Lilac Saloon

Month 1 of 12

I can't believe I've made it this far.

On January 1st I set out to take a photo every day for the year.  I had a fear of copping out by day 4 or 5.  So far I have not missed a day!  It is the end of January and I have 30 pictures to show for it (still have to take one later on today, to complete the month).

Technically I've taken WAY more than 30 pictures, obviously.  It feels good to be getting real use out of the new camera.  I love how much I'm learning and I can feel myself improving.  I hope to learn more every single day.

See my progress on Flickr or even in the photo album in the upper left corner of the blog!

Crisp Winter Air

  

I really enjoyed using the white space in these photos.  I was playing with the odd balance of the subject matter with the flat greyish white of the sky.  I think it gives everything a cold and lonely feel.

See the full set on Flickr.        

Everyone Got Inked (Besides For Me)

When I was in elementary school, I once wrote a very dramatic tale of a girl (me) who was the only one in class that wasn't invited to a birthday party.  I called this story "Besides For Me" and it described how everyone was getting ready to go to this party... "besides for me" and how everyone arrived at the party with bags of gifts in hand "besides for me" and... ect.  In the end I ended up spying in on the birthday party and no one was having fun so I helped them sneak out the window and escape the lame party that everyone regretted going to "besides for me".  Haha.  

Well here's another story in which everyone did something... everyone, besides for me.

Everyone got tattoos.  Besides for me.
Our friends Sarah & Charlie came down to Ohio from Michigan for a visit.  Evan had just finished getting the outline and shading of his newest tattoo (dedicated to ME!!) done before they arrived and when they heard that... they said "We want new ink too!". 

So, Saturday was spent together in the tattoo shop Adorn Arts, putting new art on skin.
Besides for me, of course.  I have no tattoos.  None.
And the thing is... I'm not sure I'll ever get any.  Even though I love them on others.

I used to think maybe one day I'd get one.

But after watching Sarah's face... I'm less sure.

Do you have any tattoos?  Do they have special meaning to you?

More HDR

I tried to do a few more HDR photos this weekend.  If you haven't read about what HDR is or about my first try, you can... here!

So here are a few more.  I think I'm going to need a lot more practice to be able to take any really good ones.  None of these are that good but I wanted to share them anyway for the fellow beginners.  Also I'm ok with showing progress and not just a final perfected version of things.

What do you think?

Fabric Gift Bows

After seeing this amazing tutorial on How About Orange blog, I thought... I want to make those!  

(This photo is from the How About Orange tutorial!!) 

But... I always think just a liiiitle differently.  So I thought... I want to make those... out of FABRIC!

I was a little concerned that fabric wouldn't have the same oomph that the paper ones have.  I thought maybe they'd be sort of floppy and droopy.  I tried making one quickly with some normal quilting cotton.  Guess what?

Yeah - It's totally awesome!  Eeeeee!  I was so excited that I decided to make more.  I don't even have any gifts to give out right now.  I guess I'm just stocking up bows for the future at this point.

The fun part is experimenting with different materials and different prints.  My favorite one is the polka-dot one because it's so darn cute.  The easiest one to make was the red one because it's made from grosgrain ribbon.  

In the How About Orange tutorial she talked about using glue dots or staples to hold the bow together.  I used Fabri-Tac fabric glue and it worked like a charm.

Go ahead now and get bow making.
      

Love of my Life

This weekend, Evan and I are finally taking a few days to celebrate US, together.  We're going to stay in fun hotels in Downtown Columbus, eat yummy food, shop and relax.  Why?

Well - the 17th is our one year wedding anniversary!  Woo!  We made it a full year!

Also, the 19th is "our anniversary".  That is the day he asked me to be his girlfriend "officially".  We were only 16 and 17 years old!  That was 8 years ago.  So we are celebrating our 8 years together and one year of marriage!  Quite a success.

I have never told our story here on the blog.  I guess now is a better time than any, right?

This photo was taken on our "first date".  It wasn't really a date.  Friends of ours told us we were going to this dance (yes, High School dance as first date!) together.  Then they forced us into each others arms, as you see in the picture below.  Well... you can't see our arms... but his arms are somewhere there around me.

(Wow, blue eyeshadow, really?  The times have changed.  Thank god.)

 After being annoyingly shy for what felt like decades (but was really only a month or so) he fiiinally asked me to be his girlfriend.

Here is actual documentation.  Yes, here's what my blog looked like before it was a blog:

It was love lovey love from there on out.

 

We had art class together in High School.  The teacher was awesome and always let us sit together.  I think it improved our art.

Oh check out our awesomeness after Prom:

I moved away and began college.  Here I am at college... rocking out on the guitar and getting smooched by Evan simultaneously.  The collegiate type are known to multitask.

We spent four years doing that whole "long distance relationship" thing.  It.  Was.  Awful.
I hated it.  I can also say... IT WAS TOTALLY WORTH THE WAIT.

One year ago - we got married!

We knew after being together for only six months that we wanted to get married.  We also knew that it was smart to wait until the time was right.  Until we had matured and had real jobs and understood our relationship fully.

Many people say that marriage is hard.  They say marriage takes work.

I don't know who these people are or who the heck they married, but being married to Evan is the easiest thing I have ever done in my life.  Every day of our marriage I am thankful for him.
I appreciate what we have and I don't take it for granted.

  
      I never knew I would be one to find love at a High School dance.

I guess I didn't really go looking for it.  The love just found its way to me!  

 

First Try at HDR

I remember seeing HDR images for the first time about 7 months ago.  As with all things awesome - I was drawn to it and wanted to know more.  I wanted to know HOW.  

HDR stands for High Dynamic Range.  A detailed explanation of it can be read here.  The short and sweet version is this:

- take multiple exposures of the same image

- layer them (using the HDR feature in Photoshop or program of your choice)

The different exposures capture different details of the scene.  When combined, you see the details from all of the layers which gives a very dimensional image.  

My beef with HDR images is that a lot of the time, they look really fake.  TOO fake, too manipulated and too computer generated.  It can take away from the natural beauty of the image, which is bad (to me!).  The HDR images that I gravitate toward are the ones that give more detail and dimension to the photo without making it look totally unrealistic.  

An example of a nice HDR that keeps the photo looking natural.

An example of an amazing looking HDR - but - unnatural.

I decided to try it for the first time the other day to use for one of my "Project 365" photos.

Here are my three exposures, straight out of the camera:

Here is my HDR:

 

Definitely a difference.  It's not a mind-blowing picture - at all - but I was interested to see if I could figure out how to create one!  I'll try it on a more interesting subject matter next time!

Julia Fullerton-Batten

Oh.  Wow.

 

Nothing inspires me more lately than amazing photography.  I'm eating it up.  I can't get enough of it.  The more I see... the more I want to see!  Ok so enough gushing though.  It's time to get serious and appreciate some SERIOUS talent here.

Julia Fullerton-Batten

Please look at her site!!!  Click on "Projects" and then click on "In Between".  

That project is absolutely my favorite.  

It's innovative and stunning and full of meaning and perfect imperfection.
I love having a hero.

Salt & Pepper

It is only the 3rd day of Project 365 but I'm beginning to notice a pattern.  Maybe just because it has been the weekend and not a busy workday... but the "one photo a day" has been "one photo shoot a day" in which I take more than 20 pictures and then edit them for 45 minutes.  Then I am forced to choose a favorite to be the single photo for the day.

It's okay though.  As long as I'm taking pictures, right?

  

Japanese Fried Rice

We had an amazing meal at a Japanese Steakhouse a couple of weeks ago and figured it would be a long time before we'd have one like it again... because...that stuff's expensive!  $75 for us to have one meal isn't necessarily economical, ya know?  

(photo from ehow.com) 

But something amazing happened tonight.  We had a really good meal that I can confidently say was a good substitute for the real thing.  We discovered a how-to video for fried rice, a recipe for the "yum yum" sauce and we made scallops!  

I didn't expect the rice to be perfect but I thought it'd be okay.  It is seriously SERIOUSLY good and it is NOT difficult!  I don't consider myself a great cook (maybe a decent one in training) but I made it easily and perfectly.  I really recommend you try it!!

HERE is the video for the how-to.

We altered the recipe slightly.  We didn't use the veggies they used.  Instead, we used sweet onion, green pepper and mushrooms.  YUM YUM YUMMMMM.

Painting With Light

Playing with light is seriously fun.  I had a flashlight, some Christmas Lights, a tutu and a camera with the shutter speed set to 30 seconds...on a tripod.  It kept me entertained for hours!

                    

Macaroons

Have you ever HAD these things??

 

They're amazing!  They're really kind of weird... but they're also like heaven.

A weird heaven.

Go there.

 

Those Final Days of Fall

I let time slip away a bit and I forgot to share some of the photos I took from the last few days of Fall that we had before we finally started getting snow.

 

 

Sock Fire

You've never truly lived until you've lit your sock on fire.  

Seriously, try it!  Well... choose wisely though.  Not any old sock will do.  You don't want a sock full of synthetic fibers melting to your foot.  An old fuzzy cotton sock is the secret.  Evan freaked me out one day by showing me this.  It doesn't burn you at ALL, it's just a bit warm.

 

A fun party trick that's almost as cool as lighting your farts on fire a la Dumb & Dumber.