Adventures in... Carman?

Today, we decided to drive out to Carman to bring my Grandma to Aunt Verna's home for a visit. We planned to visit as well, but figured we'd let them be for a little bit- that way they could talk in Low German without feeling like anyone was excluded from the conversation.

So off we went, driving around Carman. We headed to a park, King's Park, it sounded promising... Except it was more of a campground/fairground. Oh well, onwards!

We ending up parking on 2nd St. SE and started our wandering from there.

We could hear some rushing water and went to find the source. Of course, it was the Boyne River. There was quite a nice path all along the river. There were some small rapids -the source of the rushing water.

As we ventured further into the forest, a small furry creature came bounding towards us. It was a very happy, friendly grey cat. It ended up accompanying us along the entire trail.

(This was its "You shall not pass" pose)

Everything looked so beautifully lush and green.

The forest floor was covered with moss, Creeping Charlie, and small white flowers.

There were also interesting fungi on some of the fallen trees.

It was such a nice little gem of trail to find. I could have kept going. I was kind of curious where the trail would end, but it was time to head back. When we got back, we were treated to some Faspa- sausage, buns, tea, muffins, and rhubarb cake.

Here's one last photo, we were parked near this building. What can I say, I have a bit of a weakness for photographing brick. I love the contrast, especially when viewing this photo with all the green ones above.

Ramblings

So I haven't exactly been super awesome about updating the blog. I'm sure that's okay though, since there's not exactly a huge following.

This weekend was somewhat of a roller coaster, weather wise. Friday I got home from work just after 2:00, after a lovely 20 minute walk home from the bus stop. You know that wonderful feeling of sunshine on your face, a warm breeze, and that almost humid fresh smell. That's what it was like on Friday. I had caught a glimpse of the upcoming forecast, so I figured I'd best make the most of it. Off I went into the backyard and had a bit of a rest on the swing. Nothing quite refreshes you, like beautiful weather!

Saturday came around and it was rainy. I went out with Tamara to do a few errands. Every time we were between destinations, the rain got harder. And of course, some time early Sunday morning, that rain turned into snow. Sigh... we just couldn't have a May without a little bit of snow. At least it happened on a Sunday, so it won't screw up traffic flow too much.

May was going to be a month where I followed a challenge set up by a co-worker. She was challenging people to be Vegan for one month. It was set up as a "see how it makes you feel, health-wise/trying a lifestyle before rejecting it" type challenge. At first I was all for it, then I thought, maybe I can just try Vegetarianism for the month, and then I figured out that unfortunately it wouldn't quite work. The easiest way to make life-altering changes (even short term ones) is when you don't have to work/force other people into it. We've got a good dynamic of everyone sharing with meal preparation. It's hard to suddenly bring about something as drastic as Veganism or Vegetarianism. I don't want to encourage food waste, and I really don't like the idea of having 2 separate meals planned all the time. And yes, I'm aware that you can make some meat-free dishes, and then cook some meat on the side. BUT- they wouldn't really be properly balanced for one group. . You can't just make 1 meat dish, 1 protein dish, 1 starch, and 1 vegetable dish. It's not that simple!

I figure I might try the challenge eventually, when I don't need to worry about inconveniencing others. In the meantime, I'm trying doing little things. My morning muesli I take with soy milk, instead of milk (it actually tastes better too!). I am trying to cut down on cheese. Given the choice between yogurt and cheese, I'm actually leaning towards keeping the yogurt. I am still going to try to incorporate 2 vegetarian days a week. We'll see how that goes....

The first 36 days

So, despite saying I wouldn't do a Project 365, I decided to anyway. I have to admit, it's getting kind of hard finding something new, interesting and inspiring to take a photograph! When you don't go out all the time and you don't have little ones to take photos of, it can get a bit dull. I think it's also because it's the middle of winter. There's only so much snow one can capture, and there haven't been very many pretty days. I am still just itching for a hoar frost where I have the day free to go to St. Vital Park. The last time it frosted, I had to work in the morning!

So here is a small glimpse into what the first 36 days of 2011 looked like...

In case you're wondering what these are:

Row 1: Glitter, Candles, Salad, Tiara, Domo, Bathroom Lights

Row 2: Corkscrew, Tea, Snow, Ice Block, Presents, Tea pot

Row 3: Bananas, Toy Story Characters, Footprints, Sunrise, Light Streaks, Water Droplets

Row 4: Dripping Faucet, Window Frost, Water drops, Book, Baubles, Keyboard

Row 5: Numbers, Strawberry, Hoar Frost, Cat, Legislative Building, Dishes

Row 6: Flame, Jessie, Sign, Boots, Chocolate, Ribbon

I ended up getting myself a macro lens. I figured I was going to buy it sometime this year anyway, might as well get it sooner than later (especially with the rumour that Canon lens prices were increasing.) So you may notice there's quite the macro theme to my shots. 

You know it's cold out...

When you look outside and see this:

Once I eventually ventured outside I saw that there were actually multiple sun dogs. On the left side of the sun, there was a second prism farther out.

It's kind of funny, until I actually look at a picture like this, I tend to forgot that the sun really doesn't get very high during the winter. It pretty much stays at this level throughout the day. This photo was taken at 11:43AM, so the sun had already been up for 3 hours. I'm just so accustomed to it, that I never really think about it. I've lived here my whole life, it's just the way it is: 8 hours of day in the winter and 16 hours of day in the summer. As I've started to take more photographs, I've started to think more about light. And you can't really think about light without considering the sun. That's when you start to have those blatantly obvious thoughts, like "Right, the sun is only directly overhead when I'm trying to take photos of summer flowers in the backyard" or "It's so much easier to get a good sunrise or sunset picture from the south side of the house in the winter because the sun's route is that much shorter".

I've decided I'm going to do my own Project 52 of sorts. I saw one group one Flickr that gives a weekly topic, so I may participate in that one. I may also do a second project that doesn't have any particular theme, other than to have fun and try and become better at photography. I had waffled over the idea of doing Project 365, but that's just too much work at this point.