Camera crazy

Last night I was as goofy as a kid on a candy high. I found out that the nearby country club was going to shoot off fireworks and that we should have an incredible view of them from our house.

I love fireworks. Just love 'em. And as a bonus, I decided to try to photograph them.

I pulled out a "shooting fireworks" article that I had saved in my photography tip book. The article was by Candice Stringham and it was written for the July 2008 Creating Keepsakes magazine. I set my camera on a tripod, switched to manual focus and set the aperture at f/16. I hunted up my camera manual to see how to set my camera for the "bulb" shutter speed setting per the article instructions.

I ended up at a f/11 aperture and captured over 30 fun-filled shots. Karen was tickled at hearing my little gasps of delight at both watching the fireworks and shooting them. I won't bore you with all 30 pictures (although I kind of want to), instead I'll give you four of my favorites.









I don't know if it was all of the excitement or too much coffee or what but I had horrible insomnia last night. This morning, as I slogged out of bed, I didn't know if I had the energy to take Kylie to the beach like I normally do on Sunday mornings. But I managed to get us both ready. I was certain that I didn't feel like taking the camera with us. But something niggled at me and I ended up putting the camera into our stroller.

When I stepped out of our door, I could hear the waves crashing--really crashing loudly. As we walked toward the ocean I saw a larger-than-usual amount of surfers speed by. I thought to myself, "Wow, if the waves are doing that, I wonder if we are going to be able to play." When we walked over the bridge to the ocean, I was half expecting to tell Kylie that we would have to go home. Instead, I saw the most incredible sky.

A breath-taking sky.


And the sand was so reflective it seemed that Kylie was walking on clouds.

And I thanked the heavens that I had my camera.

There was tons of seafoam (or sea bubbles as Kylie calls them) and within the foam there were all these amazing colors. I ran around like crazy taking pictures of it.

And then Kylie and I found this little guy.


A surfer dude was walking by right when Kylie was asking, "What is it? What is it?" So I said, "Hey Surfer Dude! Do you know what this is?" Surfer dude picked it right up and said, "I think it is a jellyfish but it won't sting ya." We exchanged "Wow, cools!" I got brave and touched the little thing and then held it up to the sky for a shot.


Then I asked him if he knew what these things were.

He laughed and said he had no clue but they were everywhere this morning. He speculated they were sucker-like aliens sent to destroy humankind. I laughed and backed slowly away from the surfer dude.

After he left, I felt brave again and picked one up. So if any of my readers know what this is, please let me know. It felt like a membrane or like fish-skin.


After picking up various beach things and photographing them avidly, I noticed that many of my beach-combing neighbors sitting in their nearby beach chairs were looking at me funny. Sort of a "what-the-heck-is-she-doing" and "why-is-she-so-excited" look on their faces.

I smiled and took a few more shots of Kylie and a few shots of the hunky lifeguard and burly runners.


The beach-combers smiled and nodded their heads as if they were thinking, "Oh she's all right then."

I chuckled softly to myself and thought, "Dudes, you have no idea."