Photography....

So, I have always wanted to be able to take beautiful pictures. But, for some reason they just never have turned out that great. Well, I have become determined to learn the art of photography. So, until I am able to take a class in it you will all have to bare with me as I work on it. My sister Jenny sent me her old camera and I have notice that it has made a big difference. I have now told Mike that when I graduate from college (notice I said when, not if...now that is a big step) with my bachelors degree that I want a really nice camera. So, until then I am going to work with what I have. The other thing that I am working with is my Mother's Day gift which is Photoshop Elements that I have wanted for years. I am very excited to figure this program out. It is so much fun. And now with my classes over for the next 2 weeks I am going to try and learn as much as I can. Anyway, here are some of my recent pictures of "Nature" that I have taken on Juliana and my outings...one is even from today!!!!!
These flowers I found at the San Francisco zoo on Juliana's birthday!!! I thought they were one of the most beautiful flowers I had ever seen. I need to find out what they are. They look so delicate and almost tissue paper like.

This is the friendliest duck I have ever met. He wanted is picture taken. I am not kidding when I say that either. He would swim up to us and stop and look at the camera until I would snap a picture of him then he would swim into another pose and stop again and pose. it was really funny. We didn't even have food to feed him.
Here he is again working the camera!!!
Juliana helped me take this one!!! She loved these flowers and would pick them and stuff them into her pockets. I tried to get a picture of her pockets full of them but they didn't turn out.
These leaves were perfect. Juliana wanted to pick them (she has a weird obsession with leaves, rocks and sticks). I told her that we don't pick leaves off of trees we can only pick up the leaves that have already fallen to the ground but she wasn't satisfied. So I had to promise her that I would take a few pictures of them. That made her happy...and when I pulled them up on the computer I thought is was a very lovely picture.
And last but not least, I saw this beautiful rose on the way to the park today. It was so pretty and just at it's peak in my book and I just had to photograph it.

Anyway, sorry that you have too look at all of these boring pictures but I needed to post about something. LOL.

I really will come back for a real post about what is going on later today or tomorrow!!!!

New FHE Lessons!!!!

I just wanted to let any one who reads my blog...(I really don't think more than 2 or 3 people do) that there are a few new lessons on my FHE blog. The one that was posted last by Bobbie is really cute!!!!

My FHE Blog...

I don't know how many of you know that I started blogging last year with an FHE blog. I was pretty good about it for a few months but, I started feeling like no one ever looked at it or even used the site really and so I fizzled out on it. It just didn't seem worth all of the effort. Well, in February I watched the Worldwide Leadership Training broadcast. They really put a strong push for FHE along with other things. But it really got that feeling going again in me that I needed to be working on Family Home Evening. I need to have those formal lessons and really would like to be doing with my website. Now, I really don't want anyone to feel like they have to do this, but I wanted to put it out there for anyone who would. Yesterday I got a comment on my blog from a really sweet lady asking me if I could up date my FHE blog. I sent her a message back telling her that I was going into the many reasons why I wasn't doing it right now (I am going into finals week and then I will have a 2 week break and then start taking my last 2 classes to get my associates degree, in the mean time going on a 2 week vacation and then coming home to finish up school and having 6 weeks to pack up so we can move to graduate school.) I am feeling like I have a full plate but, I really feel like our family needs to be doing better with Family Home Evening. I have been thinking for a long time that I wanted to find people who would like to do this FHE blog together with me. So, I asked the girl who commented about it if she would like to post a few FHE's and now I am going to put it out there for all of you. It you or anyone you know would be interested in being a contributor on my FHE blog I would love to talk about it with you/them. I was hoping that I could find between 3-7 women besides myself and that would make it so that we would only have to come up with a FHE lesson at the most once a month and maybe only once every two months. It would also give us more traffic over there and we could compile a list of Lessons that people would like to see. Now, keep in mind that the goal of my site was to give parents with small children (0-5) FHE ideas because I was having a hard time finding good ideas for kids this young. Anyway, let me know what you think.

Introducing Caroline Jane ....

On May 2, 2008 @5:30 PM my sister Gayle brought a beautiful little girl into the world. She is cute as can be and I can't wait to meet her in June at our family reunion. I just wanted to post a few pictures of this beautiful little girl and tell Gayle, Mark, Grace, Mary, Max and Caroline that I am so happy for them and that I love them very much. This beautiful little girl is so lucky to have 2 older sisters and 1 older brother that will be looking out for her and loving her everyday. Gayle, Mark and Baby Caroline....how cute are they!!!!
I really don't think that she could get any cuter!!!!!