Lovely Sun Flare

Though I'm out of town visiting family, when I saw that this week's I Heart Faces photo challenge was "sun flare," I knew that I just had to enter. I went out (at a seriously crazy hour) a couple weeks ago to have a play-around photo-shoot with a couple friends of mine (one other photographer and our friend [a musician] who wanted some promo shots for her new album). Anyway... I walked away with some absolutely lovely sun flare shots. Below is my favorite, and my entry for this week's photo challenge.

If you haven't been yet, you should definitely go check out http://www.iheartfaces.com. It's a great site, and such a fun community :)

National Harbor

Have any of y'all ever been to National Harbor? It's on the Maryland side of the Potomac, just south of the Woodrow Wilson Bridge. I would definitely recommend checking it out if you're in the area and have a little time to kill.

I mean, there's still construction going on, and it's completely and totally created for tourists (in a city with a huge tourist draw to begin with), but there're definitely some fun things to see.

You can check out some gorgeous mosaics along the walls of the stairs leading down to the docks

There're some fun animals

Good cupcakes (though if you're in the DC area, Georgetown Cupcake is really the place to go for cupcakes)

And there's this guy

I love him

Every time I pass by the National Harbor exit, I think about him and smile

I love how huge he is.

I think he's simply wonderful :)

So tell me, what delights are you currently loving?

Bloop Bloop

That's the sound of time plopping away without me. I've been going and doing and adventuring and trying my hardest to slow down and breathe :) Since pretty much everybody has posted a lovely Halloween post, I'll at least mention that we went to a Halloween/Goodbye party for our good friend Matt who moved to Pittsburgh today. We will certainly miss him, but I'm quite certain we'll see him again!

In other news, I've begun a grand adventure with one of my favorite people in the world.

Jenn and I have started a little photo blog in the vein of mintyforest. We've only just begun, but I'm loving it so far! Jenn's studying higher education at Oxford currently, so I'm thrilled to have a means of staying in frequent contact. Anyway... our new little project is at http://justfollowyourfeet.wordpress.com/ . We're still working out a few wrinkles, but I'd love for you all to go check it out :)

Swinging

Apparently it's going to take a little while for me to get back in the blogging swing of things. I think that's ok. I'm actually working on a collaborative project with my BFF Jenn that I'm hoping will inspire me for this blog as well.
I'm still over the moon with excitement for fall. It's getting cooler everyday, and I'm totally reveling in this blissful time of change.
Speaking of change...

Josh is now working close to home again (he'd been working at a hospital on the opposite side of the district from our home {in other words, an hour long commute one-way every time he went to work}), and he's now back to working about 15 minutes from our house, which is a HUGE stress relief for both of us. Additionally, he'll be switching back to working nights starting tomorrow night. The transition is always a little tough, but we've gotten pretty good at making it work :) All in all, it's a good switch for him at this point, I think. On top of that, he's also looking at his options for the future and making some choices that will effect the next few years. As part of that, he took the GRE this past week (and totally rocked it!). Basically, life keeps on flying by.
I finally jumped on the band wagon and got a pro flickr account. I'm hoping that it will remind/inspire me to document and organize my memories that I'm collecting. Within the past three months, I've made new friends, worked to deepen existing friendships, seen friends move away, and am preparing to send off two more friends for their next adventures. It's a nice reminder that life isn't static. It's 100% transient, and if I don't grasp what I can of it now, I'll end up missing something great.

Passion

I attended a baptism a few weeks ago for a friend of ours who was preparing to leave for India to begin a two-year adventure as a staff-member of YWAM.
I’ve been thinking recently about passion and inspiration. Here’s what I’ve come up with so far…
Passion is the something that drives you, a steady rock in an otherwise swirling and churning life. Passion is what makes all the sacrifices worth it. It makes your heart beat harder, and it permeates your thoughts. Passion gives life a spark.
Inspiration is most often a surprise. Though it can be sought, inspiration often comes from the most unlikely of places. It makes your heart skip a beat and your mind whirl. It’s like a completely confident freefall. Inspiration colors life.

Wordless Wednesday

A Time to Reflect

The seasons are changing, I'm experiencing my first real fall, and life is moving on quite well. It's funny to me to think that Josh and I have lived here almost a year. In many ways, it seems that we have been here much much longer. We have found and plugged into a wonderful spiritual community here, and we've been awesomely blessed by the friends that we've come to know and love. After a very rough job hunt, my job is going great, and I'm still very much enjoying where I am for the moment. The flexibility and understanding of my boss has enabled me to do many things that I would never have been able to do in a different location. This summer I was able to take off for a family vacation (on fairly short notice) that was, I believe absolutely what I needed. Though we've in many ways settled into a routine, we're absolutely not at a stand-still, as we're planning on moving once more in March. Our last move was made before I had settled into my job and before our community became such a huge part of our lives. As it is, we feel very disconnected from them, as we're in Maryland, and they are all in Virginia. So, after much discussion, we'll (hopefully) be crossing the Potomac next spring and settling into the place that will be our final stop while Josh is stationed here.

I keep thinking that I'll get back in the blogging swing of things, so we'll see if that actually happens J Until then... I'll be enjoying the weather!

WooHoo!!!

Ok, so... I've been waiting and waiting for iHeart Faces to finally have a category that I have a picture for (and have the time that week to post), and it's finally here :D Every week I wish I could rent kids to take photos of, but I have yet to find a place for that...

Anyway... This week, they have a special pets category (something the terrors are actually good for ;)). SO... I posted this photo of them a while back, but it's still one of my favorites. Here it is, my iHeart Faces photo :)

From A Life of Delight

If you haven't been yet, you should definitely go check out http://www.iheartfaces.com. It's a great site, and such a fun community :)

Well, that's all for me!

Tabula Rasa

Ok, so... Funny thing happened today (on the way to the forum...). I've been meaning to update the mp3 player and make some new cds to keep in my car. It's been in my mind to do it for a while, and it just hadn't happened. Anyway... tonight I finally decided to just do it. So I get on the computer, and I start sifting through all 20 gazillion folders of music that I have... and it's gone. It's all gone. Somehow, somewhere along the line, our computer ate my music. So... I have the cds for a chunk of it, but not a lot of the newer stuff. Anyway... here's my plea, since I have such an awesome opportunity to start with a clean slate... I want some suggestions. I know there are some of you who have really great music taste. So what'll it be? What do I have to get?

Oh, and uh... thanks in advance!

A Little Update Con Muchos Fotos

Oh my, has it been nearly a month since I told you that the hubby might have given me swine flu and then I promptly dropped off the face of the planet?! Oh dear... that was poor planning on my part.
Well, if anything can remedy that, I'm sure a blog post of epic proportions can. Right? That's just what you were all looking forward to :D
So, where to begin? I suppose we were still enjoying the cherry blossoms at the very beginning of the month...They're all gone now, but I suppose that's ok, cause after they leave, cherry season is close at hand :)

This past weekend the hubby and I checked out the Air Show at Andrews...

Seriously, could he be any more excited about me taking that photo? Moving on... I think my favorite plane was this guy...

I didn't get it in this shot, but it may have had a jolly roger on it's tail. It was kinda a theme...

Anyway... That's been our excitement. We're pretty fascinating, I know...
In other news, I decided to do some photo exploration this morning, so I hopped in my car and went wherever it took me (turned out that my car took me to Calvert Cliffs State Park).
I made a few new friends...



Enjoyed the pretty flowers...


Gazed at the lily-pads...


Took a rest on the beach...

And fell completely in love with these little blossoms...

We're talking head over heels...

Seriously...

Which all brings me to my question of the day... Seeing as how I flunked out of Girl Scouts due to a complete dislike for insects, arachnids, creepy-crawlies, and most small woodland creatures, I have no idea what those little blossoms are. They were on small trees, and they were everywhere. Does anybody know what they are so that I can name my lovelies? I'd be very much obliged :) 

Other than that life has mostly been business as usual around here (well, other than the fact that I finally came out of my Trekkie closet to the hubby... he took it fairly well). I keep thinking longingly of my little corner of the blog world, hoping to make it back here... It hasn't consistently happened yet, but I'll keep trying :) Until then, have a lovely day.

True Love

So… the hubby got back from Louisiana on Monday. One of his friends got married, and he was in her wedding. Anyway, last night he decided that he wanted chili dogs for dinner, so he went to the grocery store, came back, made his chili dogs, and sat down to eat. Meanwhile, I went up to our room to read cause I wasn’t feeling super hot and didn’t really want to smell his seriously nutritious dinner. So about 30 minutes later, he comes up to tell me about his awesome new favorite hot dogs, notices that I’m not getting quite as excited as new favorite hot dogs really require, so he asks me what’s wrong and we have the following conversation…

Me (to hubby): I don’t feel good…
Hubby: I’m sorry… What kind of not feel good?
Me: Just kinda nauseated… Please stop talking about hot dogs.
Hubby: Oh… maybe I brought the swine flu back and gave it to you.
Me: *blink blink* …
Hubby: Yeah, I mean, my plane on the way back went through San Antonio and Austin before I got on in Little Rock. Maybe I picked the germ up and gave it to you. Hahaha! Well, sorry if I gave you the swine flu. Try not to die or anything.

Oh yeah, I can so totatlly feel the love just oozing out of him.