Project 365: Week of the Roses

This has been a really challenging week for my 365 project, mostly because I was embroiled with two sick kids, a sick caregiver, and a secret project that sucked up ALL my spare time (and more than a bit of my not-so-spare time as well!). More about the secret project later.

So here’s what caught my fancy this week!

Here’s your weekly dose of cuteness. He’s reading If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, one of our new favourite books.

We’ve spent a lot of time haunting the Manotick branch of the public library lately. Conveniently, we moved into a house just around the corner from the library just about the same time as my mother, otherwise known as my main paperback supplier, bought herself a Kindle — and my stream of free paperbacks dried up overnight. This is the centre of the kids’ section of the Manotick library, where Lucas is “reading” a book about potty training to Tristan. The funky frame is courtesy of the Camera+ app on my iPhone. (I don’t know what I love more, the giant colourful sunburst, Lucas reading to Tristan, or the fact that the page he is reading is covered in underwear!)

From warm and fuzzy to cold and wet — I took this one from the narrow bridge on Jockvale near Stonebridge, but no matter how much I played with it, I couldn’t quite make it what I wanted of it. It’s one of those “good enough, and I’ve got nothing else for today” shots, I suppose.

Speaking of good enough, this one is really a bit of a mulligan. I spent hours glued to my computer on Sunday working on that secret project I mentioned, and by the end of the day had nothing really to show for it — and no picture for the day, either. So I took this with my iPhone and called it “Time Sink” because that’s what the computer can be sometimes. Um, often.

On Valentine’s Day, although Beloved and I had agreed not to get each other any gifts, I came home from work to a dozen of the most beautiful fresh red roses I’ve ever seen. (Good thing I’d picked some chocolates up for him, too!) And I’ve been loving those roses all week!

First, Valentine TtV roses:

Then, roses with a hint of cross-processing:

Roses desaturated in black and white:

And finally (for this week, at least, as they’re still going strong!!) roses with a hint of sunshine:

I think they got better as the week progressed — that last one is definitely my favourite. 🙂

Oh, and did I mention my secret project? Yeah, it’s really not so secret since I outed myself last night on Twitter, and I’ve actually been screwing up my courage to tell you about it here all week.

A couple of weeks ago, I was at the schoolyard fence waiting for the boys and got to talking with some of the moms and dads, and one mentioned going to Sears to get portraits done and how she wasn’t really thrilled with the results. I mentioned that I really like to take family pictures, and we got to chatting. She asked me for my website, and I gave her this URL. A couple of days later, she came back and asked me where the information about my photography business was, and I hemmed and hawed a bit and said, “Well, that’s pretty much it.”

It got me thinking, though. I’ve been toying with the idea of putting up a separate photography blog ever since I started my first 365 back in January of 2009, and even toyed with a few themes and galleries, but nothing ever worked for me. I tried building a gallery with Lightroom, but the results were underwhelming.

Last week, with the help of a few friends on Twitter, I finally found a workable (and free!) WordPress theme and installed it. I spent WAY too much time sorting through some of my favourite pictures, and came up with a result that is not quite perfect, but at least worth sharing at this point.

With butterflies in my tummy, and wondering what the hell I am thinking, I am thrilled and terrified to pull back the curtain and show you my latest cockamamie scheme, Mothership Photography.

Eek!