Lisa Falls

Maya and I decided to go for a drive up Little Cottonwood Canyon then go for a hike. The first trail we were on was great for awhile but suddenly turned into a very steep bushwhacking adventure. The ground was wet, muddy and slippery. Pretty soon we lost all trace of the trail and we decided to head back to the car. As we descended the canyon I realized that we had been on the wrong trail. We found the correct trail and soon we were enjoying Lisa Falls. It began to rain as we approached the falls then it quickly turned into hail so our visit was very short. We ran down the trail trying not to get beat up too much by the hail. Believe it or not, this pretty much constitutes all of the fall pictures I captured this year! Before I knew it, autumn came and went. I missed the colors! There are a few more pictures of the hike here.

LensBaby Photo Walk

The PhotoWalkingUtah group had another photo walk this last month. This one specifically focused on LensBaby lenses. LensBaby lenses are speciality/novelty lenses in that they are a fixed focal length and fixed aperture. The body of the lens is movable so you can change the focus point in the picture. It creates some interesting effect with the out-of-focus areas. Pictureline and Lensbaby provided lots of demo lenses so that everyone (about 60 people) could try out the unique lenses. I tried a LensBaby Composer and had a lot fun trying to be creative. Most of the pictures are of classic cars from a private collection located on the same block as PictureLine. Check out the Classic Car Museum website for more info, like the purchase price of some of these cars. There are more pictures on SmugMug and a few that I submitted to the group on Flikr. You can find other peoples' LensBaby Photo Walk pictures on Flikr.

More Random Pictures

Real Salt Lake

Maya's soccer coach gave her two vouchers for a Real Salt Lake game. We had a lot fun watching the last game of the regular season. RSL was struggling to make it into the post season and really needed to win this game against the Colorado Rapids. RSL put on a great show for us by winning 3-0 then we caught a soccer ball at the end of the game. RSL was able to advance to the post season and are actually in the Eastern Conference finals since there were not enough teams in the East that had good enough record to advance to the playoffs. RSL played Columbus in two semi-final games with the team scoring the most aggregate goals would move on to the Eastern Conference final. Again they did awesome by wining both games and upsetting the best team in the League and the League Champions from last year. On to Chicago. I don't think anyone thought they would get past Chicago. But RSL didn't listen. The score was tied 0-0 at the end of regulation, and tied 0-0 at the overtime then they had to go to a shoot-out. Real Salt Lake won the game with 5 PKs to Chicago's 4!!! Way to go RSL! Eastern Conference Champs! One week later RSL played LA Galaxy in the Major League Soccer Finals! The DVR was set to record the game since our schedules did not synch up. At 10PM I began to watch a pretty great game. RSL and LA have been closely matched in the regular season and they again battled back and forth during this game. LA scored first then during the second half RSL tied it up and remained tied through end of regulation time. Thirty minutes of overtime began and then the DVR stopped. CRAP!!!! I had to search to find out what happened. Another shoot out! And another 5-4 WIN! O-le . . . Ole, Ole, Ole . . . Re-al Salt Lake! Way to go RSL!

Zoo Babies

A couple of months ago we went to the Hogle Zoo to see all the recent additions. Zuri the baby elephant was a lot fun to watch playing. The Snow leopard cub and mother were active and wandering around the enclosure. The 3 tiger cubs were sleeping in the shade The baby giraffe was enjoying some lunch The baby howler monkey was being held tight in her mother's arms There were several babies we did not see. For the full list of new arrivals check out Hogle Zoo's website. There are more pictures here.

Maya Plays Soccer

Maya played on a soccer team this past fall. It was her first time kicking the ball around and learning the game. She improved a lot over her short season and she really enjoyed playing. Her favorite positions were defender and goalie. It was a lot fun watching her learn the game and have a lot of fun out on the field. I helped out with the coaching which was fun too. Great job Maya! We are proud of you. You can find more Soccer pictures here.

September Sunset

Here are a couple of shots I took of the sunset while we were at my relatives place west of Layton. They are not very good due to hand holding the long(ish) exposure but I still like the colors and the blurred wings of the geese. You can find a few more pictures of the sunset here.

The Circus

Yay for the Circus! It was quite a circus just getting to the circus. One by one, the original people going to the circus were not able to make it. I ended up calling around at the last minute (in the car, on our way...) to find available circus go-ers. Jill had to work late and was going to meet us at the arena which meant I had to fit everyone into the Acura. Maya, Noah, Isabelle and Parker were lucky ones. The security staff did not want to let me into the arena with my camera. Some how I smooth talked my way in. Although it was pretty tough getting any usable pictures with my old camera. New point-and-shoot cameras are much better than my old trusty D70s. We had a great time watching all of the amazing acts. Jill spoiled them with a $12 bag of popcorn to share! OK, I don't know what the actual cost of the popcorn was...it was propably $15! Here are some more pictures.

Halloween

OK, I have finally had a chance to go through the Halloween pictures and it has only been a couple of weeks! The other 10 posts I have not completed yet will have to wait...again! The family had a great costume party hosted by Curtis and Brittany. We had great Halloween inspired food and everyone had great costumes. Unfortunately it took me a few tries to get my costume accessories to work properly so they were not done for the family party. That made me the only party pooper without a costume which is just not like me! Jill and Noah were on the plane coming home from Philly during the party. (Jill is still working on the Philly trip post....right Jill?) You can find more Family Halloween Party pics here. This year we went as the Oz Gang for the ward Autumn Fest (they avoided calling it a Halloween party). We were a hit, but we didn't win any prizes. At least we don't think we won. They were very disorganized and their judging system did not work too well since there was a lot of confusion about who the prize winners really were. There were about 30-40 different types of soup and chili for dinner and we found some really tasty ones. Halloween night we ventured to Maya's Grandma's place. Maya likes to Trick-or-Treat in that neighbourhood. Although in years past, it has typically been a struggle to get her to go to the three houses that she knows. This year we actually did about 3 blocks! We were the best Trick-or-Treaters in the neighbourhood that night. None of the other parents were dressed up let alone all in a matching theme. Halloween is always a fun holiday. Maya and Noah did pretty well with their loot of sugar. Maybe next year we will actually be organized enough to decorate and have the party at our house. You can find more Halloween pictures here.