Month: May 2009

Social Media for Mothers Seminar

This is a neat idea I wish I’d thought of myself. An Ottawa company is offering Social Media for Mothers seminars, just in time for Mother’s Day.

From the press release:

This unique seminar will show moms how to use social tools like blogs, Twitter, social networks, YouTube and Flickr to share their experiences online with family and/or other moms on the web. Moms will also learn how social media can help to nurture existing relationships and build new friendships in a global web community.

This seminar is for:

* mothers-to-be
* new and seasoned moms
* grandmothers
* great-grandmothers

Neat idea, eh? And if you go, you get to see me — on YouTube, blathering on about social media and motherhood. Natasha, the brains behind the operation, approached me a month or so ago and asked if I’d be interested in being interviewed for her seminar and being the shy and reticent person camera whore that I am, of course I said yes. You can see the clip on the social media press release. It`s a little drawn out, but she didn`t give me the cut sign so I just kept talking and talking and talking and talking. (There`s another familiar face there, too!)

Good luck, Natasha! Can’t wait to hear how it goes!

It’s Tulip Festival time!

I’m not much of a Winterlude girl, but I do love Ottawa’s Tulip Festival. (How can I not love a festival that’s mere steps outside my office door, jam-packed with gorgeous subjects for my 365 project?)

102b:365 Tulips!

There’s some cool stuff going on in the Tulip Festival this year, too — truly a little something for everyone. You’re too late for Margaret Atwood (one of my heroes) or Rick Mercer (my old nemesis from year one of the Canadian blog awards), but there are plenty of other intriguing presentations as part of the Celebridée speakers’ series. You can also see an acrobatic troupe or even try out the trapeeze yourself. Or, you can do what I’ve been doing and just wander around and enjoy the vibrant colours that the tulips splash throughout our winter-dulled city.

102:365 Tulip artist

I love playing tour-guide when we have visitors, and I always tell the story of why Ottawa has a tulip festival in the first place. During World War II, the Dutch royal family stayed in Ottawa, and Queen Julianna’s daughter Princess Margriet was born in Ottawa’s Civic Hospital. For her birth, the maternity ward of the Civic (where Tristan and Simon were both born) was declared “Dutch soil”. After the war, the Dutch people sent 100,000 tulips to the city as a thank you, and now more than half a million tulips bloom here each year.

105:365 Tulips and the Peace Tower

This is my favourite tulip festival picture so far. (Hey, we still have more than 10 days to go!) I’m riding on the vintage ferris wheel, circa 1917, and used the bars to frame the National Gallery of Canada. A little something different from your everyday tourist shot of the Gallery! (Just don’t tell my mom that I practically fell out of the chair trying to get a low enough perspective that I didn’t cut off the top of the Gallery. Shhhh!)

105b:365 National Gallery from the ferris wheel

The Canadian (I like to think of it as the Ottawa) Tulip Festival runs through May 18, and there are some reasonably-priced and even free events for a wide range of audiences. It’s worth the effort to come downtown for this one!

Happy Star Wars Day!

What, you didn’t know it was Star Wars Day today?

Look at the calendar, isn’t it obvious?

(wait for it, you’re gonna groan)

May the 4th be with you!!!!

(I couldn’t possibly resist this one. The intersection of embarrassingly bad puns and hopeless geekyness is my happy place.)

So since we’re talking about Star Wars, I thought I’d share this article from Slate with you (waves to Holly, who sent me the link in the first place) that asks, “Why does Star Wars still take over the minds of young boys?”

The author ponders: “Maybe it’s the combination of simplicity and multilayered detail, good vs. evil in a world of interdependent yet rival creatures. Maybe it all comes down to Darth Vader, with his fearsome helmet and the voice of James Earl Jones. Or maybe the magic element is the open void of outer space as a backdrop.” (It’s a fun article, well-written and wry, but the comments afterward served as an unpleasant reminder that the Internet is a largely nasty place and maybe I should rethink my goals of ever wanting to be published in something like Slate!)

Whatever it is, there’s no doubt that a love of Star Wars is entrenched in the DNA of our family:

In which the evil Lord Vader protects the innocent Frog Prince and half-Batmanned Bruce Wayne from the evil Mamarazzi

Save the Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography building from the bureaucrats!

(cut and pasted with vigour from the Save the CMCP Web site!)

The Government has announced that the Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography (CMCP) building at 1 Rideau Canal in Ottawa will be taken over by Parliament for office space and meeting rooms. The CMCP is the only museum in Canada devoted to the photographic image. It was created in 1985 after intense lobbying by the photographic community and opened its $16M state-of-the-art facility in 1992.

We are firmly opposed to this arbitrary decision, delivered by the Government and National Gallery without warning or consultation. This is not just a photographic community concern. The loss of this public art space concerns us all.

To join the fight to save the CMCP, please take a moment to sign the petition:

www.ipetitions.com/petition/CMCP/

For background information on this announcement, please visit:

www.savecmcp.ca/

Project 365: Milestones

I’m glad I didn’t quit my photo-a-day project last week, and I’m kinda sorry I whined at you with all my artistic angst. *embarrassed shrug* The thing about the blog is that I write whatever is in my head (if you hadn’t noticed) and if I’ve just stubbed my toe and spilled my coffee and my underwear are riding up a little bit too high, I suspect I come across as a little whiney. But I feel much better today.

This was a great week, though. I got some good photos, I had a lot of fun taking them, I discovered an awesome new shortcut (more on that in a minute) and I hit some fun milestones. On Wednesday, for example, I made it to Day 100 and marked the occassion with this picture:

100:365 Day 100!

(Some other dude kept trying to steal the Day 100 limelight on Wednesday, but we know who had the larger world impact during the last 100 days, don’t we?)

It’s been beautiful to be out of the house lately, and nature has given me no shortage of subjects this week. I got down low underneath these dried out weeds and shot at the moody clouds of the sunset because I thought they looked like some sort of funky prehistoric tree, but one of the commenters on Flickr said they look like Dr Seuss trees and I like that even better.

95:365 Weedy

The tulips are on their way, but the daffodils are in full bloom. These guys in my garden practically begged me to take their picture on a rainy day:

97:365 Feeling daffy

And this guy lives in a bed beside the Canal. (Is there anything more lovely than a huge bed of wild daffodils? Exquisite! Plus, lying on your belly in the sun taking pictures of pretty flowers is an excellent way to spend a lunch hour! I highly recommend it!)

98:365 Bee's-eye view of daffodil (1 of 2)

Katie and I had both had a long day when I snapped this portrait of her. The tolerant but oh-so-mildly annoyed look on her face? After three kids loving her within an inch of her life, I think it’s her most common facial expression these days.

99:365 Katie

We’d gone to the annual Lion’s Club pancake breakfast at the fire station on Saturday morning when I saw this giant shelf full of fire hoses around the back of the station and I was utterly fascinated by them. The little sign says “Hoses to be repaired” but why so many? How do they repair them? If these are the broken-down ones, how many good ones do they have? And I just liked the pretty colours, too.

96:365 Hoser

Yesterday, I knew I’d be driving to work instead of taking the bus and going right past Hogsback Falls. Last time I was there in the blazing daylight, I couldn’t play with the longer exposure that would give the water that silky, ethereal look, but at a half an hour past dawn, the light was still low enough to get it, so I stopped for a while to play on my way to work. (Anybody want to spring for a neutral density filter for me? Anybody?) In truth, it’s not a bad way to start the day, and I was still at my desk by 7:15.

101:365 Falling water

Here’s the mosaic for the month of April. It’s fun to see all the new stuff I tried this month!

April mosaic, project 365


1. 101:365 Falling water, 2. 100:365 Day 100!, 3. 99:365 Katie, 4. 98:365 Bee’s-eye view of daffodil (1 of 2), 5. 97:365 Feeling daffy, 6. 96:365 Hoser, 7. 95:365 Weedy, 8. 94:365 Flower vendors in the Market, 9. 93:365 Musical bokeh, 10. 92:365 Baby blankets, 11. 91:365 Bitter!, 12. 90:365 Hogsback Falls, 13. 89:365 Gears, 14. 88:365 Suburban sunrise, 15. 87:365 Pizza night, 16. 86:365 First wildflowers (1 of 3), 17. 85:365 Tristan in motion, 18. 84:365 Brothers, 19. 83:365 Mischief in the pantry, 20. 82:365 Easter candy, 21. 81:365 Colouring eggs for Easter, 22. 80:365 Selfie in granite, 23. 79:365 Orthodox, 24. 78:365 Winter’s last blast?, 25. 77:365 Beach in a bottle, 26. 76:365 Empty cradle, 27. 75:365 Rainy bokeh, 28. 74:365 Spring sun, 29. 73:365 Starbucks revisited, 30. 72:365 Just dropping by

Finally, I’d be remiss if I didn’t give a huge hat tip slobbery wet smooch of affection to longtime commenter Mrs Gryphon, who sent me the link to Pioneer Woman’s sets of free Photoshop actions (here’s one and two.) Ironically, I’d just discovered the Pioneer Woman website (funny, with gorgeous photography and great tips) but hadn’t made it to the PS action sets yet. If you know how to use actions, these provide instant and extremely satisfying photo pick-me-ups with just a few clicks, and they’re really fun to play with. I used them in the long shot of the daffodils, for instance, and in the portrait of Katie.

Hooray for finding the fun again!!