Another 'while you were teaching' post!

 Here, in the foothills of the Adirondacks of NY state, it was a cold November day, never even making it to 40 degrees.  But despite the cold temperature, it was sunny, and my husband and I took a drive to our 'camp' on Loon Lake.  While he put on the storm windows, I took the kayak out on the quiet lake.  I wore a sweater, a heavy sweatshirt (my son's), a fleece 'turtle fur' hat, fleece gloves, two scarves (one wasn't enough), and warm socks; I put the spray skirt on the kayak to keep the cold water off my lap, packed up my camera, and away I paddled!  Here's a selfie from somewhere in the middle of the lake. 

 

 It was a magnificent sky!  I struggled setting my camera while looking into the sun and wearing gloves, but it was so beautiful that it was very forgiving of my camera setting selections. 

 

I haven't told you all about it, but recently I had the opportunity to take a one-day photography class with esteemed Adirondack photographer Carl Heilman.  His photos are widely published and we are lucky to have him live in our neck of the woods.  I took his class at the Adirondack Folk School, and learned about things like hyperfocus (I have done photography for years and neve had heard of this), and got a handle on some more of of my camera settings.  Now my next step is to learn to use photoshop!  (No, none of my photos has been edited in Photoshop.  It has been on my computer just one day and I don't know where to start!) 

 

Problem is, pretty much everything Carl taught was dependent on patience (I have none) and putting your camera on a tripod to use the smallest aperture for the greatest depth of field.  But you can't put a kayak in a tripod, so I'm dependent on hand-holding the camera and adjusting the ISO to get the exposure I want.  But I learned a lot from Carl, and I look forward to "Getting Perfect Pictures Every Time", which was the title of his wonderful class. 

 

Meanwhile, enjoy  my photos of my day, and stay tuned, as I have some more art-related posts coming soon,   with a great museum trip planned in a few days, a Project Runway-related project almost complete, and much much more.  Don't give up on me;  I promise there will be art lessons coming soon too, as I prepare to teach 3 workshops at my state conference in 3 weeks. 

 

 

Georgie and Irma, our jack-o-lanterns

Not sure why, but somehow during the carving process, our jack-o-lanterns were named Georgie and Irma.  So here they are above, Georgie and Irma, on our front porch awaiting the arrival of trick-or-treaters.

Above is Georgie, glowing from within.  Below, the pumpkins waiting to be carved.

Before the carving, I drew the faces with permanent marker, and my husband cut them open and scooped out the innards.  (I still plan to roast the seeds, but somehow it hasn't gotten done yet.)

Normally, hubs does all the carving after I've drawn the faces, but he looked upon this year's drawings with skepticism.  I think his exact words were "You've GOT to be kidding, right?"  (I wasn't.)  So I said I would carve them myself.  And I did.  I broke one eyeball, after I had completed all the basic carving and was just trimming corners.  You can see the toothpick supporting the pupil if you look closely.  

But all in all, I don't think I did too badly for a novice pumpkin carver.

Belated Happy Halloween to you all!