Month: June 2011

One week until BOLO 2011!

Did you hire your babysitter and mark your calendar? The bloggy social event of the season is only a week away!

Yes, next Thursday is Blog Out Loud Ottawa, and you don’t want to miss it! Lynn has been teasing us for weeks by releasing details of each of the 20 local bloggers who will take to the stage to read a favourite post from the last year, and I’m beyond delighted to be one of them!! (Isn’t that description about the most lovely thing you could ever imagine reading about yourself? I’m still blushing!)

This will be the third year I’ve attended BOLO, and I can tell you that they get exponentially better and more fun each year. After seeing who my fellow readers will be, I can barely stand to wait seven more sleeps. BOLO 2011 is going to blow the doors off the Prescott!

Will I see you there?

Mothership Photography: Perfect Porch Manotick Mini-Sessions!!

I am so excited about this!!

I’ve been wanting to offer summer mini-sessions, but I have been waffling over the location. I wanted a location that was unique, accessible, interesting from a photographic perspective and most of all, filled with delicious light. It was my friend Christine who suggested the porch, after I posted my pictures of it last week.

Of course! The porch!! It’s big, it’s got great photogenic furniture, it’s covered in case of inclement weather, and the light is magnificent. See?

185:365 Porch party

So what’s a mini-session? Here’s what you can expect:

  • a 30-minute session on the porch and in the garden
  • 10 – 15 custom edited proofs to choose from
  • one 8 x 10 or two 5 x 7 prints
  • three high-resolution digital negatives
  • Cost is $100 (more than 50 per cent off my lowest portrait package!)

This is a great package for families, kids, teens, grads, or even engagement photos. Sessions are available the afternoon of Saturday July 9 or Sunday July 24. However, they are limited (the best light of the day is actually a pretty small window!) and it’s first come-first served! Contact me or send an e-mail to danicanada(@)gmail(dot)com to book your appointment today!

186:365 Porch week continues!

And! Since you’ve made the trip to Manotick, you might as well take a look around while you’re here. I’ll throw in a complimentary $5 gift card to Manotick’s My Toy Shop, snuggled down on Tighe Street between the Gingerbread Man and the HodgePodge Shoppe (with ice cream, coffee and antiques!!) That’s just a few steps down from Watson’s Mill and the used book sale in the carriage house, not to mention all the other fun and interesting things Manotick has to offer!

Don’t wait, book your Mothership Photography Perfect Porch Mini-Session in Manotick today! 🙂

Project 365: (the other) Willie and Kate

When we adopted Willie last weekend from the animal shelter, it wasn’t only because kittens make for excellent photo fodder. At least, that’s what I keep protesting. *wink* Truth be told, I’ve always been a dog person, and even though we’ve had cats for many years, I was unprepared for how quickly the little furball would endear himself to me! I’m only a few shutter clicks away from my official membership into the crazy cat lady club.

And hey, milestone fun this week – yesterday’s picture was 183 of 365, the half-way point. Hmmm, doesn’t seem nearly as momentous an achievement as it did the first time I did a 365 project. Maybe because I can’t really imagine *not* continuing this project for the foreseeable future?

I did manage to tear my lens away from the furball a few times this week, though. Last Sunday, we invited my parents over for a Father’s Day dinner, and then roasted a few marshmallows over the firepit as the perfect day descended into evening. The light as the boys played on the tire swing was magical, and something about this one epitomizes summer for me.

178:365 Summertime

After a long stretch of sunny, dry weather, we’ve had quite a few days of rain. I liked this picture and the raindrops a lot when I took it yesterday, but looking at it this morning only reminds me of the torrential downpours from last night that seem to have flooded something from our well and caused water to (yes, sign, can you believe it?) flood into the basement. It’s not a lot, but enough. The well guys are coming this morning to look into it for us, but I’ve heard that a lot of people in Manotick had problems with flooding last night. 🙁

183:365 Roses in the rain

And of course, there were a few (!) cat pictures this week. This one was actually taken at the shelter, just when we were choosing Willie. It was nice to see on the LAWS website that the female orange tabby we were also considering was also adopted on Saturday. I love happy endings!

177:365 Hello kitty

He’s kinda cute, and poses for pictures better than the kids!

179:365 Buttercup

He seems to like the patio door in my bedroom — the only place in the whole house with curtains. Admire them now, I fear they may not last the summer. 😉

180:365 Willie formerly known as Buttercup

This one made us laugh. We’d just finished dinner and the boys were searching the house for Willie. Tristan eventually found him in the closet in his bedroom, just about the most isolated corner of the house. He’d tipped over a bin of stuffies, and then curled up and gone to sleep with them. I know he’s happy with us, but in the shelter he was in a cage with half a dozen other kittens — maybe he’s wondering where they went?

181:365 Cat nap with the stuffies

After a week of cat pictures, I was feeling disloyal, so here’s a portrait of my first baby, the patient and always delightful Katie. You can read the whole story in her expression, eh? “Really? More pests in the house? Sigh.”

182:365 We interrupt this cat fest for a doggie moment

And this one wasn’t an official picture of the day, but it makes for a fun post-script, no?

Willie for the blog

You know what I just realized? I’ve inadvertently named our pets after the Royal Couple, who happen to be due to visit here this week. Willie and Kate. Ha!

Friday Family Fun: Five places to meet the animals

As I mentioned yesterday, this summer I’m launching a new bloggy series: Friday Family Fun! I thought I’d get us started with one of my favourite summertime activities: meeting the animals. Here’s five great places to visit if you’d like to get to know our furry friends in and around the Ottawa area.

1. Valley View Little Animal Farm

Valley View is the perfect place for the toddler to early school age set. There’s fun stuff to climb on at the front of the park, and a small barn with goats, chickens, rabbits and the usual petting zoo type creatures that you can feed by hand. My boys have always been fans of the dozens of metal yellow Tonka trucks strewn around near the entrance… when they were toddlers, I think we could’ve just paid our admission fee, play with the trucks for three hours and then leave again without actually looking at the rest of the farm! If you do that, though, you’ll miss the wonderful animal barns (pigs, ponies, peacocks, geese and chickens, bunnies, ostrich and deer and so much more), the most amazing playgrounds and climbers, and a fantastic agricultural museum. You can read my blog post about Valleyview from 2009 or visit the Valley View website for more details. Valley View is open every day except Monday, and admission is $8 per person.

Tristan airplane

2. Papanack Park Zoo

It’s been quite a few years since we’ve been out to the far east end of town to visit the Papanack Park Zoo, but I’m surprised that I’ve never blogged about it. At this zoo off Highway 174 near Wendover, you’ll find an assortment of animals from lions and tigers to gibbons and squirrel monkeys to arctic wolves and black bears and much, much more. Admission is $17.50 for adults, $10 for kids 6 – 18, and $8.00 for kids 2 – 5 years old (kiddies under 2 are free!)

3. Parc Omega

Parc Omega is on our list of places to visit again this summer! Parc Omega is a kind of African Lion Safari with native Canadian animals like wapiti and wolves and bears instead of lions and baboons. It’s the same concept, though. You drive a 10 km loop through gorgeous forests and plains amidst the (mostly) free-roaming animals. Instead of baboons crawling on your car, you can feed carrots (and, in our case, soda crackers) to wapiti and red deer. There are also hiking trails and an interpretive centre.

Big ol' black bear

Parc Omega is about an hour from Ottawa, down Hwy 148 to Route 323 near Montebello. Rates are as follows: adults $18; children 6 to 15, $13; and 2 to 5, $7. I blogged about our visit in 2008.

4. The Canada Agriculture Museum

We! Love! The! Farm! I’ve had the joint membership to the Canada Agriculture Museum, the Aviation Museum and the Science and Technology Museum for years, and they have paid for themselves over and over again. It just wouldn’t be summer without a morning at the Farm, visiting the smelly cow barns, petting the baby calves, admiring the muscular horses and the chubby pigs, and taking a ride in the tractor simulator. And have you checked out their relatively new (2009, I think?) play structure? It’s awesome! The Agriculture Museum is definitely one of the best places in Ottawa to visit with kids.

189:365 At the farm

Admission is an affordable $16 per family (oh how I love family-pack admissions!) but there are excellent membership and day-pass combo prices as well. Check out their website for details!

5. Little Ray’s Reptile Zoo

Let’s face it, summer is not all sunshine and clear skies. If you’re looking for a rainy day activity or need to get out of the blazing sun for a while, consider a trip to Little Ray’s Reptile Zoo in the city’s south end.

DSC_0636

You may have encountered Little Ray’s traveling show at a summer event or a birthday party, but if you’ve never made the trek out to see them on the south end of Bank Street, you should! They have an amazing array of slithering, swimming, creeping and flying creatures, and an amazing educational program that keeps kids riveted. Family admission for four (sigh) is $38, and $8 for each additional person. I’m particularly fond of Little Ray’s because that’s the first place I ever took all three boys on my own back in 2008, and we make sure to go back at least once a year.

That’s my five recommendations – do you want to play along? If you blog about animal adventures in the national capital region this week, let me know and I’ll put up a link to your post. Or you can play along in the comment box. Got a suggestion for family fun with animals in or around Ottawa?

Summertime feature series: Friday Family Fun!

Hooray for summer!!

194:365 Birthday beach bliss

I don’t know about your house, but at our house we’ve been counting down the days. Only three more days of school lunches and then we’re free for the summer. Yippee!!!!

230:365 Mud Lake dock

One of the things I love best about living in Ottawa is that there is no shortage of fun family activities. In fact, I’ve made a whole bloggy career about exploring them and then telling you all about them! I’ve been thinking for a while now that this would make a fun summer series, so here we go. Every Friday from now through Labour Day, I’m going to try to post an idea for family fun in Ottawa. Some of them will be specific to the city — places to visit, things to do, events to attend — but some of them will be fun ideas for family play no matter where you live. Some may be repackaged ideas from the deep well of my archives, but some will be fresh new ideas too. Sound like a great way to launch a weekend? I thought so too!

Hiking the rocks

I’ll post my first entry tomorrow. If you have ideas you’d like to share, feel free to pass them along. Maybe we can even make this a carnival sort of event, where lots of us post on Friday Family Fun ideas and we can cross-link the posts. What do you think? I even toyed with the idea of a button or a badge, but I think I exhausted all of my graphic capability for the week on the new photo banner! 😉

Sunglasses

Tune in tomorrow and we’ll get started on a summer of family fun!

In which Buttercup becomes Willie. For now.

Who knew naming a cat could be so difficult? Yeesh!

At the shelter, his name was Nero. That was definitely not a keeper of a name, although Simon did call him that for the first 30 hours or so while we tried on other monikers. I was an early fan of Percy, and Henry, and Jasper. Aren’t those great names? And Bruce. The first kitten I fell in love with on the shelter website was named Bruce, and I thought that was a wonderful name for a cat.

The family did not agree.

Willie for the blog 3

Then we came up with Butterscotch, which shortens to Scott and Scottie quite nicely, and I liked that too. But the boys had a hard time getting their mouths around Butterscotch, and once someone slipped and said Buttercup instead, and it stuck. (It’s kind of cute, actually, because that’s also one of the pet names I use for the boys. Maybe that’s the reason they liked it so much?)

I have wanted a Buttercup for quite some time. In fact, when I was pregnant with the Player to Be Named Later, who became Lucas, for the first 18 weeks of the pregnancy I was desperate for him to be a girl for many reasons, not least of which so I could call our little baby bump “Princess Buttercup.” Buttercup is an endearing and adorable name — for a female.

So we tried Buttercup for a few days, and while there’s no denying the cute factor, he’s begun to exhibit a wide mischievous streak. Try scolding something using the name Buttercup and keeping a straight face!

Willie for the blog

Beloved called me this morning and said he’d had an epiphany. We’d call the cat Streaky, after some cartoon they’d all watched this morning. And I immediately vetoed that one. Nope, not gonna work. But he did send me off on a hunt for the perfect orange tabby name.

Some of the contenders included Huckleberry, (Orange) Julius, Cheeto, (Orange) Pekoe, Oliver, Seamus, and Gizmo. I was particularly enamoured of Oliver, aka Ollie. And I read one online suggestion for Loki, the Norse god of mischief, which seemed exceptionally appropriate.

However, after all that, I think we have a winner. None of the above, though.

Meet William. William of Orange, in fact.

Willie for the blog 2

Willie for short.

(At least, that’s his name for today….)

IHF Challenge – Let’s hear it for the boys

I’m sure you can imagine my delight when I saw that this week’s I Heart Faces photography challenge: Let’s hear it for the boys. The problem, of course, was narrowing it down to just one of the dozens (hundreds?) of pictures that express how much I love the boys in my life, and boys in general for that matter.

There is something about this picture from earlier this week that captures something lovely about the essential nature of boyness, and something entirely different that this one captures. (Sorry for the links, but under the challenge rules I’m only allowed to post the actual submission in my entry, and I can only enter one photo!) And I thought the photo of Tristan loving Buttercup from the weekend was a great choice, too.

Sadly, I had to choose just one. Since it was a challenge inspired by Father’s Day, and since this picture hangs as a canvas in a place of honour in the living room, it seemed like a pretty good choice. (Maybe one of these days I’ll get around to photoshopping Lucas in there, too!)

98:365 My menfolk

Check out this week’s entries, and if it’s before 9 pm CDT on Tuesday, you can play along, too!

Photoshop fun

As I mentioned, I’ve really been enjoying the act of photography lately. More particularly, I’ve rekindled my romance with Photoshop, a program I’d left more or less alone since I discovered Lightroom about this time last year. (Cuz, yanno, I have so many spare hours in my day for idle noodling on the computer. Sleep? Who needs sleep? And interacting with your children is overrated anyway…)

During my first 365 project, I used Photoshop mostly for adjustments and actions. In particular, I am a huge fan of the Pioneer Woman’s actions, which I use in both PS and PS elements. Recently, though, I’ve taken to doing all my image adjustments in Lightroom, and have been having fun using Photoshop to create storyboards and playing with frame effects.

I started out with some I downloaded from Rita’s amazing collection on The Coffee Shop Blog (I like Rita’s stuff so much that I actually made an online donation, something that I rarely do for websites) and now I’ve started to use Lightroom to create my own.

I’ve also been using Photoshop to create a banner for my Mothership Photography site. I’m on my third version now, and I think I’ve finally got it right. In fact, I am so pleased with myself I wanted to show it off. I was searching for a PS tutorial on how to make photo borders and stumbled across a tutorial for this clothesline effect and immediately fell in love. It was a little more advanced than what I’m used to, but luckily I had PS expert Beloved on hand to walk me through the tricky bits.

Ta da! What do you think?

If you click on the image, you can see it in action on my portfolio site. Fun, eh? It only took me an hour (okay, two hours) to do, and I think I’d like to make up a few different versions so they refresh every time you change the page, much like the banners on this blog do. In truth, the hardest part of the whole process was choosing which photos to use!!

I’m finally happy with the look of the photography site, after picking at it in fits and starts for the last couple of months. I’ve got a couple of shoots lined up for this summer, but now that I’m almost in vacation mode, I’ve got a lot more free time on my hands and quite frankly, my kids are desperate for me to find someone else to point my lens at for a change!! I’d love to capture some beautiful memories for you and your family – drop me a line and we can set something up!

Hello kitty

It started innocuously enough. (Doesn’t it always?)

A friend had a free kitten to give away. We haven’t had cats since the two that came part and parcel with Beloved moved on to that great catnip field in the sky, maybe three and four years ago. But I know Beloved has been pining for one. And, Beloved found (gasp!) mouse poop under the cupboard earlier this week.

Free kitten + need a mouser + Father’s Day weekend? Score! Plus, Tristan has been lobbying relentlessly for a cat lately.

So I called the vet, and found out that free kittens are really not so free after all. Not unless you define “free” as $650 for in the first six months, anyway. (That’s first checkup plus vaccines, plus suggested meds, plus spay or neuter. Yikes!)

So the free kitty didn’t seem like such a great plan after all, and when I tweeted the cost of a free kitty on twitter, @deadsquid was nice enough to mention the Lanark Animal Welfare Society, where you can adopt a cat for $125 all in. And the idea of a young but not kitten-y cat seemed like a pretty good idea too. Young enough to adapt to a house with a dog and three noisy boys, old enough to not be completely insane.

Beloved, still cautious about the idea of leaping into cat ownership again after the loss of Ben and Tiny, thought about it over night, but I was pretty sure we’d be heading down to Smiths Falls within a few days at the latest. And I was right.

We met a lot of cats today; there are currently 97 (!) up for adoption in the shelter. We found ourselves drawn to the orange tabbies, and for a while debated between a female and male. It was a tough call, and I began to wonder if maybe we’d end up with two instead of one, but luckily we’re a little bit crazy but not THAT crazy. I’m not sure if the cat chose the boy or the boy chose the cat, but they both seem pretty happy with the deal.

Hello kitty

He’s a 12 week old orange tabby. We’re still working on the name. Percy was an early contender, and I favoured Bruce. By the evening, we’d migrated to Butterscotch, shortened to Scottie, which was cute. Then I slipped and called him Buttercup, and that seems to have stuck. Prince Buttercup, or Peanut Buttercup, depending on who you ask.

It’s adorable now, and downright hilarious when you think 10 years into the future, with a handful of oversized teenage boys calling what I’m sure will be a large and happy but mature orange tabby “Buttercup”.

*snicker*

Project 365: Friends, flowers, feet and porches

Funny how the Muse comes and goes, eh? The last two weeks, I was definitely just going through the motions with the photography thing, but this week my spark reignited and I’m feeling passionate about pictures again. It was a very photogenic (and more than a little bit silly) week!

I love this picture, partly because I love the components so much. The blinds on the windows were one of the things that drew us to this house last summer, and I love the way the morning sun comes through them. The harvest pine table made from reclaimed wood was something I coveted for half a year before we saved up enough for it, and it makes the perfect centrepiece for a family dinner. And speaking of centrepieces, the vase is an Ikea special with a couple of fake flowers, but it makes me happy every time I look at it. It’s all about the little things, isn’t it?

172:365 Daisies in the morning light

And daisies, yes, I have always had a thing for daisies.

174:365 Dreamy daisy bokeh

Also from the garden, these peonies still wet from one of those brief and blissful overnight showers we had this week. I like this one enough I’m thinking about hanging it up somewhere but, erm, we’re kinda running out of wall space!

175:365 Peony

And this? Well, there’s no real story behind this one, except that it makes me happy to have my toes painted to look like I’m keeping a box of smarties in my shoes.

171:365 Silly Sunday summertime toes

(I am close to overusing the vintage frame effect, I know, I know, but I really like it!! Step away from the cheesy effects, DaniGirl….)

I supervised my first class trip this week. 🙂 The grade threes went to Upper Canada Village. These are two of the three kids in Tristan’s gang this year, sweet kids who made him feel welcome and at home in a new school. And sadly, one of them and the one not shown are moving to a different school for September… poor Tristan, the child who hates change.

173:365 Class trip

You already saw this picture of my precious porch earlier in the week, but for the sake of the project here it is again. I’m excited about the porch for another reason, too, which I’ll tell you about in a couple of days. 😉

170:365 My happy place

And, closing out with the leitmotif of both porches and overuse of the vintage frame, plus a good dose of my love of the random and absurd and inexplicable, is this found treasure. Here’s how I captioned it on Flickr:

Porch and front door used to be best friends. Then one day in 1975, that all changed. No one knows what happened between them, but they’ve been avoiding each other ever since.

176:365 Wandering porch

The alternate caption was: “George! The damn porch is wandering again!”

Seriously, WTF? How does this happen? I totally love the absurdity and would buy this house just for the conversation-piece aspect of it. How exactly do you miss the porch when you install the front door, or vice versa?

I wish you a week full of beauty and random silliness!