Photo Challenges!

I haven't entered any photo challenges in awhile, so I am jumping back in today. I am entering five photo challenges today, and some of these photos are ones that I am entering in the fair this year also!

Photo Challenge #1:

"Over My Head"

I took this at our annual Balloon Fair last year. I love all the colors!! Can't wait for the balloon fair again this year. 

Photo Challenge #2:

"Landscapes"

This was taken just a week ago at the Ride in the Light Christian Biker Rally. This was during the Sunday morning ride. I followed behind the bikers and took this picture out the sunroof of the car. This is one of my favorites from this weekend. 

Photo Challenge #3:

"Faces"

This was taken at a friends wedding a month or so ago. This sweet girl was resting on her Momma's shoulder right in front of me. I just couldn't resist snapping a few pictures of her precious face. I used The Pioneer Woman's Vintage Photoshop action on this photo.

Photo Challenge #4:

"Action"

My "babies" playing and running around. I am amazed that this pic is not more blurry!

Photo Challenge #5:

"Ice Cream"
My furry baby, Cammie, loves ice cream, which is probably part of why she is a little pudgy!! This was taken when she was just a pup. She really loved that Coconut Sorbet!

That's all for now. I hope you enjoyed my pics!

~Amber

Waterfront & Macro Challenges

Here are a couple more photo challenges for this week. I am really enjoying entering these, as I feel it is helping me grow in both my photography skills, and my post processing knowledge. Looking at everyone else's photo's always gives me some great ideas. I hope you will also check out the links below and gains some inspiration from everyone's amazing photography.

Waterfront:

This picture was taken in Bandon, Oregon, the day after my Mom and Step Dad's wedding. It was taken using my old Pentax Film camera. I love how the focus is on the grass, but you can still see the ocean in the background. It is one of my favorite pictures from that day.

Macro:

This picture was taken outside of our local junior college after the first big snow of the year. I love how the light is shining through the leaves and reflecting off the melting snow.

That's all for now.

~Amber

Wedding Post, Part 1: The Cake & Candy Bar

This past weekend, I had the pleasure and the honor of helping my friend Kelly with her wedding.

I have known Kelly and her family since I was about 10... maybe younger. Kelly, her sister Megan and I always looked similar as kids, and spent a ton of time with each other, so I became their adopted sister. They were both bridesmaids in my wedding 6 years ago. We have always had the kind of relationship that you can come back to, even after not seeing each other or talking in a long time. Just like sisters. Oh, and we bicker like sisters too. :-P

From the very beginning of the wedding planning we knew I would make her cake (of course!), but eventually I also became her official Wedding Coordinator. I love weddings, and I usually end up filling this role at friends weddings anyways, so it only seemed natural that I would be that person for Kelly. At the end of the day, I had worn many hats, including that of cake decorator/cutter/server, DJ, bar attendant, driver, forgotten marriage licence retriever (LOL), stress reducer, and probably a few others. Basically, I was there to make sure that Kelly and Will's wedding went as smoothly as possible, and I do think that I succeeded. The wedding was beautiful, and so many people pitched in all over the place to pull it all together.

Despite being incredibly busy, I did manage to sneak off and take a few pictures throughout the night, or at least until Kelly's camera died! I don't have all of them yet, so I am just going to post them as I get them uploaded. First up: the cake!

I spent most of the week working on her cake, and I was thrilled with how it turned out! The inspiration for Kelly's cake came from Marth Stewart Weddings. There was a cake on the cover of the magazine that was plain white, with a swarm of multi-colored butterflies cascading up the cake. That is what Kelly wanted, just in pink. I love the butterflies!

Kelly also asked me to put together her candy bar, so I decided to have the cake and candy on the same table. My mom and I decorated all the containers for the candy, and then I just set up the table.

For the candy bar, we had Rock Candy, small and large Whirly Pops, Watermelon Licorice, M&M's, Strawberry Gummy Puffs, and Raspberry Chocolates, all in pink of course!

This was the first candy bar I have done, and also the biggest wedding cake I have made. All in all, I was thrilled with the result, and so was the Bride.

I can't wait for the chance to do it again!

~Amber

P.S. I am linking this blog post up to Sweet Shot Tuesday for their photo challenge. The first photo in this post is my "sweet shot" for the week!

New Photo Challenges

I was so busy with my friends wedding this past week, that I didn't have a chance to enter a few photo challenges. That's okay though, I found some new ones.

Check out my pics, and let me know what you think!


My first entry is for In a Yellow House. The theme there this week is Water.
I took this picture at the Lower Burney Falls in beautiful Northern California. Shortly after taking this picture, I managed to get my car stuck in the snow, and was almost 2 hours late for my ceramics class. You know what? It was totally worth it.

My second entry this week is for Simplicity. The theme there this week is Self Portrait.
I kinda like this picture of myself. :-)

My final entry is for Trendy Treehouses' Shutter Love Tuesdays. The theme there this week is a Father's Love. I have lots and lot's of pictures of my Dad. But, they either were not taken by me, or they do not fit this theme. So, I am adapting the theme a little bit here to (Grand)father's love. If it doesn't count for the challenge, that's okay, I still wanted to share this photo. This is my Dad, with his Grandson giving him a big ol' kiss. I love, love, love this picture!!!

Well, that's all from me for tonight. Soon I will have pictures from the wedding I helped coordinate this last weekend. It was tons of fun, and really beautiful, so be on the lookout for that post! Until then, have a good night all.

~Amber

A Few More Photo Challenges

I am finding that I really enjoy photo challenges. I love looking through my pictures to find the perfect one for theme, and I really love looking through all the other submissions. I feel like I learn more and more about photography just be looking at other people's work. On that note, I have found a few other weekly photo challenges that I will be submitting my work to. I am going to try to submit pics on a weekly basis, however I am also going to try and post them all in one post next week, instead of in a bunch of separate posts, with the exception of the iheartfaces entry.

The first entry is for The Trendy Treehouse, for Shutter Love Tuesday. The theme there this week is Smiles.

This is the other son of my friends Daniel and Melissa. He is the big brother to the adorable baby I posted yesterday. This little man is such a cutie himself!

My second entry is for In A Yellow House Photo Challenge.

The theme this week is Nature. My entry is one of my favorite shots of Mount Shasta. I love living in an area with such gorgeous scenery. I could take pictures of this mountain every day and never tire of it!

That's all for now. I'm off to bake. :-)

~Amber

Another Photo Challenge!

While looking through the entries on iheart faces, I came across another blog that also hosts a weekly photo challenge.

The theme this week is school, and I figured I would give it a shot. So here is my entry:

My adorable cousin Nila, celebrating her graduation from Sonoma State University!

YAY NILA!

iheartfaces - Babies

Here is my iheartfaces entry for this weeks theme, babies!

This adorable little man belongs to two great friends of mine, Daniel & Melissa.

They have two little guys that are just so cute!

Check out all the iheartfaces entries by clicking on the link below.

My First iheartfaces Entry

This week, I decided to start entering some of my photography on the website iheartfaces. iheartfaces hosts weekly photography challenges that any one, at any skill level can enter. I thought this would be a great way to stretch myself in my own photography, and hopefully receive feedback from others!

This week, the theme is "Play". You can check out other entries at the iheartfaces website, here. For my entry, I chose on of my favorite pictures of my husband, doing what he loves. Erik is a very talented musician. He sings and plays the guitar (acoustic, electric, and bass). I have always loved listening to him play, and I am constantly encouraging him to play more often! To me, this picture truly shows his heart. I hope you like it.

I am planning on entering the iheartfaces challenges every week. If you get a chance, check out some of the other entries. There are some crazy talented photographers out there!

Till next time,

~Amber