Matt - Flag Football 1st Week

Matt's in kindergarten this year. Along with most of his classmates, he didn't quite get the concept of flag football. His father had set him straight on the non-tackle concept but Matt thought he was just suppose to "collect" flags each play. He did a good job getting flags, unfortunately they weren't attached to the player with the ball!

But seriously, who couldn't love a face like that.....

Here his flag fell off as he was running, so he turned around to pick it up and put it back on!

He's missing something on the instructions on how to "set", I'm pretty sure it didn't include flopping one arm backwards like that.

Katie - 1st Week Flag Football

Yes, that would be Katie doing her cheers on top of stacked up trash cans!

This cheer would be "I want a T-O-U-C-H down, down, down.

The little girls loved shimming down, down, down!!

Johnathon Flag Football - Week 1

Okay, I know I'm late getting these posted. These are Johnathon's first flag football game this season. He was injured in the last play of the game. There was contact between he and another kid and his glasses cut his upper eye lid. Hey, what's football without injuries! Luckily it wasn't anything serious, the glasses didn't even break.

The 3rd and 4th pics are of a touchdown catch!!

Last two pieces of jewelry

These two were created by Julie Lowery. It was her first year at the festival. I hope she's at many more in the future. Not only is her work beautiful, they're extremely well priced.

I can't wait to wear the set on the left with a brown sweater tomorrow. I wore the set on the right to work today with a pair of jeans and a polo.

Julie's company is JEWELRY BY DESIGN.

More jewelry finds this weekend

The next two pieces I'm not sure who the two artist are but will find out and update the post asap. The necklace and earrings on the left I wore Saturday after I bought them! The looked great with my outfit.

The necklace and bracelet on the right I had an artist create for me, she had ankle bracelets done like these - I wanted a necklace and bracelet. She had it ready first thing Sunday morning so I wore it around Sunday! I've been looking for a multi-bead sterling silver necklace (at a reasonable price) for some time now.

Both pieces are great to layer with additional necklaces which it typically how I wear necklaces.

Glass Beads

Here are the first two of my jewelry purchases this past weekend.

These necklaces are made from hand blown glass beads. I have several pieces of her work and love them all.

The artist who created these is Rhonda Lemay.

Check out her WEBSITE

Busy, busy, busy

I'm going to ramble for a moment. It was a very busy weekend.

It was the 9th annual Art & Wine Festival at the SoIL Artisan Shop. The weather was almost perfect (could have been 15 degrees cooler to suit my taste, but I'm very hot natured) and the turnout was wonderful. I "volunteered" once again to work and spent all of Saturday and Sunday leaning over a table applying arm bands to those partaking of the wine tasting. In addition the the wineries, which Bruce was ever so nice to provide the ticket workers with a comp bottle of Red Raz (my favorite!) on both days, the artists in attendance did very well this year also.

There were several jewelry artist this year whose work I loved. I'll try to take some pics tonight of the pieces I bought. I ended up with 6 new necklaces, 3 bracelets and 3 sets of earnings!! So, from my point of view it was a successful weekend! A girl can NEVER have too much jewelry.

After the festival on Sunday I ran home as quickly as possible to take pics of an adorable little 18-month old boy and his parents. Promise I'll get those pics up either tomorrow or Wednesday. Unfortunately since I worked the Art & Wine Festival I missed the second week of flag football, which I still haven't posted the pic's from the first weekend...I had issues with Picasa the other day which is why the pic's aren't up yet. I have a board meeting tomorrow as soon as it's over I can hopefully get some other things done - first of which will be flag football pics.

This weekend I intend to get a least one more set of senior pics taken, possibly two. The temp in SoIL is only suppose to be in the low 70's which in my opinion is PERFECT weather for picture taking. I'm also going to try to get some pics of nieces and nephews done. The second weekend in October is the outdoor wedding which I'm planning, coordinating, decorating, catering, & photographing (how do I get myself into these things??).

In addition to the outdoor wedding which will consume most of my day, my cousin (Tyson) is getting married, another cousin is having his retirement party and two of my favorite cousins (Arielle & Bethany) are the senior attendants for Sesser Homecoming Queen! Hopefully one of the Seniors will be named 2008 Homecoming Queen - Go Seniors!! October 11th is just going a packed fun-filled day. I'm not quite sure yet how I'll make it to everything, I'll worry about that next Friday!

The third and fourth weekends in October I hope to be taking lots of pictures, I have several sessions booked already with others waiting to lock down an exact date/time. I'm super excited to be taking so many pictures! Needless to say I'm going to be busy, busy, busy until the end of the year! Hopefully I'll find time to keep everyone up to date on my blog.

I guess nothing is ever really free

As I've already shared with you I signed my father up for a "FREE" continuing education class in "Beginning Digital Photography" and gave him my old Nikon D80 to use in the class. In addition to the class being FREE for him due to his age, it got him out of the house and is teaching him the in's/out's of digital photography. He has a film Nikon but doesn't know the first thing about what to do with a digital pic once he takes it......

Well, I learned last night that nothing is ever really free. He found a magazine/order book from an online site I order most of my lenses from and has picked out a few nowhere near FREE lenses that he "might just need" hint-hint. I'm happy that he's found a hobby that he enjoys and is able to do but I have proved the old adage that nothing in life is ever really free! Oh well, looking on the bright side - I know what to get him for Christmas!

Go Tony Go!

FYI, I'm for the orange #20 car!

Tony's in 7th place but only 113 points from first.

I love the chase, especially when my guy's in it!!

Photographer in the making

I've found my future photography partner!

Thought this was too cute not to take a picture of, Matt was taking a picture of Blake playing football.

More football pics to come. My computer connection is so very slow tonight. The pictures will have to wait until tomorrow.

Pray for NO rain

As I'm sitting at my computer, balancing my bank accounts, paying my bills, drinking my Saturday morning pot of coffee and making a mental list of things I must get done this weekend. I'm decorating an outdoor wedding in three weeks that I should really devote some time this weekend to make sure I have all my bases covered and all required supplies ordered! But, first and foremost I have a half of a day of flag football. Johnathon @ 10:15, Katie (cheerleading) @ 11:30 and Matthew @ 12:45.

So everyone say a quick prayer that it doesn't rain again until at least 3:00pm today. As much as it rained last night I know I'm going to be sitting in wet grass - I HATE to get my feet wet when walking through grass. So do I chance it and wear my flip flops anyway or put on real shoes? hmmmm??

As long as it doesn't rain the camera will be out capturing the flag football & cheerleading moments.....will post later if I'm successful at the photography attempt.

Spiced Pumpkin Latte

I just googled the spiced pumpkin latte to do a quick post on the most wonderful drink N and I got at lunch today. Thankfully I was able to find a pic of it, unfortunately I found it on the site that also has the nutritional data on it. My venti latte has 440 calories and 62 g of carbs.

Good grief! I didn't even get whip cream on it.

I'm going to savor every last drop of this, may have to lay off these for a while.

To put this into better prespective, we had mexican at lunch - chips, homemade salsa, layered been dip and the works. I feel like a slug right now.

Appointments

I'm looking for people to volunteer to let me take your picture for practice.

I would like to get several appointments booked before the end of the year so I can show my teacher and ask for advice of mistakes and get the praise for accomplishments!!

Since I don't have a "studio" the pictures would need to be on location either at your house, my house, or any where else that we decide to take them. I'd love to travel around So.IL exploring new locations for pictures. Honestly I can take your picture ANYWHERE, it's what's done afterwards in Photoshop and "how" it's taken that I need the practice on to make it look awesome. I've seen pics taken in parking lots and in overgrown fields that have great visual affect.

If you're interested on booking a photo appointment get in touch with me, I'd love the practice!

ALW September Photo Session

We had a very productive photo shoot on Saturday, here are a few to get started. Check back though, blogger is not wanting to upload anymore pics for some reason. I'll have a more later today. For those who know Arielle, the overalls she's wearing belonged to her father along with the ball cap and red bandana you'll see in the pics.

Football in the rain

Attended another of Wheatley's freshman football games last night, in the RAIN!
Man was it ever nasty out last night....hot, humid, constant drizzle - YUCK!
My hair was straight when I went to the game and curly when I left.

Johnathon is now the "official" water boy so not only did I attend the game, I had to get there early and stay the entire game (somewhat comical seeing him with the water bottles which are around 20 lbs each x2 when they're full - they weight almost as much as he does). With the rain I didn't get my camera out and take pics and we lost to top it all off. John had some nice tackles though!

On a good note, I made "Wheatley Fan" buttons. Forgot to bring the file with me to load them. Will get to that later!

I may just learn how to use my CAMERA

I started my photography class at JALC last night. The instructor has over 35 years experience in photography/teaching which I was happy to hear. I think the first class was a little overwhelming to most in there. I thought I was going to look like an idiot and everyone else in the class would know a lot more about their camera and taking pics than I would....not so, we're all beginners.

The only thing that I can see that would make the class better is if we'd separate into camera mfg. A Nikon and Cannon aren't the same camera. I'm not going to get into which is better (I own a Nikon though!!), just the simple fact that there are soooo many differences between the mechanics of the two brands and for true beginners which we all are it would be helpful if I could ask more pointed questions on my specific camera.

I'll have to remember to bring the manual to the next class so that I can look up things specific to my camera as we go along. Knowing what a button does and making it do it aren't really the same concept at all. I did learn what a button on my camera was last night that I can't wait to read about and try out, had I know what it was I would have been using in my still shot pics of Arielle.

I wish we meet more than once a week!!!

FYI - I noticed on JALC's website yesterday that if you're over 60 you get to take the ACE classes for FREE. So I signed my father up for a class at the DuQuoin extension.....it's free, why not.

Love the Look

Thanks Nina! Love the site!

You can create your own account and customize you look as I have. Click on the pic to see where you'd buy the items I like.

Class starts tonight

Starting my first photography class tonight at the junior college....can't wait!

It's just a ACE (adult continuing education) class but the description sound like they cover a lot of material and since I've never had a class I'm hoping to start the photography learning process!!

Longaberger Pottery Sale!

Wednesday, Sept 10th......another one-day online sale from Longaberger.

www.longaberger.com/amygalloway