Kanapaha Botanical Gardens–April 2016

Groupon was offering an excellent deal on annual passes, so I picked one up for me and the husband. Besides being able to enjoy a nice afternoon in a quiet, serene setting, it gave me yet another opportunity to become more comfortable with my recently acquired Pentax KS-1 camera. Wanting a minimalist approach to my camera gear, I paired it with the film-era Pentax F 35-70/3.5-4,5 macro lens. This lens about the size of a typical 50mm prime, making this camera/lens combination easy to carry. While not a true 1:1 macro, the 35-70 allowed me to get close enough to get some good details in the flower shots.

Click here to see the rest of the pics.

A walk in the woods–March 2016

  

Click here for the rest of the pics.

A walk around downtown…

Recently, my husband and I spent a little time walking around downtown on a nice Sunday evening.

The rest of the pics can be found here.

Notice something different?

This blog finally has, for a lack of a better description, a subtitle!

“So many avenues. So little time. The struggle is real.”

Like most of us creative types, I haven’t figured out a good way to financially support myself with my creative endeavors, so I have to work a 40-hour-a-week regular job.

I knit, I spin, I shoot things (with my camera), yet there is more that I want to do that I struggle to find time for. I want to get back into music–piano and perhaps guitar. I’d love to get into painting and drawing, maybe do some quilting. The problem is that I need to sleep too. I also need to go to work so I can pay my bills. I just don’t have time for everything I want to do and it can be really frustrating!

Yes, the struggle is very real.

#tbt Driftwood Beach–Jekyll Island, Georgia

This was taken in April 2015 while vacationing on the coast of Georgia. While I had been to Jekyll Island before, I wasn’t aware of this awesome beach until I started planning for this trip and looking for photo-worthy places to shoot. It was a dreary day, but it was totally appropriate for the subject matter.

The rest of the pics can be found here.

Time to dust this blog off…

A lot has happened in the 2 1/2 years since I’ve written anything of any consequence to this blog. In that time, I…

• left a marriage that was sucking my soul dry
• moved into my own apartment
• got a whole new life–church, interests, friends
• worked (at the same job–one of the few things that did stay the same)
• travelled a bit
• met a wonderful man (in the course of my travels)
• married Mr. Wonderful ❤

Among all the above, I still managed to find time to pursue my creative interests. I did a lot of knitting and spinning and not so much photography.

One of qualities on my wish list for Mr. Right was that he have a creative side. Mr. Wonderful does not disappoint! He enjoys writing, music (piano and guitar), and videography. With my encouragement, he’s also starting to dabble in still photography. Being around another creative soul encourages me to make more time for my own creative pursuits. Being a creative himself, he gets that need and desire to create. Sometimes we’re creating together–other times, separately. Creating makes us happy, so we make it a priority. 🙂

As you can tell from my last post, I’ve once again picked up my camera and have taken it with me on our weekend outings. My goal is not to shoot as much as I can, but just to shoot at this point. I’ll be posting more pics from those outings, so stay on the lookout for them. I also plan on sharing more about what I’ve been up to in my knitting and spinning pursuits. Other times, I’ll just be waxing philosophical about my creative process.

Looking forward to what’s ahead… 🙂

An afternoon in St. Augustine

All the pics!

Lemons to Lemonade: a different approach

This is a bit of a departure from my my other postings in that it will be a little more personal. I feel like that it is important for me to document these thoughts, not only for myself, but in hopes that you will find some encouragement from my experiences.

I’m not going to bore you with the details of how this current situation came to pass because they really don’t matter so much and they wouldn’t benefit the spirit of this posting. I have been given a 3-day unpaid suspension from work. Considering the nature of the issue that led to this outcome, I believe it to be an excessive penalty. This has left me to question my self-worth as a person and a librarian. I have been left with a deep mistrust of my employer. I fear losing my job after 15 years with the same library system. I have tried to remain as positive I as I can throughout the process, but reality hit me this weekend. What would happen if I lost my job? What would I do after that? No amount of positive thinking would bring me peace of mind, Heaven forbid that these things should ever come to pass. It’s a very unsettling and upsetting feeling, to say the least. I had been handed some nasty, bitter lemons.

Then I went to Mass this morning with one of my best friends and had an encounter with the Great Lemonade Maker! I heard the themes of faith and courage throughout the service. The Maker himself assured me that everything would be OK and that He would protect me. I could hand over all of those nasty, bitter lemons and trust that He will make the sweetest, best tasting lemonade.

I don’t know exactly how that lemonade is going to taste just yet. In the meantime, I’m going to take these 3 imposed days off and take care of myself. I have some things that I want to do that will be positive for my body, mind, and spirit. This will be a time of renewal.

With that, I trust that The Maker will deal accordingly with those who dumped the lemons onto me to begin with. 🙂

Sock heels–new thoughts…

1st Afterthought Heel Socks

Many a knitter has sung the praises of the afterthought heel on handknit socks. You knit a tube with shaping for the toes and then add the heel afterwards by either unraveling a piece of waste yarn previously knitted in or by (gasp!) cutting your knitting at a spot just past your ankle bone on the back side of the sock and taking a needle(s) and picking up the live stitches and knitting what essentially is another toe.

To me, it was appealing and intimidating at the same time. I mean, what would happen if I lost my live stitches and my sock became a tangled mess? 😮 I finally got up enough courage to attempt it when I decided to take some leftover Noro Silk Garden Sock yarn–about 190 yards worth, and knit some socks. Since 190 yards probably wouldn’t be enough for both socks, I picked up a skein of Cascade 220 Sport Superwash in a matching color to knit the toes, heels, and top ribbing with. Originally, I was going to knit my fall-back toe-up gusset heel pattern, but realized that the gusset was probably going to eat up more yarn than I wanted it to. That’s when the afterthought heel came in.

When knitting the first sock, I did learn a couple of things that will make future socks easier. One is that I only have to knit 1 inch beyond the length I normally knit my toe-up socks before needing to put the waste yarn in–definitely less knitting than with putting in a gusset. Secondly, the waste yarn needs to be a contrasting color to the color of the sock. When taking out the waste yarn on the first sock, I accidentally pulled on the wrong yarn and dropped a good many stitches. While annoying, I was able to fix it, though.

As I continued to work on my socks, a few things dawned on me. My husband adores the handknit socks I knit for him, but he has a tendency to blow out the heels. Perhaps I should knit all of his socks with afterthought heels so that when he blows out a heel, I can just simply replace the heel rather than having to ditch the whole sock. Another thing is that since I’m knitting a tube, more intricate patterns will be easier to deal with since there is no gusset involved. I also really like the concept of 2-at-a-time socks. I’ve tried them both toe-up and top-down, but never could figure out traditional heels, so I gave up. Since I’m basically knitting a tube then adding the heel later, 2AAT with afterthought heels is definitely do-able. In other words, this has opened up a new avenue of sock knitting possibilities to me.

I am a happy camper. 🙂

I’m back–hopefully to stay!

Over the last couple of years, I’ve really struggled to maintain any sort of photo mojo. It’s due to a variety of factors, both physical and emotional. I’ve been feeling a bit guilty and have started to miss going out on my photo adventures.

I think what really got me to thinking about it again was a trip to Daytona Beach the hubs and I took weekend before last. I generally like to take a camera with me, but I couldn’t decide between my Canon S90 or my Pentax K5 with the compliment of lenses. Obviously there is a great difference in size and features, size ultimately won out. I really do like my S90 as it does a lot of what a DSLR can, but the one thing I don’t like about it is that there is nowhere to mount a circular polarizer. I did use it, but at the same time, I was kicking myself in the butt for not bringing the Pentax. That got me to thinking…what about a micro 4/3s camera and lenses?

I started investigating my options and found an extremely good deal on a new Olympus E-PL2 + 14-42 kit lens for $299 at Adorama. Sure, it’s not the newest model, but it’s a good way to get my feet wet in m4/3 without too much expense. I finally pulled the trigger on Monday of this week and I’m anxiously awaiting it’s arrival. 🙂

In the course of my investigation into the m4/3 mount, I discovered a site devoted to it:http://www.mu-43.com/. Of course I joined right away; I’m HeatherWB there. Since joining, I’ve learned that the m4/3s mount is one of the most adaptable mounts to other mounts, including Pentax. I’ve since ordered an adapter and I’m looking forward to seeing how well my Pentax lenses work with the Oly.

I’ve really come to understand that the best camera is the one that I will actually use. I’m hoping that this Olympus will be that “just right” camera–not too big, not too small and does the things I need it to do well.

In the meantime, I’m hoping to get out with the Pentax and do some shooting this weekend. 🙂

Now the waiting continues…