Christmastime

 I have been done with college for a week now, and theoretically, that means I have more time. HA. Time still keeps slipping away. I am still working full time, which means that I have tons to say, but no energy to write all out. I haven't been shooting much due to time, and daylight comes and goes when I am at work.

I would feel awful about missing the sunrises and sunsets, but for the most part, the sunsets have not been as spectacular as I was hoping for. The sunrises have been lovely, and I have made it to the beach for a couple, and a couple I sat at home and watched because of how chilly it was outside.

I am not sure how much I will be working in January. I want to work as much as possible for the money, but a break would be nice. Right now, work is in the Christmas nightmare, so I work later than usual, but the day goes by quickly.

Like I mentioned, I am finished with school. I have been done for a week, and finally got one grade in - an A-. That was for the class I was not concerned about. The class I am concerned about, the professor claims she will have grades done by tomorrow evening. The final was brutal for that class. I got a 75% on it, but it will be graded on a curve. The professor has been really, really behind on the gradebook all semester, and she assigned a ton of work, so that didn't help her keep up. So she posted a bunch of things to it yesterday, and then told us not to panic, because the grading was incomplete. My score was a 61%! BAH. I need a 71% to pass for my degree. So I'm praying that the curved exam and the assignments she has not graded yet bump it up!!

IF I get a C or above in that class....I will have completed my bachelor's degree......I will post more on that when I know more....

Court system rant commencing....
In other frustrations, I have had jury duty for the month of December. I hate jury duty. The last time I had it, a year and a half ago, it was a nightmare getting there, due to having the biggest blizzard in 20 years the day previously. I was excused before I could be questioned. A week later, I was called in again, and this time, I was lucky enough to be questioned. It was a drunk driving case, and I pleaded bias, basically due to a family drunk driving accident. I was excused.

 A year later, I was scheduled again, and rescheduled for December.

December, it looked like it would be homefree. The first two weeks, no one was called in at all. On Tuesday, the first 80 people were called in at 1pm, and then sent home 20 minutes later with no explanation. Wednesday morning, 100 of us were called in at 8:30am. I was not happy to be waking up early on my day off, but I was also happy to not be missing work for it. I almost fell asleep from the monotony of waiting before the judge finally walked in at 10am. Once again, I got called up to be questioned, and once again, it was a drunk driving case. I again pleaded my bias, and I was excused.

I narrowly escaped yesterday. Several jurors had to call in at 10am and had to report at 1pm. Come on! Who can leave work in the middle of the day like that? And then, to top it all off, they also got sent home shortly after coming in. I have not received instructions about calling in next, but I am dreading it.

I have discovered how jaded I am to the US court system because of these two months. I took business law a few years back, and found the process to be incredibly fascinating and enlightening, but also frustrating in some ways. I have come to the conclusion how much I hate drunk driving cases, and consider them to be a waste of everyone's time. I don't care where or if you drink, just don't get behind the wheel and endanger everyone on the road!

ANYWAY. End rant.


 I have my Christmas shopping finished. It's all wrapped except for two presents. Christmas cards went out yesterday. I'm ready!! It's been fun to be in a more spacial place to decorate. I wanted to buy a bigger tree this year, but have been thwarted by out of stock, and C's protests :)

Our weather this year has been really bizarre. Fall came late, winter seemed to be dragging its feet as well, but then it hit with a vengeance. The first few weeks of November, we had freezing temperatures, most under 20F and a lot hovering around 0-10F. The week after Thanksgiving, it warmed up very quickly, resulting in rain, sloppy snow and treacherous parking lots. That is how it has been since. A slushy downpour, that freezes. It currently is 36F and supposed to snow this morning. The skies have been almost perpetually cloudy for weeks. Sometimes the morning clears up a bit bringing the nice sunrises, and for sunset it clears a little. We've had several days where the sun never tries to peek out and it remains gloomy and dark all day.

We had a nice Thanksgiving. It was really busy, like it always is, with two sets of family, and having to drive a half hour both ways. But we made it work yet again, and were happier for it.

So that's what's been happening :)

Whew! I'm Back...Sort of

Wedding we went to in September

I apologize for the lack of blogging the past two months or so....I have been busy with my last semester of college, as well as working full time. I have not been shooting much, and when I have, I've been up to a month behind on the editing....I've been missing blogging though!

Northern lights in September

I have been eagerly looking forward to being done with school...I won't know what to do with free time! I've been pondering many things for the coming months. I'd like to push my photography harder, and move this blog to Wordpress, among other things.

Fall

When I do have free time, I've been helping work on our house repairs...but now it is cold, and the snow is coming soon, so we are wrapping up our outside project and starting on the inside. Beyond that, I have been making time to read lots of books. I usually don't have this luxury during the school year, but I've had a voracious appetite for reading the past couple months...I've been reading up to 4 books at a time O.o, but I'm down to 2 at the moment! Heh.

Mt. Augustine at sunset

Here's a list of a few books I've devoured lately:
- Anne of Green Gables. I'd never read them before! I found the whole series at the thrift store this summer, and am on book 6 now.
- The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and the other 2. What a fascinating story. I could have done without the sex and the graphic sexual abuse, but it was an incredible story.
- Whisper on the Wind by Maureen Lang - Interesting fiction story in the time of WWI. Quite gripping!

I've read several others, but these are the ones I figure many of you may be interested in.

My new Canon 7D!!!

I caught a cold a month ago, and I actually missed work because of it, which never happens. C caught it after me, unfortunately. One of those days, when I was feeling a little better, I sat on the floor in front of the heater, drinking tea, and watching the yellow leaves flutter down. I sat there thinking, "Despite feeling awful, life is good. I can't complain." It was a nice feeling :)

I emailed my college advisor a couple weeks ago about making sure I was ready for graduation. I had not understood that graduation and commencement are two different things! Or rather, when I applied for graduation with my AA, I didn't really know what I was applying for. I missed the deadline for graduation by 3 weeks, and had to apply late, something I had not understood until right before the deadline. Now I have applied, and I went into my local campus to ensure that I could walk in the ceremony in the spring. I was surprised to learn that my college will have to send someone to represent the school, because UAA is different from UAS. So...tax payer money is going to be spent because I am graduating college. Hmm. But anyway, I'm happy to report that things should be moving that direction, and I pray that I pass my classes!!!

My sunsets are coming back and getting more glorious the closer to winter we come. Unfortunately, now that Daylight Savings Time has come around again, I will be at work for most of the sunsets, and I am mourning that :(

C's Halloween costume...an expired ice cream sandwich

I was shooting the other day at one of my favorite beach locations, and this truck with out of state plates pauses by me as I'm walking by, with my camera around my neck. Two guys in the front seat and one rolls down their window. "Excuse me miss, would you do the pleasure of marrying me?" I was confused for a couple seconds, staring at them, and then just turned and kept walking. What on earth was that?

Oh yes! The biggest news lately: I purchased a new camera!! I bought a Canon 7D with my dividend for the year. It's been fun working with two cameras when I am shooting. I haven't been out enough yet to have a great system down, but it's very satisfying. I bought a Luma Loop strap to alleviate the neck strap stress, and it is pretty nice.

Lynx at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center

We've had a couple of good snowfalls since Halloween, but then it rains and it disappears! We do still have some on the ground right now.

Bear at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center

We made a couple trips out to my hometown to spend some time with my parents, which was nice. I also made a trip up to the big city with a friend, which was a lot of fun.

Wood Bison at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center

I will probably never get caught up blogging the photos I have missed blogging, but this is a random collection of what's been happening :) Thanks for not giving up on me! I hope to come back and blog after the semester is over...less than 6 weeks now!

College Disruptions

I apologize for my lack of posting, and I have to admit that it may stay this way for a while. I started my final college semester last week while continuing to work full time. It has been a challenge so far. Unfortunately, posting will be light. I have not been out shooting much in the past month, so there is not a lot to share, either :(

Last night, the northern lights were out, but I had to get up at 7am, and only stayed up till 12:30. I heard that about 2am they started over head. *sigh*

I was shooting the sunset 2 nights ago, and managed to drop my wide angle L lens in a small puddle of seawater...I followed several tricks posted online, and it seems to be alright. I have an upcoming trip for the fall colors and I need that lens!

How can I take a trip when I have so much homework? We shall see :) Nah, it will be fine. Part of my busyness has been setting it up so I can work ahead a tiny bit.

All this to say, I can't guarantee that my schedule will slow down when school is finished either, but I will pop in here and try to update.

Family Dessert Night

One of my brothers in law just took off for YWAM. C and I ended up taking him to the airport, which was an adventure :)

Before he left, we managed to get everyone together for a last hurrah: ice cream!

And banana bread :)

It was a fun evening with the family. And also depressing, because, all 7 kids were finally back in the state, and now we are missing one again for several months. Times change :(

End of Summer Stillness

My beautiful winter sunrises and sunsets are finally on their way back.

Approach of Fall

At the beginning of the year, I told myself that I would blog every day. I did really well, though rarely posting anything of substance, until this week. It occurred to me yesterday morning that I should check on the blog, but procrastinated until I finally checked just now. Um, wow, 4 days? Oops!

I was out wandering in the yard last week when I found this heart shaped yellow leaf. I grinned in delight at how pretty it was and stamped out the distress that fall is rapidly on its way.

I am admittedly concerned about how winter will treat us in our new house and new location. Our driveway is a bit treacherous. Will I be able to keep the temperature low enough without freezing or spending our savings on fuel oil? But at the same time, I adore fall now. So much photographic potential. I am excited to make snowmen in my yard. I have a porch with a railing that I can string garland and Christmas lights on if I want.

I am excited for the possibilities :)

You know you're married to a photographer when...

C was making a sandwich and I glanced over and exclaimed over it: "Stop! That looks so appetizing! Let me put that in the light tent and take a pic before you continue!" Poor guy :)

Swing Portraits

I was stuck at the park by myself for a long and drawn out reason, and decided to take some photos of myself as I swung on the swings!

It's been a while since I had time to just swing for the enjoyment of it!

I miss playground days!

Massive Clouds

Big. fluffy clouds make my day! This was taken on the beach, looking up at a trail and the big clouds!

Lovely Sky

I was intrigued a couple weeks ago by the brilliant blue sky and white fluffy clouds, and went a little crazy taking photos, when I had another task to do.

Well worth it, I think!

Lily

My in laws have this cat with a really strange personality, and one aspect of that is that she does not like to be cuddled at all.

Which is so unfortunate, because she is one of the softest kitties I know.

And she is very pretty :)

FIreweed and Buttercups

The fireweed is creeping up toward the top of the stalks now.....Summer is sadly coming to a close..

Fireweed Shoot!

It is a really wet morning outside today, so my way of coping is to look at the pictures I took just a couple evenings ago...

 I drug C out of the house to a close field of fireweed in the evening light.

I think most kissing shots are rather silly and obnoxious, but I couldn't help but take/share this one.

Then I had C try to take photos like I wanted him to.

It didn't quite work, and I wasn't about to lay back down among the bugs for a second round! It has gotten harder and harder to convince C that we need to do photoshoots every so often, but I keep managing most of the time :)

Gull Island Trip, July 2011

It's a month after I took this trip, but here is the recap finally!

The Tustumena, the ferry

I decided to take this trip by myself, which I was not too concerned about. When I am shooting, other people are a distraction to me. It would have been fun to have another person there to chat with, but it was fine. I hadn't counted on the boat being as tiny as it was, nor the other "exciting" things that happened!

Land's End Resort

First of all, we were waiting for a party of 8. The party made us late, and only 5 of the people showed up after making the rest of wait. They ended up being grumpy, hardly participating at all, and 3 of them never got up from their seats, preferring to play on their phones instead!

A view out my window of the waves crashing along the boat!

In the stress of getting the latecomers on, the deckhand helping out (who I knew) fell into the harbor, and so we had a different deckhand on board than was planned! 30 minutes after we were supposed to get started, we finally left the harbor!

Cormorants and a gull at 60 Foot Rock

I could tell as soon as we got out of the harbor that it was a bit choppy out in the Bay. Sure enough, there had been a storm in the Gulf of Alaska 3 days before, and it was just making its way into the Bay. So, a small boat + big waves = unsteady shooting conditions. We made our way to 60 Foot Rock first, where we came across the only sea otter I managed to get some photos of.

We departed and headed into Sadie Cove for a while. It was much calmer in there, but much less that I was interested in shooting. We spent a good deal of time in the Cove, stopping for 3 bald eagles way up in the trees and on the cliffs.

Sadie Cove

It's always gorgeous across the Bay.

After a while, we finally made our way to Gull Island and all the birds to be found there: Gulls, puffins, cormorants and murres.

Poot's Peak and the beautiful greenish ocean water

Birds everywhere.

Waves crashing onto the rocks created a temporary waterfall!

Murres

Murre

 

Love the color of the water!

End of the Spit from Gull Island

Puffin!

Homer hillside

 After what I considered too little time at Gull Island, we turned back toward the Spit for our return journey!

Back in the harbor!

I'm pleased with the photos I ended up with, and the trip was definitely memorable!