A Mommy and Me Date at the Malibu Getty

Last weekend my mom and I took a drive down the coast to explore the J. Paul Getty Museum: The Villa in Malibu, California.  We had found out about it a little over a year ago when we toured the other Getty Museum which is off the 405 in Southern Ca. 

This was an unforgettable experience, and one that I'd love to repeat.  The museum is full of ancient artifacts, some of which have survived THOUSANDS of years. These sculptures, bronzes, and mosaics have seen more of the human condition than any of us could ever hope to.  They have stood silent witness to the horrors of war and the joys of family and friends.  If they could speak, they would never shut up and still wouldn't be able to tell us everything.

We also ventured down the to Historic Santa Monica Pier and the end to the Route 66 (to get our kicks?). Neither of us had been there before and it was fun to munch on corn dogs and take in the sights.  People watching is never boring on a beach in Southern California. 

Here are a few of my favorite photos from the day, I haven't uploaded the ones that are on my camera yet, but this is the iPhone collection. 

Enjoy! 

Pismo Beach, in black and white

Last week my best friend and I took a walk on the beach with the intent of getting some great landscape photos for my mom to hang in her new office.... sadly the marine layer was extremely thick, and due to an operator error on my camera a lot of the photos I took were seriously blurry (lessons learned people, if the image is blurry AND your lens is clean, your camera MAY possibly in the wrong setting for the scene).  Out of the 30+ I took that night, these were the best.

I feel like the black and white made the details pop so much better than the color images.  In color they looked dreary and sad because the lighting was depressing, but in black and white they look so much more alive.

Fall Winery Photos

This past Saturday a good friend of mine Karla had a photo shoot with a really cool family that she has known for years and she asked me to tag along to help with child wrangling and carrying equipment, so of course I said YES! and brought my own camera along so that I could shoot the beautiful fall landscapes. Here in California we don't always get to witness the leaves on the trees changing colors like on the East Coast, but the vineyard leaves were reflective of the season. It was a gorgeous day, and I'm excited to share some of my favorite photos with you.

Most were taken at the Laetitia Vineyard on the Wine Trail.

Central Coast Thursday Night

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Can't get enough of the California coast? Check out my flickr set here. There are pics that range from San Luis Obispo County to Orange County.  I need to find my way north to get some of the rest of the California coastline.

 



 

 



 

Dallas Cowboys Training Camp 2013

This summer I had the opportunity to go to Dallas Cowboys Training Camp in Oxnard, California. It was a really cool experience and one that I can't wait to do again next year (although, I think I'd like to do it with a little more planning involved so that we can get to the field earlier in the day). I learned some cool new things about my camera and I was pleasantly surprised at it's capabilities. All the photos that follow were shot from about 2-3 feet behind a chain link fence, my camera edited it out for me WHILE I was taking the pics.

If you want to see more, you can view the set on flickr here and I'll be updating it periodically (as they get edited).