I am finally posting assignment 2. Nothing like waiting to the last moment.
I took these photos of a rose bush in front of our house about 3 weeks ago. I have one set of shots that are 'close ups', and one that are a bit farther away. They were taken around 8:00am, Noon, 4:00pm, and 8:00pm
Close Ups
8:00am
Noon
4:00pm
8:00pm
Back a bit
8:00am
Noon
(Can you see my son in the window?)
4:00pm
8:00pm
And for a fun one, here's one from our recent trip to the local zoo.
I'm so excited. There has been a mystery plant in front of our house. For those of you who don't know, we moved into our current house in the fall last year. We don't know what any of the plants are around here, and it's been fun to see what blooms. Well this plant has been a mystery. My sister came out and trimmed it for us. It has thorns like a rose bush, but we just weren't sure if it was or not. My sister says it is a rose bush, just not one I'm use to seeing.
Anyway, this morning Paul was outside doing some lawn work and he noticed that the bush had bloomed. And here was my first thought, "Yea, I have a flower I can take a close up picture of." So I grabbed my camera and off I went. I did an 'auto adjust' to the picture with my Paint Shop Pro 9, but truly didn't like what it do to it, so I didn't keep it. These are the original pictures, no editing. What do you think?
I know that I had put some other pictures out there before, but this is my first 'official' assignment. The original assignment was to read our manuals and then take pictures. I have read my manual, somewhat. I'm the type that does better reading and doing at the same time. Just dry reading, and I forget what I read. But one of the things I did learn was how to take close up pictures. Every time I tried getting a real close picture, like of a flower or something, it was always blurry. I found the button that changes that. Unfortunately, all my flowers around here are gone, so I decided to take a couple of pictures of small, cute little plates I got as a gift from a friend of mine. The blue one was hand painted, and the pinkish one changes colors when wet. That's what I tired to show in the picture, though it's hard to see. It actually looks like there are some 'dimples' on the plate, which there aren't. It's water drops you are seeing. So I'm not completely happy with my first true assignment, but I know it will get better as I go along. And now that I know how to take up close photos, I'm looking forward to trying that more and more. Especially when I get around some flowers.
I have finally decided what I'm going to do with this blog. Hallie, over at From the Rubber Room is doing a photography course. I have always had a desire to learn more and do more photography, so I decided to follow her course and see what I can learn. Our first assignment was today, and it's to read our camera's manual and truly get to know our camera. So I'm off to find my manual, read it, and make sure it's always available when I have questions. We went for a nice drive today, and I took some nice pictures. And I do need to read my manual, because normally I can never get up this close and have such nice pictures, but for some reason it worked this time. Yep, time to read the manual. Here's a couple of pictures.
Ok, I know I haven't blogged here in a while, but this is a contest I just couldn't pass up. Rocksinmydryer is having this great give-away. I have copied her blog so you know all the rules.
I have a giveaway for you today that will positively wear out your CD player.
WOW Hits 1 is a new compilation CD, full of hits from some of my favorite Christian recording artists, including Steven Curtis Chapman, Casting Crowns and Chris Tomlin. You can see more details here. The nice folks behind WOW Hits 1 are offering TWENTY winners each a boxed set of 17 CDs, one CD for each of the artists represented on WOW Hits 1.
Did you follow that?
TWENTY of you will each win the following boxed set:
1. Barlow Girl - How Can We Be Silent
2. Aaron Shust - Whispered and Shouted
3. Cadia - Cadia
4. Point of Grace - How You Live
5. Skillet - Comatose
6. Brandon Heath - Don’t Get Comfortable
7. Michael W. Smith - Stand
8. Third Day - Wherever You Are
9. Relient K - Five Score and Seven Years Ago
10. Casting Crowns - The Altar and the Door
11. Steven Curtis Chapman - This Moment
12. Chris Tomlin - See the Morning
13. Matthew West - Something To Say
14. David Crowder Band - Remedy
15. Jeremy Camp - Beyond Measure
16. Newsboys - Go
17. Toby Mac - Portable Sounds
::AND:: You will also win a copy of the WOW Hits 1 CD.
Y'all. That's a lot of CDs.
Here's how you can win (this is a little different than most of the giveaways I host, so please look closely):
This giveaway is only for bloggers (sorry, non-bloggers!). Public blogs only--no password-protected sites. Only U.S. bloggers are eligible to win (sorry--shipping all those CDs is expensive!)
Put a link to WOW Hits 1 somewhere on your blog: that's www.WOWonline.com. You can post about it, you can put the artwork of the album in your sidebar, whatever you'd like. (If you want to put the graphic on your blog, here's how you do it.) As long as you have a link to www.WOWonline.com on your blog, you're qualified.
You don't have to link back to this post of mine, but you can if you want to.
Enter your link in the Mr. Linky below, so I can find you!
I'll close down the Mr. Linky Saturday morning and will draw 20 (holy shmokes!) winners.
Wednesday, March 19, 2008~ Rosetta Stone Contest ~
Yes, you know I will enter this contest on both of my blogs. That's how much I want to win.
Rosetta Stone has been the #1 foreign language curriculum among homeschoolers for a while -- next week they are unleashing a brand new curriculum, and you can WIN the *all new* Rosetta Stone Homeschool Version 3… FOR FREE!
This is a $219 program (and believe me it's worth every penny!) and the winner gets to pick from any of these 14 languages: Spanish (Spain or Latin America), English (American or British), Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Irish, Hebrew, or Russian.
This will also include a headset with microphone, and students will participate in lifelike conversations and actually produce language to advance through the program. Rosetta Stone still incorporates listening, reading and writing as well, in addition to speaking. Many homeschoolers requested grammar and vocabulary exercises, and with Rosetta Stone Homeschool Version 3, they're included! For parents, the new Parent Administrative Tools are integrated into the program and allow parents to easily enroll students in any of 12 predetermined lesson plans, monitor student progress, and view and print reports.
To win this most excellent program -- in the language of your choice -- copy these (blue) paragraphs and post it in (or as) your next blog post -- then to enter the contest, go to the original contest page HERE: http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/JenIG/501132/ and leave a comment with the link showing where you blogged about it. And please make sure the link works to get back to the original contest page when you post it.And good luck!The winner will be picked randomly on March 26, and will be notified thru the link they left to their blog pg. And if you have more than one blog, you can post them and enter those separately for more chances to win. Yay for free stuff!
I can't believe I completely forgot yesterday that it was my one year blogging anniversary. Goodness, my day was just too busy. We had our monthly homeschool meeting last night, so I never had time to blog, and it went out of my mind. I still haven't decided the direction of this blog yet, but I'm blessed to have it. You are all a blessing to me, and I'm always looking forward to your comments with encouragement and words of wisdom. You are all so very sweet, and I'm blessed by the friendships I've developed through HSB. Thank you Lord for bringing me to HSB and the friends I have made through here. I pray that You bless all my friends in blogland.
I just looked at my start date of my blog here on HSB, and it's March 10th. I can't believe that next week I will have been officially blogging for a year. It's been a great year.
I wouldn't change anything about the last year I've been blogging. It has been a great opening in my life, and the Lord has used it in so many different ways in my life. He has brought so many good friends to me through my blog, some I get to chat with, and some I might actually get to meet in person. These friends have brought me so much encouragement, sweet words and friendships that I truly can't picture being without. I am so glad that I took the plunge and started this blog.
I'm not sure what direction this blog is going to take. I've been praying about it, and I have a few different ideas. I'll let you know once I know what direction and changes I feel to make. Until then, I guess a sort of count down is on. Only one week until my 1 year anniversary. How fun.
Today was a good day. We finished our schooling quite early today. The kids and I were both excited about that. I was trying to decide whether I wanted to go to the homeschool playgroup today. My back is hurting, not bad, actually it's feeling better. But I'm not sure what kinds of seats they have at the gym, so I wasn't sure if I wanted to go. I had pretty much decided we would stay home, and then I got a call from my mom who was in town and wanted to stop by for a visit. It was a great surprise. The kids were happy to see her, and we had a great time together. With the weather the way its been, we haven't been able to get out there, and she hasn't been able to get out here. It's been about 2 months since we've seen each other, and we only live about 1 hour apart, kind of funny. But northern winters close roads out here, plus gas prices, have kept us apart. Once spring and summer get here, we should be seeing each other a bit more. I guess the kids have grown a bit, my mom couldn't believe how tall they had gotten. It's funny because living with them I don't see a huge growth spurt, but I guess they have.
So that has pretty much been my day. I hope you all have a blessed night. Oh, do you like my new signature? I've been playing with my new software.
It's always such a blessing to have my sister here, and this was no exception. Her and her daughter showed up in the late morning, and the first thing we did was drop the girls off at the mall.
(Sarah's in the white coat)
I'm really not sad, it was just another milestone for my 12yo, almost 13yo, girl. I want to say how proud I am of her. First, in regards to the mall, she did great. She shopped wisely, got some good things, and behaved perfectly. But also, I have to brag on her, she graduated from Suzyscribbles writing workshop! Wahoo sweetie, I am so proud of you. She worked so hard on this workshop, and truly, Susan is a great teacher. Sarah's writing has grown since she started this workshop, and she is writing now in ways I didn't know she could. So I am one proud mama here.
OK, back to my sister's visit. After we dropped the girls off at the mall, we went carpet shopping for Carrie. She couldn't find any good deals, but it was fun going with her and seeing what's there. After we picked up the girls, we all just hung out at the house for a bit. The kids played Wii, and had a great time. Carrie and I just chatted, and said often we should have been working on our crochet projects. We all went out to a buffet restaurant, we being us four, my sister and her two children (my nephew showed up after he got off of work). It was such a great time. It was the first time our kids had been to a buffet and Carrie had such fun showing Sarah all the food, and that she could pick it all herself. She had such a great time. We all just laughed, talked, ate and enjoyed ourselves. And of course we ate way too much. We came home and we all settled down and watched a movie together. About half way through the movie, our nephew had to go home, it was around 8:00ish. My sister walks him outside to say goodbye to him, and then she comes rushing back in and says the eclipse is going on! We had all totally forgot about it. So some went outside, and Paul, me and the kids went into our bedroom and saw the eclipse out our window. Wow, it was cool. We didn't watch the whole thing, but what we saw was cool. After the movie, we got the kids settled on the floor in the living room, with Jessi sleeping on the couch and my sister got Sarah's bed. Of course the kids had Jessi up early with their giggling and playing. We had a few hours this morning to sit and chat, but they had to leave around 9:30am, so this day was short. It was sad to see them go, but we know that spring will be here soon, and we'll see them more often. It was a great time, and I can't wait for the next one.
We did do our normal schooling today, we just started later than normal. It went pretty good, but of course, it was hard to get the kids settled down and focused on their lessons, but we finally got it started. Then the mail came early and I got my Paint Shop Pro v9 !!! I'm so excited, though I have to say, the original project I started with is pretty hard and I've gotten a little frustrated. But I did make a small little graphic, my first one. If you want to see it you can go to my daughter's blog, it's her background purple/pink graphic. It's not much, and I threw it together pretty quick, but it's fun. I've made my first graphic, and it's out on the web. I can't wait to edit some photos with it too.
So that has been the past couple of days. I hope everyone has had a good time. I'm way behind on my blog reading, and I'll try to get to all of your blogs tonight, if I can. Have a blessed rest of the evening.
I am a wife and mother of two. I started this blog to share the things the Lord shows me in my journey as a wife, mother, homeschool mom and His daughter. And in it all to "grow in the grace and knowledge of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ."
II Peter 3:18
And here was my first thought, "Yea, I have a flower I can take a close up picture of." 
So I grabbed my camera and off I went. I did an 'auto adjust' to the picture with my Paint Shop Pro 9, but truly didn't like what it do to it, so I didn't keep it. These are the original pictures, no editing. What do you think?
Here's a couple of pictures.
These friends have brought me so much encouragement, sweet words and friendships that I truly can't picture being without. I am so glad that I took the plunge and started this blog.
We all went out to a buffet restaurant, we being us four, my sister and her two children (my nephew showed up after he got off of work). It was such a great time. It was the first time our kids had been to a buffet and Carrie had such fun showing Sarah all the food, and that she could pick it all herself. She had such a great time. We all just laughed, talked, ate and enjoyed ourselves. And of course we ate way too much. 
We came home and we all settled down and watched a movie together. About half way through the movie, our nephew had to go home, it was around 8:00ish. My sister walks him outside to say goodbye to him, and then she comes rushing back in and says the eclipse is going on! 
