8 Things That Made This A Great Summer

Summer vacation is almost over.
(*sigh*)
It seems like just yesterday I was grousing and complaining about the gaggy ending to the school year and just wanted it to be over.
My children are helping me adjust to the upcoming school year by doing everything they can to make me wish it would hurry up and get here already so I can enjoy some peace and quiet around the place again.
They're cooperative like that.

To celebrate the end of what has easily been our best summer vacation in years I made a list of the 8 things that made this summer great:

1.  The Lake
This will officially go down as the summer my son discovered the lake.  And that swimming in the lake about rules all.  You can run and scream and horse around in ways that you just can't when Grandpa has set up patrol on the pool deck.

2.  The Back Deck
Many years ago, after much begging and pleading and promising to be his best friend, Prince Charming installed French Doors for me in our living room.  They always looked so glamorous and classy on Days Of Our Lives and I was desperate to throw them open and step out onto my flower filled veranda and marry the love of my life whom I had thought was dead but had really just had a face transplant and now looked like someone else and went by a totally different name.  This summer that dream was realized. 
Just the flower filled veranda part, though.
(the love of my life thing happened a long time ago)
So, if I had to write an essay entitled Where I Spent My Summer, it would be this:

3.  Avocado Salad
Chop together a bunch of avocados, cucumbers, grape tomatoes, red onion, cilantro, and garlic.
Toss with lime juice and olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
For a little extra punch, throw in some grilled shrimp.
(or some fresh jalapeno if you want to serve it to someone who says stuff like
"Yeah, no it's good....not too spicy though, is it?")
Enjoy for lunch on Sunday afternoon or for dinner on the sidelines at football practice.
Put it on fish tacos, scoop it up with tortilla chips, or eat it with your fingers while you sip margaritas
(if you're in to that kind of thing)
(which I am)
It's delicioso.
(Thank you to my sweet sister-in-law for posting it and inspiring my new favorite salad for the next forever.)

 

photo from Set Your Fat on Fire Fitness

4.  House of Cards, The Walking Dead, Scandal, Downton Abbey
Through a fluky click on my laptop, we ended up with Netflix streaming,
and now I speak to everyone with a slight British accent,
desperately want to go to Washington DC where all the nefarious people are,
and am terrified that at any moment an assemblage of zombies is going to silently appear out of nowhere and eat everyone I know.
It's awesome.

5.  The Island
Our 5th annual trip to visit friends who live on a small island on Puget Sound was one of the major highlights of our vacation months.  We did things and went places while we were there that we hadn't done before because the children were finally big enough for me not to have to follow them around and worry that they would fall off a rope swing and kill themselves.
Or get stuck in a tree, 3 feet above a slimy, shallow pond, that may
(or may not)
possibly have been filled with fish poop.

6.  S'mores
I love toasted marshmallows and I think I roasted more of them this summer than I have ever.
I love holding them over the hot coals and slowly turning the stick until the outside of the marshmallow gets all golden and crispy and melty.  Then I pull off the outer part that's done, eat it, and put the rest of it back over the heat.  Then I do that again until it's all gone.
Unless I'm in the mood to just set it on fire so that it gets all black and burned and flavorful in such a way that makes my toes curl.
Oooooooo.....decisions, decisions.

7.  The Princess Tea Party
Once upon a time Grandma discovered the Disney Store.
And the girlies played princess happily ever after.
And then they did it all over again when my niece came to visit, because what's a Princess Tea Party with Princess Jasmine?

8.  My Lensbaby
I fell in love with my Lensbaby this summer.  We hadn't really spoken in a couple of years.  It really wanted different things out of life, and I just wasn't prepared to go that way.  The last few months, though, really turned things around for us.  I don't know if it changed, or if I did, but we've reunited...and it feels so good.

I hope you had a great summer!

And I love ya'.

 

If Anyone Asks, We Weren't At The Fair...

Every year we talk about going to the Fair.

We say, "We should take the kids to the Fair this year."

And then the school sends home it's yearly code of conduct that says:

Going to the Fair is not considered an excused absence.

Which they usually follow up with:

And if you try to fake like your kids are sick and go to the Fair instead, we'll know because kids can't keep a secret, and they'll be forced to make up that missed day in June when everyone else is out enjoying summer break, and then your kids will hate you for dragging them to Fair just so that you would not buy them a bubble gun for $27 dollars and make them look at a bunch of cows and stuff.

So, we never go to the Fair.  Challenging authority makes my head swell. 

So do crowds, which is why we never consider going on a weekend instead.

But this year, Grandma was in town and she wanted to go to the Fair.  And the last time I checked, Grandma trumped School Code of Conduct.

So, we went to the Fair.

And my son got on a roller coaster for the first time...in like, ever.  It was a green dragon that never got off the ground more than about six feet, but he was fine because I was able to hold his hand and run along side of it the whole time.

Baby steps.

We ate Krusty Pups without laughing at the name.

Spent more money on scones than it cost us to get in.

Saw a crazy looking animal with a donkey body and zebra legs.  It was called a Ze-Donk.  I guess when the animal cross-breeding people are finished mixing those genes all creativity goes out the window.

And only once did my kids stand in big, long line for a ride, and then decide at the last minute that it was too fast and too scary and they really didn't want to go on it after all.

But we didn't care.  It was the Fair.

And we were happy.

The Art of Beach Week

One of the great things about having a beach house is that people always want to come visit you and stay with you and move in with you and never want to leave you.

This is why...

I have a picture in my bathroom of a wave that I took a couple of years ago.  My mother said that she really loved it, so I thought I'd surprise her with an updated version all for her.  When she saw it she said,

"It's New Wave!"

I know you have to be, like, older than 40 to get that, but trust me, it was funny.

Evidently, this is called "Cub Fighting" and it's what tough guys do with each other. 

I call it "Agh!  What are they doing!?  Stop that!"

Faces of a Beach Baby

And though she be but little, she is fierce.

~William Shakespere, A Midsummer Night's Dream~

Or, alternatively,

my niece...

I don't think I can add anything more to that.

Lovin' you...

Go Flack Yourself

I took a bit of flack recently about some images that I did in black and white.

The person giving the flack basically felt that black and white sucks the big fat one and should never be used on anything ever, then they asked me to surrender my camera, my lenses, my memory cards and my broken tripod so that I could never inflict this kind of infectious torture on another image ever again.

The person receiving the flack (that would be me), pumped out her fists, squared her shoulders, narrowed her eyes and growled from deep in her gut,

"You wanna' a piece of me!?!  Bring it!"

Okay.  Okay.  I'm just joshin' with ya'.  I don't actually growl from my gut.  It usually more of a throaty thing.  

I did take some flack, though.  That part is true and real and actual.  I've come to realize that people have very different opinions about black and white images.  Some people really love them.  And some people really don't. 

For me, a lot of photography is about form and light.  The shapes.  The lines.  The story.  Taking the color out of an image can help you see that more clearly sometimes, which is what I was trying to explain to my flack-giving opponent,

who did indicate that he thought that when he looked at my images.

I didn't mind it.  I felt confident in my black and white choice.

Anytime you put something out there, people are going to have opinions of it.  It's just the nature of the beast.  You can take it to heart and get upset and defensive.  Or you can roll with it and realize that it really has nothing to do with you and everything to do with how they have chosen to interpret the work.

People are free to voice their opinions and I, in turn, am free to nod,

look interested

and then starting wondering when my new True Blood disc is going arrive from Netflix.  It's been at the top of my Queue for, like 2 weeks.  Come on, already.  I'm needin' me some Eric.

Then I nod some more,

through in an "Mmm-hmmm,"

thank them for their input and interest in my work, and excuse myself to go shove my head in a case of wine.

No problem.

Sunsets and Silhouettes and Cowgirls

I love photographing at sunset.

It's my favorite time of day.  Mostly because the massive onslaught of the day is behind me and a lovely glass of hooch is in front of me.

I love the light at sunset.  It makes everything golden and magical.

It makes me want to dance and wander in the wheat fields.

"We don't have wheat fields."

It makes me want to make out.

"Stop it."

Fine.  It makes me look thin.

"How much hooch have you had?"

None...yet.  Why?

I love how sunsets make silhouettes.  I love a good silhouette.

As I was trying to think of what I wanted to say about these silhouette pictures that I adore, my daughter suggested that I say,

"I just love you."

I mostly think she suggested that so I would finish up and she could play her game.

But, it works.

I just love you.

*Sigh*  And I love a good sunset.