Baby You're a Firework

Happy 4th of July!

We Went To The Fair

n Saturday evening Patrick and I headed to the Alameda County Fair. It was our second time going and it did not disappoint. Even though we went because I wanted to take some pictures of the rides at night we couldn't help but indulge in all the fair food. In between checking out the landscape exhibits, the baby ducks, and the miniature train setup we managed to gorge on fried twinkies, a giant turkey leg, corn on the cob, chocolate dipped ice cream cone, fresh squeezed lemonade, and of course, funnel cake. Despite putting myself into a sugar coma I think I still got some pretty decent shots, what do you think?

The Long Long Hike

ast March I registered for the Summer session, I was ambitious and I signed up for three normally difficult classes but as time creeped on and it neared time to actually take those classes I realized that those normally difficult classes were going to drain me mentally and physically because summer session means that all the hard work happens in half the time. I made the wise choice to drop a class and switch a class. And that is the long-ish story of how I ended up in a photography class.

So the reason I decided on taking a photography class is because 1) I wanted to practice taking pictures (that is also one of the reasons I started a blog) and 2) I knew that taking a class that forced me to get out of the house was the only way I was going to have a fun summer and not stay inside feeling consumed by homework. My first photo adventure took Patrick and me to Mt. Diablo State Park. It took us only about a 30 minute drive further into the East Bay and then 12 hours to conquer the mountain. At 18 miles this was the most difficult hike I have ever been on–mentally and physically, and despite climbing over 3,500 feet to reach the summit, it was coming down that was really the challenge. I had assumed that coming down would be difficult– down is difficult for me because I have bad knees and the the pressure of downhill hikes can get really intense but going down Mt. Diablo was super duper difficult because the trails we followed down were super gravelly and that meant super slippery. I fell down numerous times and got the bruises on my butt to prove it. I am pretty sure that at one stretch it took us nearly an hour to walk one mile (downhill!) Anyways, it was definitely worth all the hard work and I had a great time so if you are ever in the area I recommend you check it out. P.S. the pictures below are a few I showed to my photography class