The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow

Sing it with me now . . . Tomorrow, tomorrow, bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow . . . there'll be sun. Just thinking about tomorrow . . .

OK, enough of that. You get the picture. I can't get that song out of my head. I'm just so excited at the thought of:

1. Seeing the sun again
2. Having the weather warm up significantly
3. Starting our long and relaxing weekend

Not only are we having a pizza party at work during lunch time tomorrow, but after work Karlo and I are planning to go on a shopping and dinner date. What a glorious day it will be.

And the best part is that I'm convinced the improvement in weather will also improve, not only my mood, but also my health. That nasty cold that Karlo so graciously shared with me has been lingering forever. Today is the first day that I am almost starting to feel normal again. Well at least I don't feel like there a painful and foreign object stuck to the front of my face. So I'm hoping that the raising pressure outside will reduce the amount of pressure in my head.

Tomorrow can't come soon enough for me.

Week in Words 3/21/10

Still a Block Head

But I'm not letting this darn cold ruin my weekend. It may have shorten our evening, but we still had a nice day. After a few hours of running around at home doing projects we took off for a nice drive through the country. We headed to the Grand Opening of the new Connecticut Country Store in Coventry. This new store is showcasing about 20 different artists and I'm one of them. Yeah! I just couldn't wait to see my jewelry on display. Here's their blog if you want to check it out. If you scroll down you'll see some of my jewelry hanging in the window: http://www.connecticutcountrystore.blogspot.com/.

In honor of the Grand Opening, they had a petting zoo and it's not just for kids you know. I had a ball strolling through the animals and the highlight was petting the camel's nose. First of all, how many camels have you gotten near? And second, camel nose is even better than my beloved llama nose! And I don't think camels spit so there's a bonus.

I swear I wanted to snatch one of these adorable little guys and make a run for it:

I was a little disappointed that there were no ducks for sale, but you never know what you might find at this store. I may have to put a special duck order in and see what happens this Spring.

From there we drove our old biking route to Andover and it was amazing how lost I felt at times. I can't tell you how many times we biked this same route, day after day, and yet it felt so foreign to us after only a couple of years. We even missed the road that takes us to Andover and had to turn around. I still can't believe that one.

Karlo still refuses to drive by our old house, but that's OK. I guess I have moved on and no longer care what the place looks like. Besides Lisa gives me occasional reports on it. And speaking of Lisa, we had a great visit. This was Cooper's first time at the Gaumond compound and he had a ball.

And now I can no longer stay up so I'm signing off for the night and getting some much needed rest. ZZZZZZZZ

That Wasn't Nice at All

Well, my sweet caring husband who shares everything with me has gracious shared his cold germs with me. It hit me Thursday night and I thought staying home on Friday would stop it in it's tracks. I think the only thing that went wrong with that plan was that I refused to rest. As usual, I worked harder at home than I would have at work. Oh well, at least I didn't spread my germs any further.

I sneezed and sniffled my way through the day just hoping that I could get through 3 consecutive minutes on Friday night while Karlo and I danced in a little performance in Mansfield. Yes, of course I'm telling you all this after the event instead of before. I'm not stupid ;-) I have to say I was thrilled to get through the dance without sneezing or having to wipe my nose mid Lindy turn, but we had other problems. First, I was experiencing a waredrobe malfunction. I learned my lesson to always practice in the outfit you plan to dance it. Very frustrating. Then there was the small issue of Karlo screwing up some steps. I know I shouldn't have been disappointed in the small screw up, but I was . . . because I'm a perfectionist at times and we were the center attraction of the song, with a solo no less. Oh well, I'm still thrilled that we did it. We even celebrated and went out to Friendly's for ice cream after the show. And a small footnote regarding Friendly's . . . that will be our very last trip to Friendly's in this lifetime. We should have followed our gut the first 3 times we felt compelled to get up and walk out. At least the ice cream was nice on my throat.

The Definition of Unphotogenic

I guess he can't always be a handsome devil!

It's Gary's Fault

That title may only be funny for Karlo and Jill. They know the inside joke that I blame Gary just about every time I buy something that I didn't really need. Gary is a coworker who has this amazing talent for convincing me that I 'need' all sorts of stuff. I swear he could sell ice to an Eskimo. Every time Karlo catches Gary in my office he says, "Oh no, what is this going to cost me?"

So this time I'm blaming Gary for my latest lens purchase. I just picked up a used Nikon Nikkor 18-200mm VR lens and tell me if you think I needed it. I already owned a Nikkor 18-105mm VR and a Tamron 28-300mm VC. So really, why did I need to make this investment? I'm not quite sure, but somehow I convinced myself that I should sell a couple lens in order to have this one instead. Seemed like the logical thing to do at the time.

I am excited to have this as my all-purpose walk around lens for our next vacation. I like the idea of having a little bit more on the wide angle side rather than the telephoto side and, well, Nikon is just plain better than Tamron. So I should be all set for vacation. Now I just need to buy a UV filter for it and a travel tripod. OK, stop it. I really do need those things. Oh and I need one other small thing too. Karlo got the brilliant idea that I should carry my camera around in an insulated lunch tote while biking on vacation. I thought this was brilliant because it's waterproof. So now I'm on the hunt for a cute one. This one is a contender:
How cute is that? Of course it looks like Lisa should own it, or maybe it just looks like Lisa made it and that's why I like it. Either way, I want it. And after that I'm done. I swear.

Poor Karlo

My poor baby has a cold. I know it's bad when he actually crashes on the couch for the entire night. As much as I feel bad for him, it's working out great for me. All the peace and quiet and extra time I'm getting is wonderful. Last night we were supposed to go out dancing all night and again, as much as I wanted to go and have some fun, gaining an extra night at home, all to myself, was glorious. Of course I spent just about the entire time working diligently at my computer. I'm feverishly trying to figure out how to build a new web site and shopping cart for YogaDudes and I really made some headway last night. So thank you Karlo for getting sick and forcing me to gain some extra time. I'm actually considering kissing him in hopes of catching his bug. Perhaps that will gain me even more free time at home. I guess that alone is sick–the fact that I want to get sick just to get more free time.

And in other news . . . I realized that I never posted a picture of our finished laundry room project. I'm not happy with the shelf decor, but it was the best I could do with shopping in the basement. One of these days I'll get out to a real store. Or better yet, I'll shop on EBay for my desired collection of tandem bike figures. So picture the shelf loaded with tandem bikes . . .

The neat picture hanging on the wall is actually 6 pieces of metal with one of the photos I took in Spain printed on it. I thought this was the coolest thing ever. I originally wanted it bigger, but the wood cross beam and the fact that I didn't shoot in RAW sort of restricted me. Still nice, none-the-less.

And one more thing to show. I guess this is like Show N Tell . . . we only bought one thing on our recent vacation. Well, that's not entirely true. Karlo also scored himself a Life is Good hang gliding shirt. But while we were at the Life is Good store we picked up this little number for the Love Shack. As if I didn't already adore the Love Shack . . .

Sunrise in Eastford

I got so inspired (and so used to getting up before the crack of dawn) on vacation that I decided to carry on the tradition at home. Yeah, I know it's a pipe dream and it likely won't last beyond this weekend, but I struck while the iron was hot. On Sunday morning Karlo (being an incredibly good sport) accompanied me on my pre-dawn drive around Eastford looking for a good picture. Let me tell you, sunrise and sunset pictures are slim pickins in this town. There is almost nowhere where you can catch a glimpse of the horizon without it being completely surrounded by trees. By the time the sun makes its way over the surrounding trees you totally lose the effect of the pretty sky. Sometimes I feel like we live a hole. One of these days I want to get out to Montana, the 'big sky' state.

But I tried to make the most of it and forced myself to push the shutter release. The scenery wasn't all that stellar to start with. In fact, I was shooting across an ugly swamp. But here's the results non-the-less. I think next time I'll have to get up earlier and drive further out of this hole we called Eastford.

The Week in Words 3/21

Sharp Shooter

Seems I've been falling behind with my blog lately. Karlo and I just have to marvel at how busy our lives are, always. This year was the year that we deemed to be all about fun and relaxation. I'm not quite sure what's going wrong, but it's not working. We can't even find the time to return our library books . . . and we literally drive right by the library on the way to and from work. Simply pathetic.

So what have we been doing? Well, our work week was jam packed with dancing, yoga, and visiting friends and family. We had a really nice time Friday night visiting my family. And this weekend was glorious. We didn't have a single plan and we vowed to make it a fun-filled weekend. I'm still not sure how Karlo tricked me into thinking that staining our gigantic deck would be fun. Because believe you me . . . it was NOT. But I'm glad we got that behind us. Well, mostly behind us. We still need to do those pesky railings and I'm not looking forward to that one bit.

Let's see, what else did we do? We took the motorcycle out a couple of times, we hiked with the dogs, we kayaked, oh and we played with our new toy. What a ball I had shooting again. And I know nobody will believe this but I knocked down a target on my VERY first shot. I still got it.

Here's Karlo preparing to set up the targets.

And here are the victims:


This shows the distance between the gun and the targets.

And here we are shooting.

Final Outer Banks Notes

I guess I got sidetracked with my Cooper story yesterday and forgot that I didn't finish my Outer Banks photos story. Must have been the lack of sleep and exhaustion. The good news is that both Cooper and I slept last night. So let me pick up where I left off.

The conditions weren't always perfect for brilliant sunrises and sunsets. Sometimes we had to make the best of the situation. For instance, we got up ridiculously early one day and drove 40 minutes to see a lighthouse. Only when we got there it was raining. So I got a couple of creative shots like these:


We made a pit stop in Virginia to visit some friends on our way home. It was sort of gray and gloomy and I debated even taking my camera out of the car, but I learned my lesson that pictures can be anywhere, even when you are sure there is nothing worth photographing. I snapped this shot off our friend's back deck. I just loved the contrast:


Then on our drive home it was raining so I took a nap in the car. Suddenly Karlo whacks me in the arm, "Wake up! Check this out!" When I opened my eyes I saw that Karlo stopped at a body of water and the sun had come out late in the afternoon, just when the light really starts to get interesting. Add to the interesting light was the fact that a bank of fog was rolling in across the water.


And finally we just happened to cross the bridge over the Potomac River just before sunset. It was too perfect to not stop and try to capture the sunset. The sunset turned out to be a dud, but I was amazed at some of the cool pictures I got. I learned another important lesson . . . the camera's eye is much different than the human eye and what it sees is usually better then what reality is. Standing there in person looking at this scene was nowhere near as nice.


I uploaded some more of the highlight pictures from this trip. If you would like to see them all, please click here.

I’m So Proud, But I’m So Tired

I’m so proud of Cooper. His guard dog, ‘meaness’ training has paid off. For whatever reason he was outside on patrol last night, barking his head off and howling at the moon. I have no idea what got into him, but I was happy to hear him actually barking. Karlo threw on our outside panic lights, which I’m pretty sure you can see from space, and that quieted him down for a little while. But then he was at it again. This time Karlo went to check on things, had a little talk with Coop and he settled down. Shortly thereafter our driveway alarm went off. That was it. I was officially on edge. What the heck was going on outside? This led me to have a nightmare about being robbed. The dream was so unbelievably realistic. I woke up in a cold sweat, shaking and convinced what just happened was real. It was terrible and I couldn’t sleep for the rest of the night. I was so torn between being mad at the dog and being proud of him. I think, despite my exhaustion, I’m still proud of him. He can bark all he wants from now on.

Pictures from the Outer Banks

I meant to post a link to some pictures today, but as usual the day after returning from vacation was chaotic. Not sure where the day went. I'm also not sure where the night is going. I think something went wrong with Daylight Savings Time. I swear that time is moving at twice the speed that it should be. Is this the new DST feature? Gee, I hope not. I couldn't keep up before.

So without any further ado, I would like to share with you a few of my pics from last week. The shot above is what everybody agreed was the shot of the week. I'm calling it my prized shot. The instructor had it printed and I got to go home with an 8x10 in my hand. That was a nice touch.

Here are a coupe of shots from my first attempt at a sunset:


And here are a couple from my first cold, grumpy sunrise. I needed to get used to this waking up at 4:45 idea.


And a couple more sunsets:


And I'm running out of steam tonight. I think I'll save a few more shots for tomorrow. Stay tuned.

OBX Adventure

I failed to mention that I would be going away for a week. I guess I was getting a bit sensitive to telling the world that we would be away from home. The recent break-ins in our town have me feeling a little paranoid. But now that we are home I thought it was time to tell my stories from my Outer Banks Adventure.

I can cross another thing off my Bucket List. I always wanted to take a vacation dedicated to photography. I knew that would be a tough one because I didn’t want to vacation without Karlo, but a great deal presented itself and Karlo was game for tagging along. We took off early on Saturday morning and headed to Pennsylvania to visit our ‘imaginary friends.’ No, of course they are not really imaginary, but Lisa always teased us that they were. We visited a couple that we met on a bike trip years ago. We had a ball catching up with them, meeting their little son, and it was a great pit stop on our way to North Carolina.

The drive was relatively quick and easy. Good weather, no traffic, and a wonderful book on CD that made us relax and reflect on life. It really set us up for a zenful week of relaxation. Something that is so foreign to us, but so incredibly needed.

The week in the Outer Banks was great. We shared a big town house with the instructors and other students and we became a big happy family. Our days were filled with lounging and laughing around the house, photography lessons at the dining room table, roaming around the sights of the Banks, with just enough ‘alone time’ to enjoy our vacation. Of course the highlights were the sunrises and sunsets, which by the way, are the only times a real photographer turns a camera on outdoors. Not so sure I’m likin’ a vacation that requires me to wake up at 4:45 AM everyday, but I was a trooper.

I learned a lot about photography and also got to hang out and play with Karlo every day. We took long walks on the beach, played tennis, hung out on the dunes watching the hang gliders and learned all about the birth of aviation. It was a nice experience to not feel pressure to have a fully packed agenda every day. Maybe this was because I was so tired from getting up so darn early.

The absolute highlight of the trip was gaining the confidence to call myself a photographer. I received high praises from the instructors and that really made my week. I am really looking forward to practicing my new tricks this year.

You're probably wondering where the 'real' pictures are. Don't worry. I have plenty! I just need some time to sift through and decide which ones to upload. Stay tuned.

This is Why I Think Fashion is a Joke

I’m not normally drawn to anything that has to do with fashion. I never bought a fashion magazine in my entire life and never even heard of Dolce & Gabbana until Tina introduced it to me. My favorite clothing labels are Mountain Hardware, Eddie Bauer and Lands End. Needless to say the fashion world just confuses me.

However, with all that said, one of my favorite TV shows is What Not to Wear. I think this is because I just love makeovers in any possible form, home or beauty. So when I saw a link in an Oprah newsletter this morning about “fashions to avoid this Spring and what not to wear” it drew me in. And what I saw was down right ridiculous. Do we really need an article to explain that we should NOT be wearing these Halloween costumes? I mean, really . . . .

Example #1:
Now the picture on the left is what we are not supposed to wear and the outfit on the right is what we are supposed to wear . . . if we are going to jail, or perhaps painting our house. I can only imagine with that janitor suit costs.

Example #2:
I’m still trying to figure out which outfit is more hideous–the one we are or are not supposed to wear.

Example #3:
I think this one only applies to hookers. At least I HOPE it does.

Example #4:
There are just no words to express my thoughts on the ‘what not to wear’ outfit. I just want to know what these designers are smoking, and how much money those models are being paid to look as ridiculous as they do. And how can they even compare these two outfits? This was the only ‘what to wear’ outfit that was even close to looking like normal clothes.

Example #5:
OK, once again . . . do I even need to comment? Give me my Keen sandals any day.

A Big Night Planned

Aside from being excited to color and highlight my hair tonight, I’m also very excited to be taking a trip to the free bookstore, also known as the library. Sometimes it amazes me how seldom people take advantage of this great community perk of borrowing books for free. I can’t remember the last time I visited a library. Well, I guess I can, but the Eastford library doesn’t count as I think I own more books than they have available, and I’ve yet to walk out of there with any books. So tonight we are going to a bigger library in a different town in hopes of finding some books and CDs for our road trip next week. I am so looking forward to the thrill of looking at all the books and hunting for something that interests me. I love books! Too bad I don't have more time to actually read them.