341, 342, 343, & 344: Much Needed Escape

I apologize for not giving you loyal readers any warning that I'd be away from posting for a few days. I had a mini-vacation with three college friends to Atlanta. On Thursday Night, Katie and I drove to Charlotte to Amy's house for the night. I was excited to get to see Amy and Dan's future son's nursery. I snapped this of the corner of the window treatment. So cute.


Katie, Amy and I got up bright and early on Friday morning and headed south to Atlanta to meet up with Logan, who flew in from Chicago. We checked into the Hotel Palomar, which was absolutely hip, trendy and really swanky. (Logan won the stay in a raffle.) Once we got settled in we headed out to explore Atlanta. One of our stops was the World of Coca-Cola. (Sidenote: The admission fee was $15. I don't think it was worth it. It felt like a giant ad for Coke rather than a look into the history, the process, etc. of their products.) As part of admission we each got a little bottle of coke. They did look kind of neat coming off the conveyor belt.


On Saturday we went to the Georgia Aquarium, which was abosolutely worth the cost of admission. We had a blast seeing all of the exhibits and learning new things. (I love that I have friends that enjoy that!) One of my favorite parts of the aquarium was the jellyfish tank. I spent quite some time by it with my camera trying to get some good shots. I'm pleased with a few of them and hope to maybe enlarge some of them. This is one of my favorites:

(This is without edits...the colors and lighting were like that, which is what made the exhibit so awesome.)

Sadly this morning we had to get up and head back north. I snapped this out of our hotel room as we were getting ready to leave.


I didn't realize how much I needed this little time away. It felt good to just be relaxed with friends, laugh until I cry, eat delicious food and see new places. I am so lucky to be able to take advantage of such weekends!

340: Looking forward to...

First of all, I want to say a special hello to blog reader BFB (Big Furry Bully) who asked if I had updated yet tonight. Here you go!

I am very much looking forward to...

...road trip to Charlotte/Atlanta with three of my favorites this weekend
...taking my camera on said road trip for a change of photo-scenery
...hanging out with the Seavers peeps in Florida next weekend
...watching Eddie's sister play softball in Florida
...going to Magic Kingdom for the day

In honor of the last item, here are some Mickey-shaped crackers we got at the Disney store in NYC over winter break.

339: 500

Tonight I went to the CNU basketball games with some coworkers and their families. The CNU women continued their undefeated season and the CNU Men's coach celebrated his 500th career win. This photo is taken after the men's game when they presented the coach with a #500 jersey and let him give a speech to the crowd. It was pretty neat. Eddie is in Williamsburg for a conference with the SLR so I snapped this with my pocket digital. I was pretty impressed with how the shot came out considering the arena lights were out.

338: Good Hair

I have said it numerous times before but I'll say it again...I really enjoy the opportunities for learning that I get to have for free (or very inexpensive). Tonight I went to a showing of Chris Rock's documentary "Good Hair." It was a really fascinating and funny look at the hair culture within the African-American community. After the documentary some of my Student Affairs colleagues led a discussion with a panel and with the audience members. I am really fortunate to be able to learn new things in this kind of way.

I snapped this with my pocket digital during the discussion portion of the evening.

337: Ah, Sun!

The sun was out today and it was in the 50s, which was amazing. Eddie and "the Katies" had a kickball doubleheader today. It felt so good to be outside in the sun. After the doubleheader (including a win!), Eddie and Katie L. had to ref a game. One of the teams in that game is the team of local broadcaster LaSalle Blanks. He has been pretty involved in local kickball for a while and I believe his team even went to the Las Vegas national kickball championships. LaSalle is the gentleman in the black pants with the white stripes. In addition to getting a creeper shot of LaSalle for Katie B. I wanted to show that the sun was actually out today!

336: Breakfast for Dinner

Eddie and I have been talking about having breakfast for dinner for a few nights now so we finally did it. Delicious addition to Olympic Curling!

335: Future Duke Star (Ignore his Carolina Blue Jersey today)

My good friend Jocelyn's son, Dalon, is a 7th grader and is a great basketball player. I have been telling her for a few years that Dalon is, under no circumstances, allowed to go to UNC for college. She always says he'll go where they offer him money....I am really hoping it's not UNC because if that's the case I will only go to one of his home games each season....the game vs. Duke. Yes, I understand he's only 7th grade and he may not even want to play ball in college but a girl can dream, right?

Eddie and I went to Dalon's game tonight and it was a lot of fun. It's neat to see the kids really starting to understand the concepts of the game, setting up plays and not being ball hogs and such. I really enjoyed myself and am looking forward to going to Jocelyn's daughter's basketball game tomorrow afternoon! I would imagine she'll be my photo of the day then.

334: Give a Day. Get a Day.

Eddie and I took off work this afternoon to volunteer at the Peninsula Food Bank. We signed up to do the service as part of Disney's "Give a Day. Get a Day" program. We were originally supposed to help out with stuffing backpacks that are given to young school kids to take home over the weekend that contain nutritious food and snacks. (Our area has many children that only eat the school meals and so the weekends are a time when they might not get to eat.) The backpacks had already been stuffed when we got there so we worked to put together large food orders from churches that distribute meals weekly. We worked with two Foodbank employees and another family (Mom, Dad and twin 7-year old boys) that was also participating in the Disney program. The orders were HUGE and had to be stacked on multiple palettes. Some of the food items were cases of canned pork, spaghetti sauce, powdered milk and soup. Once we put these orders together and then helped with an assembly line that put together take home bags that were full of a variety of food items (cereal, applesauce, rice, etc.).

My thoughts as a result of this experience:
1) I am very thankful for what I have.
2) This thankfulness turned into guilt for volunteering in order to get Disney tickets when the people who utilize this facility do not have the means to feed themselves or their families.
3) I should volunteer more often.

333: Ugly Monkey Lamp

I have had my Ugly Monkey Lamp since college. I honestly had forgotten about him until tonight when I was looking for a subject for my photo of the day and saw him nestled on the shelf behind photographs.

332: Bamboo Sitting

I am bamboo sitting for my parents who are away in Florida for their annual trek south for part of the winter. I'm still feeling pretty uninspired artistically so I literally took this photo from my spot on the couch where I have been all night watching the Olympics.

331: Manual Challenge Day 7

The Manual Challenge hasn't been as successful as I had hoped it would be only because I didn't really put much effort forth in the blog this week. I'm hoping this week is better.

This photo just about sums up how the day was...

330: Manual Challenge Day 6

Today I watched Eddie and the two Katies play some kickball. This is Katie B's first season playing kickball and she rocked it out today. I felt like a proud parent as she bunted and made her way around to third!

328 & 329: Manual Challenge/Cheating Day

328: Opening Ceremonies

Every year when my parents go to Florida for 6 weeks I host a get-together at their house. It has, historically, been a ridiculously fun time and this year was no exception, especially with the addition of Olympic Opening Ceremonies. We had quite the spread of food and really enjoyed the ceremony coverage.



329: Cheating a bit...

Eddie and I headed up to Norfolk to watching the Admirals take on the Lowell Devils with Matt and Sarah. It was a really fun night despite the Devils losing. I didn't bring my "good" camera with me because I didn't want to chance having to walk all of the way back to the car if the bag-searchers wouldn't let me in with it. I just had my small digital, which doesn't have manual options so I'll have to add a day to my week of my Manual Challenge. (I still followed the "no post-processing" rule though.)

327: Manual Challenge Day 4

Tonight's manual shot was a challenge due to the extremely low lighting in the Weekend Pub since I couldn't fix levels with Photoshop. The shot is of cheesecake, obviously, that Eddie ordered as a snack during Trivia. We tied for second tonight and won Rock, Papers, Scissors to procure the $10 2nd Place Gift Certificate.

326: Manual Challenge Day 3

One of my bosses gave Eddie and I his two tickets for the CNU basketball doubleheader tonight. I really enjoy going to the games, especially the Men's Games because I have had interactions with many of the players through being in the Student Affairs office. I snapped this of Josh as he was waiting to come in. I happened to get a player dribbling through the frame as a blur. Not a great shot but the best I got with all of the manual settings through the fast pace and odd lighting of the gym....especially without allowing myself to do fixes with Photoshop on the back end.

325: Manual Challenge: Day 2

Well, Day 2 of my "Shoot Completely in Manual" is complete. Tonight's photo is an homage to the 14 bags of Goldfish Eddie and I collected over the last week. Thanks to an internet coupon and a Harris Teeter coupon each bag only cost two cents! That's right, folks...at the end of the week we ended up paying 28 cents for all of those Goldfish!

324: 7 Day Challenge

Tonight CNU's Photography Club hosted Mark Warren, a photographer that I met while assisting the main photographer at a friend's wedding earlier this year. Mark was very helpful to me the day of the wedding and shared a lot of his insight and experience with me. I mentioned him to the Photography Club and they wasted no time getting him to come in to speak to the club.

I was newly inspired to better myself as a photographer as a result of this session. I am challenging myself to, for the next seven days, shooting only in manual for my Photos of the Day and not doing any post-processing in Photoshop. This, as Mark said, will challenge me to think before I shoot and work hard to get the correct settings. I anticipate a few of the shots not being all that great but this week is about learning.

Here is Day One of the Seven Day Challenge: Flowers From My Husband

322 & 323: Weekend Fun

This weekend was full of fun events including a cupcake themed birthday party for a 2-year old, CNU's Captains' Ball (semi-formal dance for the students), the Mu Nu Chapter of Kappa Kappa Psi's Beta Class First Degree and the Super Bowl.

322: Emily's Eye

The Captains' Ball theme was Night Out in the Big Cities and in the Rio Room there was a face painter. This photograph is of Emily, a CNU student, that got her eye painted and feathered. I like this shot a lot because of the expression on her face and in her eyes, as well as the actual art of the eye painting.



323: Mu Nu

I know that I have written here before but I am very glad to have the opportunity to support the brothers of CNU's Chapter of Kappa Kappa Psi. They are always good for a laugh and truly have grown as individuals and as a brotherhood since I met some of them almost four years ago. I snapped this of Jen and her new little brother Zack this afternoon at their event. Jen is ridiculously crafty and made these shirts for them. Love it!

321: Rainy Ride

It is a very cold and rainy night here in Newport News tonight. I snapped this from the car (Eddie was driving) with my pocked digital. I like the abstract outcome with the lights due to the longer exposure.

320: Quarter of a Century

Tonight the Trivia Team gathered for a special edition of Thursday Trivia to celebrate the 25th birthday of team member Matt. His mom brought a most delicious cake (probably the best icing I've ever had) that featured an amazing replica of a quarter (get it...25?) that included his birth year as the date on the quarter. (I'm now thinking that if any of you have a 4 year old about to turn 5 I think a nickel themed party would be amazing. Instead of a clown you get a Thomas Jefferson impersonator?) Anyways. Here is a shot of the singing of Happy Birthday for Matt.

For the record, the team had its return to First Place this evening. Woohoo!

319: Argyle Wednesday

I'm not sure how I got started but I've been wearing Argyle on Wednesdays to work for quite some time. It is a trend that has been catching on in the office, which is kind of fun. Today was an especially good day with five of us sporting argyle sweaters and two in argyle socks.

Here is a closeup of the sweater I wore today:


And because I am a funfactophile:
-The argyle (occasionally argyll) pattern is made of diamonds in a diagonal checkerboard arrangement. The word is sometimes used to refer to an individual diamond in the design but more commonly refers to the overall pattern.

-The argyle pattern is derived from the tartan of Clan Campbell, of Argyll in western Scotland.

-It was much used in the golfing dress of the early 1900s, both for jerseys and for the long socks needed for the plus-fours trouser fashion of the day.

318: Fun with Skype

Tonight Eddie and I "skyped" with Ellen and Kevin (Eddie's siblings). I had never really used it before and really enjoyed it. Ellen was able to use some funny functions on her webcam to add some extras to their video feed. I was able to "take snapshots" using the Skype program. While I didn't take it with a camera I did "take the snapshot" using the computer so I'm going to count it for my photo of the day!

317: Thinking ahead to summer...

A friend mentioned Cape Cod to me on Facebook today and it got me thinking ahead to the summer. Eddie and I have gone up to the Cape every summer that we have been together and we just love it. I hadn't taken a photo yet today so I took a photo of part of our Cape Cod Baseball League throw that we have on our couch.