Queen Anne's Lace

Queen Anne's Lace with a hard light layer added in Photoshop.

A train part 2

The train again, but different.

A train

The girl

A pink wildflower

Another wildflower in a meadow.

A bear

A bear who lives at the Maine Wildlife Park.

End of a season

Edited to add: I forgot to mention that my dad and stepmom are flying home to Florida tomorrow. I'll miss them so much, but I'm happy that he's doing well and they can go home to their own comfy house and routines.

Another baseball season has come to an end for my son. Only three weeks 'til football season!

Baxter's haircut

The only photos I've taken in the last two days are of Baxter because he got groomed for the first time so here's another, "Hey, look at my dog" post. Baxter is kind of fun for practicing metering on because I get hugely different results metering off his nose versus his black fur. I was too lazy to fix his blown-out nose here.

More black-eyed Susans, and my tummy hurts

Note to self: when your belly hurts and gets increasingly painful over the next 20 hours to the point that you can't go about your daily activities, it's not just gas. :-P After a seven-hour visit to the ER yesterday, multiple tests, and a prescription for Vicodin, I'm feeling much better. Nothing too exciting, and I'll try not to bore you with TMI details, but as my dad and brother would say, "It was a lady thing." So tonight I just have more of my black-eyed Susans:
As Pat suggested, I tried the same processing on this shot as I did in my barn shot from last week:

Black-eyed Susans

Canon 40D with 100mm macro lens
ISO400 F7.1 SS1/250

Petunias

I love the word petunia.

Might as well jump

DD triple jumping:Thanks for asking about my dad--I haven't been around "blogland" much this week so I haven't given an update. He's recovering well and goes for a follow-up visit on Wednesday and will discuss his return to Florida then. I haven't been around much for posting and commenting because we're busy with visiting, baseball, track (as seen above) and generally just being outside as much as possible during our short Maine summer.

Yellow dragonfly

Barn in a meadow

My only landscape photo this week:
Because I can't leave well enough alone:

Purple wildflowers

I love wildflowers in meadows. I think this is a Canada thistle.

Canon 40D with 70-300mm lens at 300mm

ISO400 F5.6 SS1/1600

Red berries

Canon 40D with 100mm macro lens
ISO400 F5.0 SS1/320

Friends, I got peed on last night. I was standing in line to buy ice cream for my kids and felt a splash on the back of my (bare) legs. I turned around and saw that the cute little girl behind me had wet her pants rather forcefully. I didn't want to make her feel ashamed so I didn't yell, "Hey man, I'm not into water sports." This has nothing to do with my photo; I just wanted to share. How often do you get peed on when you go get ice cream? Wait, don't answer that.

Black groundhog

I kept expecting this guy to bust a move a la Caddyshack.

Flower

My dad got released from the hospital today!
I haven't posted a flower shot in awhile. This one reminds me of the way I used to draw and color the sun when I was little.

Canon 40D with 100mm macro lens

ISO400 F3.2 SS1/1000
Boosted contrast, sharpened for web

a la cart

Canon 40D w/100mm lens
ISO400 F10 SS1/30
Sepia action, burned edges, added noise

A cute pair of hoots

Do you think I'll get any hits from creepo searchers with this post title? I went on a little field trip to the Maine Wildlife Park back on July 1 and am getting around to editing some more of my photos. Darn those chain-link fences for getting in the way of my shots. Usually with chain link I put the end of my lens right in one of the holes, but there were two layers of chain link between me and all the animals, so I backed up, zoomed in, and used manual focus to try to get the chain link as out of focus as I could and the birds as in focus as I could. Any hints for me on a better way to go about it? I also think it could use a trip through Noiseware. What do you think?

Thank you

Thank you all for the prayers and well wishes for my dad and the rest of our family. He came through the surgery really well! We're hopeful he'll be released from the hospital on Saturday. They were originally scheduled to fly home to Florida on Sunday, but they'll be around for a couple of more weeks.

I haven't been taking many photos, but here's a toadstool from my yard sometime last week:

A nice view from a bad location

What's this? The view from my dad's hospital room, unfortunately. As I've mentioned, my dad has been here in Maine since mid-June for a visit from Florida. He has multiple medical problems. On the 4th of July we had a BBQ at my house, then later Dad ended up in the ER with a heart attack (his fourth), congestive heart failure, and pulmonary edema. He has been in the hospital since that time and is scheduled for surgery in the morning to have a defibrillator placed. Your prayers and good wishes would be appreciated by our whole family.

Another fireworks attempt

Fireworks

My first attempt at a fireworks photo:

Canon 40D with 24-70mm lens at 30mm, tripod mounted
ISO100 F14 SS3seconds (bulb mode)

Peacock

Canon 40D with 70-300mm lens at 300mm
ISO400 F5.6 SS1/100

4th of July

Happy Independence Day from this young bald eagle, who is currently rehabbing at the Maine Wildlife Park. The focus fell on his feathers instead of his face, but I decided to put him up anyway since he's on theme (or maybe ihe's a her).

Hi there

Canon 40D with 70-300mm lens at 300mm
ISO400 F5.6 SS1/400
Auto white balance

Track Ribbons

DD received her ribbons from her first summer track meet, and I realized they fit the theme, being red, white, and blue.
Here she is doing discus for the first time (the first place ribbon):
And the 1500-meter race for the first (and she says last LOL) time. She got the second place ribbon for that one:
The third place ribbon was for the 100-meter race. I didn't get a photo of her in that race because she's so speedy. :-D