Swinging high!

Is this weeks picture brought to you by Adalyn? You bet it is!

This spring we have quickly realised that Adalyn loves to swing. As you all know I love to take pictures. The two should go and in hand right? Well, it’s not so easy. If you are taking a zoomed out picture of someone swinging then great, not much to worry about. If you are zooming in on their face while they swing then you have some problems as the focus point is constantly changing! Getting a picture like this definitely takes lots of patience as usually when she’s smiling I don’t have her in focus, and when she is in focus she’s giving me the skunk eye. I’m definitly no expert at this picture took about twenty other shots to get, but in the end I got it and she had a great smile!

We have a swing set setup in our backyard that has an infant swing on it. When ever we take Adalyn into the backyard she starts pointing at the swing and making noises. She just can’t get enough of it! We also have a little slide on the play set but she’s still a little unsure of it. I’ve also tried her on slides at the playground but again she’s hesitant and doesn’t really get what they are all about.

In this picture you can see Adalyn’s four top teeth pretty well. She also has four bottom teeth, the last of which she received when we were down in Mexico (those pictures are still coming). Lately she’s been chewing on her fingers and objects a lot and it’s looking like a new tooth is just around the corner.

Colour me yellow

Wow, I’ve been getting behind on my posts lately. Macro Mondays should be called “Macro sometime during the week” instead! Well, I’ve never missed a week, only been late, and that’s the way I intend to keep it  :) This week i was in Regina which slowed me down on my posts. With long days I decided to spend my evenings away from the computer. One evening I headed down to Wascana park and took some beautiful evening pictures! One of them might be my weekly picture next week!

For this week I think it’s quite obvious what the shot is this week. We get a food delivery every week which consists of organic fruits and vegetables.Every so often we’ll find some nice flowers in the box and one of those times happened to be last week! I set the tripod up and got in really close with the camera and viola!

In this picture you can really see the pollen in the middle of the flower. Beautiful! Well, stay tuned for my weekly picture which is also late but will be up soon.

Bad Moon Rising!

I’ve been excited about this picture since I took it last Saturday. Last weekend there was a super moon in the sky. It’s not quite as cool as the name makes it out to be, but it’s pretty cool.

If you’d like to know more about super moons check out this Wikipedia article. Super moons occur when the moons orbit brings it close to earth at the same time as a full moon.

I had forgot about the super moon last year and saw it rising over the horizon when Krista and I were driving home. This year I marked the calendar so I wouldn’t miss it. I ventured out Saturday evening to a large hill just north of the Polo Park area. The hill gives a great view of Downtown Winnipeg and the surrounding area. I was trying to get Adalyn to sleep that night and so ended up leaving the house a bit later than I had planned. It was a cloudy night so I wasn’t even sure if I would be able to see the moon.

I took this picture as soon as I got up to the top of the hill and within a few minutes the moon was almost completely hidden behind the clouds. A little later I took the following picture in which you can see the top of the Manitoba Legislature.

It’s amazing how fast the moon moves through the sky when you are actually watching it.

Shoo fly don't bother me!

It’s macro time! I’ll start off by saying that this picture gives me the heebee jeebees and I’m not sure how long I’ll be able to write about it. I might have to click “publish” and move on so I don’t get too shivery.

Obviously this guy is a fly. As much as I would love to I won’t tell you that I was able to get this picture because of how fast I am with a camera. I was outside last week with Adalyn taking picture of her when I noticed this fly walking on my camera bag. I went to shoo it away but it didn’t fly off. I then realized that it had a damaged wing and was not able to fly. “Macro Picture” immediatly flashed in my head, blinking in bright neon colours. I grabbed a glass from the kitchen, captured the fly in it, and then went back to playing with Adalyn.

By the time the evening rolled around the fly was barley moving any more. I dumped the fly outside on our deck and started taking pictures. He kept rolling onto his back when trying to move and so I had to keep propping him back on his feet. I figured a picture of an upside-down fly wouldn’t look as good. I came away with two decent pictures and decided on this one for the post.

Adalyn was slightly interested in the fly when she noticed me scoop it up with a glass but quickly went back to exploring around the grass.

Our little girl

This week I take you back to my little girl who is getting very good at smiling for pictures. A week and a half ago Adalyn went to the doctors for her first year check up. She weighed 28 lbs 3 oz and was 31 inches long. She also had a few vaccinations which she took like a champ.She only had a few tears but no more then her dad usually sheds when he gets needles so it’s all good.

Adalyn is pulling herself up all the time now but has yet to take any steps. In fact, she isn’t the slight bit interested in taking steps. When she’s standing up all she wants to do is get back down on the floor to where her toys are. One of these days  think walking will seem exciting to her but that time is certainly not now. That’s just fine with me because walking will allow her to reach objects that she currently cannot get. She’s a flower girl in my brothers wedding this July though so we’re hoping she at least takes some steps before that.

We recently bought a bike chariotte for Adalyn from MEC and last weekend we took it out for a spin. I was worried Adalyn wouldn’t be impressed with her helmet and I wasn’t sure what she would think of it. The chariot was hooked up to my bike and after only going a few houses down she was laughing and smiling! We biked to the Nature Playground at the Assiniboine park and we all had a blast. I’ve been so excited to use a chariot, I actually have been counting the days down since before Adalyn was even born!

We played at the playground for a bit and then ventured home. Adalyn was definitely wiped out by all the excitement as she was asleep by the time we arrived back home. I love that we can now bike places with Adalyn!

It's not easy being green

This week we are back to a macro photo. With our backyard looking quite green right now I decided to go digging around in the grass with my camera. There’s so much life in the grass that we don’t even realise is taking place. Except of course when we move large rocks, then we see all the creepy crawlies scurying about on top of the soil. If i was braver I would try to take a picture of them, but alas I’m not and those things still scare the heebie jeebies out of me. Maybe one day I’ll try to get a macro picture of a bug.

This is a picture of some grass in our lush backyard. I took a few shots of various angles and liked this one the best. I applied a cercular zoom filter in Photoshop which draws the eye more to the centre of the image. I have only played with physical zoom blurring a hand full of times. This is where you zoom the lens throughout an exposure. This often leads to some really cool lines that point towards the centre of the image which is fairly in focus.

During the early spring the grass, both living and dead, was not safe from Adalyn’s appetite. What was funny is that she quickly realised that grass was not for eating but would still put it in her mouth and then promptly spit it out. Lucky for the grass she no longer tries to eat it. Unfortunately for the grass she still pulls it up. I think I next need to teach her to only pull up the dead stuff.

Wascana lake sunset

I think this is the first time I have used a picture that I actually took on the same day as the weekly picture post. Wow, I guess that makes this post a little bit special. Not that much more… but just a little bit.

I’m currently in Regina and as the weather is getting nicer I have been exploring around on foot. In the winter when I was here I didn’t do much exploring at all due to the cold, but now that has all changed! Regina has a beautiful park called Wascana Park which boarders Wascana Lake. The Saskatchewan legislative building sits on the side of the west side of the lake and looks very similar to the Winnipeg legislative building. Tonight I shot pictures from the east side of the lake looking west at the sunset. I have heard that Saskatchewan is known for it’s sunsets and tonight since I arrived a little bit late I only had a small taste of them. Next time I’m here I’ll head to the show earlier so I can take in the whole thing.

From almost the same location I also took the following picture in which you can see the legislative building.

You’ll notice that with both of the pictures I cropped them to be wide. Since I was there with the sun low in the sky the beautiful golden colours were only visible near the horizon. The rest of the sky and lake were pretty dull so I cut them out.

There are a few other locations in Regina I’d like to capture, one of which is Mosaic Stadium where the Riders play. Those could be coming in a future weekly picture post.

James Richardson International Airport

With travel and a busy weekend I wasn’t able to snap a macro photo for this week. Rather than totally skip my Monday post I figure I’ll show a regular picture. I guess that means we’ll have two “weekly” pictures this week. Sweet!

Recently I’ve been seeing a lot of the new James Armstrong Richardson International Airport, also known as the Winnipeg Airport. I’ve been really enjoying using the airport and love the architectural design. The only part of the airport that I’m really not a big fan of is the blue lighting that circles all the skylights that are above the baggage claim area. The blue is extremely bright and almost hurts your eyes to look at when the sun is down. Asside from that I’m really happy with the rest of the design.

I took this picture the morning that we flew to Mexico. As you can see from the clock the time was 6:45 am. We had checked our luggage and just about to go through security when I asked Kris to give me a couple of minutes. With the airport being quiet I figured it was a good time for a picture. I took this at one end of the airport and love the lines that the wood panelling on the roof make. On the right of the picture you can see all the check-in desks which run down the length of the building.

I’ve taken a handful of pictures inside the new airport but I think this is the first one I have posted online. Maybe I’ll post the other ones next time I don’t have a macro shot ready for Monday   :)

I’m still slowly making my way through are Mexico pictures and hope to have those posted within the next week.

Happy first birthday!

This is my forty fifth weekly picture post! I love this post as I can combine my two favourite things in the world, my family and photography! I have been really enjoying these posts as they get me shooting lots of pictures and keeps me creative. I find my technology job zaps some of my creativeness so this is a nice challenge to that.

I think this weeks picture is pretty self explanitory, but I’m going to talk about it anyways. This past weekend was Adalyn’s very first real birthday! We celebrated monthly birthdays throughout her first year but those just don’t stack up to the excitement of a first year birthday! I’m still wrapping my head around this time warp thing. Krista signed Adalyn up for a 12 – 18 month music class. I asked her why she decided on that age range because Adalyn isn’t that old yet…. but wait…. she is! Our little baby is slowly being replaced but a little toddler.

She is pulling herself up on objects and getting more stable every day. She has recently tuned herself up because her crawling speed has accelerated exponentially over the last month. Yesterday she had her yearly doctor checkup where she weighed in at 28 lbs! She also received three shots which she wasn’t a big fan of but made it through them.

On her birthday we only invited family over because they worked out to 14 adults which is comfortable but not crowded in our house. After the candles on the cake were blown out we gave Adalyn a plain muffin instead of birthday cake. A good caption for the picture on the right is, “Fine, I’ll eat my muffin but I’m not happy about it,” as she gives Krista the skunk eye.

Krista has returned to work which has gone quite smoothly with all things considered. Krista’s parents are looking after Adalyn while we’re at work until the fall. Adalyn loves her grandparents and has been having a great time with them during the day. Three days out of the week Krista’s parents come to our house to look after her. With working from home I absolutely love this as I can hear Adalyn’s giggles throughout the day and can see her when I take breaks and lunch.

Here are a few more pictures from the birthday party. Have a great weekend!

Tiny bubbles

I appologize for being behind on my posts this week. It’s amazing how fast an evening can go when both parents work! I’ll have the weekly picture up in the next day or two so stay tuned for that. Also, I have dated this post for Monday so looking back we’ll have no idea it was late  :)

This picture was actually a last minute idea. On Sunday night I poured myself a glass of water and left it on my nightstand in case I was thirsty at night. The water sat all night and in the morning the inside of the glass was covered with little tiny bubbles. I put the water glass on one of our window sills that was receiving a lot of sunlight and got in nice and tight with the camera. What you see here is the little bubbles on the water glass.

The bubbles go out of focus towards the sides of the picture because the glass curves away from the camera lens so those bubbles are actually further away then the ones in the middle of the picture.

I’m still finding it tough to come up with a macro picture every week. You really have to think differently with Macro photography. As it gets warmer out I’ll probably start taking more macro shots outside.