Bella and Tara

I LOVE this!

Busy busy busy :)

I have been very busy lately, spending time with my family, trying to put together a cookbook (HUGE cookbook... I am making it for the TwilightMOMS website and there are HUNDREDS of recipes that were emailed in...) and making jewelry to list in my shop. I have made several of my butterfly wing necklaces, and of course I have still been making Twilight inspired jewelry. The Twilight stuff is a big hit, and I have been working hard to make money so I can attend Squam later this year.

The image above is my latest design, I just listed in my shop tonight. I am loving my new supplies! I bought a couple sets of alphabet metal stamps a few years ago, and never used them... And as I was packing to move I found them again and thought they would be fun to use. so I purchased the rest of the items I would need to make jewelry with them and went to town! The necklace says "Plus que ma propre vie" which means "More than my own life" in french. This is the saying that Bella had inscribed on the inside of the locket she gave Renesmee.

44

Three times, I reached down to lift a slippery crying infant from the water.
Each time, overwhelmed by love, joy... the perfection of the tiny new face.
Three faces I watch each day, and see in those eyes the promise of a better tomorrow.

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Several blogs I follow are participating in a fun little thing today, I thought I would share it here.

Basically the gist of it is, to honor the changes being made in our country today, post a picture on your blog that speaks to you of hope, optimism, etc. It doesn't to have anything to do with the inauguration itself, just something that speaks to you on a personal level. Then post the photo along with 44 words about it or about today itself. Obama is our 44th President.

You can do this regardless of your political views, you did not have to vote for Obama in order to be able to participate.

This idea originated here: http://practicalbrownbob.blogspot.com/2009/01/44-calling-all-bloggers.html and I first learned of it on Shuttersisters.com

I *heart* my sister.

When I was in Utah over Thanksgiving my sister asked me to take some photo's for her for head shots. I am still learning how to do everything, but here are a few of the shots we got. I noticed that most of them were a little underexposed, and so I have been playing with the settings on my camera, and learning a bit about how to fix problem. I can't edit RAW files in my version of photoshop (I have an old version of CS, and it won't open the RAW files from my camera), and I have heard that that makes it easier to fix something like this that was underexposed... I will have to save up for a new version of photoshop soon... AFTER I pay for Squam :) I am going in September and hope to be able to meet some new and old friends there :)

These first 2 are some of my favorites from the photo shoot with my sister. She is so beautiful!





This last one is one my sister likes a lot, I think its okay, but it was so underexposed I had to do a lot of editing to make it work. I also think the focus is a little soft on her eyes, you can tell in the larger version.



I am really enjoying my camera, I have not had a lot of time lately to use it, but I pick it up every chance I get.