grey like fog.

Listening to: Look For Me by Decemberadio.
Quote love:  “November can rock some serious orange. And red and brown and stormy gray. November is the kind of month that starts out flashy-bright and ends with a sleepy winter sky. A definitive beginning. A sweet ending.” Natalie Lloyd, via.

Yesterday, we spent half the day pressing cider at a friend's house. I realized how much I love black and white photography, especially on foggy wet days. It's one of those things that remind me of England and the Netherlands.

blessed.

Listening to: Sing it Out by Switchfoot. 
Quote love: "The word pretty is unworthy of everything you will be, and no child of mine will be contained in five letters. You will be pretty intelligent, pretty creative, pretty amazing, but you will never be merely “pretty." Katie Makkai

we roasted coffee beans last week. the coffee was better than the espresso.

I have a few questions. Some of them make me feel stupid asking them.

But. I need to know.

Could someone explain to me why all of the pictures I post look grainy?  Cause that's not how they look in iPhoto or on GIMP. I was scrolling down my blog earlier and realized how bad they looked. Is it just me? Or are they really that noisy?

Also. Does anyone know why I'm having trouble figuring out aperture/shutter speed. (besides, obviously, I haven't been doing this photography thing very long.) Here the problem. Let's say I have Darcy set on aperture priority and the aperture set on, say 4.5. Darcy sets the shutter speed to something like 1/125. The picture turns out fine. I program the same settings into the camera, the only difference being manual priority. The picture is underexposed. I don't get it.

I've been incredibly blessed lately. Sometimes things seem to work out perfectly without any trying. That's how I've been feeling lately. God has been blessing me.

my apologies.

My two weeks off were amazing, thank you very much. Even though originally, it was only one, I just couldn't seem to write anything.

I had a lot of extra time, full of good books (I think I managed 10 the first week-a record for me), lots of rest, and focus on important things like school and my lovely family.

I'm ready to get back into the whole blogging world and write real posts, take to do something more than a choppy list and a few pictures. Not writing for awhile puts things in perspective, what's important. I can't wait to jump back in.

What's been up in your life? I feel like I've been gone for a long, long time- I have been reading blog updates and whatnot, but without the whole commenting back and forth, it doesn't feel the same. So let me know what's going on in your life!

to take a break.

Beginning tomorrow, I'll be taking a break. At least a week. No laptop, except for school. No blog, no Facebook. See you next Monday. Have a great week, all!

favorites.

Listening to: My Way or the Highway by Relient K. 
Quote love: “I know mice have a purpose. I’m sure of it. I just haven’t quite figured out what it is. Whatever it is, it’s in the same category as that of flies. And bananas. And Miracle Whip.” the Pioneer Woman. (we had mice in our cabin this weekend. on our beds. right next to our faces. have I mentioned how much I hate mice?)

See that book? I finished it this morning. I loved it; it was a great ending to the story. This Monday I finished Artemis Fowl: The Atlantis Complex; more on that later. Currently I'm reading Peace Like a River by Leif Enger. So far, it's very good, a nice break from all the "candy" reading I've been doing lately (reading that is easy/not classic).

This is my favorite spot in my room. I do schoolwork, read, write, and spill my coffee on the desk. Every single piece of paper and letter that makes me laugh goes up on the wall. I have the Little Mermaid, Hawk Nelson, Ohio Avenue (yay small band!) and Waketheday (cool story: another small band that has since broken up, but used to come play at out church. whenever they were here they stayed at our house. the bassist tours with Relient K, merching for them and practicing with the band. such is my claim to fame). My two canvases with the quotes hang on that wall; I have a board with pictures of friends, plane & train tickets, all full of memories that flood when I see it. And of course, there's my bookcase. Ted Dekker, C.S Lewis, Suzanne Collins, Jane Austen, Peter David, Max Lucado, Natalie Lloyd...the list goes on. Every single book loved, organized in alphabetical order by first letter of authors last name, pulled off the shelf, stuffed in a bag, read over and over again.

I won a giveaway last week: these super cute (and warm!) fingerless gloves. I've been wearing them all day and I love them. I love things with buttons, but relatively plain, so this is right up my alley. Thanks so much girls!

I don't want to say much about fall retreat because I have this idea that anything I say will sound flat and second-hand by now. I will say that the whole thing was amazing, minus the mice, of course!