Macros at the Arboretum

Last week, Annika's class took a trip to the arboretum near UW as part of their study of plants and their life cycles. I was fortunate enough to be able to go as a chaperone and am so glad I did. The kids were great and it was such fun to watch them learn from the arboretum staff as we wandered around the beautiful and lush grounds.

Honestly, we couldn't have gotten any luckier with the weather. It was warm and sunny the entire day. The muddy ground here and there was the only nod to the massively wet weather we've experienced lately. The kids shucked their coats and enjoyed the warm sun on their arms and faces for a bit. (What a novelty!!)

Before you wonder, yes, I did take photos of the kids and paid attention to them. In fact, I took a crazy amount of photos, but to respect the privacy of the non-my-child kiddos, I won't post any of them here.

That said, I did take a few moments here and there to snap some macro shots of the various flowers along the way, too. (Don't all field trip chaperones sling two cameras across their bodies while out with the students?)

Enjoy!

Yellow azalea

Pink azalea

Mushroom trio

Curly fern

Fuzzy fern

Teeny, tiny daisy

White rhodedentron

Shroom in profile  - up close and personal 

Macro Photography Homework

At this month's Mamas with Cameras meetup, our speaker was Sally Halvorsen, an incredibly talented macro photographer.

Sally spoke about her inspiration, the equipment she uses, how she sets up her shots, and how macro photography is her passion. Her goal is to capture the delicacy of flowers and plants ... and to photography each flower's "face".

She was inspiring and entertaining, so say the least. At the end of the meetup, Sally challenged each of us to pull out our macro lenses and put them to work. It didn't take much for me to do exactly that after hearing Sally talk about her love of this art form. A couple of days later, out came my camera, tripod, light box (for fruit photos because the rain drove me back inside), and macro lenses. I struggled with my Lensbaby lens (need more practice, obviously), but feel like I did a pretty good job with my standard macro lens.

I look forward to some more breaks in our wet weather so I can head outside again to try shooting more than only the tulips in our front yard!

Catching up on my 365 project

When I started out on this 365 photo project with Mamas with Cameras, my goal was to create a weekly blog post for each week of photos. Well, here we are almost at the end of February and I have yet to post any photos from this month. The best laid plans, eh?? So, here is a photo avalanche showing my February-thus-far. I hope you enjoy!

His "I don't like homework" face

Proud of their Irish heritage

Parent Appreciation Day flowers

Moms' night out

Buca - our fur baby

Conor scaling the zoo's rope web

Fun at swim lessons

Posin'

When he dresses himself a wee bit too quickly

Where's the pot of gold??

Story time with big sister

Doesn't everyone do a spa day when they have kids battling ear infections??

Future electrical engineer

Kowabunga! 

Our artist

Raindrops

Apparently if I leave our garden alone, some things do grow

Menchies - good to the last drop

Bedtime snuggles

More raindrops (it's been a wet month!)

Macro practice

Concentration

Annika heard there was a crow on the roof and wanted to see ... shoes be damned!

Spring has sprung

Mamas with Cameras 365 Photo Challenge: Week 2

Well, another week of my Mamas with Cameras 2016 photo challenge is complete and I'm really excited about some of my shots! It has been another fun week behind the lens, but also somewhat challenging week due to the vast amount of darkness we seem to have this time of year. Fortunately, we had some breaks in the weather, which gave me a few opportunities to shoot outside without fearing that the camera will get drenched.

In order to keep the kids from getting burned out on being photographed, I am continually looking for new subjects and ways to challenge myself. They're still my favorites to shoot, but I try to limit how much I shoot them to make sure I'm remembering to interact with them and not just capture what they're doing. Oh, that double-edged sword of being a mama with a camera!

Without further ado... week 2's photo gallery:

8/365: Blue Friday Cutie Pies

9/365: Sunrise through the fog

10/365: Annika practicing her whip kick 

11/365: Serene lighting for dinner

12/365: Apple wood pizza oven at Serious Pie

13/365: Trees reflected in a puddle

14/365: Macro water drop suspended from a pine needle