Backwards Day

I was riding my bike on Tuesday and the sun was this big red ball. I rode home as fast as I could to grab my camera. Then, I had to decide, drive or ride back? Get the shot or enjoy the ride? I chose the ride and totally missed the shot, but still it was fun, the darting in, grabbing my stuff, jumping on my bike, riding like a crazy woman.........

I tried a few TTVs, but my camera was out of focus and this is the best that I got......

Earlier in the day, the kids found this guy on the patio.............

I love insects...........well, on the patio. In the house, not so much.

Today, Max and I are off to Yuba City to visit his neurologist. It is a check-up, he has no new problems that I am aware of. I think he enjoyed the sleeping in. I know that I did.

I keep looking at him and thinking about how I can't believe he's turning 18 in a few days. Were did all that time go? He still feels like my baby boy. I guess because I do all his care and I carry him. I'm so lucky that I've had so many years with him. Most kids with his brain disorder - Lissencephaly - die somewhere between 3 months and 3 years.

I will miss being at the school today - it's Backwards Day. We are in the midst of our Red Ribbon Week. The Backwards Day is "Turn your back on drugs," and I could see all the 6th graders wearing backward hoodies when I dropped Sarah off. Dang, I wish I was there to see how silly they are being.

Tomorrow will be another theme day. I'll get in on that one. :D

Gotta get ready for the trip. I wish you a good day.

Ruby Tuesday - Ruby Sarah

Well, it's Ruby Tuesday time again. For more Ruby Tuesday participants, there's a whole list over at the Teach's site www.workofthepoet.blogspot.com

I'm going with the little bit of red theme here. Can you see Sarah in this photo below? She has a red shirt on. This was taken today at the school Sarah attends and where I work. I did some ttv photos today, after reading a post at www.shuttersisters.com
Here's Sarah again. She's swinging her purse on the bike path. She is so darn cute.
Sarah is again at our school here. Check out that tree. It looks so Fall-like, but the temperature was in the 90s today.

New TTV Box, Mall Security, and Photos

I built a new box for my Duaflex yesterday. I took it outside and got this............ and this, which reminds me, I haven't shot any baskets in forever. I think I'll see if Sarah wants to do that today.
I could feel my neighbors watching me when I took this one. I ignored it, got down in the grass and tried to catch my favorite clover flowers. I got a flare, too. I like a flare. I think that this was the point that I changed to the other camera. It has a more silvery look to it. I prefer it.
More of my Japanese Maple that I introduced in yesterday's post.
In the evening, there was a beautiful sunset. I grabbed my camera and drove over to the mall where there's a wider shot of it available. I got out, focused, then ...........nothing. My memory card was still in my computer. I drove backhome, got it, drove back, took a couple of shots, then Mall security drove up and he told me that I could not take photos of the building. I said, "You can see that I'm pointed away from the mall, at the sunset, can't you?" I could not believe that it's against the law to take photos of the stores signs. I could feel my inner rebellious child wanting to sass this guy. Every once in awhile, that kid pushes me to be a bit stupid.

Anyway, I got this shot - the mall is behind me, but I'm shooting over the top of Kohls. The lights did something here. I don't know what makes them do that. Someday I will. Anyway, it was too late to get any of the pink. Thanks Mall guy and 41-almost-42 year old brain that does things like forget the memory card in the computer. My timing was a little bit off.

After I got home, I looked it up and it is indeed against the law to take photos inside the mall. I read an account of a woman who was chased by mall security (not my mall) and a janitor. Odd. It was a seriously empty mall, too - nothing espionage-y at all.

I'm very glad that my world is much larger than the mall.

A Duraflex and an Argoflex

A few months ago, I found some photos done Through the Viewfinder. I thought they were gorgeous and different and just ........wow. I wanted to try it myself, so yesterday Sarah and I went out on a search through the local "treasure" stores and I found two box-type cameras that I could use for the process.

Just looking down into these cameras gives me this silly sort of thrill. The picture looks so silvered and it's hard to explain if you haven't actually looked into one yourself. They remind me of an old mirror that has had part of the back scratched away.

The cameras were really inexpensive - I don't know if either of them work, you just use them for the lens - but they are so cool-looking. I'm going to have them as part of my decor when I'm not using them.

Sarah loved the treasure shops. She is fascinated with old equipment - especially typewriters. She told me a story yesterday and it went something like this....... when she was in the first grade and changing in her teacher's office for the Halloween parade, she saw an old typewriter and she admitted to me, "I might have maybe touched a key or two." I love that idea, that she was so fascinated by the typewriter, that she was tempted to touch it.

I used the cameras to take her picture yesterday. She was pissed. I don't know how I'm going to get her to let me keep practicing on her.

This was one of the first images that I took with the TTV. It's the trees out front, up through the branches, which is something that I enjoy shooting. I'm not sure why. I do it over and over.
I'm not sure which camera takes better pictures yet. I still need to figure out a better box for the camera to fit into - you shoot down the box, with the duraflex at the bottom of the box. When I get that right, then I can figure it out.

There are some huge fires in my area. The wind kept the smoke away, but made the fires really hard to contain. They had to evacuate some areas - down in the canyon where my friend Tony's family lives, up in Paradise, where Steve's dad lives. The fire burned out by my college - the campus is in large part a wildlife preserve.

This morning the wind died down and I woke up to a smokey smell in my room. Sarah just came in from playing on the patio and she smells of it. Strong of it. The people in Paradise are being allowed back into their homes. I can't imagine what these people have gone through in the past 36 hours. I feel very lucky.

In this picture, you have no clue that there's any smoke, but a little to the left, there's a huge plume of it.

Here's my son, Max, taking a nap. He lies on this big pillow called a Cloud Nine. His head is to the right, but it's hard to see.
I'm taking off now. It's time to give him his before bed medicine. Take care.