FIMBY

Wrote this post, journal style, 3 days ago on our first day of vacation. Today we have wi-fi access at our campground, in the Maine woods no less. Don't despair, subsequent days improved...

Miserable, am I allowed to feel this way when camping? What about selfish? Miserable and selfish, and this is supposed to be my vacation. Think I'll eat another marshmallow...

I'm an expectation person. Day to day life often doesn't disappoint me but an expectation unfulfilled can frustrate and in this case deeply disappoint.

Up until 3 months ago I hadn't expected to upgrade my camera for another year or so. And even then I wasn't expecting much. Let's see we're a family of five with one modest income (I haven't earned a cent
for 9 years), kids who eat like caterpillars, car repair bills, immigration lawyer fees and a house that's freezing cold 6 months of the year. Oh, and all our family lives in another country. You don't want to know how much international plane tickets cost these days.

Then the government announced it's economic stimulus package. We did the math, 2000 bucks. Wowsers! Maybe we could get those replacement windows afteral so I wouldn't freeze through yet another Maine winter. But then my thoughtful husband suggested we get a new camera, and a nice one, sooner than later. My artist self easily convinced my cold winter self to wear more layers.

Prior to this I had no expectation for photographic greatness anytime soon. And it's that expectation and the subsequent months of camera researching that made today's discovery so heartbreaking. Because Damien has a work visa and I have a dependant visa and therefore no social security number (I will when we're permanent residents) we don't qualify for the stimulus check. Not even Damien and the kids qualify since we file taxes jointly. Of course Damien is a tax paying resident just like any other. Go figure.

All those months of planning, pining and drooling over a beautiful camera that would soon be mine. And dreaming about all the images I could capture and share - gone.

And when do I find this dream shattering news out? 30 minutes before we leave the house for our much anticipated week long summer camping trip. When I decided to investigate why our check still hadn't arrived after yet another week of waiting. We'd expected it would be late because we filed taxes late, but we didn't expect it would be never. Better late than never, ain't that the truth.

Now to add injury to insult I'm beating myself up for being upset. "Yessh, you're so selfish girl. Lots of people in this country, especially this state, can't afford their winter heating bills and you're boohooing about a fancy pants camera. And on top of that this is your vacation, you "should " be enjoying yourself and being a peppy mother, your kids depend on you." Yada, yada.....

Bitter diappointment with a generous serving of guilt. I can think of better ways to start a vacation.

Went to the Great Falls Balloon Festival this evening with the kids. Couldn't get any good shots of balloons, need a better camera for that, but I did have fun taking pictures of the belly dancers.

Ugh... the first week of August, the pinnacle of summer, has been a wash out, literally. It's rained, rained and rained some more. Those beautiful beet juice pictures were taken on the one sunny day this week. Crops are rotting in the fields at the farm, my bean plants were floating this morning in my yard and my beautiful tomato plants that I've mulched, staked and lovingly pruned are all ravaged by blight - AH!! It's been a frustrating gardening week.

The artistic prompt today at Shutter Sisters is abundance. Specifically, "where is the too much, too little, never enough showing up in your camera lens". That's easy to answer today.

Too much green (or should I say purple) beans. I don't like canning but I had no choice when we got our 5 lb bag of beans yesterday from the farm. With last week's 5 lb bag I blanched and froze, gave away and of course ate. With yesterday's bag I made 7 jars of dilly beans this morning, and I still have beans left over!

Canning beans takes forever. All that rinsing, washing, boiling, and stuffing each individual bean by hand into the jars. So not my thing... but neither is wasting food I've paid for and I know on a snowy January day the kids and I will appreciate those dilly beans with our lunch.

We also have too much rain. Way to much rain. This morning we tramped through the swamp, also known as our back yard, rescuing drowning slugs and arthropods of various sorts. So I guess you could say we have too little sun.

Too much rain, too much beans (a blessing I suppose), too little sun and never enough fresh tomatoes. That about sums up the first week of August.

I steamed farm beets for supper last week (a vegetable I'm learning to love) and saved the "juice" left in the bottom of the pan. I stored the juice, about 2/3 cup, in a glass jar in the fridge and pulled it out yesterday for the kids to paint with.

The kids also mixed up a yellow paint with 1/2 cup hot water and 1 tbsp tumeric mixed together.

The resulting artwork is beautiful and my own art (photography) is inspired by my children's creativity. For more natural painting inspirations check out one of our favorites, Berry Smudges and Leaf Prints by Ellen B. Senisi.

I Am an Artist by Pat Lowery Collins

An easy to read (2-3 sentences per page) and simply lovely book about the artist in each of us. Although it's directed towards young children and their innate curiosity and interest in the natural world, I think more adults should read this kind of book.

Do you see the world in an unique way? Then you're an artist. We're all artists. We should let our children and ourselves embrace and explore that.

One more note, I love this book's focus on the natural world and how we see it. You don't need paints, a camera, a sketchpad or fabrics to be an artist. You just need to get out into nature, open your eyes and ears and appreciate.


View all my reviews.

I'm experimenting with this, and almost going blind. No seriously, the sky this afternoon was magnificent. I just had to try and get a shot (or twenty). Good thing I took my camera to the mall after all. Yep, took this shot in the mall parking lot. Cropped out the ugly parking lot, Best Buy across the road and various light poles.

I haven't seen a sky quite so mid-afternoon incredible in a long time.

This may sound pathetic but I seriously got the excited "I can do this, I can do this..." flutters in my stomach when I read these Top Ten Photography Tips from Me Ra Koh Photography. I found the article from one of my favorite photography blogs, Shutter Sisters.

To all my loved ones, or really devoted readers who want to see better photos on this blog, I truly want this DVD teaching set for my birthday or Christmas. Hint, Hint....

I don't know how to explain it except that I want to be a really good photographer. I love looking at photos, taking tons of my own photos (yikes, need more hard drive space soon) and learning from other people. Just thinking about taking rockin' photos gets my heart pumping and my stomach fluttering.

What is with that? Am I weird? I'm not used to having a passion about something other than my family's well being and homemaking. I wonder, am I even allowed to... (Oh, I'm probably supposed to mention my best friend when talking passion, you know I'm hot for you babe.)

Anyway, if you're interested in photography read the tips. And if you really love me check out the DVD series and buy me a copy.

Oh, and because a photography post isn't a photography post without a picture here's the way expensive native Maine peaches I bought today. Not cheap but man, they were good.

Is that kind of like "Ebony and Ivory"? (You are a blessed individual if you can read that and not hear the song in your head)

My 9 year old beauty peaking out from behind her handmade (by her) rag doll.

I'm getting tired of waiting to get my new DSLR so I'm pushing all the limits of my point and shoot. Last night I took it into total "manual mode" to try and capture the sun as it peeked out from behind the clouds. This is the best into the sun shot I've managed to get so far.

Shutter: 1/60
Aperture: f 8.0
Canon PowerShot S60