All Dressed Up

For the first time I ever, I got dressed up to take some photos.... I helped out at a wedding reception!  What was I thinking???

I definitely haven't found a new calling but it wasn't as bad as I thought.  I concentrated mainly on getting candid pictures of the guests before dinner (and then worked the Photo Booth after - which took me a little while to warm up to, but I think I got there in the end!  Yikes!).  Thankfully there is lots of laughter and smiles at a wedding.  It was interesting to "eavesdrop" from a distance with my camera, not being able to hear the story, but waiting for the punchline to catch that moment when people would smile and laugh.  It was also interesting to watch people light up when the kids were around.  People watching the kids play was almost a guaranteed candid smile for me.

I fell in love with a little boy.  He is probably not much more than a year - still in diapers but running around like crazy.  I think if I ever wanted to photograph people, that age would be the perfect one for me.  He knew I was there, I'm pretty sure he knew what I was doing, but he really didn't care.  Once he got over the shyness of someone new watching him, he was uninhibited and cute and dare I say it... just like a dog.  :)

I did not fall in love with trying to get pictures of cake or decorations.  Ugh. Now that is a talent I don't seem to have.

I'm not sure what the "rules" are for posting the pics, so it is probably best if I don't share any.  I'm handing them over to Lorelei for her to deal with.  Hopefully she can work some editing magic on some of these because from the ones I've glanced at - they could use the help.  :)

A Walk in the Wind

There has seriously been no good time to walk the dogs in the past 2 weeks.  It's either been too cold, too snowy, too unsafe to drive or too windy.  We went out to Park Lake today for the first time in ages - the highway was good, the parking area was good and the trail wasn't bad but snowshoes wouldn't have been out of the question.

Coulee didn't seem to be feeling all that great earlier this week but today she seemed to be feeling great.  I didn't have the heart to try and reign in her enthusiasm - she was just too happy.

Her goofy face even made an appearance.  :)

Lacey also had a blast.  I'm not sure what she is digging for here, but it was something exciting apparently.

The snow was pretty deep in sections and then almost gone in other areas due to the wind.  The dogs didn't seem to mind but we weren't all that comfortable slogging through the soft deep stuff.

I changed lenses part way through the walk and had to take my mitten off to do it.  I caught Lacey trying to make a run for it with it.  LOL

Coulee bashfully brought it back to me.  (Not her most flattering picture but she has her "Bessy ears" on which is so hard to catch with the camera as they only come out when she is feeling playfully guilty.)

And Lacey just tried to steal it back.

Overall we all had a pretty good time.  The dogs have been sleeping soundly ever since and we finally got in a long enough walk to have peace in the house.

Snow Bunny

Lacey doesn't like the cold.  It doesn't take much before she is standing up on her hind legs like a gopher and her love of boots hasn't improved.  But the snow.... she LOVES the snow.  I bet she'd stay outside all day if I let her.

Permanent Eye Goobie

Coulee had a small lump on her eyelid that caused us some concern.  It's turned out to be nothing, but now where the lump used to be, the pigment has changed colour... Which is not a big deal except for the fact that in photos, it looks like she always has an eye goobie.  It's going to drive me nuts. Although pretty soon I'll be an eye goobie, cloning master! LOL

Cold and Snowy

So first we had a blizzard, and now we are having extreme cold - minus 40 C kind of cold... That's just this week and it isn't even winter.  I think it is going to be a long one!

Different Feel

I'm not sure if I like it more, or less, but it definitely gives things a whole different feel...

Playing with Edits

Just for fun...

Straight out of the Camera

Clean, "regular" edit

Vintage edit.

I liked the vintage edit, until I looked back at the "clean" edit and then I decided the vintage one was too weird.  :)

A Little Fun

It was a really weird week... I have 4 coworkers and they all had something really sad or scary or devastating happen this week. Not only am I scared and worried about them, I'm literally down to 1 co-worker so we've had to reduce the hours at the daycare and let all the clients know and figure out how to make things work for the foreseeable future.

I've discovered that when you email 350 people a couple of times in one week, you end up having to respond to a lot of emails!  LOL.  All the clients have been fantastic though - super understanding, and lots of offers to help.

But today I needed a little break.  So I packed up the kids, borrowed Lorelei's lights again and went to the daycare to have some fun.

I find practicing with the lights really hard - I don't know what I'm doing and I can't seem to tell what is working or not working until I get them home and look at them.

I didn't have any tape to hang the backdrops up (I keep forgetting to buy it) so I ended up doing some with just one on the floor and nothing behind them.  In theory, if you have no backdrop, you can set up your camera so that the only things illuminated is the stuff that the light falls on.  It seemed to work pretty well for me!

And I tried some backlit shots which I quite like - although it give such an intense look, it reminds me of pictures of hard core athletes in a gym.

Buddies

Lacey and Vito are great friends but they still have a bit of a weird relationship.

You know those dogs that when they see each other again, they instantly start wrestling and having fun together?  Well that isn't them.

They are thrilled to see each other but then instantly go and do their own thing.  One dog will get the zoomies and the other one will just stand and watch.  Then the other one will be feeling flirty and the other one is too engrossed in a smell to even notice.  This happens over and over again and neither of them seems to feel playful in the same moment.

But when they finally get their act together, watch out, as they have a blast... for about 5 minutes.  And then it is back to their own thing.  :)

Regardless, they make a pretty cute pair.

Vito at the Beach

I needed a little pick me up yesterday so what better way to do that then a trip to the beach with my camera and my favourite dog that isn't mine.  :)

The problem with the beach is that the dogs have so much fun, I take way too many pictures.

I have pictures of Lacey too but thought I had "enough" for a blog post with just Vito.

He actually retrieved the Frisbee a few times but eventually he just did his own thing with it, in true Vito fashion.

I love the beach, but hate all the sand that gets all over them.  All the pictures require giant sand goonies to be edited out but if I tried to get it all, I'd be editing forever.  Besides, it just adds to the charm right?

Lacey was hogging the big stick that we found so I scooped up a different one for Vito.  He was in heaven.

But once that lost it's appeal, I had to break out baby ball to keep the good times rolling.

Once they were nice and tired, I tortured them by getting them to sit on a picnic table.  :)  Vito can sure turn on the charm when he wants to and this one below is one of my favourites of him.

He was ready to go though by the time we got back to the car.  From what I heard, he was a tired boy when he got home.

Thanks for the good times V!

X-rays

The clinic emailed me Coulee's x-rays.  Isn't technology great?!  Here are a few of them...  If I attempt to point out the bad spots, I'll probably fail as I had a hard time following it during the appointment but I'm pretty sure you can see two of the spondylosis spots in the first image (near the centre of the image) and in the second image I seem to remember something about the areas above the disk gaps are supposed to look like a horse's head and so the ones that don't look like that aren't a good sign.

Ironically it was her neck (below) we were the most concerned with, and it was totally fine.

Gathering my Thoughts

We met with the vet today to discuss Coulee's x-rays on her spine and neck.  She has 5 discs in total that look like they are squishing out as well as areas of Spondylosis.

I'm not sure what I feel. Helpless for one.  There doesn't seem to be anything we can do to make it better.  It was a "here are the facts" type visit, not a "here is what we can do to make it better" type of visit.

What I do know (and am writing here so I won't forget):

• After an "episode" (which I think just means when she shows signs of pain) she should be on 8 weeks of reduced activity. The first week she is allowed a daily 5 minute walk, the next week a 10 minute walk, then 15 minutes and so on.  After 8 weeks she can go back to life as normal.
• If we aren't sure if her back is bothering her, we can look for signs of pain by pushing along her spine.
• No more jumping - over things, on things, etc.
• Keep her in good shape but don't be a weekend warrior - i.e. she can swim only if we do it regularly or build up to it.
• The crossing of her back legs when she walks may or may not be related to the back problems - it is usually a sign of weakness, not disk disease, at least not in the areas of her spine that we found the problems in, although there could be more problems lower down in areas that we didn't x-ray.  I've just recently noticed this so I'd be surprised if it isn't related somehow.
• Walking her on a collar or harness is fine - it doesn't matter which we choose
• No more backpacking (mainly because it is a weekend warrior activity - if she carried a pack every day that would be fine)
• Do not play tug
• It will never get better - only stay the same or get worse.

That's it. Nothing has really changed from what we knew yesterday - other than the length of the walks she should be going on - whoops!  The rest I already knew or at least assumed.  

The good news is her teeth look great and she can go back to eating regular food and chewing on toys and bones.  

In the Land of Lights

I'm trying to learn.  Poor Lorelei... she's getting texts from me constantly while I try and figure this stuff out. Without all the handholding it would be a disaster.  Not sure what I'd do without her!

Max helped me practice with antlers on.  :)

And then we did some just plain.  I quite like this one.  Simple and sweet.

The next day Kort helped... I added a sheet on the left to act as a reflector and get some light onto that side.  It worked!