Dancers

Suzy had to go take pictures of  a dance studio's dress rehearsal yesterday and I tagged along to be a second shooter to document and practice in a stage lighting situation.  They are grainy because my ISO was at 2500 most of the time, but sometimes grain is good, right?  I'm just too cheap to buy the plug-in for Photoshop to edit it out, but anyhow, here's a few that I took.

Wheat Thins are for the birds

 Yesterday while I was sitting on the beach watching my kids, I noticed the birds were out scavenging.  I just love these little cardinals and love to see them around the island.  So I broke out the Wheat thins and crushed them up and tossed them on the sand nearby to get a closer look.  By the way, all three of these shots are straight out of camera!  I didn't do any enhancing of these cute little things at all!

 I love the contrast on these "red head" (I don't know the scientific name) cardinals.  So pretty!

These two must be a pair because the red  one was giving her food.  It was really cute watching them interact.

Two more days in Paradise and then hopefully home to some decent weather in Utah!  It's been a nice break to be consistently in the high 70's and low 80's everyday these past two weeks!

10 year-olds Shredding it up at Kalihiwai

I actually don't know how old these kids actually are, but I'd be way surprised if they were over 10!   Holy Cow, I was impressed!

This kid was doing flips off his board, too!

Gabe had absolutely no fear in grabbing his board and heading out to the waves.  He was determined to get out there with the other kids and do what they were doing.  He did pretty well.  He's played around with the boogie boards, but these were the biggest waves he's tried on a board.

 Jake tried for about 10 minutes, but the arm thing wasn't working too well for him.

That's a happy look!

 Riding it all the way in!

I think he had a good day!

When they resist...just name the girl!

 Really?  A GIRLFRIEND?  I was sitting on the beach alone with Jake and although I had failed to charge my camera battery, I thought,  "I might as well use it up!"  Can't pass up the opportunity to find one really good shot!  So I dragged him out onto a rock and told him to sit and look at me!  He sat there for a minute while I fussed around with my settings.  About the time I was ready, the waves surged a bit and it started to pound him from the back a little.  Not hard, but enough for him to be done with me! If he's gonna get pounded, he's gonna get POUNDED!  I urged him to wait for a minute and was getting total resistance. Like this:

So I remembered that he has mentioned someone named Claire at school.  I really hesitate to call her his girlfriend, but she is a girl and obviously a friend, so  I  told him to look up and say "Claire"!  IT WORKED!  A sunny bright smile from this freckle-faced boy!

So that gave me a little mileage as I snapped as many as I could before he got up and walked away to go play in the waves some more!  He puts up with me, what can I say?

Gabe Gives Good Face

My son is so used to me with a camera in his face that he doesn't fight me, but indulges me while I shoot!  It helps that he has a cute face.  Here are some shots of him over the past few years. With kids, especially, I like to get in close and tight.  They have great skin and bright eyes and lots of expression!  I also LOVE the missing tooth pics!  What a cutie!