Wheww.....

The month of October

is almost gone.

We have had so much to watch these past few weeks.

This is our backyard.

Our lake is now cleaned out with a new berm built.  

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Here is where I sit, looking out my dining room window. They will be hydro-seeding it sometime next week and then thehubs will be planting trees and bushes.

The excavation crew is also in our front yard building a new pond and using the black dirt to line our new berm on the old lake. We will miss watching them work, but then our work begins.

Trees and bushes to plant, and patios to build.

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It's Halloweanie time here in the Ozarks and we are ready to pretend, play and just have fun. Thehubs has his masks that he wears when he chases all of us in our golf carts. In the past I have been a witch, gypsie, cowgirl, and even attempted to be a Michael Jackson one year. I think this year I will be a post-menopausal woman with bad knees... yep, that will be me.

Have fun, act a bit silly and eat some candy!

My Interpretation of Still Life

I procrastinated. 

I kept putting it off.  

I'm not sure why, just did.

Until this morning.

Then I had a deadline, 

a "do it or lose it" situation, 

and it got me charged up and ready.

This month's 
A Personal Photo Challenge
was - Still Life.

What is "Still Life"?

I didn't even know.

I have never studied art or photography. 

So I googled it.

It felt so me.

I would have to control everything,

the light, position, angle, background and subject.

I LIKE control...

Here is my INTERPRETATION.

The photos below are from the same original,

both edited in Picmonkey.

Love and Marriage

I set up my tripod, positioned the Bible and rings. I brought in a lamp and turned on the over head lights. I even went out to the garage and found 2 LED flashlights to get the sparkle I wanted. I used the food setting on my Nikon Cool Pix and kept moving the flashlights around as I snapped photos playing with sparkles and shadows. In Picmonkey from the basic edits menu, I played around with Exposure settings and also a little sharpening. Then I went to the Effects menu and played with Focal Soften and Frost. It was fun seeing what all of the features do.

Rings and Scripture

Same photo, only in Picmonkey, from the Effects menu, I played around with Black and White, Radiance, and the HDR features.

I had fun doing this project!

As life goes...

Life here in Southwest Missouri has been filled with Fall Festivals, cooler weather and rain. Our little community out here in the country is going through some changes. We have had lots of conversation about how and where we want the changes to happen. That is one thing we do well, working together.  My brain has been in a fog lately and when I sat down at my laptop to write, there was nothing there. My writing was empty. A change in medication is some to blame and I am still working on that. Since my neck surgery I am happy to say I haven't needed it!