Anyone Still With Me??

WOW!!!  It's been a while.  Hello again!

We just got back from yet ANOTHER fun weekend at the lake with friends!!!  We're trying to make the most of the last few days of our summer!!!!!  Two more days until school starts!!!

This weekend was filled with several "firsts" at the lake.

Well, not with Rhodesie baby...he was GREAT all weekend long!

We  hooked up both tubes behind the boat...and TUBED THE KIDS TO DEATH!

I think they all have battle wounds to prove it too!  Either from holding on so tight, or the tube rubbing them!  But they were all smiles (most of the time) out there on the water!

Rhodes taking his morning nap on the boat - under the towel.

Lillian thinking she's sneaking sips of my Diet Dr. Pepper!

We even broke out some bubbles!!!  Robert tested it for everyone. :-)

One thing the kids have been begging to do at the lake is stop at this little island in the middle of the lake - Sand Island - and take a dip!  We put it off as long as we could but it may be a regular stop from now on.

And then for the big one.......

I let my babies jump off of Chimney Rock.

This.Is.Huge.

Robert was proud I loosened up a bit.  But I just can't help it.  I've heard so many stories of people dying or becoming paralyzed from jumping from the rocks.  Of course, they're jumping off the 40+ foot rock.  Which I have done, but will do everything in my power to keep my own kiddos from doing the same stupid thing I did.  Even though I loved it.  :-)


Here's Olivia doing the "extra small" rock.  (btw, there are 4 sizes: xs, s, m, l)

Then I decided to go off the "small rock".  Wasn't quite thrilling enough.  ;-)  Fun though.

Like my form?!?

Then Olivia jumped off the "small rock" and that's as high as she'll ever go!

The other mom, Mrs. Liz, and I floated in the water with all 6 kids (less Rhodes) and watched the kids jump!  They loved it!  You had to pull yourself up with a rope and climb up the rocks!  I think the kids were pretty proud of themselves!

And I have a feeling Chimney Rock will be a regular stop for us now too...as long as there aren't too many boats floating around, I'm all for make memories jumping off (small) rocks at the lake.  That's what it's all about!  :-)


Like I said earlier, school starts WEDNESDAY!!!  Yikes!  So we're taking the week to get back on track!

I have to say, summer wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be.  But I think I got that "dread" in my head from listening to other people dreading the end of the school year.  I have to say, we had a blast!  And the part I was most anxious about at the beginning of summer - keeping my house up and going grocery shopping with 4 kids in tow - wasn't so bad.  I actually DID IT and didn't lose my mind.  Well, not all of it at least.

What was most comical were the constant comments I had about having them all with me out and about.  And the kids are catching on.  Today leaving the gym a lady yelled out to me, "Girl...you got FOUR!?"  I smiled and said yes.  And Landon said in a fed up tone, "They're always saying something about us!"

Then last week, I had a man pull past me in the parking lot and say, "Are these all yours?!"  Me: "Yes sir!"

I think he was so baffled (why I don't know), that he said, "Well, congratulations!"

Thanks....I think!?!

Sounding Like A Broken Record

It's so hot here, all we do is swim!!!

1 week until school starts!! LOTS of changes coming up! :-( I've really enjoyed summer with the kids! Surprisingly more than I expected! I'm glad school hasn't started back yet and I have 1 more week with them!

Oh, and what am I going to do with ONLY TWO kids at home!?!? Seriously, the pace is definitely going to drop around here and I'll need some things to fill my day!

That or my house will stay SUPER clean! HA!

Let's Talk White Balance

Over the past weeks, I've been able to hang out with some friends and/or family and let them pick my brain about photography/camera/lenses, etc.  And I had a total epiphany!

I can "talk" photography much better when asked a specific question!!!  (Y'all are all probably saying, "DUH!")  When I begin to try and explain things on a whim (which I feel my brain thinks a little differently anyways), I can't get one single point across.  But when someone gets right to the point, I can get right to the point!  Really quite obvious.

So I was thrilled to answer the question I received from Rebecca.  "Lindsay, How do you get your indoor shots to keep from being orange?  I have been tweeking my Ap and F and still can't avoid this!"

Though I don't quite understand what she meant by Ap and F, I want to try and and answer this question with some of my own photos.  I could just go linky on you and give you an article to read, but I was up to the challenge of explaining it myself.

First off, white balance is making sure the colors in your photos come out looking like they would if you were there in person.  Our eyeballs know what true white looks like and can adjust in any light setting.

Well, our cameras aren't that smart.  They need a little help figuring out when white is really white!

So here are some photos I took this morning.  First on Auto White Balance, and then in all the white balance setting my camera offers.

These are all completely untouched, straight out of the camera.

ISO 500 f/2.8 1/40 17mm

AUTO WHITE BALANCE

The camera didn't do a very good job at picking out white in auto white balance. 

ISO 500 f/2.8 1/40 17mm

TUNGSTEN SETTING WB

Definitely MUCH better!  And suffices most of the time when I seem to get an orange cast on indoor photos.

ISO 500 f/2.8 1/40 17mm

SUNSHINE WB SETTING

Just for kicks I took the same picture in all the other white balance settings.  The sunshine setting was still very orange.

ISO 500 f/2.8 1/40 17mm

Cloudy WB Setting

The cloudy setting turns the picture even ORANGER!  And that is because on cloudy days, there can be a bit of a blue cast in pictures, and this can off set it to make the colors look more accurate. 

ISO 500 f/2.8 1/40 17mm

Shade WB Setting

Same thing with the Shade setting.  Shade can cast even more blue shades in a photo and this setting helps off set some of the cool tones that can appear in photographs!

ISO 500 f/2.8 1/40 17 mm

"K" setting 2800

This is the "K" setting my my camera.  This means that I manually select a number ranging from 2500-10,000 which is assigned a "temperature".  The "K" refers to Kelvin, I'm guessing that's who came up with all this, and is really for more advanced users.  I'm not completely proficient in these numbers, but I have memorized what works best in my home - this one was set on 2800.  Which I think is just a hair too cool.

ISO 500 f/2.8 1/40 17mm

"K" Setting on 2900

Which is pretty close for manually manipulating the camera.  It looks like it has a bit of a green tint to it, which I can also correct in Camera Raw. 

So as my final edit in Camera Raw, I took out the green in the photo (with the tint slider), boosted the brightness, contrast, clarity, and vibrance (all just a hair) and slight edge burn and we're good to go.  From here I save my pic as a JPEG, and if I then decide if I want to run any actions on it to spruce it up even more.  

Voila!!!

Just for kicks, I processed the CLOUDY white balance photo too.  WOW, what a change!  This is what shooting in Raw is so helpful with - to help correct some minor things in photos and still preserve the quality.  BUT, for you jpeggers out there, there are still ways.  And also, The Pioneer Woman also has some cooling and warming actions that help with this too!


Even though I can go in and change the white balance in photoshop or camera raw, I still try and adjust it and take a good picture right off the bat.  I don't want to rely too much on software to produce my photos!   But sometimes, just a little tweak can help!

I hope this helps you too!!!

Oldie But Goodie

Telemarketers drive me crazy!  Crazy I tell ya!!  On our land line (which is basically a dial tone - and kept only for emergencies) we maybe get ONE legit call per week.  Usually a family member.

Most of the time, they're recordings, heating and air reps, or hangups.  Lately, we've had a bunch from Verizon wireless looking for Robert Nunneley.  Even though I keep telling them this is NOT the Nunneley residence, and kindly request them to stop calling.

Typically, our answering machine messages says something like this:

"Hey!  You've reached the McClellans!  We're not home right now!  If you really want to get in touch with use, call our cell phones!!  Thanks...bye!"

Basically implying that if you REALLY know us, you have our cell phone number - a sure fire way to get in touch with us.


BUT, since we've had so many crazy calls, I decided to pull out an old prank.  But a good one!

Our answering machine now says:

"Hello?  [pause].........Hold on! [rummaging around].........Hello!?  [pause]......................Oh, we're not home right now!  If you really want to get in touch with us, call our cell phones!   Or leave a message!  Thanks! Bye!!!!!!"



Well, let me tell you that I now look forward to phones on the land line now.  It.Is.Hilarious!!!  The person on the other end tries THREE times to ask for us....then hears the rest of the message and hangs up!! 

Even Robert got a kick out of it when he didn't pick up the phone this morning!!!!


I'm hoping someone won't feel too stupid and actually leave a message saying "haha" or something. 

What a fun harmless prank to play!!!


And for this post not to go pictureless..........

ISO 500 f/2.8 1/20  17mm

ISO 500 f/2.8 1/25 17mm

ISO 640 f/2.8 1/20 17mm

ISO 640 f/2.8 1/20 17mm

ISO 640 f/2.8 1/25 31mm

I cropped them all a little, adjusted the white balance in Camera Raw (it was still orange even after setting my white balance on the tungsten setting in my camera), and boosted contrast and brightness just a bit!  No photoshop actions this time!!

Something Tells Me....

....that there will be LOTS more photos of this past weekend on my cousin, Abby's blog. I think she took close to 400 pics! ;-)

Since I recently received a new copy of my boating license, I was more eager to stay behind the wheel of the boat tubing and wake boarding everyone!  Makes it just a wee bit difficult to take pics.   I can multitask pretty good...but not THAT good.

I just hopes she posts the ones I took (on her camera) of her skiing.  ;-)

But here are ours!

We had a very fun weekend with the kids...mostly out on the water trying to stay cool!!!!!!! 

Took FOUR steps by himself this weekend!!!! 






Inseparable.






Getting better at driving the boat.  (He's actually doing the online course as I type this!) ;-)





The funniest 23 month old I know!





Landon was actually VERY mad at this point because he got thrown off the tube.  He got over it pretty quick.





Tubing with cousin Trey!!!

Refused to look at the camera.  But I was patient.





Caught just one eye!  And I'm pretty sure he was smiling...  :-)

We pulled up to a place on the lake called Chimney Rock.  It's a hangout of sorts and everyone anchors down and watches other people jump off cliffs.  Crazy...I know.  I may or may not have ventured off and jumped the high cliff at one time in my wild teenage years. ;-)

So we floated and jumped off the tubes and such.  I think the kids really loved it!










And that's all I got!  But like I said, check out Abby's blog and I'm sure she has a lot of fun ones!!!