skills are awkward, and the elegance of a floral arrangement would show my awkward and clumsy photographic style in a bad way.

I am not drawn to perfect beautiful things. These are not what make me gasp and grab the lens cap off of Ruby (My Nikon D80), and frantically snap off several shots. I like the ordinary and the ugly. This is what brings me to my knees. I love the chip in a teacup, the decay of an old shed, the rust on the fender of an abandoned car. My awkward clumsy photographic style matches up with the awkward nature of a chipped teacup on a shelf of perfect ones, it matches with the abandoned items I find along the railroad tracks, it matches with parts of me. I am awkward, I am clumsy, I have been abandoned and left to rust, I am an odd duck.  I like that about myself now, it took a while.

I will take pictures of flowers because the colors are incredible, I will take pictures of my family because they are beautiful, and I will capture them in my own way, but the thing that gets me going is taking pictures of ugly things, and make them look pretty.




Friday the 13th, List of thirteen things I love to take pictures of:
1.Old hand made items, like the sweater and the pillow shown here. The stitches are coming loose, and there are stains and tears, but they are beautiful. Somehow you can feel the energy of the lovely person who made the item so many years ago. You can feel the love!

2. antique technology, they show me what was. They tell me stories of the way things were. An old radio tells me a story of little boys dressed as cowboys and indians sitting listening to old westerns after school, and news reports of the end of a war, and playing songs that made people fall in love and dance. Cameras that captured not only the family all dressed up in their sundays best standing outside the old Packard, but the long shadow of the person holding the camera.

3. things out of place, one red flower in a garden of yellow, or one fence post bent and broken in a line of perfect spires.

4. decay, natural or not, I love seeing the cycle. Everything eventually gets swallowed up by mother nature. It is a constant battle to keep our homes free from blackberry brambles. If we left our home for 5 years, it would be buried inside a giant mound of blackberry bushes.

5. reflections, I like the clouds mirrored in a mud puddle, or the bare branches of a tree mirrored ina puddle filled with its leaves, my own reflection in a storefront window

6. my kitties, they are so cute!!!

7. art

8. strange things I find along the railroad tracks, like a fork or a shoe

9. my own feet, I like the splash of color my own fun shoes can add to a scene

10. sweetness, no matter how "dark" a shot may be, I like to have a bit of sweetness or innosence there, a bit of wonder and magic

11.  from ground level, or near it, I like different perspectives. I like seeing the world from 4 inches above the ground.

12. shadows, my own or a street lights shadow, a fence or a flower, sometimes reducing a photo to the shape of a flower can be quite beautiful.

13. Odd things, things that make people cringe in a strange way. Like the duckling above. I did not touch it, that is how they had it displayed. A dead duckling in a teacup. I love antique doll faces even thouhg so many find them creepy. I think of the sweetness. How many teaparties did the dolls attend? How many nights did they make safer for a little girl in the dark? I like odd things.

Tuesdays things:
-negative-
*I have bunches of housework and no energy
*cold gray weather
*feeling overwhelmed
*I think my cat scratch on my cuticle is getting infected
*my nose is getting stopped up
*my ears are ringing
*throat is scratchy
*sleeping is not easy

+positive+
*I may be sick, but it is not terrible, no fever, aches, etc
*my camera bag should be coming in the mail today
*there is a nice warm fire burning in the wood stove
*the yard looks pretty when it is frozen
*hot coffee to be followed by hot chocolate
*I have enough housework done to keep up on the progress of last week
*I have so many pictures edited and ready to upload
*I have been sketching so many new ideas for scenes to photograph
*big hugs from Mr. L before he leaves for work.

I am a day late but I don't think anyone will mind.

Nay-
1. I have the smell of comet cleanser stuck in my nose
2. so many photos to go through and edit
3. I have a pile of stuff on a table behind me (I swear there is a dining room set under it all) waiting to be organized and put away
4. today is the last day of sunshine, back to rain and gray

YAY-
1. Mr.L still has his job
2. I have a lot of pictures to edit (yes it is both)
3. I have stuck to my schedule so far and laundry has been kept up on, my kitchen is clean, my bathroom is clean. Today is the dining room.
4. I have a stack of towels to donate to the animal shelter
5. my coffee is hot
6. I feel good (thanks to the sunshine)
7. I love my quiet life
8. tomorrow Mr. L and I will celebrate our 15 year Kissin' anniversary. 15 years of Kissin'
9. I have books to read
10. I have some great ideas for some strange photographic images.



Todays list of to do:
1. laundry (one load)
2. dishes in the dishwasher, tidy kitchen
3. tidy bathroom
4. make bed
5. clean computer desk
6. dining room table cleaned
7. dining room chairs cleaned
8. sweep


seriously this will take all day long. There is a lot on that table from when we had to evacuate from the flood.

If I stick to my schedule, my living room, dining room, bathroom and kitchen will be clean.

next week, laundry room. Yes, a whole week just for that room. it has been the dumping ground for years now. I want it to function.

then the bedroom.

Then the art room.

Then the office room.

After I get the rooms tidy enough to function. I am going to declutter, seriously declutter. I have been reading this book, and it really has given me a big push. I am going to go through every drawer, every cupboard. I want a clean home by the end of the year. I want to blog from the office room rather than my dining room. I want to go into my art room and create when the mood strikes me. I want to walk easily through my laundry room without tripping on piles and piles of stuff. I want to invite people over to my home.

wish me luck

ps. My sister posted a small and funny blog about our fun outing to the antique show.

I could not choose between which yellow dress photos to post, so I posted both. 

There is a yellow glow seeping in between the cracks of my heavy drapes. It is sunshine, beautiful honey colored sunshine. Warm and crisp, bright and soft. I have huge windows on my home, I threw open my heavy dust soaked drapes and let the light pour in. My kitties Loved rolling back and forth in the beams, eventually falling asleep in the sunshine which was next to the toasty wood stove. They were happy. So was I. 

 I was chatting with my friend Heartshapedsky yesterday on the phone, she gave me an idea. I think I might try it. She was telling me how effective her new hula hoop was in her workout routine. Yes, I said hula hoop. It is not your kmart $5 hula hoop, it is a custom made weighted hula hoop, made for a hula hoop dance class. How much fun does that sound like? I think of my days on the playground and in PE, hula hoop spinning around my tiny body, listening to the two balls  swirl around inside, I always got the kinked one, I was never fast enough to get one of the new pretty sparkle ones. I still worked it though! My other fave on the playground was hopscotch. Tossing a pebble out over the numbered squares Jumping out avoiding the square the pebble fell into, and picking it up on the way back to the beginning. I also loved wall ball, one of those big red bouncy balls being hit against a large wall of the school. I loved the echo sound the ball made every time it was hit. I loved riding bikes, and playing hide and go seek, and tag, monkey bars, swings,  and... I loved playing.

So I was thinking, why did I stop? What was the reason I stopped playing? Did I stop because it was no longer cool to play when I hit junior high? Because my body started to grow quickly and I stopped playing because it was painful? Because I had no friends to play with? The answer is Yes. All three. 

I am now nearly 36 years old and I struggle to work out. "Work out" has become a bad word for most of us. A chore. It is not fun (although Heartshapedsky would disagree, she loves it, but she is taking hula hoop classes) I was thinking what would my day look like if I did not set time aside to work out, but to play. 

9am-dishes

10am- laundry

11am- clean bathroom

12pm- lunch

1pm-Play!

 

What would happen if I set time aside to go out and play? To hopscotch on the sidewalk for twenty minutes, to hula hoop, jump rope while singing "Cinderella dressed in Yella..." Could I invite friends over to play? set up play dates? What would someone think driving by my house seeing grown women playing hopscotch and laughing like we were still 10 years old? Would they stop the car and join in? 

My shopping list:

- hula hoop

- jump rope with the plastic beads on it

- sidewalk chalk

I wanna play!

I can tell my body is trying to get sick. I get a little feverish, clogged sinuses, scratchy throat, but I drink lots of peppermint tea, rest, and it seems to die down.
I went to the antique show with my baby sister. I bought some vintage photos, okay stacks of them. They were only $0.25- $1. Oh I got one tin type for $4, he was such a dapper young man. I love the vintage photos, the secret stories they hold. I can stare into them and daydream all day. We looked at lovely old frocks, ribbons, lace, and buttons. It was really nice. I want to collect vintage cameras, but did not buy any because I have no place to put them yet. Proud of me? There was a sweet little "baby Brownie" kodak camera, slightly larger than a childrens wooden block. So pretty! But, I left it there, It was extra money I really do not have to spend, I have no space for it, I do not need it. So I took pictures of it. Haha! Good enough right?

I made myself some hair clips last night, glued some old buttons on some bobby pins. Cute and cheap accessories.

I am nervous. Today is the day that my husband's company announces layoffs. They asked for volunteers two weeks ago, and they got 5 takers. My fingers are crossed that Mr. L will be able to keep his job.
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In other news:
My baby sister has taken her fashion blog in a different direction. She started interviewing people in the fashion industry. Photographers, like our Very own Ivysgrankid. When I showed her his photos she was blown away that he was her age and a struggling student just like her.
She has interviewed a couple photographers, and a couple of designers. She has had the dream to be a fashion magazine writer. I do hope she can make a living one day on doing what she loves. So check her blog out, leave comments, she is trying to get in on some blog groups but she does not have enough traffic. I hope a few of you go and check her out.
www.darrahsdresser.com

Hello Monday Morning. 

You came so quickly, I feel as though I should still be dreaming of your possibilities snuggled warmly inside of my bed. But here you are, like a child staring at me on Christmas morning, waiting patiently for me to get out of bed to unwrap all the new things. What, no breakfast in bed? I guess that is not part of the new years possibilities. 

What do you have in store for me this year? This week? Do you even know? Would you tell me if you did?

Too many deep questions so early this morning. I will settle for a refill on my dancing goats coffee please. Oh, okay, I will get it myself.

 Is that my lesson? If I want it to get it myself? Is that the theme of this brand new year? You know that has not really worked out for me in the past.

I wanted things so badly when I was a kid, not the usual things like a swatch watch, a trapper keeper with kittens on the front, and an atari system. But bigger things, like an adult who cared enough to let me ramble and listen to me, a schedule or routine of some sort, someone to help me with homework, someone to give me hugs when I needed them, you know basic stuff. I tried so hard to be good, with no results. I never tried bad, maybe I should have. 

I started to look forward to things, like Daddy weekends. But so many times they were cancelled. I would look forward to them, visualizing myself on dad's clean couch, watching TV or at the dining room table playing Risk or Trivial pursuit. Eating delicious foods like spaghetti-o's and chili pizza. I started to think that if I visualized things I wanted it was jinxing them. They would never happen. When my Dad planned a trip to disneyland when I was in 6th grade, I would cry every time I would start to daydream about the vacation thinking that my thoughts were going to somehow cancel the trip. I stopped dreaming and hoping for things because anything I ever dreamed of fell through. Disappointment was a faithful pal. It was always there, to show me my mother had no potential as a mother, that I had no social potential with kids at school, that good things don't happen no matter how much I wished them to. I became a cynic at age 12. Yes, it took that long to break me. 

Even now as an adult who knows that my thoughts are not powerful enough to do anything besides be my thoughts, I still get a little scared when I dream or want something, I still feel like I might jinx things by wanting them. 

First Monday of the new year, is it okay to dream again? Is it safe for me to try new things this year? Do you hold more dream fruition than disappointment? Am I strong enough for the rejection if I put myself out there? Will I keep going if I find disappointment? Can I be successful in my own life? Am I worthy of a clean home? Do I deserve the compliments on my photography? Am I allowed to dream? Monday? Oh, just silence again. I should drink more Coffee. 

Hello My neighbors. After a long talk with Monday and some e-mails with Little Odd Me, I have decided to open a shop on the new site 1000 markets. I am going to sell my photos. I need your help. I am not good at picking photos. My faves are not necessarily the faves of the majority. Little Odd Me has suggested choosing 20 photos to start. If you have time could you look at my Flickr photostream and let me know which are faves, which ones you feel would sell. If none sell, no big deal, I will have at least tried! Also my Yoga Teacher has talked about showing my photos in the studio to sell. It is all a little overwhelming, but I am going to put myself out there. 

The last two and a half weeks with Mr. L at home has been lovely, warm, wrapped in cotton sipping hot cocoa, and a trip to the ER. Mr. L stabbed his finger while chopping wood. 4 hours in the emergency room allowed me to take bunches of strange photos in the hospital. I still have them on the camera, right next to the ones I took yesterday At the Blackwater Cafe where Kelly of Portland stopped for a cup of tea on her way back down to portland from a family visit in Seattle. We chatted, hugged, and looked at each others babies (cameras). She is a Delight! I am hoping for a Springtime Portland Photostroll. We could have chatted for hours, but the snow was piling up outside the cafe and they were worried about the drive, so we parted. Until Spring!

Tomorrow is my first shift at the food bank. I am excited, I am a people person, not really, but I can pretend VERY well. Hah! My worry is that I am not very good with heavy accents, there is a growing population of Hispanic and Russian folks here. I have a loss of hearing in both ears so it makes it hard for me. Mostly I guess at what someone is saying, I recognize most of the sounds so it makes it easy for me to guess what sound goes with the others. I do not want to offend any of these people, I know how hard it is for people to go to the food bank, why is there that feeling? Like you are a failure if your job does not pay you enough to feed your family? Should be more embarrassing for the companies! Anyway, little nervous.

My sleep schedule is all messed up, I was used to going to bed at about 11pm give or take an hour (usually give) and waking up at 10-11am. Sometimes later. Now I am back to the alarm beeping at 5:45am, I could not get to sleep last night. I stayed awake for hours listening to the rain hit my roof, the trains passing by, my cat throwing around tiny fake mice (don't tell her it is fake), Mr. L snoring, the sound of my inner voice counting up to well over 1,000 to lull me to sleep. My head would not shut up. Hoping for a nap today. Can't take that until MIL comes by for the handycap sign she now has due to a broken foot. We swapped cars because she cannot drive a stick right now and our car is an automatic. But she complained it hurt to drive the car so now she has the truck. Sucks since we are almost out of wood and Mr. L gets old pallets at work. Can't pick that up with the car. sigh.... She left the handycapped thingy in the car. So she has to come by and get it before she goes to work, I don't know when that is so my nap has to wait for that. 

Here are a few more pictures of when we had the big snow a few weeks ago. I am so glad it is all melted and gone. I am a rain kind of gal, I got new fun rainboots for Christmas asking for puddles to splish in. 

I am going to now tackle the large task of looking in on all of you! I obviously won't be able to read everything you all wrote from December 17th, so send me links! I am going to look back on this weekend I think. Depends on how long my eyes will allow me to focus.  

My thirteen things I find comforting to me today

1. the sound of Mr. L breathing next to me in bed

2. thick new jammies 

3. hot coffee, hot chocolate, hot tea

4. warm purring kittens on my side while sleeping

5. the sound of hail beating on my roof (I have a roof)

6. the whir of the fireplace fan

7. slippers

8. big thick sweaters

9. knowing I have enough to pay my bills

10. the sound of Ruby's shutter

11. music from the bathroom while Mr. L showers the mud off after a run in the woods

12. the train whistle

13. I am enough

I have still been away from here a lot. As soon as Mr. L gets back to work I suppose I will have more to say, as it is now, I just talk to him. It is nice to be able to have someone to tell everything to. My deepest darkest secrets, funny ones and painful ones. He understands and listens. I do the same for him too. I hope i do as good a job as he does. 

Mr. L has been home since Dec. 18th. Two and a half weeks, we have messed up our sleeping and eating schedule so much. We have been going to bed at 10-11 (usually 9) and waking up anywhere between 10am and noon. We have not woke up earlier than that yet. Monday at 5:30 it is going to be horrible! Haha! I am still in my jammies, there have been days where I never got out of them! I have lived in flannel for weeks! It has been lovely. I figure I will be back posting and reading on Monday. 

I have not been to Yoga in weeks either, no walks, no exercise. I need to get creative again. I feel very slow and sleepy. 

I think I may get dressed now. In layers from my skin, tank top, sport socks, undies, long sleeve t-shirt, tall socks over sport socks, jeans, t-shirt, sweatshirt, slippers. You can find me below layers of soft cotton.

I don't have much to say. I fell back asleep on the couch after we awoke this morning. Mr. L usually wakes me up again with a cuppa coffee and a request for a smoothie. This morning he let me sleep, and boy did I. I woke up when he got out of the shower. He had already packed his lunch, made his tea, and made a fire in the fireplace. He also opened the coconut oil bucket so that I could make soap today. What a sweetheart of a man I have. So today I am going to just make a list of my favorite things.

Mr. Lavender, sitting on the couch with a blanket and kittens watching the fire burn in the wood stove, coffee hot and black, yoga pants with a long inseam from Target, fleece lined slippers, photography, the new picassa editions that allow me to create a diptych and triptych, winter, autumn, summer, spring (gotta include them all), Ruby my camera, Clementine my bike, mushrooms growing in my lawn, pillow top mattress, buckwheat pillow, flannel sheets, giant sweaters, soft t-shirts, tank tops under everything I wear, bare branches, hot tea with honey, comedy, converse sneakers in bunches of colors, kitties, mr. clean magic eraser, meeting new people in yoga class and exchanging phone numbers, candlelight restorative yoga last night, warm home, hot shower, magazines in the mailbox, the moon, vintage things, vox, flickr, crafts, art, music, dancing, fresh fruit, donuts after yoga, cookies, mashed potatoes, books, orange, layered clothing, soft caps and scarves, play, good news, laughter, pony tails and messy buns, quiet, the train whistle in the middle of the night, living, happy, peppermint ice cream, breathing deep, calm, the idea that my hobby could provide some income, the smell of cinnamon, vanilla, lemongrass, lavender, apple slices and string cheese, being okay with my body while naked, forgiving myself for not being perfect, being imperfect is great!, silhouettes, tv, extra coffee, old movies, black and white, seeing photographs in everything, the sound of leaves crunching, the smell of fresh lilacs, honeysuckle, wild roses, blackberries, raspberries, grilled cheese sandwich, christmas ornaments vintage of course I like the scratches in the metallic finish, glitter or as Mr. L calls it Stripper dust, trees, children, hopscotch, massage, thrift stores, giant sweatshirts, hats, paths in the woods, ponds, ice, sudoku, fun paper, pencils and erasers, markers, today.

My assignment for photography class was to find
1. color
2. texture
3. perspective
4. curved line
5. straight line
6. emotion
7. motion
8. combine two of these things

so here are my results, I had SO many texture photos, I tend to gravitate towards those naturally. And of course I don't have to look for color, color finds me. Perspective, I tend to take photos from the ground, I am not scared of getting my knees dirty. Lines were harder because I don't see things in that way, I don't look for lines, they are everywhere and in everything, but it was hard to try and find lines isolated. The hardest thing was Emotion, because I am by myself most of the time. Motion was difficult for me because I tend to not like the photos of things in motion, the blur bothers my eyes and makes my head hurt.

The teacher did not give constructive criticism, he just showed the class each photo. He did remark a couple times about how cool a few photos were, and mine were among those.  I know these are not my bestest work, but I did my homework.

This week my homework is to spell my first name out in photos
L=avender
A=rt
V=iolet
E=lephant
N=arrow
D=og
E=ar
R=adio
Like that only with my much shorter first name. I am stuck on the letters
Y- yellow? what else?
I- idiot? How can I capture that?
all my other letters are Wheel of Fortune staples, among the first letters chosen.

I walked all over town yesterday, gave myself blisters and walked so far from home that I almost peed my pants by the time I did get home, seriously, one more block and I would have been in trouble. I can't walk 4 miles and hold it.

Okay, Off to yoga, be back in a while!

1.flannel sheets fresh from the dryer, makes it hard to make the bed without climbing in
2. the way Ruby feels in my hands and the pull on my neck from her strap, out on a photowalk looking for beauty in everything
3. black and white photography, I love the ones that are mostly dark, I have not been able to shoot for black and white yet, I will make that a lesson this winter, because when everything is all shades of gray anyway, it is the perfect time to look at things in a dark and light sort of way
4. my bird feeders full of swarming tiny birds and my cat making those chatter jaw noises from the top of the cat tree
5. feeling very crafty lately, I like making little brooch thingies with vintage buttons
6. the smell of my house right now, I made lemongrass soap, I call it Polly's Poppy seed soap after my Granny who passed last year. It was her favorite soap and she gave me an old spice jar with poppy seeds in it for the soap. I mixed that small jar into my giant costco sized container. I like the sound it makes when I shake it.
7. hot coffee, that always has to make the list.
8. the carrot soup I made yesterday. It took almost three hours to make, but it was delicious!
9. a list of stuff to get at the craft store, I love the craft store!
10. I have bags of sorted buttons, the sound of them rubbing against each other is nice. I like the colors, the size, the designs, each one telling me humble stories of the past. A giant vulcanized rubber black button, bigger than a silver dollar,  with an anchor carved into it. The bottom half of the design has been rubbed away. What sailor wore this? what did he do that would make this wear mark on the button?
11. husband brought home a bonus check yesterday. Another bit of money to squirrel away for potential hard times. I don't want to waste that bit of money now and have him lose his job and wished I had it for a meal later.
12. baby sister coming by last night and showing me her new vintage clothing purchases. The bug has bit her. There is something about vintage clothes, they have a richness to them. They are different than anything you can find at the department store. They are unique and fun.
13. oversized sweatshirts and sweatpants, tall socks and slippers, tank tops and t-shirts under the sweatshirt. SO COZY!!!


My to do list today:
1. put laundry away from yesterday
2. put the washer stuff in dryer
3. clean kitchen up! I need more space in there!
4. make some more soap today

12.