As summer flies by (can it really be July already? Am I really working on Christmas card session plans now? I am! More on that later), The Great Minnesota Get Together (more commonly known as the State Fair) grows closer. That also means that the deadline to register for the Fine Arts competition is even more rapidly approaching. Just like yearly fair attendance is a tradition for many Minnesotans, yearly application (and for many of us, subsequent rejection) to the Fine Arts competition is a tradition for local photographers. The Twin Cities is chock full of talented artists and acceptance is difficult - there were over 2200 applicants last year and only 300+ pieces were accepted.

I’ve entered the competition three of the last four years. My first entry was this photo, taken at Peacham Pond in Vermont. It was sort of a last minute decision, made on a whim just as I was preparing to leave town for several months, and I didn’t really realize the caliber of the competition. Not surprisingly, it was not accepted.

I missed the registration deadline the next year so did not enter. The year after, I entered this photo, which I don’t actually like much. This was also taken in Vermont and my parents have a large print of this hanging in their house. I entered it because, despite my dislike of it, I’d gotten several compliments on it and figured with my luck, I’d be successful in entering a photo that I didn’t like. I wasn’t.

(It doesn’t actually look as bad as this version.)

Last year I entered this image. I printed it quite large (30×40) just because I wanted to. It was the most obvious of my images that I could think of that would do well in a competition. The judge apparently felt differently. It did hang for several weeks at the Lake Elmo Regional Art Center and currently graces the March page of 3M calendars everywhere. I got tired of looking at that photo though so it now resides on the mantel in my parents’ house.

I’m not sure what or if I’m going to enter this year. The results of my previous entries haven’t deterred me but I think picking an entry this year would be difficult and likely time-consuming so maybe I’ll save the fair for various foods on a stick. We’ll see.

A belated Happy Fourth courtesy of the Stillwater, MN fireworks. They did a great display, complete with firing of cannons. It seemed like most of Minnesota was there and had arrived earlier than our “let’s get there early!” but we were able to secure a pretty good vantage point down near the water anyway.

Giving some thought to attending the fireworks in Hudson tonight. There’s no such thing as too many fireworks, is there?

What a week! I spent seven lovely days at The Homestead with my crazy friend Jeannette, photographing a corporate event (and everything else we could find). The Homestead was originally built in 1766 and is now a National Historic Landmark in addition to a fabulous hotel with loads of things to do. It was sad to not wake up to a breakfast spread consisting of every fruit and breakfast food imaginable this morning but it’s good to be home anyway. Few words and lots of photos for today because I’ve got so so many photos to process still!

On Sunday, I photographed the March of Dimes’ March for Babies. Early weather predictions had me a bit nervous as they were calling for rain and storms on Sunday. Then it got colder and colder and snowed on Saturday. Thanks to the craziness that is living in Minnesota, the windchill was below 30 when I was getting ready Sunday morning. But thankfully there was no precipitation of any kind and even a bit of sun here and there.

The St. Paul walk was held at Phalen Park which was quite beautiful despite the colder temps. I arrived at 9 as the volunteers were setting up the registration tables and the sponsors were preparing and the mini-donut truck was smelling oh-so-delicious. (Sadly, I had not brought any cash!) The walkers started arriving around 10, kids and strollers and dogs in tow.

The purpose of the March for Babies is to raise money to fund research to help prevent premature births, birth defects and infant mortality. Many of the families there had heartwarming stories about their NICU graduates and others had heartwrenching stories of little ones that they had lost. This is the daughter of this year’s ambassador family who was born weighing little more than a pound and is now doing quite well.

And a mother who led us in the National Anthem whose daughter had a similar story.

The walk route was around Lake Phalen, 3.1 miles. Most people welcomed the opportunity to warm up. I felt slightly annoyed at the weight of my camera bag until I saw many mothers toting (lugging is probably even a fair word) toddlers in their arms around the lake.

After the walk was more mini-donuts and hot dogs and the hokey pokey and St. Paul Saints mascot Mudonna and lots of playground time. And for me, lots and lots and lots of photos to look through!

A local Flickr group planned a Flickr walk (a photo meetup) for last Sunday and I’d been toying with the idea of attending all week. When the weekend rolled around, I wasn’t really feeling interested in taking photos but the weather was getting nicer and nicer and I was afraid if I didn’t go, I’d spend the day inside working.

Generally when I go on these photo walks, I overpack (just like I do every time I go on a trip). I’m never sure what lenses I’ll want to use and I don’t want to miss anything (!!) so I bring too much. I’ve been getting better over the months, partly dictated by the fact that the weight of camera gear adds up quickly and, many times, an hour or two into the walks, my bag has become just annoyingly heavy. Because I wasn’t really excited about taking photos this past weekend, I decided to go a different route and just brought two lenses - sort of specialty lenses - a Lensbaby and a 100mm macro.

A Lensbaby is a selective focus lens meaning that it has a very specific point of focus and lots of blur. It’s a pretty unique little gizmo and certainly not for everyone. When I first got my Lensbaby and was experimenting with it last year, I took some of the images to camera club and scored about as low as possible. I actually used to be in the “hate it” camp as well until I saw this gallery of images and fell in instant love. I haven’t really mastered the use of the Lensbaby yet because I don’t use it often but I do like some of the results.

So I headed off and met up with quite a group of other photographers. We started at the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden, home of the iconic Spoonbridge and Cherry.

Walked around and saw some interesting sculptures (I don’t know what this one was titled but if it were mine, I called it “Lost My Mind”).

And perhaps most excitingly, saw a few flowers blooming! Minnesota really doesn’t seem to be into that transitional period that most areas experience between snow and 75 degree weather.

Then we reconvened and headed over the Irene Hixon Whitney Bridge which connects the Sculpture Garden and Loring Park. The bridge is decorated with lines from a John Ashbery poem, making it a unique crossing of 16 lanes of traffic.

Also boasts something of a view of the Basilica of St. Mary.

Loring Park was idyllic. Beautiful weather, everyone was out, the ducks were happy to have somewhere liquid to park their rears and even though I still wasn’t really feeling the photos, it was just nice to be out. We eventually ended up all watching a rather large group of boys stunt riding on bikes in painfully impressive ways.

My overall photo haul from this walk was significantly smaller than usual. I probably took about a 1/3 the number of photos that I usually take and didn’t like most of them but I plan on making an effort to do more shooting on my own in the near future.

Last summer, I started working with Family & Children’s Service, a local non-profit organization. I attended several of their summer kids programs to photograph them and then they used the photographs for various promotional materials.

Last fall, an artist named Katie Thompson began working with them to design a mural that runs the length of the 55 foot hallway in their Lake Street office. She came up with the design and sketched it on the wall so that volunteers could help paint it. One hundred and twenty volunteers, the youngest being four years old, worked on it and it took them over 400 hours. The most exciting part for me, though, is that the mural is based on the photos that I took over the summer. When I attended one of the volunteer days in the fall to photograph the mural in progress, I could immediately recognize some of the faces and yesterday when I attended the dedication of the finished product, I could recognize a few more. What a fun way to see bits and pieces of your own work!

The final work looks amazing! I have absolutely no ability to draw or paint so Katie’s talent boggles my mind. During the dedication speech, President and CEO Molly Greenman said that they used to feel that if you didn’t come into the building depressed, you’d leave depressed for sure because of the long, dreary hallway. Not anymore!

If you’re looking for a way to get involved in the Twin Cities area, check out Family and Children’s Service. They are looking for help in a variety of areas and they are very good to their volunteers.

I spent four sunny days in Orlando this past week. It was kind of a last minute trip but March is the perfect time to escape Minnesota. I actually went back to the same area I’d visited in January which provided me with two excellent opportunities:

1. I got to have lunch with the super fabulous Amy Smith who I met when I was there in January. She was nice enough to drive down for lunch at the Cheesecake Factory and let me pepper her with questions about her business which she happily answered. That totally made my trip. If you’re in the Orlando area and need a photographer, check her out!

2.

I got to eat at Urban Flats again! I had lunch catered by them twice in January and was lamenting the fact that I wouldn’t be able to eat there again when I left. But I could! So once again, I had the roasted turkey, pear and brie flat with honey mustard sauce. If there’s one near you (they’re not very widespread yet), you should eat there. For real.

A few more photos from the trip…

And what was waiting at home….sigh.

Sometimes when I’m on vacation, I don’t like to drag my whole bag of equipment around so all of these photos were taken with a Canon Powershot SD700IS. Handy little camera that easily fits in my pocket. It doesn’t have many manual controls which I do miss every now and then but for something simple, it’s pretty nice.

Now I am off to answer emails and work on photos! Some exciting stuff coming in the next few weeks so check back soon!