Be Still 52 - Week 35

Breakfast, the first meal of the day. A meal I'm not very thrilled about, that is unless there's a doughnut involved!! Then, I think it's the best meal of the day, especially when the doughnut is heart-shaped, strawberry flavored, and covered with sprinkles. 

So now you know my "guilty pleasure!"  A pleasure I try very had not to partake of on a regular basis. A doughnut for breakfast only happens if it's a special day OR I need something for a Be Still 52 exercise. This week's exercise is breakfast. It also fits perfectly with a flickr group I belong to, Prompt Addicts. This week's prompt is heart-shaped. Definitely those two things combined are a great reason to have a doughnut for breakfast!!

A little trivia about doughnuts. . .

"According to anthropologist Paul R. Mullins, the first cookbook mentioning doughnuts was an 1803 English volume which included doughnuts in an appendix of American recipes." (thank you wikipedia for the information between the quote marks!)

My apologies if you haven't had breakfast and now you're craving a doughnut!!

Have a sweet day!

A Week In Review

Hey, I'm back with a Week In Review!  Or shall we say Weeks In Review!  Things have finally settled down a bit. I have finished three of the four classes I was taking. I still have a couple of weeks on the last one. But my time has freed up considerably. I was pleased that I was able to keep up with all of them but one, which was the Texuality class; using text in scrapbooking. I've downloaded tons of material and will work on that one this winter.

OK, so here goes, a catch-up on favorite photos and prompts.

My Favorite Photo Of The Week

I just love this fuzzy thing, I have no idea what it is.  I found it near the woods behind my son's house.

Prompt Addicts Flickr Group
Prompt - We were to made a home studio using foam board to reflect the available light.

 

These are taken in a east window. I was surprised that you could really tell a difference with the foam board. You can see that in the bottom picture the inside is much brighter.  I'll be using this more often!

I have to brag a little. In our Prompt Addicts group we all vote to choose the top three photos for each prompt. I was so pleased that the above photo was voted one of the top three for this prompt.

Prompt - reflections #1

I took this at a street rod show. I'm the far person in the green, my husband is next and a friend of ours is the closest.  We were just looking at this beautiful car when I looked down and saw our reflections.

  Reflections #2

The car show is held at beautiful Lake Carlton in Robber's Cave State Park, Oklahoma. I was at the park before sunrise was able to capture the morning mist and this reflection on the lake. This photo was also voted in the top three for the reflection prompt!  I was very surprised, there were some gorgeous and unusual reflections.

Prompt  - find objects that start with the letters A, B, or C

"A" is for acorn

"B" is for birdhouse and bokeh

"C" is for corn

Picture Inspiration Week 35 - Oh, my gourd

 Picture Inspiration Week 36 - Punchy Color

Picture Inspiration Week 37 - Textures

 In most editing software you can find textures that can be applied to a photo. I'm really a straight-out-of-the-camera kind of person. But, I do like to try new things, so when these prompts came up I went to Picnik and tried a few textures. I have no idea what I'm doing. I figured if they were pleasing to me they were OK!

Picture Inspiration Week 38 - Balance in textures

This image had a very bright background that I was able to tone down by adding a texture from Picnik. This experiment has been fun. You may see textures showing up more often.

A Week In Review

My Favorite Photo Of The Week

This week I visited Historic Washington State Park which was the Confederate Capitol of Arkansas during part of the Civil War. The museum village includes historic, public and private buildings. In one of the homes, a young lady was demonstrated weaving on a historic loom. I loved this basket full of cotton fiber. So simple, yet so beautiful!

The Simple Things

There were several butterflies on these zinnias at the park. They kept fluttering all around me and didn't care that I was taking their picture. They were only interested in the last of the the nectar.

Picture Inspiration Week 34 - Hand Held

The State Park was full of ornamental trees. I spotted this beautiful tree with these tiny citrus fruits. It smelled wonderful. I'm guessing they're a type of orange, maybe mandarin oranges?

Prompt Addicts

Our prompt this week was to take a photo leaving plenty of space to add a verse or quote. This leaf caught my attention. It reminds me of an old flower called "Jack-In-The-Pulpit".

For the next several weeks I may not be doing as many link-ups. I'm taking four classes at the same time:

• Two with Big Picture Classes ~ Textuality a journaling class for scrapbooking and  Picture Fall a photo prompt class
• Two with Kat Eye View Of The World ~ Digital Photography Basics and Find Your Eye Journey of Inspiration

I think I'm going to be very busy!! I knew I would learn so much from each of them and they just happened to be going on consecutively. One good thing though, there is no real deadline for any of them. If I get behind I can finish at anytime. I'm going to try very hard to keep up and apply myself to learning more about photography!!

Prompt Addicts ~ August Best Of Show

I wanted to share some exciting news. I belong to a photo prompt group called Prompt Addicts. We began as a spin off from the prompt classes at Big Picture Classes. After we finished Picture Winter, the group had become so close they didn't want to lose contact. A Flickr group was formed. I didn't join until recently, because I didn't have a Flickr account and I'm a little leery of groups like Flickr. But, I finally gave in, joined the group, and I'm so happy I did.  They are the most wonderful, awesome group of friends. And on top of they are amazing photographers. I could not begin to tell what I have learned through the prompts and how inspired I am by their photos.  Anyway, back to the news. For each prompt three top photos are chosen.  One of my photos was chosen for the prompt "creating art". We took a photo and used some processing (or not if your didn't want too) to make the photo look like a piece of art. I know very little about post processing! This was a definite learning experience!

This is my before shot

I then edited the shot in Picnik, a free photo editing program. I like the free ones!! It was very simple, all I did was use the Ripple Blocks effect and added a frame. It made it look like abstract art, but you can still see the salt and pepper shakers.

. 

Now do you see why I love this group so much!!!  They teach me something new each and every week!!

A Week In Review

My Favorite Photo Of The Week

My Favorite Photo Of The week will not always be the best I took that week. Sometimes, like this one, it will be a photo of a moment that I enjoyed. This picture was taken at the Historic Arkansas Museum, which features five pre-Civil War houses that are restored to their antebellum appearances.  Dressed in period clothing she sat in 100+ degree weather gently playing her lap harp.  I stood for a good while (in the shade) listening to her beautiful melodies.

The Simple Things

peeking through the garden

 Prompt Addicts - Creating Art

 Salt and Pepper

Added Ripple Blocks in Picnik

Sweet Pencils

Boosted color a bit and added Smudge with Picnik

 

Picture Inspiration - In The Bag 

 My favorite bag to take on road trips in our 1940 Ford Pickup.

52 Photos Project - Silhouette

 

Photos Of The Week

My Favorite Photo Of The Week

He waits patiently. What's he waiting for? Me!! I'm taking pictures of a covered bridge in one of the nearby parks. The picture is not even focused well, but it's special to me!

The Simple Things

Just an ordinary weed spotted near a lake.

Simple beauty!

Prompt Addicts - Minimalistic Yet Meaningful

I spotted this door knob on an old church. I wonder how many hands have turn this knob and entered this church to worship.

Picture Inspiration  - Back To Basics

Serenity through simplicity

Simple ~ Serene ~ Calm

52 Photos Project - Black and white

Sundial taken at a Layman Library in North Little Rock, Arkansas

It's been an amazing week!!

A Good Photo Week

My Favorite Photo Of The Week

Nature always amazes me!!  I wonder how does this curlicue of an ordinary sticker bush grow in a coil even though it's not growing around anything. Fascinating!  Only two curlicues on this bush were this unusual color. You can a see if you look closely the water drops inside the curl. We've been blessed this week with rain!! I like that it's not a perfect coil and that's it's a different color than the others! Reminds me of myself. I'm not perfect but I just keep on growing, reaching out to embrace life the best I can. I also like that it's different in color. Going with the crowd is just not me. In fact, I usually balk at being like others.  I'm chuckling here!  I can still remember my Mother saying "You don't have to be like everyone else!"  I think that lesson must have suck!!  I just like being me!

Prompt Addicts - dream a little dream

We purposely took a photo out of focus to make it dreamy.  Honestly, this was hard.  Since I'm just learning manual mode on my camera, I take a lot of pictures out of focus, but I wanted a beautiful out of focus shot!!! I took a bunch before I got one that I really liked.  It's a picture of my Mother's crepe myrtle bush. I'm seeing a little theme here...look how the berry I unfocused on is a different color than the others. Hmmm!!

The Simple Things

A wild flower growing on the edge of our property. Simple in beauty and simple in color. I'm just learning to use my macro lens and so far I'm not getting the sharpness I want.  But, I'll keep on trying!!

 Picture Inspiration #1  -  well balanced

symmetry in nature

 Hen and chicks
This one is sharper.  I set the timer so the action of my pressing the button didn' move the camera. Maybe this will work for me.

Picture Inspiration #2 - well balanced
symmetry in nature

The pine cone is balanced (or really stuck) on barb wire. The shape of it is very symmetric. I received a comment on this image that I want to pass along. Angie said "I like it, even if you think it's just stuck. Maybe that's a commentary for our lives, too? Even if we think we might be stuck, we might just be hanging on the balance waiting for the right thing to tip us one way or another?" I love this!! After I read her comment it made me do some thinking. I love taking photos, I love sharing them, but there is more than just the photo. There's something deeper! The reason that shot appeals to me...the reason I keep returning to me favorites. Those are photos that are taken from the heart. Not, just snapped and forgotten. Angie sees things in her photos and ours. When she posts them she includes such wonderful thoughts or quotes. I can tell she spends time with her photos studying them. She has inspired me to look, really look at the shots I take. To think about why that photo appeals to me so much. I had already written this post when I read her comment. I came back here, looked at the photos I'd posted and added a little of my feelings. I'm not good at this, but I'll be doing it more often. Thank you, Angie!!

Do your remember this photo from a few weeks ago. I finally found out what they are, Seedbox (Ludwigia alternifolia). Seedbox fruits are small capsules. They usually have a box-shaped top, thus the name "Seedbox". The seeds fall out of the little hole in the top when the wind blows or when the plant is shaken by an animal. They are a wildflower from the "family" evening primrose and are also known as rattlebox. That's just the coolest thing!! God gave us creation for our enjoyment. He could have just created a simple seed that just fell to the ground. But he didn't, he gave us this gorgeous little box to enjoy. One thing I'm learning though, to enjoy you have to spend some time searching nature!!

It's been a good photo week!!
So thankful I have discovered photography and through the lens of my camera discovered the beauties of nature.