4th of July weekend (2 weeks later)

The 4th of July is a mega big deal in this little town of less than 10,000 people. It's essentially a 3 day festival of music in the park, craft and food vendors, pancake feeds, fun runs, parades, multiple fireworks displays and more food.

This year was the 1st year we went to the parade, and when I was told it was a big deal I thought "sure big deal for a small town."

I seriously underestimated the parade.

First of all, this parade starts on campus at WOU and goes down main street, through the entire town of Monmouth, crosses Hwy 99, (our small town equivalent of an Interstate) and continues into the neighboring town of Independence, down their Main Street to the friggin river. I'm sure if there wasn't a giant waterway blocking their path this parade would head on into Salem.

 

That's almost 3 miles! And 3 miles in a small town, well, runs into another town. This production is such a big deal that starting on July 2nd, you will start seeing tailgate chairs & lawn chairs appear along the sidewalks of the parade route. People start staking out their parade watching spots 48 hours prior to the event. It's like the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade of Monmouth. 

The parade gets started at noon (that is of course, after the fun run and kiddie parade,which is decidedly shorter than the big kid parade due the smaller legs) with a B-52 bomber or C-130 flyover. I'm not sure which. My air force dad, who has spent the last 40 plus years working on military planes, would be ashamed of my dismal aircraft identification skills.

I swear this parade had like 200 entries, that's like the whole town. How there were thousands of people lining the 3 mile parade route is a mystery in itself. It's like the loaves and fishes but with humans. So here are some photos from a big, small town parade!

My Houseguest...

This weekend while Daniel was gone I got to dog-sit a friend's dog. It also meant another living creature besides my husband to take pictures of ! Meet Ripken....

Ripken is a big, slobbery, sweet pound puppy who occasionally snores! He literally followed me around all weekend like a big furry shadow. He would have sat in my lap if I would have let him.

He tried.

He was denied.

He started by walking up to me and laying his head on my lap. I thought it was sweet so I sat there petting his noggin'. Then he put a paw up. Still cute. Then the other paw... I was on to his sneaky game.

He settled with laying by my feet.

Checking out the action in the neighborhood!

This is his tough guy look.

Crashed out after a trip to the dog park.

I thought at least Ripken wouldn't give me the "cut it out with the camera" look I get from Daniel. I was wrong. I got the "no more pictures" paw....

Now that Ripken is back home with his mom, I'm back to shooting pics of Daniel- hehe! Daniel eating, Daniel working on his computer, Daniel on his phone, Daniel washing dishes......for the sake of my husband's sanity someone send your kid over!

Happy Monday!

Speedlight

I got my speedlight in the mail the other day and let me tell you....it. is. life changing.

I think if you have a DSLR and you live in Oregon you should invest in one of these puppies. Especially for indoor pics - there are only like, 3 months out of the year where there's enough natural light to take indoor pics without needing a flash.  The best way to describe it is if you're taking a pic where there's not enough light, you typically use the built-in flash in your camera to provide extra light. But the bright flash that's built in to your camera only faces directly at where your lens is pointed so it comes out ok, but kinda shiny and harsh.  Here's a pic of Boomer with my regular built-in flash.

but now I have this sucker.....

It twists and tilts so that I can point the light away from Boomer and bounce the light off a wall or the ceiling.  Here's the same shot same settings with my nifty new speedlight (my last purchase from the interweb for a while).

I just moved from using A and S  setting to full on Manual setting like a week ago so don't judge too harshly- my focus was wonky among other things. I'm still a looooong way from good, people. But isn't he much smoother looking and less washed out? Yay Boomer! Yay Speedlight!

I was hoping to get to practice on my alumni at an event in Portland last night but apparently when a dusting of snow falls people freak their freaks here. So that has been postponed for a few weeks. 

Anyone having a kid party indoors this weekend?? Can I crash it to be the creepy stranger who is snapping away like the paparazzi after a Charlie Sheen tantrum? Anyone!?!? 

Otherwise, I'm stuck using my spouse as my guinea pig, and his patience for my photography-guinea pig-antics has grown short. 

Plus, he never does what I tell him. 

Somebody get me a dog, a fish, a buffalo something to take pictures of with my new toy! Drop your kid off at my house for a few hours (cause you know, what kid wouldn't want 1,000 pictures taken of them? Coloring and playing video games is so overrated) I'll even feed them, although I can't guarantee it won't be 100% sugar.

I know, I'm whining. What can I say....I'll try anything...I just wanna practice so I can get better. Send me your children.

New lens!!

My incredible husband surprised me with an early Christmas present (so I can use it for the holidays) - a new 35 mm lens for my camera! It hasn't been a full 24 hours and I'm head over heels for this sucker. Here are some straight out of camera shots I took last night. No flash needed yay!

(I love Daniel's "quit tinkering and just push the stupid button" face! He's such a good sport- he's my only animate object to practice on!)

 

Still lots to learn but I will have an absolute blast doing it!