Have you ever considered...?

...sponsoring a child?

 

 

 

 

I know before we started sponsoring a child through Compassion, we were skeptical. Are these kids real? Does the money really help these kids? How does it all work?

 

 

At concerts we had attended, I would see the child packets being handed out and I just couldn't bring myself to raise my hand to take one. "We don't have enough money to do this", was one of the lies I believed.

 

The reality, we do have enough money to do this! For most families, you can make a $38 a month sacrifice to make the difference in the life of a child.

 

Make iced coffee at home instead of buying Starbucks, make pizza at home instead of having it delivered, rent a movie at the Redbox instead of going to the theater, cut your cable, eat rice and beans once a week. There are so many creative ways that most families can squeek out $38 a month to be that one family that can make a difference in the life of one child.

 

If you are willing to make the sacrifice, be sure to visit the Compassion web site. Pray about the children on the web site, pray for God to help you select a child that you can add to your family today! I challenge you to seriously pray about this. And if you do decided to sponsor a child, please let me know. Knowing that one more child has a family to love on them just makes my day!

Homework!

When I first started pictures years ago in the fifth grade, I was taking pictures with 35mm film in a little Kodak Brownie camera similar to the one in this link.

Obviously, photography has come a long way since those early beginnings of my photography hobby. If you haven't been able to tell from my blog so far, I really love to take pictures.

Last year, I was able to purchase a 'real' camera. A Nikon D3100 with 2 lenses. What a treat this has been for me! I have been told that in order to really be creative in my photography ability, I need to learn how to shoot in manual mode. Manual mode? So intimidating!

So last week, with a day to spare, I was able to enroll in a photography class! This was the chance I was looking for. Of course, I could read through books and manuals to try to learn more on my own, but the instructor for this class will be giving us feedback on our photos.

Last night, we were given an assignment to take pictures of water with a slow shutter speed and in a fast shutter speed. Too bad we didn't have a trip to Yosemite planned over the next few days! :o)

So, the kids and I headed over to a place with a nice water feature. Here is what I was able to capture:

 1/250s, f/9.0, iso 250

 



 1/5s, f/29.0, iso 100

 

 1/250s, f/14.0, iso 100

 

 1/10s, f/25.0, iso 100

 

1/160s, f/9.0, iso 100

 

I cheated on the last photo. The first four photos here I did shoot in manual mode. However, the last one with the barn in the background, I did shoot it in landscape mode.

 

So, now to keep trying these settings out and wait for next week's homework assignment! :o)

Our Backyard Beach Retreat!

As much as I would love to live on beach front property, at this point in our lives, I know it is not a possibility. So we created a beach retreat in our own backyard!

 

The inspiration for this was in a previous post, but we weren't quite finished with the project yet. We have been able to finish a couple of things up and I worked on a couple of decorative items, so now we have our backyard beach retreat to enjoy!

 I am going to love those red chairs during our cold and foggy winter mornings!

 

 I found quite a few ideas and pinned them on my Backyard and Garden board on Pinterest. Be sure to hope over there if you need some backyard inspiration!

 

Matthew spent quite a bit of time with the jigsaw cutting out this 'driftwood' sign for our beach.

 

As I mentioned in my previous post, a lot of the items we added to 'the beach' were already sitting around in the garage. With some paint and a few additions, we were able to creatively and somewhat frugally create a backyard retreat area that we will be able to enjoy for quite some time!

The Birthday Day Trip

 Matthew's Birthday Morning Breakfast!

 

 Finishing up decorating the cake before leaving for our day trip

 

 Today's day trip destination...Winchester House

 

 Gingerbread Winchester House

 

 Cool old things on display

 

 The whole reason why Matthew wanted to come here for his birthday! Firearms Museum!

 

 Old advertisement

 

 I know they were wishing they could get through the glass and hold all those guns!

 

 We did go on the house tour, but they strictly forbid any photography inside the home. So I had to make do with just a couple of pictures outside the home. Many windows in the home were purchased from the Tiffany Class Company.

 

After our day trip, we headed home to prepare for a BBQ with our church college group and some friends to continue Matthew's birthday celebration.

 

 "Happy Birthday to you!"

 

It ended up being a great night to celebrate Matthew's 18th birthday!



Compassion Blog Month

Have you heard the news?

 

September is officially Blog Month at Compassion and there is a big goal! There is a goal to have more children sponsored via the Internet than any other September in history. I have committed to do my part to help spread the word about Compassion Blog Month and help more people make the decision to become Compassion Sponsors.

 

If you are a blogger and you sponsor a child with Compassion, you can join in the fun! Just click the "I'm Participating in Blog Month for Compassion" button. You won't regret it! :o)