Cat's Eye View

The One with the Water Lilies

2011-05-17T11:13:00.000-07:00

While I was out taking Gemma's one-year photos (and being attacked by vicious bugs), I snapped a couple of photos of some water lilies:

The One With Gemma's One-Year Photo Shoot

2011-05-16T04:57:00.000-07:00

After a lot of debate, we decided that I would do Gemma's one-year photos rather than us taking her to a studio or hiring a photographer. The pictures turned out great - we were very pleased with the result. Unfortunately I had a incident with a bug while out snapping photos that resulted in a trip to urgent care and an injection, but oh well, the pictures were worth it!

The One at Middleton Place (2011)

2011-04-14T08:44:00.000-07:00

I realized after we got back from Middleton that unfortunately I had forgotten to change my ISO setting from the last time I shot and a lot of my pictures were really washed out. Some of them turned out okay though, so posting the non-ruined ones here.

The One at the Zoo (2011)

2011-04-06T06:13:00.000-07:00

Took Gemma on her first trip to the zoo and got a few really great pictures while there:

The One with the Macro Extension Tubes

2011-03-29T07:01:00.000-07:00

Inspired by my photography class, I ordered a bunch of accessories for my camera, including a set of extension tubes that would essentially convert my wide-angle lens into a macro lens and allow me to take extreme close-ups. Here are some photos I took while experimenting with my extension tubes:

The One with the Supermoon

2011-03-24T04:19:00.000-07:00

...sort of. I didn't take any pictures of the super moon until a day or so later, when it wasn't as super. Also I am still learning how to manage my own camera settings, so the pictures didn't turn out the greatest. It was a bonus, however, when I realized I did in fact own a tripod (a random old one found in my husband's grandmother's house after she passed away) and that it worked with my camera.

The One with the Digital Photography Class

2011-03-23T14:15:00.000-07:00

I took a fairly basic day-long digital photography class at Trident Technical College over the weekend. I definitely learned some things, so hopefully I can put them to good use producing some photos for this blog. Below are a couple of shots I took while doing my "homework" for the class during our lunch break.

The One on March 7 (very creative, I know)

2011-03-07T12:20:00.000-08:00

These probably look exactly like a lot of my other photos because I don't get out too much these days. Oh well.

The One on Valentine's Day 2011

2011-02-14T17:03:00.000-08:00

The One with the Surprise Cupcake

2011-02-05T09:19:00.000-08:00

Cy surprised me the other afternoon with this delicious red velvet cupcake from Cupcake. It looked so delicious I had to snap a photo of it!

The One with Black and White Christmas Photos

2011-01-05T12:22:00.000-08:00

The One at Shem Creek

2010-09-28T04:09:00.001-07:00

Snapped a couple of nice pictures of the sunset over Shem Creek at Vickery's last week.

The One on Broad Street

2010-09-20T08:34:00.000-07:00

Gemma and I wandered around Broad Street over the weekend while Cy got his haircut. It was fun, but super hot out still. When I looked back over these pictures, for some reason, the music from The Pillars of the Earth started going through my head. . .

The One at the Lake

2010-09-13T09:11:00.001-07:00

The One at the Park Formerly Known as Sunrise Park

2010-09-07T11:18:00.000-07:00

The One at Brittle Bank Park

2010-09-05T07:44:00.000-07:00

The One on and around the Battery

2010-08-21T13:08:00.001-07:00

The One with the Crape Myrtle

2010-07-26T07:13:00.002-07:00

2010-07-26T07:13:00.001-07:00

The One with Church, Queen, and Chalmers Streets

2010-07-10T15:05:00.000-07:00

The One with the Edited Photos

2010-07-02T07:36:00.000-07:00

At long last, I am posting some new photos that I took today. I finally was brave enough to drag my camera along while taking Gemma for a walk this morning. I was only brave enough to wander through my neighborhood, however, so some of these photos are fairly similar to ones I have already taken. I am hoping to branch out further from home here soon. To spice this post up a bit, I tried out some different settings on my camera. I also used iPhoto to edit and retouch some of the photos I took today. As you will see, I was loving the blurred edge effect. . .maybe a little too much actually. Anyway, here are the final edited versions of photos from this morning's walk.

The One (and probably the first of many) with Gemma

2010-05-27T06:18:00.000-07:00

I haven't had much time for *artsy* photography lately due to the arrival of Gemma Natalie Shealy on May 7. However, my camera has been getting more use than ever, also due to arrival of Gemma. So as a compromise, I'm posting a couple of the more artsy photos I've taken of the little baby girl. I'm planning to do a black & white photo shoot of her sometime soon (assuming I get up the energy to do so), so maybe this blog will have another post sometime soon. Doubtful.

I added this last picture because it's just hilarious.

The One Where We Plant Some Flowers

2010-04-21T08:41:00.000-07:00

I guess we decided we didn't have enough projects to do with a baby coming at any moment, so we randomly decided to plant a bunch of flowers last night! I went ahead and snapped a few pics this morning, hoping to catch them before they all die, which is likely to happen at any moment as well. But for now they look really pretty!

The One at Old St. Andrews Parish Church

2010-04-17T07:35:00.001-07:00

The One at the Beach

2010-04-05T12:52:00.001-07:00

We went for a walk out at Sullivan's Island this morning and enjoyed the nice weather and I got the chance to snap a few photos.

The One with the Roses

2010-04-01T05:08:00.000-07:00

Our pink roses (which, like Melman, we also thought were dead) have started blooming this week. We've realized that only pink plants seem to survive at our house (which of course, I am okay with).

The One with the Weird Pond

2010-03-26T12:40:00.000-07:00

There is this totally weird looking pond at the very front of our neighborhood that has these horrible looking trees sprouting up out of the water for no apparent reason. I hate those trees; they drive the OCD part of me insane. But I was bored and looking for a new photography spot, so I headed over there for a while this afternoon. I got some surprisingly good photos despite the crappiness of the pond.

The One with the Swamp

2010-03-23T11:54:00.000-07:00

I thought about calling this one "The One Where I Exercise Bad Judgment and Wander Around in a Random Swamp," which would be a more appropriate title, but that was just too long. So I will just put a disclaimer. I was bored and feeling hormonal, so I decided to cheer myself up by going to take a few pictures. I had seen this really pretty tree up the street with pink blooms, so I planned for just a short walk to get some pictures of the tree. Since I was planning on a short walk, I didn't bother to change out of my flip flops (and these weren't even my good Rainbows; these were my rubber & cloth SC flops). After I hit up the tree, I decided to scope out the pond for ducks since I had the bigger lens on my camera today, and the pond was only a bit further. As I was at the pond, I noticed a path winding through the swamp. I figured, hey, why not, so I started walking down it. Like I said, probably not the smartest idea for several reasons: a) I'm wearing really flimsy flip flops, b) I don't have my cell and no one knows where I am, c) I don't really even know where I am having never been through this random swamp before, and d) I'm ginormously pregnant. Ignoring all of this, I plow my way through the swamp. It ended up being really awesome and I took about 200 pictures, most of which turned out really great, so either I'm going to have to be really choosy about what I post here, or I'm just going to be posting swamp pictures pretty much every day for the next month. The craziest part of the whole thing was when I got all the way to the end of the path through the swamp and it opened up into this huge, gorgeous pond. I felt like I had wandered into Narnia or something (except post-White-Witch, as it fortunately was not winter there). Anyway, I give you my swamp photos (I promise they are better than that sounds)!

The One Where Melman is Pink, Part 2

2010-03-22T04:34:00.000-07:00

The One Where Melman is Pink

2010-03-18T07:16:00.000-07:00

Last night, I discovered that our Jane Magnolia tree (whose name happens to be Melman - click here for the full back story) was covered in gorgeous pinkish purple blooms!

The One Where I Make Fun of LOST

2010-03-09T04:43:00.000-08:00

MAJOR THEMES/MOTIFS:

Flight 815. . .CRASH. . .BURN. . .

The Statue. What lies beneath the shadow of the statue? Apparently my bathroom sink does.

What's this polar bear doing on the island?

The Hatch:
The Smoke Monster. . .ahh! Run for your lives! It's making that terrifying clicking noise!

SOME RANDOM CHARACTERS:

Keamy: "I make good eggs". . . okay, dude, whatever. No one cares.

Shannon: Remember her? Yeah, neither do I.

Christian Shephard:

Jin:

Richard Alpert:

Charlie:
Hurley: (It's not Mr. Cluck's, but it was in my freezer)
Locke:

The One with the Diabetic Diet Food

2010-03-01T16:09:00.000-08:00

The One with All the Books

2010-02-23T10:27:00.000-08:00

The One with Random Baked Goods and Food

2010-02-21T13:13:00.001-08:00

Blueberry muffins

Homemade Banana Bread

Ahh. . .delicious Cadbury mini eggs!

Thought the way the light was hitting this chair was kind of cool.

Various potatoes

The One on Valentine's Day

2010-02-14T11:09:00.000-08:00

Since today is officially Valentine's Day, I decided to try to do some "Valentiney" photos. We are not actually celebrating until tomorrow, due to my recent illness and because we didn't make any plans until yesterday (mostly due to said illness) and the fondue place was totally booked for tonight. Anyway. . .one of the featured subjects for today's shoot is my Get-Well-Valentine's-Puppy from the hospital gift shop (he serves a variety of purposes).

The One with the Snow

2010-02-13T05:58:00.000-08:00

Cy and I were incredibly skeptical, but the rumors about the snow came true! We got several inches last night. . .in Charleston! I dragged poor Cy out this morning to take a few pictures.

The One with a Chick and a Duck. . .or Two Ducks, Actually

2010-02-03T15:10:00.000-08:00

Some beautiful flowers that Cy bought me. :)
Various swamps/ponds around the neighborhood.

The one with two ducks.

A random candle.

The One with All the Shoes

2010-01-30T07:15:00.001-08:00

Yes, right now I am really overzealous with the posting. I'm sure that will slow down a lot pretty quickly. It is pouring down rain and Cy and Frank are working on the baby's room so today's photography subject is. . .shoes! One thing I learned from today's attempt (aside from the fact that I need better lighting): I have way too many pairs of shoes!!! (I actually have at least twice as many as those featured here.)

My red Converse shoes with my diploma.

The shoes from my wedding, with a bit of veil thrown over them.

I thought the leopard print bear looked pretty cute wearing my zebra print flats.

A rogue espadrille!

The One with the Lost St. Lucia Photos

2010-01-30T06:00:00.001-08:00

Yesterday I managed to hack my broken MacBook and access the lost OS X file from Windows. This was huge - I was able to retrieve all my lost photos (notably, all the pictures from St. Lucia), some music, and a bunch of writing assignments from undergrad that I don't really care if I ever look at again. But I was pumped about the St. Lucia photos, which are now backed up in several places on various machines. Here are a few of my favorites from that trip (the first of three trips to the Caribbean, and the only one we actually enjoyed):

The One with the Dismal Day

2010-01-30T04:41:00.000-08:00

Yesterday Cy and I wanted to go for a walk around our neighborhood after he got home from work, so I decided to wait until then to do some photography. Unfortunately, by the time he got home, the sky was extremely overcast, so I decided to shoot in black and white again. It was also freezing, so I only managed to get a few photos.This last one was my favorite from yesterday. It was the most unique at least - the upside down reflection of a tree in a pond. Kind of cool.

The One with a Few More Oldies But Goodies

2010-01-29T05:33:00.000-08:00

I found a few more older photos in a random folder out on my network drive. Sadly, the photos from St. Lucia may be lost forever. If I can somehow manage to retrieve them from the hard drive of my broken MacBook, I will back them up in about sixty different places and post the best ones here. I've been on a roll with fixing electronic devices as of late, so I'll give it a shot and see what I can do. But for now, here are a few more oldies but goodies:

I have a black and white print of the above (spiral stairwell at Wentworth Mansion) hanging on one of my walls and I think I am partial to the black and white actually.

The One Around the House

2010-01-28T16:26:00.000-08:00

Okay, so since I just came up with this *brilliant* photography plan this afternoon and I actually had stuff to do today (surprising, I know), I didn't have time to do too much so I just did some shots of a few things around the house. A few minutes into it, I decided to experiment with some black and white photography (which I always enjoy - it looks so clean to me) and some funky angles. Below are the best shots from today. Maybe tomorrow I will come up with a more ambitious subject for a photo shoot.

The One with the Photo Sampler

2010-01-28T09:14:00.000-08:00

I really enjoy photography, but it's been a long time since I've been motivated to indulge in this hobby of mine. This morning, I saw that a friend of mine from college (who majored in art and is an infinitely better photographer than I can ever aspire to be) has a blog devoted to her photography. She keeps in practice by making herself take some photos every day, regardless of if it's just shots from around her house or if she deliberately chooses a setting for a shoot. Then she posts a selection of her photos on her blog every day. I thought this was a fantastic idea, and would be a way to get me motivated to take some pictures. We will see how long this lasts. . .I am sure my photography and my writing will taper off after the baby comes, but until then, I'm going to give it a shot (no pun intended).

I'm planning to do a bit today and maybe I'll post some new photos later, but for now I thought I'd start off with a selection of some of my favorite photos that I've taken over the past couple of years.