I did go to the doctor yesterday and the diagnosis is pleurisy, which seems to be French for your-lungs-hurt-really-bad-and-you-cough-all-the-time-and-we-can’t-do-anything-about-it. I’m supposed to use an inhaler (our poor air quality here isn’t helping matters), take ibuprofen, and rest. I’m not very good at the resting part. But I’m going to try to be a good girl and follow the doctor’s orders.
Hope to be back in blogging form soon!
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I’m still working on my December Daily/Project Life album. I had originally hoped to have all of it done and ready to share today because I talk about it a lot in episode 26 of The Digi Show that will be released later today. *Hint* – you’re going to want to listen! However, real life has gotten in the way and I’ve been pretty sick the past few days. I’m a little worried I have pneumonia so I’m heading to the doctor today. It came on super fast and strong almost directly after I finished recording a podcast on Tuesday. Really strange. So the rest of the album will have to wait until I feel a little better. In the meantime, here are links to 5 posts I did in December that show my approach to this album. I’m very happy with how it has turned out so far!
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I started this little tradition back in 2008 where I pick my favorite photos of the previous year and share them here in a roundup type format. This little exercise has really helped me see how my photography has evolved and it’s a fun way to recap some highlights from the past year. Here’s a list of my previous posts:
Doing an annual review of my own photography has been an incredibly useful tool! Of course, it’s always difficult to judge your own work, but taking the time to try and evaluate which pictures turned out the “best” helps you realize where your strengths and weaknesses are when it comes to photography skills. I’m always surprised at what I discover and my photos from 2011 gave me a lot to think about. Here’s my collection of favorites:
As usual, January was my least inspired month for photo taking. I always have a hard time wanting to take a lot of pictures in January. The short days and yucky weather make it difficult to find good light. I did have fun with some colorful cookies that my daughter made. A new Lego game gave me the chance to practice with a white background. My twin nieces colorful birthday bags made for a cheery picture. A bowl of taco rice for lunch was quite yummy.
I was so happy to capture some fun photos from the World of Color water show at Disneyland. I've never been great at night photography, but I think this one turned out pretty neat. I like the shadowed figures in the foreground.
The Jazz kitchen photo is a favorite simply because my kids have the perfect facial expressions to go with the statues they are mimicking. I love the middle photo of my hubby in the hotel room because you can see what a great view we had. He was also very relaxed! I can't believe I got a shot of Paradise Pier in the evening while it was empty. Score!
I love this picture of my parents because you can see their fun personalities and their love for each other.
My brother Zach is a great photographer who gets up close & personal with his subjects.
The landscape in New Mexico is so amazing. The last photo just makes me laugh so hard. My brother Mike fell down and a "bad word" came out of his mouth. I was taking a picture of him on the ground just to be silly, and I had no idea until I looked at it on the computer later that day that my daughter was covering her ears because of the "bad word" - lol!
Love those Lego minifig packs!
It took forever for the blossoms to bloom.
A trip to Vegas & a stay at The Venetian.
Only in Vegas would you see a couple getting married at 9 a.m. in the morning.
May was a fun photography month for me because I followed Katrina Kennedy's May Merriment challenges. I practiced a lot more than I usually do. I also got a new camera and a new macro lens. :)
Flowers at Gardner Village
Downtown Salt Lake City
Summer Squash
Almost all of these photos were taken at a friend's house during a 4th of July barbecue dinner. The campfire treats were enjoyed around our little firepit we bought at Target.
I was lucky enough to capture this first shot because the giraffe came right up to the upper fence at Hogle Zoo. That's my husband's hand reaching out to pet her. The baby elephant was another favorite photo from the month. We went to the zoo in the evening and the animals were very active and willing to be photographed.
We spent a lot of time on those 3 green swings. I also love all the green things we grew in our garden!
My son doing his online school work.
A beautiful green tomato
We received gifts of heirloom tomatoes throughout the season from our gardening friends.
Play-dough cupcakes
We went to Yellowstone National Park in October so I had a ton of neat pictures to choose from. I love the picture of my daughter behind the camera and my hubby looks cute too.
The bears at Bear World in Rexburg, Idaho were just amazing!
One of my favorite landscape photos came from my iPhone camera during a rainstorm.
I love that we all had our cameras going at the same time. It took 4 cameras to make this photo happen.
Thanksgiving pictures - the rolls, the centerpiece, the weather, and the stuffing.
A trip to Trader Joe's at the end of December helped me capture these pretty flowers. A stay at The Grand America and a photowalk with my daughter. A small portion of my Mom's Santa collection. Blue sky in Albuquerque - it really was that blue!
Again, I have learned so much about myself as a photographer by reviewing my photos this way. I love seeing them all together! Historically speaking, January is always my toughest month for photography. I need to remember that right now and spend a little time getting some fun shots over the next week. I think May was my best month for photos, but it’s because I was practicing every day. Practice really does make a difference. I’m happy that I take the time to do this annual review, it always inspires me to keep going and try to improve in the coming year.
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Thanks to my roundups, I can easily review the layouts I created in 2011. Can you believe I created 94 digital layouts? I was a little surprised when I saw the total because there were a few months were I only put together a handful of pages. It adds up though! Almost every single layout here is linked to where it originally appeared online in case you want to read the credits for any of them.
Overall, I’m really happy with the pages I created. I feel like I did a better job with storytelling and I had fun with a lot of different design techniques. I would call it a “banner year” because I also used a lot of banners – also known as pennants (see my post at The Daily Digi if you don’t know what banners are).
How did 2011 compare with other years where I’ve tracked how many pages I’ve made?
Even with all the pages I created, my quantity was down quite a bit in 2011. I’m sure that has something to do with everything else I’ve been involved in. Teaching others through workshops, writing, podcasts, and more takes time away from scrapping. On the other hand, 94 pages is still a lot of pages. That’s 94 creations that mean something to me and the people I love. I’m happy about that!
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I've resisted the Instagram urge. I like my photos bright and sunny, clean and crisp. I like really big photographs. I thought I didn’t need to take tiny little pictures with funky filters. I was wrong. I love these little things! Suddenly, my peanut butter sandwich looks cool.
Hubby and I look so much cuter with a wonky little border and hazy filter.
I’m enjoying taking pictures of random things just so I can play with the app settings.
I’m noticing different details in these types of photos – like the slightly worn edges of my Artful Blogging magazines.
They need to be printed up in small sizes, they are only 612x612 pixels. I have plenty of ideas for these – and what’s even more important is that I’m having a lot of fun!
I’m still a newbie and I’m trying to figure out the community aspect of it all. I signed up for a followgram url of http://followgram.me/ktscrapbooklady if you want to check out my instagram stream or you can check out my new instagram Flickr set. If you’re an Instagram junkie, my username is ktscrapbooklady.
If you want to hear me talk about more of my latest photography tips, you can listen to me on episode 25 of The Digi Show.
I’m off to take more pictures!
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