it's fall {again}, y'all

In case you are the last to hear this little fun fact, autumn is the best season in New England. The best, Jerry! The weather is unstoppably beautiful nearly every day, enough so that you don't even feel guilty wasting a few hours of mid-60's and blue sky so you can sort boxes in the basement. You know, in case you've got a move coming up in a few weeks and still have beach toys scattered about your yard. So...

behind the scenes

Happy Saint Patrick's Day! I hope you're doing something merry and preferably without ingesting too much artificial green dye. We are off to spend our morning on my favorite local farm, where we will see the farmers harvest maple syrup and eat loads of pancakes. It promises to be memorable and filling. And after a fruitless ransacking for green in Vivi's wardrobe, she is planning to wear her frog costume, which is apparently the only green thing she owns. There will be pictures.

Along the lines of the {a day in the life} post I wrote a while back, I thought I'd share some of what happens behind the scenes at our Home on the Range. I can typically be found in the kitchen, where we get lots of natural light. My basic life philosophy is that where the food resides, so do I. The girls like hanging out with me here, so the kitchen is also the location of impromptu dance parties and story hours on the floor.

playing in the modern darkroom

It took me a while to get on board with enhancing my digital pictures. Programs like Photoshop felt like cheating to me, probably because I spent my adolescence and early twenties learning the craft of black and white film photography and darkroom editing.

I taught photography at summer camp for years, during which I spent countless hours in a dank, rank, pitch-black darkroom with behemoth black rat snakes and copperheads lurking in its deepest chambers. I pored over books and experimented with exposure times while standing for an eternity under an enlarger. I mixed noxious chemicals in old pots on 90 degree days in unair-conditioned rooms, with no shoes on and up hill both ways!

While it definitely had its downsides, I had a trade. I was an artist, at least in my own mind. And I had a dream that one day I would have a darkroom in my own house, where I'd continue to perfect my art. So I had to mourn the loss of my craft, and it's been a long, hard road to get back on board with learning a new one.

Well I'm back, baby! I recently got a thirty-day free trial to try Adobe Photoshop Elements. I'm enjoying the learning process so far, but I'm discovering as I go that it is much more difficult than I originally thought it would be to do. In a way, this makes me happy! I'm so relieved to find out that there is skill and frustration to be had in modern photo editing. Be careful what you wish for, right?

I was feeling the "old timey" look last night. Nate said the second looked like a sonogram when it was sepia-toned, and he was right! That's why I keep him around. Keep me honest, Bubba.

So far I haven't really done anything I couldn't do in iPhoto in less time, but I see the potential to do more. It's exciting! Although I got the trial a few weeks ago, I was only finally inspired to sit down and use it last night, and I owe my inspiration to the Pioneer Woman. If you haven't been to her website, check it out! I thought to myself, if she didn't know what the word aperture meant just a few short years ago, then I can do it too. That, ladies and gents, is where her true genius lies.

Later gaters,
~J

p.s. If you already have Adobe and are further along in the learning process than I, you might enjoy Pioneer Woman's Photoshop actions.