by jove - I think I've got it!

Depth-of-field. Grokking that has been a trick. In so many of my photos I am aiming for crystal clear depth of field, but am always seriously disappointed. I spent this morning doing some online photography lessons and voila! I get it.Now for practice, practice, practice. Next .... histograms.

sprucin' up the joint

We have company coming today so I guess it's time to cut the grass. We don't have the cows up here this year (not that they came around the house), so maybe we need to get a goat ... or a llama ... or a lawn mower. I don't think this weed-wacker is meant to work so hard .... and now it's broken.Anyhoo. Our company is R.T., a long lost friend from 30 years ago that Art has recently reconnected with, his wife Rhoda and their dogs, Tommy & Molly. We are SO looking forward to seeing them. And Xena has no idea of the fun that is in store. Woo-hoooo!

Xena is a very .... what's the word? ..... exuberant hostess. She LOVES when company comes. Yesterday some friends stopped to say "hi" as they were driving from Terrace to Vancouver. Eric knocked on the door and there was our blonde greeter hopping all around him. Then she quickly went over to the garden, took a dip in her pool and returned to greet Charlene as she was getting out of the car. Soaking, dripping wet dog right in the lap ..... "how do you like me so far?" Gotta love 'er.

step into the light

For a couple of cats who were born on a farm and were feral for the first 6 months of their lives, these two sure are reluctant to go outside. "We'll just watch from here, thanks Mom."

more excuses to take pictures

Not like I really need excuses to take pictures. While we were in Vancouver in June, I signed up for a 2 day intensive course at Vancouver Photo Workshops. It was a really great class, but a lot of info crammed into a short amount of time. My head is still spinning.

Since then I got myself a book and a video to help reinforce what I learned....I also got a circular polarizing lens and a very skookum tripod, which my camera is almost permanently attached to now. .... because you just never know when one of these is going to walk through .... .... or one of these is going to fly past the veranda (no kidding .... past the veranda) ....

time to move forward

Back at the end of May, we made a trip to Vancouver. I went to Victoria to spend some time with my sister and her family and I had a hoot. Just when we were scheduled to return home, one of Art's aunties died and he decided to go to her funeral...in Flin Flon, Manitoba. So, I stayed in Vancouver with Xena while he made the trip, driving with another auntie and uncle. All told, we were away for a little over 3 weeks. We left our home in what we thought were trustworthy hands, but very sadly we were mistaken about that. The person we "hired" was a friend who promised to take care of things, watching over our garden and our animals. We loaned him a cell phone and gave him some gas money and were going to pay him on top of that. We were shocked and dismayed at what we returned home to.

Without going into too much detail, we were duped. He took complete advantage of us and seemed to be under the impression that all that was ours was also his. He brought in a girlfriend (or 2) which is probably where the trouble started, but we ended up ransacked, robbed and left with paraphenalia from activities that go against our lifestyle. Worse than all of that, though, is the violation of our trust. This was a friend. Now, I know friends screw up. Heck, I've done my share, but I might be able to put that aside if he just came to us and said "I'm sorry".

But, it does me no good to carry this resentment. I haven't 100% forgiven him, but I think I'm on the right track. I just had to re-assess what the meaning of forgiveness actually is. I always thought to forgive was the same as saying "it's OK what you did....you're off the hook". It took someone very wise to help me understand that what it really means is "this is too big for me....I turn it over to a higher power".

Now I can get back to posting about the fun stuff that's going on around here. And there's plenty!

global warming....?

this is what it is doing outside right now .... at this very moment .... 7:00 am on July 10th. BRRRRRRR..... never mind the bug repellant. bring a parka.

Two Xenas

Actually, it's Xena and Sena. Sena is the 11 year old Goddaughter of our friends Roger and Rosemarie and she is visiting from Switzerland. She doesn't speak any English so was a little shy visiting with us, but she is very sweet. We just HAD to get a picture of the two blonde beauties together.Sena is enjoying her summer vacation, ATV'ing and horseback riding and there's plenty more of that, plus some fishing, to come. I hope it stays nice and warm for you Sena and that you have the best summer vacation ever. It was lovely to meet you!

Happy Canada Day

I took these photos from our veranda, with our new flag flying in the background. I thought the upside down effect through the hummingbird feeder was pretty cool.