{You Capture} Get Down Low!
Hi all you wonderful You Capture people! Yes, I’m back- for this week at least! Unpacking from the move is still happening, but we’re definitely feeling more settled.
This is one of my lovely peonies in front of our new house, looking at it from the underside up. Don’t you just love peonies?
Sweet Summertime…
Ahhh, I do not think that words can convey how happy and contented I am to be finally, officially living at our new place. Well, I guess I’ll be even more contented once I get all the boxes unpacked and everything put away. It’s not my forte, but unpacking after a move is infinitely better than packing for a move. Hopefully this will be our last move for a very long time and I won’t have to deal with the packing-for-a-move thing ever again. Or not anytime soon at least.
G is also enjoying it immensely. New places to explore. A big open deck that just beckons to be crawled around on. Green grass.
Back doors to figure out how to open.
Wildlife to meet and get to know.
We found this box turtle crawling across our lane.
I’ll be the first to admit that I detest reptiles, especially the long, slithery kinds, but this guy is kind of cute. All those colors and patterns are simply amazing!
Forget zebra and leopard prints- I want turtle, er, tortoise prints!
Does anybody know what box turtles eat? We let this one go, but I thought it might be kind of fun to keep one as pet for a couple days, if we ever come across another one.
*sigh* My peonies are blooming! And I love them! They just finish off these lovely, warm, and sunny summer days just perfectly.
And I’m not a huge summer person. At least I haven’t been until now. I’ve always preferred the cool coziness of fall. But I can now say that North Dakota summers definitely measure up to those lovely temperate Michigan summers. Sorry, no, Pennsylvania summers, with all their heat and humidity, do not. Northern summers just pretty much rock!
I do want to post some shots of the inside of the house when I get everything arranged the way I like it and once the yard is mowed. However, neither of those projects are done yet and so no pictures yet. Sorry.
Who knows how long it will take a procrastinator like me to get everything unpacked. Alas, I have a plan! We are getting to know some perfectly lovely people and actually, um, wait for it, making friends! And I am inviting some of said friends over for Sunday dinner (or lunch, whatever floats your boat). So, that is my motivation. To get everything unpacked and put away so I can show off my new and awesome house. Yep, friends (you know who you are), I’m totally just inviting you over as some kind of personal motivation thing.
Or NOT! I love company and I’m so glad to have people to invite over!
Excuses…
Hey everyone! So sorry I haven’t posted lately, but we are smack dab in the middle of moving. And I am ready to go stark raving mad. Or curl up in a fetal position, suck my thumb, and moan. One or the other- or both.
Our New Neighbors
Yep, these are them. They are residing in the huge pasture across the road from our farm until the end of summer or whenever they have the grass all eaten down. Seriously, the pasture is huge- at least 100 acres, nah, maybe closer to 200.
They’re a Charolais/Angus cross and I think they’re really pretty. Such a pretty golden color. You can tell they are loving this life in the pasture just by looking at their coats- see how shiny and glowy and silky they are?
The rancher who owns these cattle told us that his family has been in the area since his great-grandfather came from Sweden in 190something. Can’t remember the exact year anymore. But I imagine that this is what a photograph of the same scene would have looked like back then- had they wasted the film and 3 minutes on taking a picture of cows, that is. Oh, and it probably would not have involved my watermark either…
Something about the lovely evening light on the prairie and these cows just does something for me. I could just shoot and shoot them all evening. Well, until the mosquitos carry me off.
{You Capture} Sky
Yeah, I know, it’s really time for You Capture again?! I don’t really have too much to offer this week. Have been seriously busy with the new place, getting ready to move, etc., etc.
No, it’s nothing too spectacular, but it’s what I got. This was the view from our front deck, facing the east, as a storm rolled in from the southwest. Really, the picture in all it’s graininess, doesn’t do it justice. The clouds were really amazing and I knew, as soon as I looked through my view finder, that there was no way I’d really be able to capture it. But regardless, here it is, almost-SOOC and all.
On the house front, we spent last weekend painting the front deck. Actually, we only got the first coat of primer on, but thanks to that the second coat of primer and then the paint should go on much quicker and we’ll use a lot less paint too. The whole project is part of the conditions with the title company. I think I mentioned them before. Although, we probably would have ended up painting the deck anyways (it started out as a kind of nasty dark red), but this way we get reimbursed for our supplies. Which makes me happy. Particularly because it’s such a great motivator for getting the whole project done and ending up with a fresh- and clean-looking white deck. Yay! And no, I don’t have any pictures of the process. Yes, I know- I’m such a great blogger.
Oh, and back to You Capture and this blog for a bit. I’m feeling so very guilty for not having had the time to get around and comment on all of the great submissions! Ack! So many lovely people have stopped by and commented on my contributions over the last several weeks and I LOVE it, which of course, just makes the guilt so much worse. 
Every evening, I sit down to surf through the links and comment and I usually end up blinking like crazy to keep my dry contacts from popping out and then just wanting to keep my eyes closed and sleep and then just going to bed. Yup, lame, I know. Same thing goes for the Fledgling Photographers list I’m a part of over at That Wife. Blah. But, I promise, when this move is over, my blog posts will {hopefully} return to a every-few-days kind of regularity. Oh yeah, except for the part where I’ll be leaving on a 3- or 4-week trip out East only a couple of weeks after our move. *slaps back of hand to forehead and faints*
{You Capture} Depth Of Field
My You Capture contributions for the week.
The ‘Depth Of Field’ (DOF) assignment was so fun for me- I love me some good bokeh. Seriously, I could have gone through my files and come up with a good 100 shallow DOF images that I’d have been proud to post. As it was, I managed to get some shots that I loved this week.
And I know I mentioned that I didn’t want to shoot dandelions last week, but, during a lovely, warm afternoon in the back yard, I couldn’t resist.
Ok, so there they are! Hope you enjoyed. Head over to I Should Be Folding Laundry for a bunch more geniusness.
Our Farm
I have been trying to sit down and finish this blog post all morning now. And this is the furthest I’ve managed to get. Apparently thinking up a title and getting started are the hardest parts for me. Not that the title of this post is anything real brilliant. And I’m not sure you can call 16 acres a farm, but it works for this title.
I’m going to attribute my brain-deadness to the fact that I got up at 5:30 yesterday morning and then proceeded to get a bunch of exercise, sun, and wind throughout the day. My lips are chapped. My face is burning- either from the sun or the wind, I’m not sure yet. My legs are sore from running up and down the ladder. My hand is feeling a bit crampy from gripping the paint brush. All in all, yesterday was awesome! And no, I’m not being facetious. It was a super, super day.
Let me back up a bit. We spent Saturday night there and got up so bright and early Sunday morning because, well, the sun was up and since there were no curtains in the bedroom we were sleeping in, it was quite literally as bright as day. And JD Man was too pumped to stay in bed, so that meant I had to get up too. Because, ya know, what’s the point of staying in bed if you can’t sleep anyways and there’s no one to cuddle with?
Honestly, there’s not much that’s better than a springtime morning in the country. It was so totally refreshing. Like deep down, soul refreshing. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh. The songbirds. The freshness. The crispness in the air. Oh, and the magnificent, glowing prairie light.
Yes, perfectness.
And another cool thing?
The road to the north.
The road to the south.
Yep, we’re lovin’ it.
Here’s a few more shots of the actual farm:
Notice the pretty white trim? Yeah, I know, probably not. I do because that’s what we were doing yesterday afternoon. Chipping the old and peeling, brown paint and then priming and repainting it. It’s a condition the title company called for and needs to be done in the next 55 days. So the window and door trim is going from brown to white. We’ll also be painting the front deck and back porch white. Another condition. But that’s alright- we would done it after awhile anyways. And this way we’re being reimbursed for our supplies. Score!
I was so happy to find these lilac bushes in the shelter belt! And, even though I forgot to get pictures, there’s some peony bushes in front of the house. Which is pure awesomeness as I had told JD Man that if they weren’t already there, I wanted to plant those two specific things and now I find out that they’re already there and established! Lilacs and peonies are my favorite spring/early summer flowers, by the way.
To help clear up any confusion about the layout of things.
Oh, and would you look at the light in the kitchen?
Sure, I used my flash to avoid any noise and bluriness, but notice the window on the right-hand side of the shot, if you please. It’s a west-facing window and there will probably have a table set under it. Which totally calls for a lot more food shots and maybe some recipes to blogged!
Probably the thing I love most about the actual house: every main floor room has several nice big windows. The whole place feels so bright!
Example: the living room.
Oh, and can we say photo props?
And one last pretty picture for the end.
The Cause Of My Busy Wednesday…
…is this right here! No, not the snow {thank goodness!}, but the house and the rest of the buildings and fences and trees. As of Wednesday afternoon, it’s OURS! And let’s just say I’m really, really, really excited about the whole thing!
We’re headed over there (it’s about 80 miles from where we’re currently living) to get started on some little projects (although the house is totally move-in ready) and just enjoy calling it our own. So, while I currently have no pictures of the place, other than this one from the first time we looked at it, I’ll be taking lots and lots and posting some of them here either Sunday evening or Monday morning.
Seriously, the weekend cannot come soon enough! I. am. PUMPED!
{You Capture} Yellow
Ack! So I wanted to do at least one other post between You Capture contributions and, well, I guess it just didn’t happen. I guess you could say that I’m still finding my way with this blog. That is to say, this blog is supposed to be for my business and the advancement thereof and, since my sessions are few and far between, I’ve been filling in the spaces with a lot of personal stuff and I’m not sure that’s the direction I want for my business blog. Oh well, I guess that’s the status quo as of right now. Hopefully, when I get more clients, I’ll be able to phase out the personal stuff. Maybe to another blog or maybe I’ll get one of those cool photog blog/sites where I can have my business site and blog, as well as a more personal blog. We’ll see. But as of right now it’s a little hard to know what to blog about and what to leave out.
But anyways, on to You Capture. I’m posting it this morning because today is going to be a busy and exciting day (trust me, I’ll be blogging about it as soon as it’s official and I have pictures) and I wanted to get it done before things got hectic. I’ll just link up whenever Beth gets Mr. Linky posted.
I wasn’t particularly inspired this week, so I just shot some yellow stuff. Tried to be creative, but if you head over to I Should Be Folding Laundry, I’m sure you will find some much more creative ideas. Oh, but you won’t find any dandelions here. Not that there’s anything wrong with dandelions or dandelion photos, but there’s been quite a few dandelion shots done for You Capture’s spring assignments over the last two weeks and now with the assignment of ‘Yellow’, I’m sure there will be a few more. And, tempting as it was, since I actually love dandelions, I decided to do something a little different.
Yep, I love my Nikon equipment. Yes, I’m sure Canon (and Sony and whoever else) does great stuff in the D/SLR world too, but Nikon is just so good for me. I love the way my camera feels in my hands. The buttons and dials are in all the right places. Plus, and I know this is up for debate, but I’ve been told that Nikon lenses are some of the best.
And if you’re wondering why the backdrop for my camera strap is the pick-up seat, well, I was waiting on JD Man and I was bored and this is what happened.
Yes, I am truly 6 years old.
Pretty self-explanatory. What mom of toddlers doesn’t have at least one of these boxes in her pantry?
Of course, you knew I couldn’t resist, didn’t you? Because all that green just wouldn’t be the same without the yellow!
Four-Legged Deer
This is a relatively old shot from last winter when I was doing my 50-50-50 challenge. I now have it available as a print under the Regina Lynn Collection. And I just thought it fit in with the green and yellow theme I seem to be have going on here.
Ok, I need go and officially start my busy day. See ya’ll later!
{You Capture} Spring II
This week Beth’s assignment was once again ‘Spring’, with an encouragement to shoot something totally different from last week’s ‘Spring’ assignment.
I have to confess, I had an awesome idea for this week, but with the weather the way it’s been this week, it didn’t happen. So without further ado, my You Capture contribution for the week:
This right here, my peeps, is what spring means to me, a first and last farm girl. The smells of spring mingled with the scent of damp soil. The busyiness. The excitement of trying to be the first in the fields and the first done. Everything. I love it.
