perfection.

i already mentioned that my momma came in to town over the weekend for my pinning ceremony, but we got to spend the entire weekend together! i can't remember the last time i got to spend mother's day weekend with my momma. and it was perfection.

after the pinning ceremony and reception momma, austin, and i tried out community pie for some pizza for dinner. it was really good! we forgot that nightfall had started up for the summer so the whole downtown area was crazy and community pie is right smack dab in the center of nightfall. but we actually didn't have to wait for a table.

we considered trying out some of milk and honey's gelato, which they had at community pie, but instead we decided to go to one of my favorite places: dub's! {and here's people looking right and eating soft serve ice cream...}

saturday morning, momma and i went and got some delicious donuts from julie darling on the north shore. if you go there, please get the honey wheat donuts. especially if they have fresh, warm ones. but if not, a quick trip in the microwave is almost as good as fresh. omg. so good.

and then we went yard sale-ing! one of my favorite things to do. and although a lot of the sales were pretty unimpressive, we did manage to find a few things we just had to have. austin bought us a new cooler for when we go camping {2 bucks!} and i got some halloween decor. you can never have too much halloween decor, right? after exhausting all the yard sales we could find, we decided to head down to the saturday river market. and i got this cute little guy!

are you kidding me? he's the cutest little weenie dog i've ever seen! the guy there makes all kinds of creatures and designs from metal. momma got some really cute dragonfly stake things for out in the garden and their wings were made from old silver ware handles! i wish i had gotten a picture of them, but don't worry because i plan to buy some dragonflies of my own soon. and then i will share their cuteness. we then had lunch at the vine street market. i highly recommended this little sandwich shop and bakery, but it's not on vine street. so don't look there.

after some gardening, and perhaps a little nap, we got cleaned up to head to dinner with austin's mom and then we were off to the ballet.

then on sunday, on mother's day, i had a little surprise planned for my momma. thanks to bri and her husband i had a mother/daughter photoshoot planned. these next pictures are some that austin shot in the background, i'm anxiously awaiting the pictures from josh. i hope they turn out well!

after our picture session, it was time to grab some lunch at taziki's. and then i got baklava. i just couldn't pass it up. and it was delicious.

unfortunately, it was then that miserable time when momma had to head back home. even though we did so much {and ate SO much}, the weekend never seems long enough. but i am so incredibly happy that i got to spend mother's day with my amazing momma. i can't wait until she {and timmy!} makes the trip back down here. sooner, rather than later, i hope. love you, momma!

photo project three.

this week in photography, we presented our third project. for this assignment, the teacher wanted us to move away from taking pictures of people or things, and instead to focus on photographing light, shape, form or textures. and this was kinda confusing to me. we looked at some photographers like kertesz, weston, and freidlander for inspiration.

so these are the seven pictures i presented, including one picture of a building in texas that i thought would apply to this project, even though i obviously didn't take it for this project.

exciting pictures? no. but abstract and emphasizing light/dark/shape/form? yes.

and the teacher really like the one of the building, the shadow of the bottles in the window and the bamboo with the shed.

so. yeah.

photo project three.

our third assignment was to play with depth of field a little bit. the teacher wanted us to present six photos in which we had some psychological reason for what we are focused on and why. if that makes sense. actually, it didn't seem to make sense to most of the class, because for the most part they just took pictures of objects up close and blurred the backgrounds.

although i'm not incredibly proud of any of these photos, i think i did an ok job of getting a reason for connecting or disconnecting the foreground and the background... maybe.

first, austin reading the paper. i always think how he's so intellectual, reading the paper and all. then he reads me his horoscope. and i laugh.

second, austin overlooking the mountain over in dunlap {at least i think it's dunlap}. i was trying to focus on the land that austin was looking at and not austin. my teacher didn't like that austin is so out of focus here. oops.

third, lunch. with austin in the background praying over the meal.

fourth, austin's obsession with lottery tickets. i don't think he won though...

fifth, austin and juliet talking. her little tail is just a-going.

and sixth, study time. except even when i'm so focused on school, i wouldn't want to be away from social networking for too long...

i told you none of these were all that interesting. the class got a good laugh out of the horoscope picture and the facebook one.

photo project two.

so our second assignment in photography was to take 24 pictures in 24 hours {or close to it} simply documenting a day in our lives. even though we took 24 exposures, we were then to select our top six choices to present to the class.

here are my six.

first, a kinda crazy picture i got of a grasshopper flying in the air. it's kind of hard to see that it is a grasshopper, but it is.

second, mr. dinger giving me an evil, get-that-big-camera-out-of-my-face look.

third, juliet frolicking through the yard after getting a bath.

fourth, austin. he's wasn't feeling very good, but he let me take his picture anyway.

sixth, some fake hydrangeas i have in our spare bedroom.

and lastly, juliet asking for a belly rub and showing her teeth all at the same. typical.

not very exciting pictures, i know. but typical of a 24-hour period of my life.

photo project one.

since my PTA class schedule doesn't make me full time, i'm taking a digital photography class to reach full-time status {ok, and maybe i just reeeallly wanted to take photography}. so i think that i might share my pictures that i present in class, just for fun.

so our first assignment was to find a couple of pictures we had previously taken that we really liked, for whatever reason. so i picked these three.

first, my julie boo. i just love this picture. down on her level, focused in on her pretty little face, but you can see her little tail wagging {because she loves me, duh}.

second, sophie and juliet in my parents front yard. i love this picture, even more now than before. the two of them were best friends and this picture just shows it. two friends hanging out, enjoying the scenery and chatting about their days. juliet and i both miss sushi very, very, very much.

and lastly, this picture of the arbor vitae on the trail to the natural bridge i took when austin and i went with mom and timmy. i like the texture of the bark and how the angle of this picture shows just how huge the tree really is.

critiques on this first project were minimal, but included a liking for the angles that these pictures show and using the camera at different levels to connect with the subjects in different ways.

when we presented these photos, we were given our next assignment of 24 pictures in 24 hours, documenting our day in photographs. i'll share the pictures i chose to present from that assignment soon.

nellie, part two.

you might remember back in march when austin and i joined the heards on a trip to nellie's big fish road and we just had another big adventure with nellie this weekend!

steve, gloria, taylor, ozzy and bailey made their way to the cabin on friday night and austin and i joined them early saturday morning after a few pit stops and adventures on the way.

for our first pit stop i needed a pair of shoes that i could wear hiking to the falls and tubing down the river. we stopped at academy sports+outdoors, even though it was about 7:45 in the morning, but we figured they would open at 8. and it's a good thing we got there when we did because acedemy was giving away $20 gift cards to the first 25 customers in line! austin and i each got our own gift cards and i used mine toward these bad boys.

sweetness, right? and $20 off? yes, please!

then on our way up the ocoee river, where all the rafters are, we saw some flashing lights that grabbed our attention. we then realized it was just about time for them to release the water from the dam into the upper ocoee, the area where the 1996 olympic rapids course is. so we pulled over and waited on one of the bridges to watch the water pour in.

i'm not sure how this picture turned out so terrible {i blame austin the overcast weather}, but here's me and juliet on the big bridge waiting for the water.

and here's a series of pictures showing the water coming down the river, it starts coming down the top left side of the picture.

and then the water on the down river side of the bridge before:

and after {and you can thank austin for the long exposure photo}:

we were really hoping some sort of wave would come rushing down the river, but it wasn't quite that dramatic. but it was still pretty cool to experience it.

when we finally got to the cabin, austin headed down to the river for a little bit of fishing.

then, after searching the entire county for some inner tubes, we all went tubing down the river, starting at the deep hole and getting out right in front of the cabin. of course, i don't have any pictures of tubing in order to protect my camera, but we all had fun floating down the river. the five minute road trip took about an hour in the floats!

i like to call this my bonnaroo outfit: a little bit of every thing. sundress coverup, bathing suit, and hiking sandals.

don't judge.

and then on sunday austin took me hiking to a waterfall! after about a thirty minute drive, we arrived at the base of the trail to fall branch falls.

i was worried that there might not be any water at the falls, but right at the bottom of the trail i found plenty of water running, so i knew it would be pretty when we got to the top!

after a short but straight up hike, we made it to the falls!

after getting some rest, splashing in the freezing cold water and taking a gazillion pictures, we headed back down the mountain and made our way back home. and that was our weekend at nellie's big fish road!

i hope you all had a great weekend, too!