Day 249 - Into the Wild Blue Yonder

I was playing around with my macro lens that I got for Christmas and thought crayons would a fun subject! I just love all the names they give the colors.

Exposure: 1/15 sec

Aperture: f/4.0

Focal Length: 50mm

ISO Speed: 1600

Day 248 - It's a Bird... It's a Plane...

Oh wait, it's not Superman, it's Batman! Happy New Year's Eve all! We had a great night with friends playing Wii and over indulging! Here's to a fantastic 2010!

(Played with some blur filters on this shot!)

Exposure: 1/8 sec

Aperture: f/4.0

Focal Length: 40mm

ISO Speed: 1600

Day 247 - Desert Hike

I seem to have some issues getting pictures taken when I'm off work. Missed another day, so this is a shot from our last day in Arizona while we were hiking. This area has some neat hieroglyphics on the rocks.

Exposure: 1/1250 sec

Aperture: f/4.0

Focal Length: 35mm

ISO Speed: 250

Day 246 - Big Kids

A day out sledding with the kids - some bigger than others! Fun was had by all and much hot chocolate enjoyed afterwards!

Exposure: 1/250 sec

Aperture: f/10

Focal Length: 84mm

ISO Speed: 200

Day 245 - Woody

Late night and last minute photo. At least Woody was willing to pose for me! I played around with color saturation (or desaturation as the case my be) on this image.

Exposure: .6 sec

Aperture: f/10

Focal Length: 73mm

ISO Speed: 1600

Day 244 - Life

So it appears that I do not have a picture for today. This shot is from our trip out to Arizona/Nevada for Christmas at Red Rock Canyon. Love how you can have all the stone and then a tree growing seemingly out of no where.

Exposure: 1/800

Aperture: f/4.5

Focal Length: 90mm

ISO Speed: 160

Day 243 - Jagged Horizon

Out last day in Arizona for our Christmas trip. We had a red eye flight later that night so we spent the day at my mom's. We decided to go for a hike at Christmas Tree Pass and of course I took my camera! It was a great day - a little chilly and a little overcast but so beautiful in the desert. This is one of my favorite shots of our hike. I love how the clouds look around the sun and the textures of the earth below.

Exposure: 1/640 sec

Aperture: f/16

Focal Length: 32mm

ISO Speed: 250

Day 242 - Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to All! Well I took a few pictures of the turkey, but they just weren't cutting it, so I had to move into my family shots. As you can see, I'm actually in this picture, but technically I did still take it as I set the timer and clicked the button! This was the Bauman clan (and their significant others) that were able to make it to Arizona for Christmas and to celebrate my grandma's 80th birthday!

Exposure: 1/3 sec

Aperture: f/4.0

Focal Length: 32mm

ISO Speed: 500

Day 241 - Rusted Slumber

It's Christmas Eve and believe it or not, I did not get a picture in today! So I'll use one from yesterday. On our ATV tour we stopped at an old mining area and hiked around a bit. Laying there in the gravel was an old mattress spring. It looked pretty cool - so I took a few shots of it! I didn't do any post processing to this shot.

Exposure: 1/1000 sec

Aperture: f/4.0

Focal Length: 65mm

ISO Speed: 250

Day 240 - Desert Adventure

Today was the family ATV tour in the desert! I have to say it was a blast! We were out for over 3 hours in all different types of terrain. My grandma even went with us - and she just turned 80! The only bad thing was that even with sunglasses on, I got SO much dust in my eyes they hurt for a few days!

Exposure: 1/500

Aperture: f/4.0

Focal Length: 32mm

ISO Speed: 320

Day 239 - Canyon Snow

Day two of our trip at Christmas was to visit the Grand Canyon. We drove over 5 hours the night before to get there and I had big plans to get up early to get to the best viewing area for sunrise photos. Unfortunately Mother Nature had different plans for us. When we got up - it was snowing like mad and already had 3-4 inches on the ground. We still made our way to the viewing area (not easily - the roads were horrible) but you couldn't even get down to it because they had closed it off due to the snow! At that point we decided to go get breakfast at a hotel restaurant in the park. After we finished eating it had nearly stopped snowing so we were able to see a little of the canyon (as seen here). Overall it was a little disappointing as there was so much haze and clouds that you couldn't see down into the canyon at all - which I'm guessing is were you get the hugely immense sense of beauty and grandness of it. But I did see the Grand Canyon in a snow storm - so there!

Exposure: 1/3200 sec

Aperture: f/4.0

Focal Length: 24mm

ISO Speed: 1600 (accounts for the grain in the shot)

Day 238 - Contemplation

We were out visiting my mom for Christmas and we spent a day hiking in Red Rock Canyon just outside of Las Vegas. It was a beautiful day for hiking - just a little brisk. We were walking back on one of the trails and I saw this guy just sitting and looking out at the beautiful view. He looked so peaceful - reflecting, contemplating.

Exposure: 1/1600 sec

Aperture: f/4.5

Focal Length: 55mm

ISO Speed: 160

Day 237 - Recombobulation

Come on Julie, that is not a real word... on the contrary it is! Well at least it's being used at Mitchell International Airport in Milwaukee, Wisconsin! This would be the area at the end of the security checkpoint with a table and a handful of chairs where you get to re-dress and re-pack everything you had discombobulated to go through! It just screamed for a picture - albeit a pretty lame one!

Exposure: 1/160 sec

Aperture: f/4.5

Focal Length: 50mm

ISO Speed: 1600

Day 236 - Cooking Class

Ray bought me a personal session with a local chef for a cooking class and today was the big day! I told them the type of things I was looking to learn and they chose a dish that fit. We ended up making shrimp and scallop ravioli with saffron cream sauce - it was SOOO freggin good! I had a great time making it, learned a lot, and LOVED eating the end product! As a side note, I tried to make them at home but had an unfortunate turn of events on the pasta dough and ended up trying to make my own (never done before) with just a rolling pin. Needless to say I they were WAY too think - but such an adventure we had trying!

Exposure: 1/60 sec

Aperture: f/4.0

Focal Length: 50mm

ISO Speed: 400

Day 235 - Guardian Angel

One more cheater day for a bit (I hope!). This was one of the top pics from my shots at this cemetery but I didn't use it for that day's post. So this is a perfect opportunity to incorporate it in! You see, the one drawback to posting only one picture each day is that sometimes you get that great day where you have more than one that you might want to use! The sky is my favorite part of this pic!

Exposure: 1/200 sec

Aperture: f/4.0

Focal Length: 65mm

ISO Speed: 250