A little lumpia goes a long way…

After swimming on Wednesday afternoon, me and the kids headed over to Grandma Gloria’s for a little “snack” as she called it. Of course, it was more than a snack to us Filipino food lovers! She made yummy lumpia for us and a stir fry too. Ohhhh, such great comfort food and made with lots of love!

A new bonus for me… lumpia wrappers are made of rice and water…it is a wonderful, gluten free, treat that I could eat the whole lot of them if it wasn’t rude :)!

They look so plain before they are fried, but after that…yummy goodness!

Don’t they look great? You might think, ahhh, egg rolls, but let me tell you they are nothing like them. They are not loaded with cabbage so the seasoning is much easier to find on the rice noodles, meat and veggies on the inside. Hmmm good!

Here is the stir fry. This time she put rice noodles in it, veggies and meat. Man, it is so satisfying!

Thanks Gloria for sharing your yummy gift of great food with your family (especially us daughter in laws…we love it!).

The Letter U

U is for Unique. I was at the Refuge Ball for the Water’s Church last night and Dawn wore this absolutely lovely and UNIQUE antique necklace that she inherited long ago. Isn’t is just lovely?

I heart faces…Texture.

Here is my effort to have a pic with texture around it. It has taken me quite awhile to give layering, masking, etc.  a chance. I think I finally have it figured out and it should make editing a little more interesting, especially when it comes to texturing a background.
I thought that this sweet picture of Will sleeping deserved this little bit of love and entry into this I heart faces challenge :)!
Go here to check out other entries…everyone does amazing work out here and it is really worth the peak if you have time!

Reach for the Skies!

Just finding some oldies, but goodies from June 2009. The kids enjoyed playin’ around with me while i took their pictures. It is so fun to have them enjoy what I enjoy :)!

Munsinger Gardens…in search of color!

LightScoop

So, how about the flash…you already know I HATE my flash…nothing new about that right? Well, I was reading this blog today and at the bottom she mentioned the LightScoop. Hmmm, I went and peaked at it and you know what…IF…I had to use a flash, this would most certainly be the way to do it. My 50 mm lens has really done the trick for me in the area of lighting, but this looked like an inexpensive option for those that just can’t part with their flash. What do you think  about it? Have you tried it before?

Fix it Friday

I decided to try the Fix it Friday with i heart faces. Here are the instructions for it.
Here is the original photo:

I didn’t make a lot of changes because I actually liked the photo the way it was. I cropped it down a little to get rid of the extra swing on the left. I ran the Vivid no Copy action from Coffeeshop. Then I used the Vignette Coffeeshop action twice to darken the outside. I did use the sponge tool and add some additional saturation to mom’s red shirt in the background and the yellow dump truck next to the kids. That extra punch of color added a nice touch I thought to the background.  That was it, I really like how it cleaned up the picture and upped the contrast. It is a fun family photo and I love the composition!

Another Day Swimmin’

On Wednesdays we continue to meet Minsan’s parents at the pool for a time of swimming and fun. Some days it is just too dark in the pool area, but this time it was just barely light enough and I set my camera to an ISO of 1600 to make up for the rest!

Will has gotten so good at kicking with his feet's and even using his hands to move himself around.

Here is Zech upset about the temperature…he got over it later and had lots of fun!

Jeremiah and Clarisse were doing crazy, plug your ear, and kick swimming, LOL!

See…Zechy got over it :)!

Duncan just loves all the action with his grandpa.

Yeah for another great swim time together! Thanks Gloria and Chip for making this time possible, the kids are so lovin’ it!!!!

On a side note and a plug for my 50 mm lens…all these pictures above are taken with my 50 mm 1.8 lens. I didn’t use my flash at all. For all intensive purposes it looks like these pictures were taken in the middle of a sunny day right? Well, it was more like 5:00 pm here in MN which you all know is more like dusk. Personally, I think they turned out quite well and I was able to capture the enjoyment of the kid’s time at the pool.

Now a year ago before I got this lens, the pool pictures just didn’t look as amazing. Here is one that was taken around 1:00 pm on a nice day AND I had to use my flash since my camera couldn’t take a non-blurry picture inside the building without it.

What a difference from this shot eh?

Maybe?

Maybe this isn’t just a bad shot, MAYBE it is a picture with amazing depth of field or great bokeh, LOL!

Clarisse, Spring 2009

Flowers from Mothers Day 2009

Aren’t you glad that I am cleaning out my 2009 pictures. I keep finding pics I hadn’t shared yet, but couldn’t just archive them just yet.  I thought I would share a few pics I took at my mom’s at Mother’s Day and my mother in law’s.

Letter T

T is for turquoise.  I found this fish on a mural at our eye doctor yesterday. I love the added texture that they put with painting.

Frosty Morning

We have really had a run of frosty mornings here in central MN. I am so thankful since they sure do make for pretty pictures. I have to be honest, I am not prone to getting outside when it is frosty like this. I have my first love of sitting with a cup of coffee inside my warm house and it takes a lot to get me to change that. BUT, it was pretty after all and I would hate to waste this snow opportunity…

What do you think, was it worth it?

Me and the Kidlets :)

Doolittles last January

These were pictures of food that I took an entire year ago. I did a little quick edits on them and thought I would post them out here. I love food pictures and Doolittles has some of the best food to photograph.

I am glad I thought to take some pictures of the menu since it had unique names. The food was sooo good!

I can’t think of what this was called, but man it was so good!

…Minsan had this too, yumm!

The final best part of all! 

This dessert was heavenly!

I can’t begin to tell you how much I love taking pictures of food, but I also really love to eat it :)!