Kerry and Kelli's Big Adventure - Day 2

Today's the day! Hip Hip Hooray! It's Thursday!
The day I meet Karen!

But first we have to stop at Trader Joe's, I need my Dark Chocolate Caramel and Black Sea salt bar! Kerry got some chocolate covered potato chips. I should mention that we may have stopped at one or two other Trader Joe's along the way to buy both items again. And again. Oh, and we bought wraps there. More than once.

We hit the road before the sun came up. So much for finding hotels with breakfast included, we were up before any of them served breakfast. 

We had planned on doing some sight seeing and other things in Bend, but then we worried we wouldn't get to Crater Lake and everyone said we had to see it. So we scratched everything off our list of things to do for Thursday! And it was worth it. I may or may not have had tears in my eyes when I saw how beautiful Crater Lake was. And then I bought an awesome Crater Lake shirt shirt! And a few other souvenirs for the family. 

We were a bit early to Jacksonville so we stopped in Medford and did a bit of shopping. Went to Harbor Freight and got a spinner rack for my crafty crap. To this day, it's assembled, that took a lot of patience, and it's sitting empty. I also made Kerry stop at Old Navy. It was 100 degrees, I didn't have enough hot weather clothes. 

I worried about meeting Karen. She's not my idol, but I've loved everything she's ever done. I have some of her transparencies from a million years ago when she designed scrapbooking products, I am hoarding them. I should have gotten her to sign them! Anyway, I worried meeting her might some how make her less likeable, maybe there was a quality about her that I would find appalling in person. NOT LIKELY! She's even better in person. 

She had cute things like these ....

And her cute momma helping out. And her dad and step-mom were there too. Such a great, welcoming family! 

That's Anna, it was her birthday! She got to have her cake and eat it too!

 Karen found these cute bottles of pop and wasn't sure where they were from. CANADA! Although, I can't remember seeing them in bottles like that lately. I think I saw cans. 

Cuteness! Remember these photos are all taken before she taught us how to take better photos! I want lights like that for the back yard, instead of the ones hidden in the bushes that I have now. Or maybe I don't have, I can't tell anymore!

We had fun. But boy, did we work. She said she was a task master. And she was but it was okay, because I felt I learned so much. I thought I'd have time to read, so I loaded my Kobo up with books, paid for book, not just library books. I only touched that thing to move it so I could stuff other things in around it. 

 Karen made us leave our comfort zones. She made us shoot Manual! And learn Lightroom! We took turns and at any given time at least 2 people were shooting. I shot this at night! In a house, when it was dark out! I think that's someone shooting from under a chair, or passed out under a chair. That's Kili, she's smiling, and I'm sure she's thinking "Holy Cats! My roommates are freakin' awesome! Later, I will regret telling them about my least favorite word!"

 And then I think I went to bed before 1 am. That was the earliest night we had.

P.S.
I forgot about Kerry. I was so excited about Karen!
He left me at the house, and drove to Yreka, not pronounced Eureka, that's a different place. This is Why Recka. Or Reeka.
He stayed there and drove back to Ashland to mountain bike where it was even hotter! He ate an expensive sandwich from the co-op, had beer, rode a long ways, met some people, one named Shaggy. And didn't have great wifi, or wifi at all. Which was one of the things that made us pick the hotels we picked! It was the same in Burlington too. Crappy wifi service. 

I see the LIGHT!

Somethings I wanted to get better at...

1. seeing the light.

2. taking my camera out in public and actually using it.

3. getting decent candid shots of everyday events.

4. white balance.

There's some things you can't fix. Like the clutter on the deck. But really, I can fix that, after I shot this, I moved some things so they were easy to find, but not in my line of sight.  

I don't mind that there's that giant hot, bright spot. The 2 of them were sitting on the deck in the sun spot.

We had decided earlier this week that we should go to the Farmer's Market more often. I had just bought a bunch of veggies yesterday so we didn't really need much. I did want a necklace like the one I  bought for the workshop to give to someone else. So I told Kerry that was what he was getting me for my birthday in August!  I took these photos, in public, and I didn't care if anyone was watching! I also tried to remember to either shoot straight on, or at a distinct angle from my subject. 

We got some treats from the German bakery truck, pretzel buns and a cookie, and in good ol' Seinfeld fashion (these pretzels are making me thirsty), someone had to have a drink right away. Nothing like a can of Coke before 10 am.

 Here Kerry asked if I wanted him to do anything else while I took pictures. I didn't.

I asked them to quickly stand there for me. More importantly, this was My Little Car's first time at the Farmer's Market with me. It's so much smaller but I can fit so much in the back! Then we went to Walmart for a t-shirt and some salt, and then the bike store for some tubes. We were back home by 10:30!

Kerry decided it was time to wash the dust, dirt, and insect carcasses from Oregon off the car. It made me a little sad. "Remember the splat that bug made on the way to Crater Lake?"

I used the Expodisc for the proper white balance for the front of the house.

My lavender is almost spent, it was crazy this year! I debated pulling out the tall weeds in the middle, but then got too lazy.

 I'm pretty enamoured with that little car.

 That tough guy washing my little car isn't too bad either.

 I felt bad for the furry jerk. So I went back to hang out with him. He has a habit of bolting across the road if he sees anything move.

 A dog in full sun isn't ideal, but sometimes it's a cake issue. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

 I helped dry the car off in the garage, there's so much more room in there now.

I saw this banged up large scary moth on those weird alien weeds/flowers. A faster shutter speed helps catch this shot. Oh,  how ran away from it after.

 And then we rolled! And now I know that blown out super bright area is not ideal. 

I love my camera so much more now! 

The Month of June, a little late.

The suspension bridges were neat, but I don't need to go back there. Kerry and Emily said they would. 

The garden really took after after all the rain, but it was short lived, because then it got so hot everything went to seed.

Heather brought over her new puppy. Gibson and Linus got along so well. 

I went to RM's dance recital. It was long, more than 3 hours. Lots of talented kids! And the costumes were great. At dinner, someone stuck the restaurant's crayons in my purse when I wasn't looking. So later that week, I mailed them to the person I thought did it. Turns out I was mis-informed. Now I scared they might show up somewhere when I least expect them.

We celebrated Connie's birthday with Chinese food at Lorana's before scrapbooking class. I hadn't had Chinese in ages, and it was so good!

We left for Oregon on the 26th. Stopping along the way to see lots of sights. That's the Columbia River.

 We made plans to see Crater Lake, then we thought we wouldn't have time, but then Marg said we had to see it so we made the time. It was pretty amazing. 

 Kerry dropped me off in Jacksonville, and drove on to Yreka (pronounced "why" not to be confused with Eureka). He stayed there and drove to Ashland to mountain bike a few times. It was stinking hot!

 And I was about to begin the best workshop ever! And meet some of the most beautiful women I  now call my friends. And take some of the best photos I've ever taken. And eat the tastiest food I've had in ages, that I didn't make. 

Each night we found treats on our pillows, which were a nice after working and thinking, and shooting and pushing boundaries into the early hours of the morning.

 Each morning we woke up to a beautiful breakfast spread, my mouth is still watering thinking about those bagels. (We stopped on the way out of town to get a few more for the next day.) And then we headed back upstairs to start the day! Notice how cute everything is! The whole weekend was like that, every detail was looked after. 

I've got so many photos from the trip and the workshop. I'll try to pace myself.

Check out Amelia's blog to see what she did in June!

Kerry and Kelli's Big Adventure - Day 1

About a year ago, my most favourite blogger, Karen Russell, decided to do workshops. While I couldn't go that year, she did decide to do more this year. I promptly signed up and started crossing days off my calendar! We decided to make it one big road trip, taking 8 days to do it. Kerry hated driving down the I-5 the last time so we went down 97 and home up the Oregon coast. I planned every single minute of this trip! And when it started to go sideways, I let it. 

When we went on road trips before, I didn't drive much because I hated the van. But this time, I drove from home to Somewhere, USA and a few other times too! I don't think I had one nap on the way to our destination. Before I had 13 naps a day. I'm not even kidding you. I think somewhere deep down, I was very excited, even nervous about spending 4 days with a group of strange women. But I didn't need to worry, they were the best, most amazing group of women ever. 

I decided the landscapes were Lensbaby worthy and shot quite a bit with my Edge 80. 

Kerry and my baby car were Lensbaby worthy too. Oh, how I love that baby car. And that Kerry too.

And the windmills, I don't know what it is about them, but I get all goose bumpy and I'm pretty sure they have something to do with aliens. I took way to many photos of them. 

We made a few wrong turns, but they usually ended up taking us to some place better. That's how we found Sonic. Had a cherry limeade and some cinna-snacks.

We did a lot of shopping for food. We picked up a lot of things up for other people. My camera bag was so heavy, it needed a shopping cart.

I don't know what Chicken in a Biskit is, or even what a 'biskit' is, but we bought them for Emily. I have my doubts that they are even any good. But who doesn't love saying "chicken in a biskit"?

The little car stopped at all the best places. Hobby Lobby was pretty great, but we didn't buy anything. 

I was looking for a specific item, and we found it at Michaels. On clearance too. Go figure. We don't even have it in Canada, and I read on-line that it was just hitting the US Michaels the week we were there.

In my ridiculous hours and hours of planning, I found things to see. Like the Stonehenge War Memorial, in Maryhill. It's right on the border of Washington and Oregon. We stayed right across the river from it at a truck stop motel. 

Kerry was taking a picture of this poor tailless lizard. It made us miss the tailless Golden at home, but only for a minute. We didn't miss the dog hair. For some reason this photo won't centre and it's driving me crazy.

Just about every where we go, we take a photo like this. It's our thing now. If there are other people around, they always offer to take our picture for us, and we always decline. 

The view from the memorial. Our hotel was just at the end of the left side of the bridge. See that barge in the river, it had something to do with the Army. There were lots of camouflaged men and women, probably more that we saw. I think it had something to do with aliens. Kerry didn't think so. We also went down the hill to the treed area, it was a large, beautiful camp ground.

Kerry took quite a few panoramic photos with his phone. If he hadn't, no one would even know I was on the trip!

Even though we stayed at the truck stop, it wasn't that noisy. It was weird to see all the trucks lined up, they were also in the lot behind the motel. Might have had something to do with aliens.  The motel was clean, the only problem was the freakin' huge sturgeon in the motel lobby. If you know anything about me, it's that I hate those things. We didn't take advantage of the continental breakfast, mostly because we were up before the sun, but really because I'm not eating a breakfast that came from a room with a sturgeon in it.