Continual State of Becoming

Today my brother came over and did a little photo shoot with Dylan and me.  There were many different scenarios, but I think the one that turned out the best was mixing the oil and vinegar together and taking some cool macros.  

One month into the new year!  Here are my stats: Total Miles for the month: 50.1 (wahoo!!) Longest run: 7.1 miles Fastest mile time:  still haven't checked in a while, though sometimes I do a 9:45 on my longer runs Indoors, on the treadmill:  getting my comfortable/maintainable pace close to 6.0 Pain:  a little bit is coming back to my hip, but I'm trying to keep it in check Other:  This year I started a push-up challenge (I got the idea from a friend who did this last year).  Basically I started with one push-up on the first of January, and every day I add a push up.  Which means today I did 31.  I definitely needed to do something about my crazy weak arms because 1- I strained a forearm muscle while hanging laundry, it took nearly a week to stop hurting (pathetic I know), and 2- sometimes when I'm running my arms get tired before my legs (super pathetic, I know).  So far the push-ups are going well.  I even throw in lunges...

I couldn't pick between these two, so it's a double feature today!

Admittedly I skipped a day.  I was sick and just didn't manage to get any pictures.  But I'm feeling better and carrying on now. This is actually from an impromptu photo shoot I did with my brother and Dad while they were explaining the finer details of flash photography, so I didn't technically take the photos, but I was part of the process.  And I did edit them. Some bonus pictures:

There was a "faces in unusual places" type theme for the project this week.  Here's one I see all the time on my floor.  Probably more of a head than a face, but I think it still works.  This has always looked like a really pissed of bird with a long beak to me.  Anyone else see that, or is it just me?

And some extra snowflake pictures because this was so fun. Dylan made the editing decisions for this version...  he's so much more colorful than I am ;)

This is bad.  I tried to see if I could "save" a bad picture in editing.  I couldn't.  Here's the best I could do.  Also, I am well aware of the over-editing I've been doing lately.  But I'm just playing around and learning different styles and techniques, which is fun.  Anyway, hopefully I'll get some better images this weekend. (here's the original for comparison.  I only took 5 pictures today and they were all WAY under exposed.  I had a good plan and great morning light intended for this, but then my kids needed me (which was fine), and by the time I got to it the light was gone and this was all I got.  I'll try again another day.

Did not realize Shutterfly was going to post this directly to my blog for me, but that's okay.  Here's a little photo project I did last fall (as in 2012, so more like 2 falls ago).  I finally got around to making the book.  Can't wait to get the hard copy in my hands :) Click here to view this photo book larger You'll love award-winning Shutterfly photo books . Start your own today.

I'm a little over due for an update on my running progress... Here are my stats for the beginning of 2014: On the treadmill: Average comfortable pace:  5.5 mph Fastest pace I can hold for 2 minutes without needing to stop:  8.0 mph Recovery pace:  5.0 mph (I'm working on getting this faster, it's up from 4.5) Typical run length: between 30-45 minutes Haven't checked my mile lately. Outside: Longest run:  6.2 miles with an 10:30 minute mile average, which has held true for all of my longer weekend runs lately.  A big improvement over 6 months ago when my long distance runs were at a 12:30 pace. Running outside this time of year is COLD! Aches and Pains: Not too bad lately.  I feel a little bit in my left hip on the longer runs, but I'm mostly pain free. Other interesting news: I ran a 10k on New Year's Eve with a time of 1:05:13 which put me at a 10:30 pace.  Which is awesome especially since the last time I ran a 10k was in 2009 and ...

My annual end of the year survey, better late than never.  I cut out some of the more repetitive questions, or the ones that don't really change from year to year (still no one night stands, dont anticipate that changing any time soon), so the numbers don't necessarily go in order. 1. What did you do in 2013 that you'd never done before? Started taking pictures in manual mode, Ran a 9 minute mile, went into the winner's circle at Saratoga 2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I didn't keep them 100% as intended, but I did a decent job.  I started running and stuck with it. I tried to join the local photography club (I went twice), but it was really intimidating, so instead I made the effort to learn more on my own, ending the year with a real class.  But I failed at keeping up with laundry.  Oh well.  This year I have a few resolutions, most of them have to do with finding a better balance in various areas of lif...