Photo Challenges Tuesday: Flowers & Ski Racing! :)

Sweet Shot Tuesday: 

This morning I took this photo of the white roses I bought as a treat for myself.  I love flowers in the dining room - there is a sense of strength they give.  Each color rose has a meaning -- I love this post from Hugs & Kisses. shows all the meanings for the different colors.

 White roses have several meanings: 

 “You’re heavenly,” reverence and humility, innocence and purity, 

“I’m worthy of you,” and secrecy and silence. 

For more Sweet Shots, go to:

Trendy Treehouse: Shutter Love Tuesdays 

Action photography I can truly say is my specialty.  Once you understand the sport and the games you can get the right kind of action at the right time for the prime photo.  Ski racing has helped me get in tune to what is the best photo that someone would want to buy.  It is with such pride that I watch these children on the race course in the winter.  I have a lot of other sports photos - water skiing and soccer and some baseball ones that I love, but the ski racing photos I think are my best!   I know these photos will cool you down on these hot summer days.....  we think about skiing all the time in our house, so here ya go!

Hope you like this one for this week's sports theme on Trendy Treehouse

This J3 boy is from the Killington Mountain School at the top of the race course this past March 2010  - I love the blue sky background and the focused look on his face.  I have so many great ski photos, this one may not be the best, but the Bermuda Open photos each year are just always the greatest and this is a good one to share.

And just one more from that same album as it shows this excitement of the dual ski race.  

Here is a link to the video I created with all my favorites highlighting the J5's from their 2009-10 season.

For more "sports" photos, go to:

Family Fun on the River: Trendy Treehouse Shutterlove "Faces"

Sunday on the boat with family.... another gorgeous day.... another fun time with our whole family all together which doesn't happen very often and not as much as we would like.... as Samantha is now living in Boston full time and both her and Stephen have crazy work schedules as young adults in their early twenties.  I remember those days well - 2 jobs and then fitting in the fun with friends.

We had Steve, myself, Schuyler, Stephen & his friend Meaghan, Samantha and her boyfriend Lucas out on the boat on the Connecticut River.  There is this great spot that all the boats dock and it is around 3-4 feet deep where you can jump in swim with the kids and have some fun.  On this particular day there were around 35 boats anchored, jet skis, fellow Moomba waterski boats and plenty of "Party Barges" -- it is a people watching fest and just a lot of fun.  We park, play, drink some cold beverages and crank our awesome stereo from the boat and get lots of Vitamin D - with sunscreen applied (Of course!).

Here is my selection of faces for Trendy Treehouse Challenge.  There were so many great shots --- I have some more for challenges upcoming later in the week too!  It was fun photographing the family and getting some great shots of such happy fun faces!  I updated my blog with a Photography Fun page and put my own picture taking a picture of me with my Nikon D300s camera.   Nice shot too if I must admit myself!   :)

So here are my initial selections for "faces" on Trendy Treehouse - Shutterlove Photo Challenge

"Young Love"

 "Teamwork - Getting in on the water gun fight!"

And a true classic of Lucas off the top of the rope swing:

"Cowabunga!"

Fourth of July: Our Nation's Bird

We have been spending our time on the Connecticut River on our boat and the fourth of July was spent with family and friends.  There were not a lot of red white and blue outfits or parades, just a bunch of people having fun, grilling on the backside of their party barges and spending time with their kids jumping off the back of the boats, tubing, skiing and jet skiing on the river.  Here is the post to our adventure ----->

But what we did see is our favorite bird - the bald eagle - "Our Nation's Bird" - She flies in the same area that we dock and I was able to get these shots of her with my 18/300 zoom Nikon lens.  I love the zoom and sometimes use it as binoculars alone.  :)  It was so tough to get close enough to get any kind of photo and now I know why the sport photographers have the "mega" zooms on their cameras.

Above is my favorite - I think mainly because you can feel her strength and determination - and below I have a couple below that would have been perfect if they were just a little clearer and closer.

I hope you like these photos --- they seem to give a sense of peace from a once almost extinct bird with such strength & beauty.

 High in the sky 

And away to fields....  I love how you can see the large wing span in this photo.

Shutter Love Tuesdays - "Twister!"

Twister!  I love this top photo of the Twister game on the track at the high school here in town.  Schuyler had such a great end of school year --- this was the epitome of it all!  Submitting it for the Shutter Love Tuesday Photo competition - a fun weekly place to submit your great photos.  See the link at the bottom of the page through their button. 


Here is more info on the event:
CBS coverage of the Twister World Record
Inreport coverage of the Largest Twister Mat in the World!




This is another favorite - I got so many incredible shots that day!  

Here is one of Mrs. Niquette and some of Schuyler's 2nd grade classmates.  I made an iMovie for the last day of school of a bunch of the photos from that day!  It was so fun to see their faces when their picture was on the big screen!  

Have a Happy, Fun & Safe Summer!