project 365

i have always wanted to learn about our camera. it isn't anything super fancy, but i'm the kind of person that reluctantly on vacation will take about 20 shots all in manual mode. about 10 (2 if you ask aaron) will come out. i never knew what any of the settings meant, and i felt really uncomfortable being the person with the camera.

my week 1 favorite

in an attempt to rectify this, i'm taking on "project 365".  i will take at least one photo a day for the next year. i actually started last month, but didn't want to go public with this in case i flaked out within the first month. i plan on posting a few of the photos here, but the remander can be found on my flickr account: http://www.flickr.com/photos/barbieherbst/

my week 2 favorite

i'm just going to come out and say it. i want you to go and look at my pictures. comment on the ones you like, or offer critiques on the ones you don't. i'm really trying to use this as a learning tool, and would appreciate any feedback (both positive or negative).

my week 3 favorite

i already feel like i have learned a lot. thanks to digital photography school i have learned about composition and try to experiment with it a bit. probably the most important thing for begining photographers to learn about is light. i think i struggle with that a bit.

my week 4 favorite

all of the photos so far have been taken with our canon IXY digital 900 IS. actually all of them until yesterday (26 october). aaron is doing some field research which requires some sharing of the camera. until he comes back (a week or so) the photos will be taken with my iphone. lame, i know, but i'm not going to quit. it's actually nice, because it is a bit of a challenge (and nice not to take the camera with me everywhere).

my week 5 favorite

have you ever thought about trying a "project 365"? anyone want to have a go with me? i would love company on this project. feel free to post any questions or comments.

rimutaka forest

feeling a bit cagey after an entire week of rain, aaron and i decided to explore the rimutaka forest. i'm a bit amazed that we haven't explored the area yet, since it seems like it is practically in our backyard (under and hour's drive).

we didn't do any extreme hiking, but we trotted around a 40 minute hike. and saw the following

fallen limbs

leaves grow everywhere, even trunks of trees

jurassic plant-life everywhere

things here are really green. no joke.

palm tree against an ever darkening sky

conflicted

have you tried out the new timeline feature on facebook?

i haven't. it doesn't matter. it will go live soon. but lately, i've been conflicted about facebook. i've been a member of facebook from way back. i believe i first started using it in 2004. seven years ago. it was great to see what old high school classmates were doing (woa, they have 3 kids!) and spy on old ex-flames, etc. now it seems more and more like a chore.

am i getting to old? does anyone else feel this way? all of the farmville, poking, mafia wars, two newsfeeds (two? why two?), changing my privacy settings every month (to keep things private) seems like too much crap.

in order to try and remedy this i went through a big spring cleaning on my facebook friend list. yes, i de-friended people. i'm not ashamed to admit it. just because i met you at a party or saw you in the hall way at school does not mean we are friends. i went through my entire friend list and kept people based on the following criteria:

1. are they family?
2. were we good friends in the past?
3. have we hung out besides at work or school?

basically, are we or have we ever been actual friends?

this weeded out a lot of white noise.  i'm sure there are many good people that i cut out of my facebook. but to be fair, if any of these people de-friended me i would not be offended either. i'm trying to make it easier to communicate with the people i do care about, in a last ditch effort to not quit facebook. has anyone else struggled with this?

sometimes i'm so tempted to quit facebook, but living half-way across the world really cuts into communication in general, so i'll probably stay aboard at least while we are here.

and then my sweet sister will upload new pictures of caitlin, or my best friend from high school will have a status update so funny that milk shoots out of my nose, or i get tagged in pics from a few years ago that i totally forgot about. and i think i might be on facebook for the rest of my life.

spring time

it's spring time again! and while i don't day dream and fantasize about spring in the same way that i do autumn, it's a beautiful time of year.  each year i'm surprised again by how many joyful things come with spring. the flowers, the fresh smells, asparagus (oh, the asparagus), and now that we have a place with some space, gardening!

raise your hand if you love gardening. me too! a lot. i love getting dirt under my nails and the smell of earth, especially if it's nice and sunny out and you get to work up a good sweat. there is nothing more enjoyable or satisfying.

here is what aaron and i worked on this weekend. we turned this ugly space:

and we planted the following three different varieties of coprosma

lemon & lime

evening glow

inferno

it took us about two hours to transfer a lot of extra soil from the planting area and to dig the holes for all of the bushes. but this is what the end result looks like:

we didn't want to spend too much money on plants so we spaced them out and put rocks in between. we have an abundance of rocks. i don't think it looks too bad either. for whatever reason, the rocks give it an arizona feel (to me, aaron thinks i'm crazy).

you like?