Happy Thanksgiving! After a very yummy (and filling) dinner, and a major pillow fight with two goofball little boys - I got a picture of these little guys standing guard on the shelf!
We spent the afternoon at Discovery World (it was my first time!). It was a lot of fun - especially on really big sail boat!
Ray and I were at the Milwaukee Art Museum to see the Andy Warhol exhibit and I took a few shots in the Calatrava entry room. I just love the overall feel of this photo.
The last phase of my laundry room make-over - painting the floor! The lighting wasn't quite enough (should have bumped my ISO up!!) so I had some blur - but thought the look of the paint mixing and dripping was still fun!
I bought this bird feeder at the beginning of summer, and the first few bags of birdseed that I bought must have been the "squirrel-proof" type. I switched towards the end of summer and now the little rodents find their way to it and its gone in a day! Stay tuned for some future posts that will explain why this will no longer be an problem!
It was a beautiful fall day so may people were putting up their Christmas/Holiday decorations. I found these gems at the house down the block. Tell me, what says "Happy Holidays" like flying pigs and geese dressed like Santa??!! Makes you wonder!
Out this afternoon taking some photos in the park. Absolutely love this shot of the water and how it looks almost like tar with the reflection of the afternoon sun.
So clearly a last minute photo and one that I'm not very fond of. I thought I would get some more interesting shots of the bubbles... oh well!
Well Ray was packing tonight for "Deer Camp" tonight - so what better to take a few pictures of??!! And I'm looking forward to a nice, quiet "Julie" weekend! 
For those of you who just couldn't get enough of my photographic adventures - you are in luck! My bestie Amy and I have teamed up to do a weekly photo project!
I do find it amazing how many random things I can find around the house to take pictures of (hey - I never said they were good pictures!). I used my close-up lens here. Overall I liked the angle of this shot.
One of my favorite breakfasts - homemade granola with milk -YUM! I love this recipe and it's pretty easy to make - only problem is that even when I double it - it only lasts about a week!
Woo HOOOOO - Day 200!!! Can you even believe it?? I sure can't - neither can all the hard drive space I've eaten up with 200 days of pictures! Oh well - I'm loving it and having a blast! This is a pic of one of my birthday gifts from my thoughtful boyfriend - they are gloves with open fingers (and a hole in the thumb) with a mitten that folds back so that I can take pictures outside when it is cold and still keep my digits somewhat warm! Isn't he fantastic??!!
Yay - it's my birthday! We had an awesome dinner of fish taco's with coconut rice and cupcakes for dessert! 
I just loved these slippers that I found at Target a few weeks ago - so I bought them. A week later I convinced Ray that he needed a pair too! We would have bought Connor a pair, but they didn't have kids sizes (he got Spiderman slippers instead).
Day 2 of my birthday celebration weekend and we decided to go to dinner at Corpers - I had never been before (some of the best steak in town - if you can get past the smokey supper club atmosphere)! This is what I picked out for Ray to wear - not sure he was sold on it - but he wore it (and looked rather handsome, I must say!).
We went out with a group of friends for drinks and dinner tonight to celebrate my birthday! Drinks at Indulge and dinner at La Merenda - this was our table at La Merenda. It was a fantastic night with great friends!
I brought my mint and lavender pots into the house this fall to see if they would survive. I'm told mint is a weed that will just go dormant (it did - brown as can be now), but I wasn't sure what lavender would do. So far the leaves are still green - just no flowers. 
Now that daylight savings time has left us, getting any decent pictures in during the week is really hit or miss as its pitch black outside when I leave work. So I have been trying to take my camera to work so I can try and get out at lunch to get a few shots in. This was a shot I got of a church right next to Bradley Tech High School (on my way back from getting lunch at Soup Bros - BEST soup in Milwaukee). I did some playing with the vibrance of the colors in this one - I just LOVE the sky!
I got my hair cut tonight, and my salon sometimes has jewelry for sale. They had these awesome rings that I just had to have. This is a rink that is probably between the size of a quarter and half dollar in circumference. It chunky and funky and I loved it! It might be slightly over exposed, but I loved the look of this pic.
So I roped Ray into my daily photo today. I had wanted to play with light painting, so I got him a flashlight, turned off all the lights and told him "move around". It took a few shots - but we eventually got the hang of it! This turned out to be one of my favorite shots!
Ray found the cutest non-carving pumpkin decorating kits this year.... Mr. Potato Head - as a pumpkin. They were SO cute - especially baby pirate pumpkin!
Happy Halloween! What a great day for pictures! Ray was kind enough to head out with me and drive around the area to take pictures of pumpkins and decorations and everything in between! This house was completely AWESOME - they decorate like you wouldn't believe - so awesome! This pic's turned out pretty cool - it was just dusk so the light was perfect!
Ah yes, the fire hydrant in my front yard. The not-so-subtle "don't park in front of my house" sign, and the neighbors dog's place to poop (oh - and they NEVER clean it up). Not overly exciting - but with this aged preset and a bump on the saturation - I kinda like it!
It was dusk, and I loved how the edges of the leaves looked against the fall sky. 
So home from work sick with some yucky stomach bug and I'm working from Ray's house. Well his neighbors apparently have a "family" of some sort living under their porch, so they have hired someone to remove them. This little guy was in the trap most of the day. I actually felt really bad for him - the would scrunch into the corner of the cage when we would drive down the driveway. Someone came and got the trap that day - so I'm sure he was just moved to a new location.
I was driving home from Ohio today and battling with a stomach bug - to needless to say I did not get a photo in today. Drawing from my stash a few weekends ago - I loved this one of leaves on a bush - they sat in flat sheets off the branches. The dim color adds to the overall composition of the shot.
Amy and I attempted to take some pictures of her friend Carisa's kids - Ty and Gavin. Ty was hamming it up, but Gavin was not so interested. I did get a few interesting shots that were a bit less traditional. I used a vintage grayscale on this one.
Amy and I took the kids to the Metro Park today. We thought it would be a great day to set some pic's of both kids... but Elise had other thoughts. This is one of the very few shots she let me take from afar. A few short minutes later she was yelling at me "buh BYE, buh BYE" making it clear that she wanted the camera go to away! Of course I had no intentions of letting a 2-year old tell me what to do - so I kept taking them anyhow! I used an aged Lightroom preset on this pic.
Day 2 in Ohio and it got late before I got a picture in. I just loved Beckett's socks - the challenge was getting him to stop kicking! I was only somewhat successful as it's a bit blurry from his moving!
I journeyed to Toledo, OH today to spend a long weekend with my bestie Amy! We had a full weekend planned of playing with the kiddos, taking pictures, going out to eat, taking pictures, celebrating Beckett's baptism and taking pictures! The 5.5 hour drive demanded at least one stop at Starbucks! This has an "aged" Lightroom preset applied.
Getting ready for winter - moved my herb pots to the patio table until I decided what to do with them. I kinda liked the yellow light of the backyard spotlight!
Today is a cheater day, but its been a while since my last one! Good thing I had lots of great pictures from this past weekend. I took this one while playing around with different aperture settings for the same shot - this one was my favorite of the group as it kept some of the detail in the background.
Last minute photo idea tonight - trying to capture the motion of a remote control car. The challenge was driving the car while taking the pictures!
Last day up north this weekend and I got this shot in just before we left. I loved the lines of the trees with the backlit sun. 
During a walk in the forrest today, we came across some props for the haunted hayride they run at night. I loved how the branch was winding around the feet. 
We were up north this weekend so I had some new opportunities for photos. Today I was using a flatbed trailer as a subject. I liked the overall composition of this shot as well as the depth of field.
Got late tonight and had to find something to get a picture of - my Keen shoes seemed like a good option!
Out for drinks and dinner with friends at Stack'd (in the Third Ward). The artist working on the wall art was still finishing some of it up. I liked the message!
I have been playing around with printing photos on canvas and using them to make some cool wrist cuffs. This is my first collection!
I've been a bit behind in my posting - here's to some catching up! I bought this great top this weekend and thought the layers of different textures would be interesting.
For the last 2 weeks I have been meaning to get over to Pick n Save to buy some pumpkins - they had the coolest bunch of non-traditional pumpkins. So of course when I finally get over there this weekend - they are nearly out of all pumpkins, and there are none of the cool ones to be found anywhere. But it just so happens that I tracked one down that was on a display by the Halloween candy! Woo hoo - jackpot!
It was a great Saturday - started out with a brisk 8k doing Al's Run with Todd (and Mark to cheer us on!), then some yard work and a few errands, then dinner with Todd and Mark where I made the now infamous Apple Bistro Pizza (YUMMY), and they brought home made tomato soup and chocohotopots for dessert - between all the awesome food and the 3 bottles of wine - it was a fantastic night!
I've been addicted to this website (www.photojojo.com) for the last few weeks - and finally broke down and bought the book! It arrived today - woo hoo - just in time for the weekend!
Fall has come upon us quickly and I have had 4-5 fires in my fireplace this past week (I was trying not to turn on my heat yet, but when you get up to a house that is 55 degrees - you give in). I loved how the flames made a circle around the detail in the back of the fire grate.
One of my potted flowers had just a little left in it and had this tiny flower budding from around the sad dead of the rest of the pot! I just had to take a few shots seeing as outdoor pictures of flowers in Wisconsin will soon be over!
