family and peace

Last Friday, we walked around the Sundial bridge about an hour before sunset. Instead of putting Sophie in her stroller, we let her walk with us. It took us a while, but we had fun, basking in the mild winter weather and warm sun, showing Sophie how to throw stones into the beautiful Sacramento river and loving the far-off views of the mountains that surround Redding. It's on days like that that I really enjoy living here. The feeling of family, peace, the arrival of the weekend bringing more family time, and the beauty of the nature around us, as well as the amazing Sundial bridge, just warmed my heart really.

Some of the beauty around the Sundial Bridge (not actually taken last week, but before Christmas!):

Well, Obviously Autumn is Over...

These last few months have been the busiest I've been in this photography business and I feel like I've been editing, editing, editing... It's been crazy!! As soon as I finish editing from one shoot, I have another whole set of photos to edit from another. While scrolling through some pictures just now, I found these pictures that I really like from our autumn here in Redding. Obviously, our autumn has been over for sometime now, which just shows how behind I am on my personal editing.

These pictures, to me, are quintessentially autumn in Redding (well, except this last autumn was very dry, which is pretty rare here). We had 63F weather almost every day, hence the lack of coats and hats in these pictures (and Sophie is barefoot in one photo!). Our beautiful trees in our front yard dumped their leaves in almost one day, I think it had frosted that night, and we spent lots of time outside, enjoying the weather, letting Sophie explore and get lots better at walking (she started walking mid-September).

Despite our move into a more rural area of town (not really my cup of tea), I'm really beginning to appreciate our quiet street and large yard, so Sophie can explore and run around. All the neighbours drive slow and I don't have to worry about constantly watching for cars racing around the corner. As we head quickly into spring (winter was also oddly dry and short, all our bulbs are sprouting - we're back in 60s weather again, and I hear we're hitting 68F tomorrow), I thought I'd look back real quick on this lovely autumn we've just enjoyed (or, fall, for all y'all Americans out there).

Canon 5D

I am about to become the proud owner of a Canon 5D. About a year ago, I began to see the limitations of my entry-level DSLR and yearned to upgrade. I wanted to save the money from my photo shoots to get a new camera. Sadly as my shoots are few and far between, I realised that I had to lower my budget. I figured I could work my way to save around $1000 here and there. I was unsure which camera was the best one in that price range, so I posted a question about it on Brookelyn Photography's formspring page. She recommended a used Canon 5D. After doing some research, and actually seeing the price lower on Amazon.com used Canon 5Ds from $1200 to $950, I realised that the camera was within my reach.

I have found even cheaper Canon 5Ds on ebay and so have been bidding on multiple auctions all week in the hopes of purchasing one. This morning, I sold one of my old lenses for $195 (which is amazing as we bought it for $50) and this will go towards a new lens for my Canon. I am selling my old DSLR with two lenses to my dad and this will also help me buy a new Canon lens. I am so close and impatient with the whole ebay bidding process. We are using a program called JBidWatcher hoping it will help me get in a final bid right at the end but so far we've been outbid each time. All in good time, all in good time. Good things come to those who wait. Etc. This is what I keep saying to myself to help with my impatience!

I feel like this camera will definitely increase my photo-taking, help me to really love photography even more and allow me to take higher quality pictures than I was able to with my entry-level DSLR. And so I continue to watch ebay, and continue to bid and continue to hope that today will be the day that I win. It will be mine, oh, yes, it will be mine.

Stay posted for new photos taken with my new Canon 5D.

Venice...

I married my wonderful husband almost 4 years ago, on December 16, 2006. We spent our first week of honeymoon in Hawaii and then flew to Europe. We spent two days in London, three weeks in Venice, and one week in Switzerland. I had a one last professional black and white film in my old Konica-Minolta SLR and I had tons of fun taking photos of one of the most amazing cities, Venice. We loved the canals, the narrow, windy alleyways, the fact that there were no roads, and therefore no cars in the city. We got a three week "bus" pass and spent days on the boat-buses touring and viewing the city from the canals and surrounding water. We loved all the churches, cathedrals and old palazzi, as well as all the mainstream tourist spots, such as the Ponte di Rialto and the Piazza San Marco. We loved eating salami and brie sandwiches for lunch and pizza for dinner, and finding those hole-in-the-wall restaurants with amazing lasagne and spaghetti. I think our favourite night, for both of us, was New Year's Eve, which started with following a Cuban drumming band from one piazza to Piazza San Marco, where they served free champagne and had amazing fireworks at midnight. Beautiful!

Anyway, it took me a while to develop the photos as I had to take them to a special photography store, but when I did, man was I happy with the results! What an amazing film of photos, if I may say so myself. Here are my favourites that we have on our walls (these are scans of my photos, so not the best quality, but you get the idea!):

Seattle

We spent a wonderful few days in Seattle last week. I took the photos at my friend's sister's wedding and then we spent some time visiting with our friends out there. I've become so used to taking photos of people that I wanted to practice a bit more on other types of photography! Here are some from our time there (some down-town and around the Space Needle and some at our Theo Chocolate tour):

Pumper Magazine

Back in October of last year, about a month after I officially launched my photography business in Redding, CA, I got an email from Cole Publishing asking me to do a photo assignment for them for their Pumper magazine, "dedicated to the liquid waste industry". They were writing an article for a local business and needed a local photographer for the assignment. I happily accepted their offer and spent the next few months working on the assignment.

The article came out in April's issue and they sent me a copy of the magazine for myself! I am happy to have my work published (even if it was right at the beginning of my "career" and my photos are quite simple - have improved lots since then!)

I scanned in the pages and here they are for your viewing:

Tahiti II

One of my favourite things to capture is people. Ever since I started taking photographs, it's what I've enjoyed the most. And candids are my top, top favourite. And I think candids of kids are up there too.

While in Tahiti, I snapped these shots of these amazing people.

Damali has the most gorgeous skin and her favourite colour is purple. She stopped to watch the fish descaling and de-gutting and I loved the purple of her pareo (Tahitian for sarong) and the darkness of her skin set against the gorgeous blue of the ocean behind her.



Tony is half Kiwi, half Maori and has the coolest tattoos on his forearms and legs. As I snapped this shot, I accidentally focused on his arm instead of his face. I've found that some of my accidental shots are the best, and I love this one. I like how it really focuses on his Maori culture.



This is Don, the father of the group and the ultimate joker. He was sick almost the entire two weeks we were there and yet he had the best sense of humour. As I tried to snap a shot of him, he saw me and stuck out his tongue. Yep, that's Don!

The Islands of French Polynesia

My husband and I just got back from a wonderful two week missions trip to French Polynesia. We visited the islands of Tahiti and Rangiroa. Rangiroa is a beautiful, large atoll, and we got to visit both sides. Tahiti, as most know, is the main island of French Polynesia. Despite being sick and badly sunburnt, which put me off taking photos for a few days, I was able to snap some fun shots of Tahitian island life. The first, my favourite, is of our taxi-boat driver. His tattoos, which covered his entire body, including his face, showed that he was a village elder and was of a high social ranking. We had just arrived on Rangiroa, and this was my first encounter with Tahitian culture. I thought it was beautiful and quickly snapped away!



The following three represent to me the fishing culture and lifestyle of the Tahitian islands. Almost every day on Rangiroa, our host's son and his friend would head out to the inner lagoon of the atoll to go spear-fishing. Once they returned, we would gather around to help descale, gut and clean the fish in the sea. That night, sure enough, we ate the delicious fresh fish they had caught that day. We definitely ate more fish in one week that I've probably eaten in a year!