Feb 24

These are some photos were taken at the ROTC competition today.

The first photos is my daughter during personal inspection. The inspector actually brought out a ruler to make sure her ranks and pins were properly placed and aligned.

The 2nd photo is my daughter carrying the guide for the basic drill team.

The 3rd picture is my daughter during the unarmed exhibition routine.

Our school placed 1st overall out of 20 high school ROTC units from all over the state of Florida. I am sooooooo proud of them. Kristina( DD) has been in ROTC for 3 years and we are hoping she will be the commander of the entire battalion next year. She's worked very hard and is very dedicated to ROTC.

Feb 23

Just a snapshot from last night. My daughter is in ROTC and we had a competition today. Every time we compete, we spend the night in the high school gym. Took this picture of my daughter.

Feb 21

Feb 20

Feb 19

This is the Gasparilla Pirate Boat. Our city has a local celebration each February with a parade and pirate invasion. It's a lot of fun! This is the pirate ship that docks in downtown Tampa and lets all the pirates off to take over the city for a day.

you can read more information at http://www.gasparillapiratefest.com/

Feb 18

Our Marine...

Came home for the weekend. It was so nice to get to spend time with him. I miss him so much.

Feb 17

Feb 16

Catching up.. I missed this weekend. First time since we started :(

Oh well.. I'm catching back up... Took these over the weekend. I did such a stupid thing. FORGOT TO CHECK MY ISO! It was a totally beautiful day and I forgot to change my ISO back to 200.. so all the photos I took on Saturday were at 1600! UGH UGH UGH!!
I had to run noiseware on all of them to fix them to atleast look half way decent.

No other processing done to these other than running noiseware.

Feb 15

This week has been a rough one... I haven't had a chance yet to do the theme photo of the week. I just started a new full time job and I'm trying to acclimate myself to a new schedule and get used to working outside of the home for the first time in 3 years.

This photo is from a photo shoot I did last sunday. SOOC.. haven't had time to proof them all yet. I loved this little girls dress and the flowers.. all she wanted to do was pick and eat them!

Thanks for looking!

Feb 14

Feb 13

Feb 12

This isn't following with the theme.. but hopefully I'll get to the theme tomorrow or Wednesday.

I took this at the downtown Marriot Hotel yesterday. I loved the huge palm trees that were in the lobby and the light coming in from the second level windows..

Feb 11

Today I went to the University of South Florida's Botanical Gardens. They had this awesome Orchid Room. These are three different types of Orchids that I took pictures of while visiting.

Manual| ISO 200 | Ap 2.8 and 4.0 | SS 1/60 and 1/90

Feb 10

This huge tree is in my parent's yard. I have no idea what kind it is..but it's got to be in the pine tree family. Does this count as a botanical??? LOL

Feb 9

Today I set out to take some more photos of botanicals in my yard. The second photo is another azalea... I have so many different types of azaleas I can't keep track!

The first photo.. I have no idea what it's called.. I call it a holly berry tree. Reminds me of Christmas Holly. I'm sure that's not the actual name of this plant. Anyone know?

Feb 8

I really liked the shadows in the pictures I took here.

Feb 7

I had a photo shoot with two young ladies today that are trying out for a calendar contest at their place of employment. They had to turn in swimsuit shots.. Luckily we hit a high of 74 degrees today! So, they weren't tortured to do this shoot during cold weather! LOL

Feb 6th

Botanicals... a flower from my parent's yard.

Had a really really rough day today. My dad had catarac surgery, my mom fell and really bumped her head causing a gash in her forehead. She' ok.. but I'm really worried about her. I knew one day the time would come when I'd start worrying about my parents getting older... that day came today.

Feb 5

Azaleas are blooming in my yard... I love my azaleas and my gardenias but sadly the gardenias don't bloom until around April.

Bird Rescue

 

 

Today we found a red tailed hawk hurt in our yard. His right eye was injured and he was having a hard time flying.
We called the local animal wildlife rescue and they came out to try to catch him so they could help him. The first photo was taken as the hawk sat on the roof of my house. You can see his injured eye best in this photo. He stayed there for over an hour. When the rescue volunteer arrived she had several long poles with nets on them to try to capture the hawk.

Well she missed the first try and the hawk tried to fly away into a huge oak tree in our backyard. He was having such a hard time, especially hanging on to limbs and was very dis-oriented. The second photo displays the bird hanging upside down, barely hanging on to a tree limb. My hubby and I helped her catch him finally and he was taken to the rescue shelter for rehab. It was really sad to see the hawk in this condition, but I'm very glad he was captured and will now get the attention he needs for a recovery.

Feb 3

These photos are from the walk I took today. It's still very dreary here and absolutely no sun. Just dark cloud cover.
The first two photos were taken across the street where the port a john is.. the construction site. The second two pictures are leaves turning colors and some rocks in our backyard. Not too creative today..but never the less I got out and took photos.

All taken in Manual Mode..various aps and ss. I can look them up if you want.

See ya tomorrow!

Feb 2

Today has been pretty dreary here in Florida. I'm sure most of you heard about the horrific tornadoes that swept though Florida last night. This picture wasn't taken today. I took this several months ago. I have a think for the clouds and the sky.
Don't even know what my settings are on this picture but I can look them up if needed. I really liked the dramatic feel of the sun coming from the behind this huge cloud.

Thanks for looking!

Feb 1st!

Today's photo was not actually taken today. I took it two days ago with the swing photo. Just got around to editing them and wanted to share this one today. This is the crape myrtle tree in my front yard. I love when this tree is in full bloom.


Our weather today has been really odd. Very Very Windy and off and on rain today. So, I didn't get out with the camera.

Manual | ISO 800| AP F2.8 | SS 1/4000