Day 365 - And Here the Journey Ends to Begin Again!

I want to take this opportunity to thank you, all my blog readers, for being there, giving me your feedback and cheering me on even though my energy and motivation were in the pits from time to time.  I know that I haven't given my best over the last month or more - I've been battling health issues, and other things, but I really appreciated each visit and each comment you made on my posts.  For all that - THANK YOU!  I hope I have been able to give some of you some insight into my photography along the way and I hope to be able to share many more in the future as I change gears. 

I would also like to thank a few of my friends (and you know who you are) for keeping me on track - some of them coaxed and cajoled me into doing portraits, some of them downloaded my photos and saved them to their computer desktop at work to give me the exposure, some of them visited my blog and commented on my Facebook page, and yet some others religiously visited my Flickr posts and left me encouragement and kind words.  I think I had a whole battalion of friends and well-wishers following my footsteps, making sure I didn't fail.  My hats off to you! 

This is my last post for this project and what a project it has been!  I still can't believe it's over - well, how can I, considering I've been doing this for so long now?   I am certain that I will feel the loss sometime soon, but I definitely feel that the wrap-up was long overdue.  Seriously, it was.  It took me over a year from missing days due to illnesses and other personal issues.  But I think all's well that ends well.

It has been a great journey for me, and as I mentioned in my last post, I will put together some thoughts and write it all up - soon!  As soon as I've had some time to recover and enjoy my  freedom from the all-pervading stress of having to get a shot for the day.

I had been brainstorming with my friend Rajiv (who has modelled for me in the past) and with my son (he comes up with really great ideas and therefore, I sometimes turn to him for inspiration) about what the last post should be to commemorate the event.  My son's idea was to use fireworks (sparklers, in this case) to mark the celebrations.  Rajiv suggested using tealights to write 365 with (I was thinking candles, but thought it might be too clumsy) or to take a picture of something that was indicative of how monumental this task of taking a shot a day was.

I loved all three ideas, but unfortunately, I didn't find a monumental subject I could shoot today, nor did I find tealights at my local superstore.  Fortunately, I found sparklers!  Therefore, sparklers it had to be!  I had planned to do both the sparklers and the tealights but I guess availability of one took over the non-availability of the other!

I want to end this by saying I really loved and hated this project!  Let me leave you all with that thought, so I can come back and explain it better.  I'm a little bit overcome with mixed emotions right now.

Day 362 - Little Darlings

We had a beautiful day with part clouds and part sun.  I seized the opportunity to go check if we have ducklings yet, and sure enough there was a small brood of them scooting around in the water.  They were adorable!  

I took over 500 shots today of flowers, birds and this duck family, but I'm feeling really lazy to process them all.  Therefore, I processed two of my fave shots from the day.

I loved the splash of colours in this, and I got only one chance to photograph these benches - just as I was going to change my position and shoot another one, and elderly couple came over and occupied the benches.  Disappointed! :(

And here are three of the six little fluff-balls!

Day 361 - Studying a Dahlia

Quick post

Day 360 - Ottawa Tulip Festival

I went to see the tulip festival with a few friends, and was greatly disappointed - didn't get to see as many tulips as I've normally seen in the past.  Admittedly, we didn't end up going to the park where I normally go - Dow's Lake, but the festival locations in downtown should definitely have had a lot more.

I think I probably took about a dozen shots of the tulips in all.  The flowers were mostly all dried up and in pretty bad shape.  I had to look hard to find a few nice ones to photograph.  I have only processed one for now, but I'll definitely post a few more on Flickr later.

Day 359 - Photoshop Experiment

Playing around in Photoshop Elements 8 and trying out some textures.

Day 354 - Why Did the Grackle Cross the Puddle?

... To get to the other side so he could be the early bird to get the juiciest worm!

Ok.. I took it a bit too far!  We have been having the wettest Spring in a decade, I think!  I can't remember being rained on so much!

Shots from the balcony - no way I'm venturing out into those puddles with my fabric-covered sneakers.  They're already caked in mud, and so grey, you can't tell they were ever white!  I need a pair of hiking boots or rain boots, soon!

Day 352 - Utterly Exhausted

I am frequently overpowered by these waves of exhaustion where I feel totally out of it all.  This was one of those instances where I didn't know or couldn't care what the subject for the day would be, so I picked up the first thing I could find - chocolatines.

Day 351- Pouring Honey

Tried to get a shot of honey pouring over my breakfast, but couldn't quite the effect I was after.  I ended up trying the shot about five or six times, thereby, sweetening my cereal a bit too much.  I had to decide to stop at this shot!  And I also got quite a bit of honey on to my camera and the dining table in the process. :(  A right sticky situation!

P.S. Had a bit of a Photoshop challenge when I tried to remove a drop of honey that fell on the edge of the bowl behind the stream of honey.  Cloning is très difficile!

Day 348 - Mallards

Down by the riverside for a quick photo session.

Day 347 - Osprey

I was supposed to have made a trip to a friend's farm along with some other friends, but didn't end up going because of my poor health.  I'm feeling far from okay, but I just couldn't bring myself to be stuck within the four walls on such a gorgeous day as today, considering we're getting a lot of rain this Spring.

I spent a little while in the forest at the back and tracked down an Osprey couple on lunch patrol.  I also got a few shots of a Tree Swallow and a Myrtle Warbler, but the Ospreys were the stars of the day!

I got a few really clean shots as they came up right overhead, but the ones that would have been the best ones, I didn't have much luck with as they were too far even for my long lens.

If you'd like to see more of these Ospreys, do check out my Flickr photos.

Day 346 - Pink Mums

Now that I finally see the light at the end of the tunnel (read as the completion of my 365 project), even wild horses can't keep me away from the shot of the day!  I want to get this over with now, and I'm almost there!

I took about five shots, and I decided to try different processing on these two.

Day 344 - Fast Food Take-Out

Too sick to cook, too sick to think of the shot of the day.  This was one of 4 shots of the Pad Thai dinner I bought on my way back from work.

I usually love the Pad Thai from this fast food joint, but everything tasted like chalk that day.  Dinner gone to waste!

Day 343 - Cepacol

Allergy season seems to have gotten to me pretty bad this year.  I had somehow escaped being afflicted last Spring, and was only slightly affected.  But this time the allergies are so bad, my throat is severely inflamed and sore and feels like someone has thrust a ping pong ball down it.  I'm staying alive with Cepacol right now...  no voice and I feel really miserable! :(

Day 334 - Bok Choy Flowers

Tiny yellow flowers that grew out of my bok choy!

Day 331 - I Deleted My Best Pictures!

Well, there's no harm in saying that because who's to know if they were my best? ;-)

But jokes apart, I had some really nice "moments" from the day when I photographed a squirrel way up high on a tree branch, standing up on its hind legs and holding a branch with its two front paws nibbling at it.  It could pass off as if he was playing the flute!  He looked really cute, and I'm kicking myself for inadvertently deleting the shots!

I also deleted some nice shots of the first bluebells I saw by the riverside, and also a few nice shots of the chickadees that I always find so difficult to expose properly.  Well, I was at least lucky that I had my second camera with the 18 - 55 mm on it, so I still had a few pictures on that card, that I didn't delete and that I can post now.

I also have a tree silhouette that I forgot to upload to Flickr to link here.  I'll have to come back to this post when I've uploaded that.

Day 330 - For Want of Energy and Subject

I had been meaning to take a few nice shots of the  Canon EF 100-400mm f4.5-5.6L IS USM Telephoto Zoom Lens for Canon SLR Cameras, but it just didn't happen.  Although these aren't the kind of shots I wanted to put up at all, I didn't want to miss the shot of the day.  I will definitely revisit this subject again - sooner or later.  But I'm not going to give up in the last leg of the 365 project - I'll post snapshots if I have to! :-(

As I've mentioned in one of my previous posts, the camera and lens together weigh close to 2.3 kgs!  But I'm slowly getting used to the weight and although tiring, I shot at 1/60s yesterday, and I was still able to keep a steady hand!

Day 329 - More Birds in the Bush

This White-breasted Nuthatch was pulling something out of the tree trunk and it looked like a snail or some kind of worm.  Ugghh!

My first time seeing Dark-Eyed Juncos - there were a few flocking around.

My second time seeing a Northern Flicker, but first time in my neck of the woods.  The first time I ever saw them was when I was visiting my friend in Fremont, CA last Christmas.

Day 328 - Sugar-Crusted Pannettone

I think I am addicted to this!  I love pannetone, and when it's sugar-crusted.. I can't stop eating it!

Day 327 - Balcony Birding

I just decided to stay on my balcony and photograph some birds through the windy and mostly miserable day.  The wind's still howling outside my window, even as I write.

And the squirrel takes the cake!  It looked so cute holding this piece of bread like this - almost as if it was offering me some!  :=D

Day 326 - Rain, rain go away!

I am sure you think I'm a complainer, because I've been complaining incessantly about how out of energy I feel these days.  Ergo, my slow posting rate to this blog.

Yesterday, amidst a flurry of activities, and bad weather, I managed to take a couple of shots from my balcony, just so I wouldn't fall behind on my shots.

In this shot of the Grackle, you can actually see the raindrops on it's feathers.