Growing Up Means Losing Teeth

Lost a tooth!


Lost another one!



Photos taken with Sony DSC-H7, contrast and color boosted with photoshop.
Used this technique with her eyes.

Beach Portraits: Vignettes

As in every family, there are fun stories and/or facts about the members of our family. While I was trying to get a good picture of all the girl cousins, I snapped this candid that I really like. Its not really a great quality photo, but it captures a story.

These girls are the first girl grandchildren in the family. And they were born nine months apart from each other(it was a busy two years in our family). The cousin on the left is the oldest. Nine months later my daughter (the one on the right) was born. Then nine months later,the blond in the middle arrived. Its been fun to watch them grow, dress them alike at Easter, etc. I look forward to lots of pictures of the three of them together as we watch them grow up.


This cousin, "B", was born right before my hubby and I got married. During the first years of our marriage, we lived near his family. As a result, I watched him grow up. Now that I have a son, I see so many similarities between the two of them. You may not see it so much in how they look (although they are obviously from the same genes), but the way my son acts just like his older cousin did amazes me.


This picture shows "B's" dad and older brother. While photographing all the kiddos, I glanced up to see these two standing next to each other. I swung my camera around to capture the like-father-like-son pose!

Beach Portraits: Just the Girls!

It's fun to me that of the ten grandchildren in my hubby's family, there are five girls and five boys. My children love their cousins and have such a great time on the rare occasions they all get to be together. As you can imagine, any family photo opportunity must include pictures of the grandkids.

Here is a picture of just the girls:

Joel's sister, Dawn made the matching pillowcase dresses and his sister, April made the hair bows. I love how cut they all look! And the white and pink are perfect with the blue of the sky and sea.

I played with the black and white here. I converted the photo to black and white, then "erased" the black and white on the ribbons of the dresses to allow the pink to come through.


See the man walking the beach? I tried as hard as I could to shoot in a way to avoid seeing the other people on the beach. But it just didn't happen every time.

Thank goodness for photoshop! Here is the same photo after applying the "healing brush"(and a few adjustments to contrast and color).


Here's another edit in photoshop just for fun. Have I ever mentionned that I DON'T know what I'm doing? I DO know I'm having lots of fun!

Portraits at the Beach

There is no better subject in my photos than my children. There aren't many better settings than the beach. So I took the opportunity during a recent stay in Destin, Fl. to photograph my children.

The Eyes Have It

I just acquired Photoshop Elements on my computer. And even though I already have enough distractions from my everyday duties (I'm always looking for ways to avoid housework), I am now addicted to figuring out how to use it. Its a slow process, and the dishes are piling up!

This morning, I took a picture of my daughter so I could play around with the eyes. She has beautiful eyes, and I wanted to try out a technique I had read about on Pioneer Woman. Since this blog is my place to put all my fun without boring everyone who reads my "regular" blog, I will now post the results of my playing:

Before playing:

After playing:

What do you think? I think the second picture really showcases her awesome eyes and even highlights the cute freckles on her face.

Did I adjust too much? Do the eyes look unnatural?