Category Archives: random erin

Yep, I’m a horrible flaky blogger, when something that I used to love becomes a chore I stop doing it. That is why I haven’t blogged since September, crazy.  Oh well, you all know me well enough to know how flighty I can be.

Happenings here:  Things are a bit crazy right now.  My sister had a baby girl and my life has been consumed with helping her and snuggling a squishy little blob of human.  Yesterday she smiled and cooed at me and I melted, then I went home and told my husband to impregnate me, he said no.  

The boys are awesome.  Sade is working on a science fair project, he is testing magnetism and propulsion, he is making a toy roller coaster move with opposite force magnets.  I’m pretty impressed and excited for him.  He is such a cute kid and such a little smartass, I couldn’t be prouder.

Ethan is doing so good in school this year.  He is my little reader, I love watching him pick up a book because he wants to know what happens next, not because it’s 7 and reading time.  He is super athletic and wants to take every sport, but my pocket book can’t handle his ambitions.  He does get to go skiing this year, and I have a feeling he will love it.  He is such a sweetheart, so sensitive and full of compassion.

Drew is a spitfire.  He turns 5 in a few weeks and I just might go into mourning.  He is in preschool two days a week.  He is slow in the reading area (he is 4 after all) but is fantastic at adding and counting.  He is super social, talks non-stop and tells me he loves me approximately 15 times a day.  

So the big news for our family:  After years of sacrifice, wondering if we made the right choice by leaving the military, Stewart graduates with his BS in computer science this spring.  He just registered for his finale two classes.  What faces us now is the job hunt.  We have this huge list of places we won’t move to for various reasons, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Nebraska, Idaho, Arkansas and probably more.  But we aren’t sure where we want to live, well check that, I have a list of places I want to live and Stewart has his, they don’t match.  My list includes Oregon, Washington, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New England in general and his includes Georgia (blah), Florida (been there done that) and that’s about it.  I want to be near family and friends, so I’m pushing hard for Oregon, and then Washington as a compromise.  He’s a good husband and says that if he gets a good job there he is willing to there, so I’m looking hard. We have had a couple of opportunities, but nothing that has felt right so far.  I’m not super stressed, I have a feeling he will get a good job soon, it’s the where that I’m most nervous about.   

So that’s us in a nutshell right now.  We hope all of you are enjoy the holiday season and wish you all the best.  

Sunset

Oh how I love a good sunset.  I love shooting in the sunset as well, the soft glow, the light bouncing just right, it’s my favorite time to shoot someone.

This is a photo of a friends little girl that I got to shoot.  I have so many from this shoot, but I’ll share one of my favorites.

Aperture 7.0

F/stop 1/125

ISO 200

From a low angle

I went to the one that lets me shoot them the most often, Boo.  He loves to have his picture taken, the other two run or put their hands up the little punks.  I have dozens of pictures of them blocking my shot or photobombing, I will get some of them in all of this, I think I will just have to be stealthy about it.  This shot was pretty easy.  Taken in the evening, I was shooting Stewart flying his plane and Drew let me shoot him too.  I just got down on the grass and shot up.

Taken with my Sigma lens

Since I had been shooting Stew flying my settings were more for that.

F/stop 6.3

ISO 400

Speed 1/500

Today’s challenge was clouds.  I loved today’s challenge.  I waited most of the day for good clouds to appear and with the sunset it didn’t disappoint.  I tried shooting with my aperture all the way closed at 22 to see the difference it made and to make sure it was all in focus.S

Settings:

Lens, again with my 50

F/stop: 22

ISO: 100

Speed: 1/80

Day 2 is what I wore today.

I didn’t really care for this one, it required me getting a little creative with shooting myself which proved to be more difficult than I expected.  I’m not quite happy with this so I expanded the photos a little and gave myself some extra leeway.

For my picture I shot in portrait mode suing my standard lens.

F/stop 3.5

ISO 800

The other two were shot with my 50mm 1.8 lens (my favorite)

F/stop 1.8

Speed 1/25 (slow I know, I needed to adjust my ISO)

ISO 800

F/stop 2

speed 1/50

ISO 800

Being the master procrastinator that I am I’ve been putting off doing this until I have more free time.  Then I realized that is never really going to happen so I may as well make time.  I have an older SLR that I have outgrown, but seeing as how my money tree died in my backyard and every time I have a little money saved up something seems to happen to hinder my plan of upgrading.  I’ve decided to make the best of what I have now.  I figure then when I can actually afford to invest in a decent camera I will truly be ready for the upgrade.  I found on Pinterest ( if you aren’t on there let me know and I’ll send you an invite) the 30 day photography challenge and I said “Challenge accepted”.

Today’s challenge is a self portrait.

Shot on manual,

F/stop 3.5

1/160

ISO 1600

Taken in my bedroom.

There is quite a following it Mormon blogs.  I follow many, I am addicted to the fashion on this one.   www.laviepetite.blogspot.com  I want one of her skirts but her Etsy shop has been sold out for a while, I’m hoping to have a shot at winning this skirt (a long one I know).  Anyway, check her out she has some really cute fashion tips.

I’m serial posting now.

I finished one of the toughest knits ever, it was so gratifying.  The pattern was originally in Danish so it was a little confusing at times.  It was partly lace, and lace and me struggle to have a relationship.  Once I got past the first few set up rows it got easy though.  The yarn is Madelinetosh again, I’m addicted her yarn, it is stunning and washable.  I am officially a yarn snob.  This took almost a month to make but there was little on TV so that slowed me down, thank heavens for audio books, I got through another murder mystery.  Off topic but you have any suggestions for good gritty murder mysteries I would love it, I don’t like the Stephanie Plum novels, too fluffy.  Okay back to the dress.  Because it was lace I didn’t make many changes.  The only two things I did differently was to change the style of one of the decreases from knit 2 through the back loop to slip slip knit and then on the sleeves I did 4 rows of seed stitch instead of the 10 to make it a little daintier.  I am in love with it and can’t wait to give it to my niece Adelle.

I am almost finished with my sock weight sweater that I decided to make even more time intensive by making it a tunic.  I am working on the neckline and not sure how to finish.  The original pattern has it more of a turtleneck that can be buttoned or unbuttoned and is about seven inches long like this one shown below.

I think this is pretty but I also don’t really like things on my neck.  I have knitted about 3/4 of an inch of the neckline in the rib pattern and am thinking it would look really pretty just as a short neckline.  Here’s what I have so far:

So please let me know what you think would look better.

How should I finish the collar of my sweater?

(polls)