This and That

Yes, the pillow was from the original Shabby Chic collection at Target... years ago!

I'm feeling a little better each day but still feel weak.  Thank you for your prayers and well wishes.  So many have had this same cold/bug!  I have a doctor's appointment next week and if the cough is not substantially better, I'm sure he will give me cough medicine with codeine.

I'm allergic to codeine but the amount in the cough syrup doesn't bother me much.  Now, the codeine in pain pills is another story!  I had my first bad reaction to Tylenol-3 after the C-section with Christopher's birth.  I'd never had a reaction to it before .

Sometimes I can't think of much to say here and then there are other days... such as now... when my mind is brimming with ideas!  I do hope to get more of them pen to paper keyboard to screen.

I am so far behind in housework (does dust seem to know when you are sick?), e-mails, snail mail, practicing decorating with the pastry bag for the wedding reception, and anything else requiring putting much thought into an activity.  I have, however, been doing a lot of reading!

Next week I hope to write a couple Comments posts, one general and the other having to do with deepening the pantry.  I will respond to comments about my pictures and the camera now because they made me smile.

My camera is actually old by today's standards and was given to me by a dear bloggy friend when her family acquired a newer camera.  I love it!  I don't play around with it as I've found the Intelligent ISO setting works very nicely for a point and shoot type camera.

It is also usually set on Forced Flash Off as the real reason so many pictures look "off" is when I must use the flash (I almost always have to use it in my living room as the only window there faces the front porch and rarely gets much sun).

Sometimes my outside pictures are acquired with help from the zoom lens.  For instance, I can see my neighbor's barn from my house but the close ups are taken with the zoom.  There is a highway, a fence, and lots of bushes between my camera and the actual barn.

My best indoor pictures are taken with bright morning light.  The one thing this camera doesn't do well (and I'd love to have that option) is to take pictures in dim light without a flash.  I admire those candlelit pictures on blogs that draw us into the scene.

I learned long ago that a picture should either show off an object or tell a story.  For instance, many of my pictures are close up or taken from an angle.  I once read that the biggest mistake the amateur photographer makes is snapping pictures too far away.

I saw that when we lived in Detroit and I picked up the pictures I'd taken at the Zoo.  Most of them were terrible because they were taken too far from the subjects.  Looking through the lens, I thought they looked fine but not when I received hard copies of the pictures... lesson learned!

I love to tell a story by grouping some items together.  One time the only good light I had was in the kitchen so I had to take the objects off my coffee table and put them on the small kitchen "island" that I can wheel around for the best light.  Sometimes I just have to take a picture with the flash or I'd never get a picture at all.

I've noticed that people who love to create in other areas (decorate, garden, sew, paint, etc.) seem to take pretty good pictures.  Perhaps because they love learning new ways to show their creativity?

There is always so much to learn!  If anyone has learned how to take very low light pictures with a point and shoot camera, do let me know!