Day 5: Waikiki Hotel

Another photo from my Hawaiian vacation this summer.

I took this picture while visiting Waikiki beach. My brother lived in Hawaii for two years and really bagged on Waikiki. The area is known for being nothing more than a tourist attraction with a man-made beach. Call it what you will, the area was gorgeous. Nothing could have prepared me for the picturesque view. While snapping away at the view, I took this picture of a hotel and palm trees. There are palm trees here in southern California but I have yet to find a place as heavenly as Hawaii.

I cannot wait to return.

Day 4: Yogurtland

Once again life has caused me to lose track of my writing and I am behind in my goal to write an entry for every day. Hopefully I will be able to be caught up after tonight.

The photo I selected for this day is of frozen yogurt from a magical place called Yogurtland. Some may know of this place and its yummy goodness that can be had with an assortment of toppings. For me this is more than just a dessert shop. Yogurtland will forever hold a special place for me.

Three years ago I started dating this guy. It was a very interesting time. I had long gotten over the heartbreak of my ex and was more than ready to enter a new relationship. However, I had promised myself that I would take things slow this time. Due to his commitment to music, my work schedule, and the overwhelming drama that soon came from the mother of his son, we would usually have dates that were very late at night. After dinner from somewhere like Del Taco there really were not many choices as to where we could go to talk and get to know each other.

It was then that we discovered that Yogurtland in Long Beach does not close till midnight.

Yogurtland became our late night date spot. Even on the night before my first birthday during our coupledom, we met at Yogurtland, made our selections and headed to a park to count down the minutes till it was officially my birthday.

Three years later and we are still together. From then on Yogurtland would always remind me of the early beginnings of our relationship. Even during the times when we did not know if we would last, those discussions were held at Yogurtland.

This photo was taken with my Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W370, a point and shoot. The black and white filter applied via Photo Explosion.

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Happy Birthday #AmWriting

"I'm late! I'm late! For a very important date!"


This morning I woke up feeling like I had forgotten something. It nagged me as I got ready for work and my drive into the office. Once I sat down, I knew exactly what I had forgotten!

Today is the (block)blog party for #AmWriting

Crap!

Several months ago whilst scrolling through Twitter one writer that I follow (@Quotes4Writers) had posted some hashtags to use so that one may find other writers. One of those hashtags was #AmWriting. I thought this was a good hashtag to click. Little did I know that this was more than just a trending topic. This was the white rabbit to a world of other writers.

That day, I began to follow other writers and it has been inspiring to see individuals who like me have to work to balance writing and "corporate" life. There are writers who have gone beyond me and published works, and others in various levels of their writing careers.

Today marks the two year anniversary (or birthday if you will) of the #amwriting community and I am extremely grateful for this wonderful group of individuals. Writing can be seen as a solitary life and for the social butterfly that I am, it is good to have a group of people undergoing siomilar creative metamorphosis by choice.

For an example of another writer, check out Mike St and his blog party entry. Many more writers can be found at #AmWriting!!


UPDATED: I also wanted to link to Elizabeth's blog just to keep the blog party bus rolling!
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Signal Hill

I have truly been inspired with this new found interest in photography. While looking at the world through my camera, I have come up with new story ideas.In order to keep on top of my blog a day I decided to take some pictures from Hilltop Park in Signal Hill. The view is spectacular, but they were not the best pictures. Since this photo session I have learned so much about digital cameras/photography. It looks as if many of my landscape shots were overexposed and the digital zoom caused too much "digital noise."

Although, I committed to blogging one photo a day, today I will be blogging multiple pictures from my Signal Hill shoot.

As I walked through the park I had this idea of shooting some of the foliage. My first attempt at this was a bush with these bright pink flowers.

I wanted to test out shooting a variety of colors. This proved to be difficult as the common theme at the park was green. There were some flowers but the heat proved to be too much for many of them. As such, I was very fortunate to find this solitary red flower.


When taking pictures in the bright sunlight, I found that I have to be careful of my shadow obscuring certain subjects. This took some finagling in certain shots but I felt like it added contrast to this picture of a lone daisy.

I also found a bush with a few small buds.

This turned into my first set of floral photographs. It was fun experimenting with different subjects. I have no idea of what photos I will use for tomorrow's entry, but so far I am liking this exercise in daily photography blogging.

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