Upside down

Look Who's Climbing!

well, she's been climbing for a while, but about a week ago she (and I) discovered she could get into the rocking chair by herself! This makes me a bit nervous since it's not stable, but she seems to do great getting in and out. Now, she is all over the sofas, ottoman, and recliner. The other day I found her on top of our king size bed! How she got up there, I have no idea.... a little crafty if you ask me ;). lol I've also found her sitting on the tv stand, right up against the tv! That really freaked me out!

I give up!

I am so tired of trying to find a lid that matches the bottom of the tupperware pieces! Alas, I have found a solution!

Wow! Containers!

I think I might give them a shot. Can't be worse than the situation I'm in right now!

Happy Birthday!

Happy birthday to Stori's sweet little tax day baby, Miss Isla! She's 1 today and celebrating in Russia!! I hope she knows that we are thinking about her on her big day all the way across the world! :)

Oh The Possibilities!!

I had no idea they made such a thing! My mind is racing with ideas to use this!

Swamp Tour

The other adventure we decided to go on this weekend was a swamp tour. I have been living here for 4 years now and still have not done one.

This time of year is PERFECT! The water is warming up so the animals are moving around more, it wasn't hot but it was nice and sunny, and it wasn't humid at all and there were no bugs! I got some really great shots that I put on my flickr site.

My two favorite photos from the day:

The homes on the water are real residences! The people that live here are mostly commercial fisherman and can only access their home via boat. I can't imagine that kind of life, but then again, I bet they can't imagine living like I do, either! lol Have I mentioned that I LOVE nature and landscape photography?! I think I like it so much because it is unpredictable; you don't know what you are going to get when you go on shoots like this. Plus, I hardly do any editing. Most of the time I like to simply show the beauty of the world that God created without any changes. Don't get me wrong, editing is a lot of fun and I like to do it on select photos, but for the most part, a little cropping and light editing is all you need. How lucky were we to see that gator sun bathing on the log?! I get all giddy when great photo-ops happen like that! lol

The tour was awesome and I recommend anyone take one if they are in the area!

My mom and dad on the boat:

Turtle:

Our tour guide showing us a crawdad cage:

Alligator! Oop... actually, that's a log... It fooled even the guide! lol:

A real gator!:

Trying to feed the gator:

The boat:

Global Wildlife

This weekend, while my parents were in town, we decided to do some more "touristy" things around town. I've been to Global Wildlife about 3-4 times now, but it is so much fun every time! This time we decided to get a private jeep tour and it was so worth it!! Avery was only a few months old last time we went so she slept most of the time. This time, she wasn't too sure about it at first but warmed up and really enjoyed it. The driver took us to any animal we wanted to see and stayed as long as we wanted at each. It was a great chance for me to get some giraffe pictures since I didn't get any last time. Here are a few silly snapshots of the trip:

Side note: I have set up a Flickr account to put all of my photography on. You can see the link on the left side bar of my blog. This is much easier for me to upload to and Blogger does not always cooperate with they layout I want for them, so I will let you know when I upload some to Flickr.

I have uploaded a few shots from Global Wildlife under the "Animals" folder

Coolest Thing I Have Ever Seen!

My friend, Stori, moved to Russia recently. It's a long story, but you can follow her and her family's adventure here, if you want. Anyways, she posted this link on her Facebook the other day and I have to say, I WANT ONE!! Who wouldn't want a lap sized giraffe?! Ya, that's right, I said lap sized giraffe!!! Giraffes are my all time favorite animal so what would be better than being able to have one walk around my house??

Stori is so lucky that she lives so close to go see them! The only problem is that there is a waiting list and I am #587,458 (or something close to that), and that the current baby that is due this year is reserved for a prince... which means they probably cost an arm and a leg to buy :(. Go here to check them out for yourself: http://www.petitelapgiraffe.com/index.php

Fountainebleau Park

I have been wanting to make some rounds to scenic places around the area lately. Mainly, just to take advantage of living somewhere new, I might as well try to see as much as possible. We went to Fairview Park to take Avery's 1 year pictures and I had heard that Fountainebleau Park was huge and even more pretty. After Jeff went out there for a beer festival, he said we should really take the time to go over there; he knew I would love all of the photo-ops. Since it is about 45 minutes away, I had been putting it off but since my mom is spending some time here we thought we would go take a look. I am SO glad we did! It has an old sugar mill plantation on it but it's all rubble now. I love taking pictures of old stuff! I was just wishing the whole time I had a micro lens... maybe one day. It was beautiful! There are campgrounds, LOTS of picnic tables, even cabins over the lake that you can rent out! Even more, there's a beach; sand and all! What a great place to take the kids for a summer day! There's multiple playground areas but we didnt bother going over to those since Avery is still too little to appreciate it. We mainly drove around and admired the views. My sister is getting married next year so I would LOVE to bring her to do some portraits! Here's some pics: