Half Way!

Today marks the half way point in my 365 Photography Project! Taking note of each and every day of the year seems overwhelming at times, and amazingly fast at other times. It is hard for me to believe that 1/2 of 2011 is already over as it seems it has just begun. But yet, as I look back over the blog posts I have written from January until now, I am amazed at how much we all actually do in a year's time. Here's a  short look back at the past six months

Book Worm!

We are doing a lot of reading this summer. Emma-Caroline loves books and even found time for a quick read at Sophie's birthday party this past Saturday. I am so happy to have a little book worm in the house!

Straight Out of the Camera

I am approaching the 1/2 way mark in my 365 Photography Project. On Thursday, I will have posted over 180 blog posts and more than triple that in photos. I feel I have learned so much since January 1st, but I still have so much more I want to learn. One of the things I am interested in focusing on in the next month is posting photos that I have not tweaked at all in any kind of editing program.

I am going to say at this point that there is nothing at all wrong with using an editing program to enhance the photos you take. In college, I took many photography film classes in which we learned how to edit our photos through cropping, exposure time, etc. in the dark room. Editing and enhancing photos has been done for ages, so doing it digitally doesn't affect the integrity of your photo.

I am still going to edit photos with a goal of becoming more of a natural at it, but sometimes, the photos you take straight out of your camera need no editing. Editing is a great tool, but not every photo needs it. My goal is to learn when I need to edit and when to just leave it alone.

Happy 4th Birthday Sophie!

Today is Sophie's actual birthday. Upon request from Sophie, we went out to celebrate tonight at Chucky Cheese with the Taylor's. I think Sophie may have been even more excited about going to Chucky Cheese than her Strawberry Shortcake party, or at least they came in for a tie in the excitement race. Sophie has officially turned four years old and is quite the happy little lady. Happy Birthday sweet Sophie! We love you very much!

 Posing with Chucky and the band!

 Little Speed Racer!

 I couldn't find any cupcakes that weren't already decorated for the 4th of July. Sophie was pleased as could be with whatever color they were!

Such a big girl now!

Sophie's Birthday Party: Part 2

I am sure you can imagine that I took hundreds and hundreds of photos of Sophie's birthday celebration. It was held at Smart Toys and Books, and Sophie chose a Strawberry Shortcake theme. It was the easiest party I have ever hosted. They did everything from the invites, to the cake, to the balloons, ice cream, party favors, games, etc. I did say EVERYTHING right? All I had to do was mail the invitations, show up, and take photos. It was awesome! My Mom and Aunt Brenda also came to help celebrate so we have had a fun weekend! Sophie's actual birthday is tomorrow, so we will have more celebrating to come. Of the hundreds of photos I took, I am sharing these "berry" special birthday cake pics for tonight. Strawberry Shortcake may look a wee bit scary, but the cake sure tasty YUMMY!

Shy Little Birthday Girl!

I love the little shy grin Sophie is giving. She was loving every minue of being sung to!

Blowing the candles out was a little tricky and needed some daddy assistance!

I love this sweet face! Pure happiness!

The strawberry cake was delicious!

These girls sure do love their little Sophie Rose!

Sophie's Birthday Party: Part 1

We had an amazing birthday celebration for our Miss Sophie today! Can't wait to tell you all about it. But until then, here's a sneak peek!

Sophie Rose

Although we are still without power and probably will not have it restored until mid week of next week, it has not curbed our enthusiasm for one little special girl's birthday party coming up tomorrow. Our little Miss Sophie Rose will be turning 4 years old on Monday, the 27h but we will be celebrating with her friends a couple of days early. My D90 is ready to go and I plan on taking lots of photos! 3 years ago, on Sophie's first birthday she received a rose bush. Emma-Caroline had received a hydrangea for her birthday and we had planted both in our yard. When we moved we were able to transplant both the rose bush and the hydrangea to our new backyard. Its fun for the girls to see their bushes grow each year as they do. They are something we will all enjoy for years to come.

True Light

We are heading into our 4th day without power. Again, no big deal. Inconvenient, yes. But in the grand scheme of things, no big deal. This lack of electricity has freed up my time that is normally occupied by electronics to be able to catch up on reading, especially reading from my devotional book and Bible. It has also freed me to be able to spend quality time with my girls without the distraction of the tv, wii, or computer. I am certainly not down on electronics, but this time without them has given me opportunity to reflect. This past Sunday, I was blessed to teach Kids Worship. Our lesson was on the Trinity and our belief that our God is three persons in one. We made salt dough in which the three parts represente d the three persons of God. The flour representes God the Father, the salt represents God the Son, and the water represents God the Holy Spirit. All three mixed together make one dough yet they are all three still present in the one. The children then made crosses out of the dough and I brought them home to bake. I found this lesson online, and felt it was a really great one to give a concrete image for understanding the Trinity. I told y'all last week that I have been feeling a special calling to go into ministry for children. I feel this is the next step in my path that God has for me. After teaching children for 12 years I took off after Sophie was born and never went back. I really didn't want to go back into the classroom. Children's ministry presented itself and for a while I dismissed it thinking surely I couldn't do it. But God had other plans, and He kept working on my heart. So, I said yes. My chuch is having me back on staff in the area of Children's Christian Education. I am exploring avenues to further my education at the doctoral level at Virginia Theological Seminary in Christian Educational Leadership. This is all in the discerning phase and really makes me nervous, but I feel like sharing it through writing it down makes it real. While I was at Kanuga, the Bishop of Mayland spoke to us about how we are asked to turn towards the light and draw nearer to God on our life's journey. Its so much easier to just turn away and receed into the darkness of societal pressures for time and attention. I hope and pray that God will lead me every day to help the children I work with to see God and to turn and always walk towards the true light. Writing this on my cell phone is kind of elementary because of the difficulty in editing. But my words are from my heart. r

I Heart Electricity and My Nikon D90!

We are still without power at the old Avery Homestead. Still not a big deal, but it would be nice to have it back on. My task for today is to remove all the food from the fridge and freezer since it has been two days since we have had power in our house. Our hotel stay was nice and we may be back there tonight if KUB has not restored our power by then. KUB is reporting that this is the largest power outage in Knoxville history with more than 60 percent of customers having lost power. I really take so much for granted that electricity offers this modern day girl. My girls have been troopers and have entertained themselves for hours playing indoors in the daylight. I have misplaced my SD card for my D90 so I have been snapping photos with this camera phone. They are wretched in quality but I am using what I have to keep on plugging with my 365 Photography project. I must say I have at least learned how to blog
 and post photos from my phone so this has not been a loss for me in this project
Here are photos from last night at the hotel . I cant wait to be back in a powered house and to be using my Nikon D90 again! PS it is hard to correct grammar and punctuation on the phone keypad so please excuse mistakes like this random n I can not erase! n

.

Out for Sushi

We decided to stay in a hotel tonight because our power is still out. Although I could have brought my laptop with me, I decided to leave it at home instead of lugging it for just one nights stay. Its kind of liberating not having the old laptop in tow. So I am attempting to

post another pic from my phone, but I may be denied a second go round.We headed out to Nama for sushi, my least favorite cuisine, but the family including Sophie loves it, so I reluctantly go along. The above pic was taken with my camera phone just before these two chowed down on sushi. Its kind of fun staying in a hotel in your own home town even if sushi is on the menu.

Power Out!

So last night at 8 pm a huge storm came through Ktown and
knocked the power out. No big deal, except that we still have no power at 11am. Still not a big deal or anything. I am posting from my smart phone while in line for coffee at Dunkin Donoughts :-)! Be back soon y'all!

A Visit to the Dentist

Sophie had her first visit to the dentist today! She did really well and had no caviities! I am so proud of our sweet girl for being so brave. I had my camera with me but forgot to put the SD card back in! Luckily I can take a photo with my phone. Since the power is out we will see if I can post that photo to the blog from my phone. OK after lots of attempts, I could not figure it out to post from my phone files. I will backpost later.

Doing the Charleston!

OK, I just couldn't resist the title of this post. Since I ventured back to Charleston yesterday, I am continuing along with that theme by taking you to lunch at Slightly North of Broad or S.N.O.B. and on a carriage ride around downtown Charleston. I can't believe it has been three weeks since we left Charleston. Makes me sad. I just really love that city! Upon recommendation, I am reading Folly Beach. It's a great read and I am really enjoying it, but missing the South Carolina shore and Charleston even more. Oh, woe is me (as I slap my wrist to my head and fake swoon)! So have I ever told y'all this before, Howie is a foodie. I mean the boy loves a good restaurant. He grew up in NYC, after all,and is quite the food snob. So when we went to S.N.O.B. in Charleston, well, let's just say, they did not disappoint.

I know if Howie likes a place by how little he talks during the meal, and by the sounds of "mmmms" and the "oh, this is amazing!" that comes from his lips as he is savoring his meal. Too bad he married me, because I do not do gourmet. Good wholesome, delicious food, I cook, but gourmet, not me.

While we were in S.N.O.B. and having a fabulous lunch, I took the opportunity to snap a few photos of us dining in the reflection of the mirror.

 Can you see us?

And you know I only get pics of me if I take a photo of myself in a window or mirror, so here's a couple of me while we were waiting for our carriage ride.

Our private carriage finally did arrive and Emma-Caroline and Sophie were all smiles.

They lasted through the tour up to a point, and then it was a nap for Sophie.

Emma-Caroline occupied her time by reading a book we had purchased earlier. I guess Charleston History is not their cup of tea just yet. I had a great time snapping photos of the Charleston homes. Many of the gate photos were from that ride.

The girls did like our little horsey friend and thought it very novel that the carriage driver threw a "pee marker" in the rode after our friend relived himself on the street. I guess you gotta go when you gotta go. At least Charleston does come by and scrub the streets where those markers are left.

We said our goodbyes to Mr. Horsey, and to Charleston. Sniff! I can't wait to go back!

Happy Father's Day!

On this Father's Day, I am venturing back to Charleston to say Happy Father's Day to my wonderful husband, Howie, who is an excellent father to Emma-Caroline and Sophie, and to say Happy Father's Day to my own Dad, who is a wonderful father and grandfather. We are all very blessed to have these amazing dads in our life! We love you and hope you have a great day doing exactly what you want!

Lake Club

The Kanuga Lake Site dates back to the early 1900's and has a very interesting history. If you haven't clicked on the links I have included in my prior two post, you can find out more about the history of Kanuga here. The cabins on Kanuga Lake are the original to the site.
 I thought they were quite charming and I will request to stay in one the next time I go. The inn, where I stayed, was built later in 1968.

I was actually surprised by how much the main gathering room at Kanuga Lake resembled my own family room. It felt very homey to me, and I guess that's why.

 I enjoyed my visit to Kanuga, and I actually do look forward to going there again. It was very peaceful and restful. Perfect for a retreat!