5 Great Photography Articles I've Tagged in Del.icio.us

I love it when I find a great photography post with beautiful photos for inspiration or useful advice. Here are five of my recent favorites:

1) Warning: These 9 Photoshop Techniques May Result In Great Photos
2) 15 Stunning Images Using Blur to Portray Movement
3) How to get better prints from your digital camera
4) Overcoming Depth of Field Problems in Portraits
5) Twelve Essential Photographic Rules

Speaking of Favorite Songs...

Kaitlin seems to have a couple lately herself.

Every time this Old Navy commercial comes on featuring Ingrid Michaelson's song, "The Way I Am," she always starts singing along...it's so cute!

Here's the full song off imeem:



She also has a 'thing' for "Hey There Delilah" by Plain White T's...she really only knows the chorus and kinda stumble-mumbles through the rest, but who cares...it's adorable!

Quite refined musical tastes for a 5-year-old...I'm impressed. But wait, she also loves everything Hanna Montana/Miley Cyrus. And her father does have her singing "Bullet with Butterfly Wings" by Smashing Pumpkins which she calls "The Rat in a Cage Song"...hmmm...not so refined, maybe?

New Favorite Song: Apologize by OneRepublic

We have a short break in our fair schedule right now so I walked a couple blocks over to Chipoltle Mexican Grill and got some lunch. First time I've ever eaten there...very good!

Now I'm back in my room on the 17th floor of the Hilton in downtown Minneapolis and just had to find the song I heard on the radio driving up here yesterday..."Apologize" by OneRepublic. It is officially my new favorite song...enjoy:

On the Road Again...

Now I'm off to Minneapolis, MN for a National College Fair. There are over 400 colleges and universities that will be in attendance and an estimated student attendance of 23,000! This is, by far, the biggest fair we attend. Technically, this is supposed to be a day off for me (Columbus Day = Native American Day in South Dakota), but I'll be hitting the road shortly as it starts bright and early tomorrow morning and runs through Wednesday, 12:30 p.m.

Not much free time on this trip, but hope to get together with a cousin for dinner tonight and perhaps visit the Mall of America for a couple hours during a short break we have tomorrow.

Kaitlin has been taking my trips this fall pretty well...probably because she knows I usually come home 'bearing gifts'! :-) Regardless, glad that this will be my last one...hopefully.

A Busy Saturday...

We had quite a busy day yesterday. Kaitlin had her last soccer game of the season and she had lots of family there to support her. Justin, Grandma & Grandpa Paulson, Grandma Pechous and me.

She got a few good kicks in.

Showed some team spirit...."GO BIG SHARKS!".

And good sportsmanship..."Good game, good game...".

All in all, it was a great season. She had a great time and learned a lot about being part of a team and having a positive attitude, even when your team's getting whooped! :-)

In the afternoon, Justin & I took Kaitlin out to Garrity's Prairie Gardens. It was feeling unusually summer like in South Dakota for October 6th. It was around 90 degrees and quite windy. Not quite as 'fallish' as I might have liked for the day, but figured we'd better go while we can because next weekend it could be too cold...that's SD for you!

Kaitlin and Justin got a kick out of the little goats.

Kaitlin even posed for me long enough to get a couple good pics of her with the pumpkins.

Then we explored the apple orchard...


before Kaitlin had some fun in the hay maze.

Then we took a hay ride out to the pumpkin patch to find the 'perfect' pumpkins:

An Unfaithful Blogger...

Boy, have I been neglecting my blog for the past month or so...have to apologize. It has just been a very busy time lately...work, travel for work, travel for family for fun, soccer, everyday life. Looking at the calendar this morning, I realized that I've spend NINE NIGHTS in a hotel and the better part of THIRTEEN DAYS away from home within the past five weeks. That might not be a lot to some, but to me, that's a huge amount of time away from home!

In the mix of it all, I've decided to take on another endeavor related to my beloved hobby of scrapping that I've been spending quite a bit of time prepping for. I am very excited about it and will be sharing more on in the coming weeks. (Nothing like a little tease...!) I am a little concerned, however, whether or not I'm ever going to have time to actually scrap again!!

Therefore, I have decided that I'm going to take a break from my "Sunday Spur for Scrapbookers" posts...in case you didn't notice, I haven't been keeping up with those lately. However, when I do run across any great source of scrapping inspiration, I will certainly share it here. It may just be in a less 'formal' format.

Qwest Center Omaha

In Omaha for high school visits this week and staying near the Qwest Center...