Treasures

Let's rewind again, back to my 30th birthday and our weekend trip to Louisville.  After our tour and tasting at Maker's Mark, we headed toward Louisville to check into our hotel.  For dinner I was craving Mexican food so we decided to check out El Mundo, which was awesome and I would highly recommend to anyone.  On our way to El Mundo I spotted a bunch of stuff surrounding a storefront/house that looked familiar.  I had around turn around so we could investigate.  Then I figured out what we were looking at...Jerry's Junk.  I'd first heard about Jerry's Junk from one of the blog I love, the Dainty Squid, and that's why it all looked so familiar.

The light was quickly fading but I decided to get in some shots really quick before we made our way to the restaurant.

What an interesting place, right?  When we go back to Louisville next time I definitely want to spend a little more time there, you know, taking it all in!

Floral Effects

Happy Friday everyone!  Not only is it Friday (yay!), but this is my third post in one week!  Insane, isn't it?  Don't get too excited, it's nothing all that new, just some more orchid photos.  But since it's the end of the week and not only did I start editing photos from almost a year ago, I was also adventurous and had some fun playing with my Lightroom effects.  I've only been using Adobe Lightroom for about a year and a half and I usually just use it for minor things like distortion control, cropping, and some minor adjustments to exposure and whatnot.  I've only played around with the effects a couple of times and while I had mixed results, some I loved (like this one) and some I did not, but I never really shared many of them on here.  I've always thought that those sort of effects tend to detract from the photo subject and they can get a bit gimic-y.  But then I thought, you know what who cares, it's Friday and I want to do something different, so here we go...

I hope everyone has a great weekend!  I actually have Monday off from work so it'll be a long weekend for me...yay!

Friday Fun with GIFs: No. 10

It has been about 5 months since my last GIF post which is just WAY too long!  So here's some little something to cuten (I know it's not a word, but deal!) up your Friday...

Funny thing is I had this post ready to go for last Friday and then totally spaced and forgot to post it.  That seems to be my M.O. lately which is frustrating, but oh well.  I hope you all have a wonderful Friday and a fantastic weekend!  We need to do some much needed Spring cleaning around the house...now let's see if we can actually make ourselves do it!

Cute Creatures

Once our weekend with the family was over and everyone else had headed home, Antoine and I decided to explore the area and the local shops nearby.  We had some time to kill before we needed to pick up Cheese from the kennel and there were a bunch of outlets and antique shops in the area (none of which were all that stellar), so we figured why not.  After we stopped by the glassware outlet, I spotted a candy shop and we investigated since something sweet for the road sounded like a good idea.  The candy shop was a bust (very tiny with very very little candy), but right next door was a little area with a variety of fallow deer and goats you could feed.  I'd never seen white fallow deer before so I really got a kick out of these guys!  And goats are always such clowns!

Dopey and Grumpy...if that's not what their names actually are that's what they should be based on their facial expressions alone.

Look at those teeth!

How can it already feel like it's been a long week if it's only Tuesday?!  One of the great mysteries of the world, I guess.  Anyway, here's hoping you have a wonderful Tuesday!

Staying in Hocking Hills

Each year for my family's annual cabin weekend my parents, sister, brother-in-law, Antoine and I usually go to either Hocking Hills or Gatlinburg and rent a cabin for a few nights.  We've been doing it for about 6 years now and it's almost always in November so we can celebrate my dad's birthday and Thanksgiving together.  This past November we decided to be a bit fancy and rent this vacation rental in Hocking Hills through Home Away.  It's definitely different from the log-cabin we normally get, but fulfilled our 3 bedroom and at least 2 bathroom requirements.  And while it was a good place to stay, it certainly was not my most favorite and had some definite design flaws.

The big windows and modern design totally drew me in, but the windows ended up being less than ideal since from 7am to 11am the sun shone through them relentlessly and made it impossible to watch tv (which is always what my dad does in the morning on such trips).

The main-level bathroom (which my sister, brother-in-law, Antoine and I shared) was my favorite part of the house...mainly the enormous bathtub!  The showers were enormous as well, like 8'x8', but the shower heads were positioned too high so by the time the water hit you it just felt like a light drizzle.

Loved that bathtub!  And I was so thankful that I brought a bunch of Lush bath products with me!

The first room you encounter in the house is probably the strangest!  It's a fairly large room and probably 75% of it is taken up by a gigantic koi pond.  It is kind of ridiculous and the fountain is slightly loud.  It is on an automatic timer and shuts off at night, but when it kicks back on around 7am it kind of sounds like someone is in the shower from the bedrooms....that didn't bother me too much though.  My main issue with the koi pond was purely design related.  So much of the main-level was dedicated to this unnecessary thing and the design/space for the kitchen and eating area suffered greatly.  Granted this would not be an issue if you weren't planning to do much cooking, but we always do during these family weekends.  We cook practically every meal, including your average, overboard Thanksgiving dinner.  And the kitchen was tiny!  It was tight if there were just two people in it (and Antoine and I are practiced at cooking together in a tiny kitchen...but this one was actually smaller than ours) and sometimes there were four of us in there at once.

The entry room also had a high-top table and chairs and a pair of big massage chairs over in the corner near the windows.  While I was not a fan of the massage chairs (they were a little terrifying and way too intense), my dad absolutely loved them!

One thing that we hadn't noticed in the listing photos for the rental was that one of the three bedrooms was actually an open loft.  We always try to avoid lofts (for a variety of reasons) when booking a place for our family weekend.  My parents took the loft, which had it's own bathroom with an equally enormous shower to the main-level bathroom.

There was also a really nice deck outside with a hot tub that looked out onto a yard below with a fire pit and little pond.  It was too chilly in November to really enjoy the deck, but my sister did take a dip in the hot tub...she can never resist a hot tub!

All in all, not the best place we've ever stayed for family weekend, but probably not the worst either.  I mean, that bathtub was pure magic and made the whole stay worth it for me.  Also, the weird koi pond in the front room wasn't all bad...at least there were cute fish to look at and feed!

Project 365: Days 1-12

Here's the first post of many for my 365 project I'll be attempting this year, where I'll be taking a photo every day in 2015.  I'm trying to push myself to use my camera for this, instead of my phone, not because it's better or anything but because there's still a lot I need to learn about my camera and its settings.  And about photography and lighting, in general.  I'll go ahead and admit, that the first 12 days were a challenge.  Remembering to take a photo everyday is tricky.  Not to mention the fact that it's freezing and gloomy outside so I've been pretty much limited to indoor photography.  And not just that, many most days I find myself taking photos at night, indoors, which is about the worst time to take photos.  During the work week, when I leave the house in the morning it's still dark outside.  Then by the time I get home and feed/care for the animals, it's dark again.  I look forward to the days when I don't have to go home for lunch everyday to let Mabel and I can use my lunch-break to take photos.

I've noticed that one of the things I'm going to struggle most with is not getting a photo everyday, but posting just one photo for every day.  Well, I might as well just admit defeat now...I can't do it!  I'm going to post more than one photo per day, that's just who I am.  I've accepted it, now you have to.  Anyway, here's the first 12 days, hope you enjoy.

Day 1:  What better way to start off the new year than by frying up some homemade donuts!  No?  I hadn't made donuts since high school and had been aching to whip up a batch during my time off, so I decided January 1st was the perfect day to do it!  Actually, it might have to become an annual tradition.

Day 2:  Mabel

Day 3:  I think I was feeling bad for Cheesy, like he was feeling neglected because of the new puppy, so I apparently decided to dedicate several days to Cheese! 

Day4:  Doing what our family does best...being lazy.  That's my hip/thigh covered in the quilt and Cheese is cozily nestled in behind my legs on the sofa.

Day 5:  Cheese loves all food, but his favorite veggies and fruits (which are the majority of the human-foods we give him) are probably carrots, bananas, and clementines.  Every time I eat clementines I have to share some with Cheese.

Naturally, Mabel wanted in on the actions so she proceeded to lick Cheese's jowls!

Day 6:

Day 7:  Our street is currently a work-zone (and has been for about a month now) while they work on the gas lines.

Day 8:  Cheese has learned that if I'm in the kitchen then there's probably some sort of food being made or chopped.  In this case, he's checking out the cake I was making for my boss' birthday.

Day 9:  Pistachio cream cake (with a pistachio mascarpone filling and chocolate ganache).

Day 10:  Tiki mask we got while in Hawaii!

Day 11:  For Christmas my mom made us a basket filled with all kinds of goodies (from homemade treats to a cool cutting board to bulk food store goodies).  One of the things in the basket was this bag of peanut butter cookie mix, which you just add water to, scoop and bake!  So easy and so tasty!

Day 12:  Continuing the fur-kid trend:  a picture of Gui looking down disapprovingly from his perch at Mabel.  And Cheese being a total ham!