It's rainy and dreary today... I want to see the sun again!! So here's a few pictures that I took last weekend in the SUN!!!

I love this picture of Robin. I had to lay down in the nice warm dry grass with him to get this shot.

And Frank... watching Betty...

Betty... watching Frank... wondering if she needs to go pound on him a bit for staring at her. LOL

Fun Match

We went to an agility fun match today at Tammy and Bill's - these are a few of my favorite shots. The weather was great (even if it was VERY windy!).

Tammy decided that once was not enough - she wanted to run another 5K. (doesn't it take 27 times for something to become a habit?). So off we went to the Marion Arts Festival and their 5K. This is Tammy (in the middle) with a couple of her co-workers (all of them looking quite happy before the race).

This guy was across from the start... my advice? WALK - running is too much work!!
So... here we are at the start - how am I going to find Tammy in this mess???

Ah... here she is (in the middle of the picture in light orange):

Then we walked (very fast!) a few blocks down to a point in the race to get a few more shots... who knew former President Clinton was running?!?!?
Here she is at last!!! Now we can go back up the hill to the start/finish and wait for Tammy so we can EAT!!!It looks like they went to some blow-up place to get their finish - can't miss this one!! See the guy in the red hat? That's Dwayne (or is it Duane?) - another one of Tammy's co-workers. He RAN all the way from the southeast side to watch the race and then he was going to RUN all the way back home after!! Runners are NUTS!! LOL
Here she is again finishing the race. Dawn - this is for you - she doesn't look as happy as the first race, so she was REALLY running hard!!! Tammy was awesome and finished in an even 27 minutes!! Atta girl!!!

What is a Phoenix?

This is the definition from Wikipedia: A phoenix is a mythical bird with beautiful gold and red plumage. At the end of its life-cycle the phoenix builds itself a nest of cinnamon twigs that it then ignites; both nest and bird burn fiercely and are reduced to ashes, from which a new, young phoenix arises. Hmmm... well, I don't know about nest building, but Phoenix is a beautiful gold and red and the camera liked him tonight!!

Georgie, Jazz and Tootsie managed to get a little camera time too.

Watch the ball...

Guess what? No dogs!! LOL. We went to Mandi's soccer game today. It was overcast and chilly - I can't believe all those girls were wearing shorts!! I was sensible - turtleneck, hoodie sweatshirt, fleece vest and pullover jacket! I was NOT cold!! It was fun to shoot at people - these are a few of my favorites - I took over 150 shots!

I love this series of her kicking the ball...

You've been shot!!!

Ok... not with a gun, but I'll bet Topper sure thought he was being shot at! I was at agility class again trying to get some shots of the dogs and Brian went along with his camera, so the dogs had the two of us "shooting at them". Talk about a drive-by!! LOL. It's good practice for us and a good distraction for the dogs since there will be photographers at the agility trials. It was (once again!!) very overcast tonight at class, but I messed with my settings a bit and got a few shots that I really like. Georgie's pic is the only one that I really messed with in CS3 - lightened up those shadows a bit. So this is Topper:

Jazz (I am getting good at telling all those white dogs apart!):
Georgie:
Tootsie:
Rufus:
Phoenix:

A few weekend photos...

Well, there wasn't anything too exciting going on during the week, but this weekend, I did manage to get a few shots. Yesterday, the Tulips were FINALLY in bloom. I love the color.

Last night, Brian asked if I wanted to go out this morning to take some pictures. It really didn't start out all that great - OBVIOUSLY someone has a dietary issue...

Can't really see it you say??? How's this? YUCK!!! Someone needs to bulk up their diet!!!

Anyway... on to more pleasant things. We started out going to Palisades (I am really really sure this was Brian's idea!! LOL). There was not much going on, except at the creepy house on the cliff... do you see it?

Here's a closer look - there are FIVE Turkey Vultures sunning themselves on the roof of the creepy house. I wanted them to fly so I could get some shots, but they were way too lazy. Selfish birds.

Then we decided to head to the Wikiup to see what was going on there... I am not sure how well you can see it online, but the goose on the right is totally shaking off a ton of water.

There were HUNDREDS of these little birds flying around. They were like ping pong balls on speed. I am not sure what they were, but JL they were FAST! I took about a hundred photos just trying to get SOMETHING in focus and managed to get a couple shots of them. I think birds are not my thing... I am gonig to become a professional turtle photographer!

Now this is more my speed. This little frog was just sunning itself on the decking at the pond - probably tired from watching all those little birds!

Then, on the way out I spotted this snake (ok... I better fess up since Brian reads my blog - HE spotted the snake!).