DIY all the way

I have given up on professional photographers. The ones that are affordable aren't that great, and the ones I really think are creative, original, and exciting I can't afford. I would literally have to give up my entire month's food budget to use one of the photographers in our area that I like. Sadly, we have to eat. So, I decided that I would take my Sony Cybershot, the Photoshop software that our friend was nice enough to give us for free, and do my own pictures. Some of them you have already seen on the blog. This is Leah's 6 mo pic that I took today. Cost=$10 for the basket. Location=Front yard. Result=Super cuteness! At least I think so. I may be slightly biased.

Balloon Festival

This last Saturday we got to go to our city's Balloon Festival with some good friends of ours. Dave stayed home with Leah, but Ellie and I went and had a great time! We got there just in time to watch the balloons lift off- there is something so magical about hot air balloons regardless of how old you are. Riding in one is one of the things on my bucket list. Anyway, we watched them go up then we wandered around the event for a while. We found the Kashi/Burt Bees exhibit and killed time waiting in lines to score some free samples. We got Mango chapstick-yum! When it got dark, they had different balloons set up on a field where you could wander around and see them light up. They are really hot up close but so beautiful lighting up in the dark! I felt bad for my friend's little boy- he was sitting on the edge of the basket getting a picture taken when the owner flamed the propane right behind him. He shot off the edge of that basket so fast! He didn't want to get too close to them after that. The balloon owners handed out trading cards to the kids and were super nice about letting people take pictures with their balloons. The evening ended with a fireworks show. It was a lot of fun!