Check List

My Photowalk is tomorrow morning and I'm so excited!

Created a Flickr account (as needed for sharing our photos after tomorrow); Check.
Charged all three batteries for my camera; Check.
Formatted three 4 gig memory drives and the 8 gig memory drive so I have PLENTY of memory for photos; Check.
Cleaned the lens, lens covers and dug out my tripod out of the closet. (Not taking the tripod, but am taking the monopod); Check.
Cleaned out my camera bag; Check.
Been to the ATM for the $$ for the entrance fee for the San Juan Capistrano Mission and lunch after the walk; Check.
Gassed up the car; Check.
Took the car in for it's recommended oil change today; Check.
Went to grocery store and got some bottled water and graham crackers for snacks; Check.
Printed off the directions on how to get there... even if it is straight down the I-5 and follow the Mission signs in San Juan Capristrano; Check.
Phone number for the group leader; Check.
Dug my hiking boots out of the closet; Check.

Located my "Photography Hat"; Check.

This is me last year at the Temecula PhotoWalk!

I think I'm ready!

Excitement!!

The Genealogy Bug Bit Again!

I've been doing genealogy on and off since the early 90's during the infancy of the internet and the "hay day" of the genealogy boom. I met many, many cousins (both "near & dear" to "the further up the tree, the better")! Thru emails, letters, forums newsletters and everything in between, my database swelled to 9000 souls in just a matter of 24 months. I was hooked and adding ancestors became one of my favorite things to do. I was online for hours at a time, answering emails, reading forums, answering questions on those forums. I had bookmarks for as many as 43 family surnames that I would routinely read and reply to! Brick walls I would run up against would crumble and fall when I set it on the back burner and moved on to another family to spend more time researching. With so many surnames, it was easy to keep moving on to another one!

So after many years of that... I had to move on to something else. I HAD to take a break! (Photography... have I mentioned anywhere that I love photography?)

Then last month I was trying to find something on Mike's mother's family. Holy moly... the genealogy bug bit again! I've been spending hours researching this branch of the family that I really didn't get to as much for one reason or another, but now I'm spending time with these families and putting together the missing pieces. I am amazed (all over again) at how many times these various families interacted with other families I've been researching. Several of these families left North Carolina together and settled very close to each other in middle Tennessee. Mike's grandparents are found on the 1930 census (at ages 18 & 14) living a farm away from each other only to be married 2 years later.

My database now has over 10,000 related souls (my side and Mike's side of the families) spanning from the very early 1600's thru the present. Amazing how they all connect! Below is the oldest photo I have and then the newest!

PhotoWalk 2011

I participated in Scott Kelby's Worldwide PhotoWalk in 2009, 2010 and now this year. The first year I participated, I went to Old Town Orange. Part of Forrest Gump was filmed there. It is a pretty part of the town of Orange, obviously the "old part"! It was great fun walking around and taking photos of whatever happened to catch my eye. This particular PhotoWalk took place two days after I got back from a week of driving from Tennessee to California with Mike's aunt and a friend of hers. We had the best time stopping at various places and spending time there. The best stop was the Grand Canyon. Still at a loss for words on that one!

To learn more on the PhotoWalks, go here: http://worldwidephotowalk.com/.

Here are some photos from the "Old Town Orange" shoot from 2009.

The second PhotoWalk I participated in, I drove down to Temecula from Corona, a distance of about 35 miles or so. The old part of Temecula was where we went and it was a fascinating mixture of "wild west" to "fortune tellers".

Here are some of the photos from the Temecula PhotoWalk in 2010.

9-11-11 The Ten Year Anniversary

It's been 10 years since the Twin Towers fell, the Pentagon was attacked and the flight went down in a Pennsylvania field. So much has happened since then. Do I remember where I was when I heard? Of course I do. Like millions of people around the world, I'll never forget it and what happened in the days following. I watched the TV news for almost 72 hours straight. I couldn't sleep, so I watched. I watched so much, that for the past ten years, I can pretty much tell you the number of times I've sat and watched another news show all the way thru since then. I just don't do it anymore. Did I think of what happened 10 years ago today? Yes, the same as I have done every 9/11 since it happened. Did I watch today the various rememberances that were on TV? No. I watched it when it happened that was quite enough.

Today we did get out. We went to Huntington Beach. They had some things going on there like they normally do. The drummers were back again this weekend. (I think they play every weekend!), there were surfers and a surfing tournament going on, cute girls in bikinis, overweight guys in speedos, and everything in between! While we were walking on the pier, we heard sirens to a firetruck and it made its' way down Pacific Coast Highway (main road thru Huntington Beach and runs parallel to the beach and pier). After the firetruck came hundreds and hundreds of motorcycles. The roar of the motorcycles was deafening and we were quite a ways out on the pier! I got a couple of photos, but then decided to make a video with my camera, so I swapped it over and got some video.

As always, we had a great time at the beach. It always takes us at least an hour an a half to walk up and down the length of the pier. So much to watch and see!

Sunset... Balboa Beach Style!

After spending some time at "The Wedge", we drove up to Balboa Beach pier. We walked up to the end of the pier and back again, stopping to enjoy the sunset as it cast its golden hues over the beach and surf. For those few magical moments, it really did turn "golden". Enjoy!

So, there was this storm off New Zealand...

This past week has been a busy one for those that make a living on the beaches of southern California. There were waves and high tides that haven't been seen in years! One high tide had the parking lots flooded at Huntington Beach! All this from a storm 1/2 way around the world off the coast of New Zealand!

The Wedge, Newport Beach, CA

These waves made the news for several days, some beaches were closed due to the extreme rough surf and of course, this brought out all the surfers and body boarders in droves! The most notorious place for body boarders to surf is a place called "The Wedge" in Newport Beach. It wasn't until we arrived there that I realized we had been there before, I just never knew that was called the Wedge! We called it the Newport Jetty- because that is exactly what it is!. Due to the direction this particular beach faces and the man made jetty to protect the Newport Harbor entrance, the waves at the Wedge get incredibly big in an incredibly shallow area, which is why they don't allow surf boards, only body boards- which are about 3 feet long vs. the six foot long surf boards.

Most of the time, body boarders do a lot of free falling from the 6-10 foot waves that are normally present, but with the storm off of New Zealand adding it's contribution, the waves were up to 20+ feet! Did I mention how shallow this area is? The life guards and locals that use this location suggest having your insurance card with you when you arrive, because it's a rare week when the local ambulance services aren't there to pick up someone that just got trashed by a wave. And these waves were twice the normal sizes!

So with this build up, you just know I had to go get some photos of it... along with everyone else in Orange County that owns a camera- from cell phone to one guy with a lens I swear was 3 feet long! He could have counted nose hairs of the surfers at 50 yards if he had wanted to! I know, I know... lens envy... what can I say? :o) So the beach was covered in people just waiting for the surfers/body boarders to do a spectacular wipe out. And they didn't disappoint either! After one particular wipe out, this body surfer sat on the beach for about a 1/2 hour before trying it again!

All this past week, there had been numerous news reports about the number of people the life guards had pulled out of the water due to the rip tides. Much stronger than the usual they get around here. And then they had a drowning of a surfer at San Onofre State Beach in Orange County. Sad to say the guy was 42 and a father from Torrence. Yesterday (Labor Day), they pulled over two dozen people out of the water at Newport Beach alone!

By the time I made it to the beach to take photos, the Balboa Beach Parks & Recreation folks had already put up a berm of sand 10 feet high between the parking lots and the water's edge. You literally had to climb over the berm to get to the beach! There were several spots that had been knocked down a bit from the number of people cutting thru that place to get to the beach. Quite the sight to see! In the next few weeks, the sand will shift and smooth out (whether from the people at the beach or by the Parks & Recreation Dept.) and there will be new sand on the beach.