Box of Fun and Christmas

So, I've been trying to get into the spirit of Christmas since the day after Thanksgiving. Per tradition, I'm supposed to put my tree up the Saturday after Thanksgiving, but so far, nearly a week has passed and the spot where my tree would be is empty still. I'm just not feeling Christmas this year. Maybe it's the fact that once again, I'm empty handed for Christmas. I will be making treats as my Christmas present, but I'm not happy about that. The gifts I was making got eaten by a certain doberman monster. *sigh*. I hate being broke on Christmas. I hate hate HATE it! I know "it's the thought that counts"... but it's just so embarrassing showing up for Christmas where EVERYONE has gotten you something, and you are empty handed. I can't bare to do that again. So, I have been scanning Pinterest for candy ideas, but I just don't feel like that's good enough. So, needless to say, I'm not even wanting to put up a tree.

I guess another reason is, my husband doesn't seem to care. I want a new tree. Actually, I have wanted a NEW tree for the last 3 years, and each year I get "I promise next year...". I'm NOT putting up that dinky little Christmas tree AGAIN.

BAH HUMBUG

I found this sweet box of new Christmas ornaments for this year. Ya see, every year, we get new ornaments AFTER Christmas, well, FOR Christmas, which means the ornaments are new for the following year. I thought that would excite me, but instead, it just gave me some good photos. Observe:

What do you think? These were edited in Light Room. I would really like some constructive criticism :-)

So, even though I'm still not in the Christmas mood.. who knows? Maybe I will get there. On the other hand, I could skip Christmas this year... hmm...

Photography Announcement!

So, I've been working on my editing in Light Room and I think I have a few potential photo shoots coming up! I know I'm going to be shooting a sweet winter engagement photo session with my friends Heather and Robin, and POSSIBLY some Maternity and Newborn sessions as well! I have officially decided to get more serious about photography... I hope I don't fail! ;-)

Here's the doberman (from that same photo shoot, since I haven't done any new ones)

I tried several times to achieve a GOOD B&W in Light Room. Let's face it. Just basic black and white really looks terrible! Wanna know what I did to this image? In light room, I first made it Black and White. Then, I upped the brightness and contrast and finally upped the blacks. I've found that just playing around with these little settings makes the WORLD of difference! I downloaded a few "presets" for Light Room, but didn't like any of them. I found it's MUCH easier just to manually adjust the settings.

Speaking of manual, I'm getting a lot better at my manual settings on my camera. This 50mm lens has made me a much better photographer. I'm jonesing for another one. I think I'm going to go with the 35mm f/1.4, but that's too expensive, so I might just get the 1.8.. not sure yet!

Anyway, I hope everyone had a good holiday weekend! :-) Christmas is coming up!

What started off as a bad day...

...Quickly turned into a GREAT day! I got a spiffy little email from Best Buy saying that my lens was in... 11 DAYS EARLY!! I couldn't be more excited. I love this little nifty fifty. It's a prime lens, so that  means I will be walking close/farther away if I want to "zoom". But I'm very much OK with it, because this thing takes some purty pictures :-)

So, I lower the saturation tinsy bit, but the clarity and the bokeh? Straight from the lens. I'm VERY impressed with it. Now, I just need some better subject matter. What do you think?

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Speaking of opinions, I was able to play around with Adobe Lightroom a little bit. It always thought most photographers used Adobe Photoshop.. but now I think I *could* have been wrong. Just look at this difference! I swear, even a little bit of Light Room and Photo Shop can make a good picture look GREAT!

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So, now on to the most exciting part of my day! I have had the best idea ever (though not entirely original) to make everyone a homemade Christmas ornament as my gift this year. I simply cannot afford a gift for everyone, and I really want to get EVERYONE something.. So this was the only solution. I'm not going to give anything away, but I will say this. I can only thank PINTEREST for the wonderful inspiration to make these. I wanted something fun and original to me, but I found so many wonderful ideas! So I combined my favorite things and came up with a totally original idea :-) I will post a complete tutorial WITH PICS.. but I want my friends to receive them first... Don't want to spoil it! I'll end this post with some teaser pictures. ENJOY! :-)

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Thank God...

...IT'S FRIDAY!!

So, I worked on this blog ALL DAY yesterday and I just couldn't imagine only updating once a week! So I'll throw in another one today. Just for fun :-) Let's see.. what's interesting. OH YEAH. Yesterday, my husband and I made a trip to Bedford Camera to see if my kit lens on my Nikon D40 was repairable or had to be replaced. We got some sad news... The lens was going to have to be replaced. BUT instead of paying for the 200 dollar kit lens, I decided it was time to upgrade to a better lens. See, next semester, I am going to start taking Photography Classes as my missing electives for my degree. I would *REALLY* like to get into photography as more than just a hobby, but I don't know much about it other than pointing and shooting. I'm SURE there must be more than that! I would *LOVE* to photograph infants, babies, and preggos. There is something so naturally beautiful about mother and child.. Oh, and lets not forget those sweet, squishy little newborns! Oh, how fun it would be to capture those precious moments...

*ahem* I went off on a tangent and lost track. Back to my story! I bought a 55-200mm f/4.0 lens to replace my kit lens.

 
Now, this lens took BEAUTIFUL pictures.. and it was a zoom lens... but it just wasn't meant to be. I needed a little closer and a little quicker. MUCH quicker. Plus, I like Bokeh a LOT. So, I exchanged it for this lens:

The MIGHTY NIFTY FIFTY! a 50mm f/1.8 lens. OOOOH HOW I LOVE! Or rather.. I will love it, when it comes in on the 20th of this month! *sigh*

Just 16 more days..