I Heart Faces - Smiles!

This week's challenge is Smiles! I have one sweet, little drama queen on my hands. It's hard to capture a smile that's not faked, forced, or freaky.  This rarity happened a couple of weeks ago at our local Botanic Gardens.  I was quite excited to be quick enough to capture that fleeting moment!!

Head over to I Heart Faces for some more toothy (or in our case, toothless) grins!

I Heart Faces - "All Bundled Up"

Oooo! What a cold winter it was and still is for some folks! Lots of opportunities to get wrapped up and go outside for some fun "Kodak" (or in my case Olympus) Moments!" This week at I Heart Faces the theme is "All Bundled Up." My entry is of my daughter and is from a snow day earlier this year.

Head over to I Heart Faces for some "warm fuzzies" and check out all the fun!!

Summertime...Parting with Such Sweet Sorrow

Where did it go? Our summer just flew by this year. We kicked off our break with the great Disney World reveal, and I assumed the time would creep by in anticipation of the trip. But I was SOOOO wrong!

I made a poor judgement call last summer in thinking that summertime was the perfect time to clean up and "catch up" (whatever that is) on getting my house in order. Can I say that it was the most boring and miserable summer I have ever had?! I totally had my priorities all screwed up and decided that this summer the kids and I were just going to have fun. And we did!! So much in fun, in fact, that I have gotten WAY behind in my blogging.

In order to catch up, I am creating one great big, huge post and cram some of the highlights of our summer. So without much further ado? A due? Adou? Whatever. Here is the most random post in the history of Balentine Bliss. (Which, BTW, is celebrating it's one year anniversary this month! Yay, me!)

So, this summer we went to the dog park with the puppies and the parents,

Visited some of our relatives in NashVegas,

Had one storm that had hurricane force winds and another that dropped a twister a few miles away from our home,



Grew and ate bunches and bunches of this stuff,



Played for hours & hours in the backyard,

Rescued and watched these little guys grow up then subsequently learn to fly away,

Had a long and fun (and exhausting) week at VBS,

Went to the sprinkler park several times,


Had a fabulous 4th,




Picked, pealed, and froze about a million peaches,


Did some serious swimming,

And first handedly (yes, I know it's not a word) learned the definition of "belly-flopping,"

Got a not so extreme make-over,

Before:


After:

Visited our downtown "Riverwalk,"


And rode the trollies,

Hung out at the bird exhibit at our fantastic zoo,


Had some family worship time,


And spent the whole summer just being together, loving each other, and having a wonderful time.

We started school yesterday and now have only 30 days until DISNEY!! If the time goes anything like this summer's did, it will be here in a jiffy!

Lyla Bryanne

One of my closest friends recently became a grandmother for the second time in June. They graciously humored and allowed me to take some photos at the hospital to brush up on my photography skills.

I have to say I enjoy those newborn babies! So precious in every way!

Here are a few of my favorites from our "shoot."

Great-grandma's hand...

Sweet big brother...

Giving Gramma kisses...

Congratulations, guys! Love you all so much!!

I ♥ Faces - Silhouettes

When I saw that I ♥ Faces theme this week was "Silhouettes" I knew immediately what photo I was going to submit. This was taken in Destin a couple of years ago. It is of my little boy, Duglin, running down the beach. It has to be one of my favorite pictures. I love the reflection of the sunset on the water and the little footprints he's leaving behind. I also appreciate the fact that he was running so fast that he almost didn't make it in the frame. Totally fits his personality! Thank goodness for those fast shutter speeds and snappy ISO's!



To see some more incredible silhouettes head over to I ♥ Faces and join in on the fun!

I Heart Faces - Self-Portrait

Yikers!! This week's challenge on I Heart Faces was a toughy!! Definitely an exercise in humility. I used my 50mm lens for this and it certainly is not forgiving when it comes to those fines lines and blemishes. (Thank goodness for spot healing brushes, blur masks, and other fabulous technological wonders!)

I hate having my picture taken to begin with, but having to take my own portrait and having to make sure I am not making some obnoxious face at the same time, nearing impossible!!! so here's my best shot.

Head on our to the nice folks at I Heart Faces to see what other brave people did in their own self-portraits.

I Heart Faces - HELP ME!

What a great opportunity that I Heart Faces is giving to help answer some questions about a particular photo that needs "something." And if I can hurry I will be the 50th and last person to get the opportunity to get some "constructive feedback!!"

This photo was taken at sunset in Florida with an Olympus E500 camera using a 40-150mm lens. (Yes, I know it's not the best lens to have, but at the time it was all I had.) I shot in Aperture Priority mode with a f3.5, ISO of 640, sorry, don't know what the exposure timing was.

I love the thought of how great this photo could have been. Love the expression, love the sunset in the background. I was afraid to shoot with a flash because I thought that it would wash out the sunset. So, I guess my question would be how I get a portrait shot but still have a great background such as this without out the flash washing out the colors in background? Granted my editing sucks, too, but when I tried to brighten the subject, she turned out a funky color. When I tried to fix that, the whole picture just looked odd.

Any other suggestions and comments are totally welcome!!!! Thanks so much I Heart Faces!!

Here is the unedited version if anyone else wants to give it a shot! Thanks so much!