Another Fantastic Weekend

I truly feel so fortunate that we have so many great weekends! I am truly so happy with our life!

This past weekend was Dave's 31st birthday..yes 31 can you believe that! I've known Dave since I was about 23, but honestly it doesn't feel like it's been that long. We've just been having so much fun together. Time goes by fast when your having fun. Happy Birthday again!

So on Thursday night we hopped on a red eye after a small pre birthday happy hour. We arrived to a cool and rainy MD. But being from the desert we didn't mind. After a little nap, we ran some errands and took my mom to get birthday snowballs (her bday is Tuesday). For all of you who are not from the mid atlantic your probably not familiar with snowballs. They are different from snowcones in that the ice is grounded up really fine and then there are about 50 flavors of syrup to choose from. They are way better than any snowcones! Then it was off for Japanese dinner.

Saturday was a ton of fun. Preakness Day! What a blast Preakness is. So many people just having a good time. We even walked over to the infield for a bit, but that just made us all feel old. In tradition of the 133rd running of the Preakness I decided I had to make some photos kind of antiqued. Pimlico is a really old track.

Just had to make sure my mom had a black eyed susan!

Big Brown to the finish line

After the preakness we headed home for a traditional MD crab feast! Yummy...nothing like crabs steamed in old bay!

On Sunday the rain returned. But we headed down to DC anyway for some sightseeing. We went to the Lincoln Memorial, but the rain really started coming.Now thats old skool, huh! I think i really like the action I used here.

So instead we drove to the Dulles Air and Space Museum. That place was pretty neat and was new to me. Then it was off to fly Virgin Atlantic back to LA.
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This photo is from a few weeks ago, but just wanted to post it anyway. It's Dave in La Jolla but I addded some texture for a unique feel. I got action...totally rad action! I also applied one of the BW Totally Rad actions. Haven't had much of a chance to use them yet, but so far I love them!

Happy Early Birthday Dave!

We actually spent all weekend at home, but it was a good one! Although we spent a lot of time doing some much needed cleaning, organizing, lawn care, etc..

Mothers Day/Fathers Day are pretty uneventful for us since we don't have kids or even live close to our parents. But Dave always manges to sneak out, get a little something, and say its from the cats. How cute! Today he got me a wireless optical mouse for my laptop and told me to order the actions I wanted to CS3. He's so adorable!

Anyway sunday morning started out with us assembling this....our new grill (thanks to gift cards from Lowe's from our kitchen remodel! )

We are going to MD over the weekend for Dave's birthday so we can go to Preakness with some friends and family. So while Dave took care of lawn stuff, I went shopping. So we could have Dave's birthday a bit early. We cooked a steak dinner (that was yummy) on the new grill and then it was time for presents!

Look what Dave got!


He also got some new shirts and a hat for hiking.

Instead of birthday cake, he got birthday white chocolate fondue!
What a good day!

Happy Hour!

So we will be traveling for Dave's birthday again this year. Our customary thing has become birthday happy hour. So today I came up with "Dave's 45 sec commercial!" to promote his happy hour! Ha. I love it! It was a surprise for him and when he saw it he loved it too. Check it out. If your local expect this or a link to somehow show up in your inbox in the near future. Location is still TBD. More info will be in the email we send out.

Sometimes the small details make a difference!

I have fallen in love with WHCC (White House Custom Color, for all the non photographers). I ordered some "sample" prints on Linen texture paper this weekend and Gift Certificates for Photoshoots. I must have placed the order on Saturday and the order arrived on my doorstep today! Then every time I get a package from them I get a lollipop! Ha I feel like when I was a kid and would go to the bank with my mom and they'd give me a lollipop! I love that every time I get a package from WHCC I get a Tootsie Pop or a Blow Pop! How cool! Yeah, I'm a sucker for small details, huh! Oh the linen paper is awesome. I love it. I used a wedding photo to get it printed and I absolutely fell in love with it.

Show and Tell Time

Just thought I'd share a few photos from last weekend.

We spent last weekend in San Diego with 2 friends from Maryland

View from our hotel room

Shells on the rocks

Our friends enjoying the view in La Jolla

Walking in the water at La Jolla, and wishing I had put my bathing suit on


The View from the park at the top of the hill (I forgot the name, it's soledad or something like that)

Mt Whitney Update

Still no permit! Ergghh..the minute we both called we got busy signals. Which apparently means there are at least 50 people ahead of you. I was thinking I should have called at like 7:55 and just let it ring for 5 minutes until they turned the phones on or something. I'll probably try again next week for August. There are plenty of weekday day hike permits, but I don't know anyone willing to do 22 miles in one day with me! So disappointing, as this is the one thing I really want to do before we think about having kids since I know this kind of stuff will become much harder to accomplish.

But I also faxed in a permit request for the Grand Canyon for September. If we don't get that, then I guess we'll jut be backpacking in Yosemite or something. Any way we do it, we will be backpacking this year. I'm determined! And I think we are going to call the Mt Whitney people every Thursday afternoon starting in July and see if there are any cancellations. It's close enough that we can just drive up there at the drop of a hat. So that's the plan.

Wish Us Luck!

Tomorrow morning at 8am the phone lines open at the Mt Whitney Permit Office and there are about 8 overnight permits currently for July. So the question is can one of us be one of the first ones to reach the people at the office. According to Dave if we get a busy signal then there are at least 50 people ahead of us! We'll see what happens. But I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we snag a couple of permits.

Weekend Updates

Gee, its been a while since I've posted anything! We've been quite busy lately.

The other week we had a last minute trip to Maryland for almost an entire week. While we were there we did some fun stuff..baseball game, Baltimore aquarium, Smithsonian, etc... It was good to go back there for a little bit. And we'll be back in about 4 weeks!

Then when we got back we had a couple of days until a friend from Maryland came out to visit. She arrived on Wednesday. I had to work on Thursday, but left early on Friday to spend the afternoon with her. We ended up going out to the poppy reserve. It was a great afternoon for it. Hardly any wind and it was warm. Then we drove down to Hollywood to see some of the touristy stuff there before picking Dave up at work. Then it was off to the Stinking Rose in Beverly Hills for dinner. We had some time to kill before picking up her husband at the airport, so we went to Santa Monica and walked on the pier. However the rides were all closed to the public due to a private event. So we just wandered. Then we picked up Mark and drove to San Diego! We spent Saturday at Wild Animal Park and wine tasting nearby. Then went for dinner and drinks in the Gaslamp district. On Sunday we drove to La Jolla to see the seals. Then it was back to LAX to drop them off. I'll post some photos soon

Oh I almost forgot! Check out the new website design for my photography stuff. www.micheleschankerphotography.com

Not a big fan of spring!

For one it means ski season is pretty much over, unless you like skiing in mush. Secondly our lawn always looks so bad! This is two weekends in a row we have spent time working on the lawn. This weekend was cutting and fertilizing. We have so many weeds. It's uncontrollable. Our front area looks awful. We used to have plants but they all died in the cold weather last winter, now we just have weeds. So we've decided that its to much of for us to take care of, so we are going to look into getting a front patio put on. It won't be covered or anything, but some decorative concrete. Besides our front walkway is all torn up from ice too. So that needs to be repaired or replaced anyway. Ahh...the joys of home ownership!

So while Dave was enjoying an intermission during his hockey game today, I dragged him outside to practice a few headshot type things for a few minutes. Not the best background...its our driveway, but it was just practice stuff. Here's one of them.

Coming soon to a computer near you...my new photography website. It's going to be in flash and its pretty sweet. I'm very exited. But its still in the works, as I'm mostly trying to figure out what images to use. But it will still be at www.micheleschankerphotograhy.com

Gotta love it when...

..Brightroom comes to a race I'm running! I never really like photos of myself (I'd much rather be behind the camera) but I especially don't like most photos of me while I'm running. Not exactly the most flattering. Most of the time I have some painful look on my face. I guess this one isn't so bad. I've seen worse.

Santa Anita 5K Race

This past weekend was the Santa Anita 5K run. We do this every year. It’s a tougher course because there are some gradual uphills plus you run the last quarter of a mile or so on the dirt horse training track. I finished with a pretty average time for myself…24:31. Funny thing was the night before Dave and I were predicting our times and I said 24:31!
This is a big race with about 2000 people. I came in 7th in my age group and 44th overall female! Not bad since there were about 1000 females entered! Yipee! Dave ran the race to and maintained about the same time as previous years. I was really proud of him though because he ran about 1.5 miles straight and no walking!

Home Improvement

Yeah, so I have no other rooms to paint in this house! I have now painted our laundry room! But boy do I love the wall color and the curtains. We got brown curtains with blue and green circles! So cool! Now we just have to get the tile put down thats been sitting in the closet for a year now! And hopefully relocate the litter box to the garage in the near future, with a cat door installed of course!


Oh and I also love my fisheye lens on the canon 5D!

The Disappointment Grows!

So after getting our permit status in the mail, I figured we would at least be able to get a permit for the middle of the week. The availability calendar was posted yesterday and absolutely nothing is available for overnight hiking from mid June to the end of Sept! We could go in early June but I'm to scared of that. June can mean cold temps at night and still lots of snow pack up top.

I am so incredibly disappointed. I was so looking forward to doing this hike this summer. It was something I really wanted to accomplish before having kids. There are plenty of weekday Day Hike permits available, even some on July 4th! But I don't know anyone that would be willing to do 21 miles and an elevation change of ~6000 feet as a day hike with me. I just feel so awfully disappointed right now. This was something I was reallllyyyyy looking forward to.

I guess we could change our focus completely and go hike the grand canyon or something this summer. That would be cool. But the highest point in the lower 48 is so awesome. All I know is I will do it. Maybe not this summer, but I will at some point. Even if we have to have our parents come out and watch a kid one summer. I'm soooo determined to get up there.

Photo of Jackson Hole Mountain

Big Disappointment

Well to start off I've been sick with some sort of stomach virus since Wednesday. I'm starting to feel much better tonight and I'm hoping to actually eat solid foods tomorrow! I've been living off Jamba Juice, jello, and yogurt.

So I went to get the mail today and found out that by the time our application was selected in the Mt Whitney lottery there was no room for any of the dates we selected. So that means no permit for us! I'm very disappointed about this. I was so looking forward to getting to the top of Whitney this summer. Our only hope is to check the availability calendar when its posted and see if anything will work for us. If so then we can try and book that. But most likely it be weekday dates.

Lost and Found Vacation (and photos)

Dave and I have decided today on the way home to nickname this trip the "Lost and Found trip".

On Monday we woke up to very overcast gray clouds! We knew the snow was on the way. The morning wasn't to bad, just gray. Which is tough when your skiing because it is very hard to see all the bumps and moguls when the light is that flat. About noon or so the snow started and didn't stop all day. So the visibility got worse, but we still had a good time. I was pretty much forced to ski the "easier"( double blues, etc..) stuff all day because I couldn't see very well. I did do a few black mogul trails, but it was very tough to see them. We only made it up on Sublett Lift once, because the wind was horrendous. By the end of the day we had some nice powder for our last few runs.

So now for the real reason of the nick name of this trip. After lunch we decided to take the gondola up the mountain. We got up there and put our skis on and Dave realizes he doesn't have his poles! He left them in the gondola! Ooopss! So the lift people said they'd call down to the bottom and have them hold the poles for us. So Dave has to ski down the hill with no poles. Which isn't to big of a deal, its just hard to get used to. We get to the gondola...and no poles! So we go back up again...still no poles. So we figure maybe someone took them or something. Dave got a rental pair for the rest of the day. About 3pm we decided to take the gondola one more time. Guess what...they were there. So we managed to lose and find a ski then lose and find ski poles all in the same trip! Pretty crazy huh.

So I know I've totally slacked on posting photos. Ski trips for us are so busy. I hardly find time to even take photos. As I won't ski with a camera, since I'm a bit daring on skis. So my photography is limited to on and off the slopes time only. I haven't gone through them all yet, so I haven't picked out my favorites. But here's a few that I quickly picked out :

Dave on the sleigh ride ( I tried to get a candid shot, but he noticed the camera and turned and looked at me, oh well. It's still cute. )

Some Elk at the Reserve

More Elk

At the elk reserve... the bird in the tree is a Bald Eagle

Moose Crossing

The Snake River

One of the moose who frequented our condo complex

Sunrise light on the mountains behind our condo complex (It was -2 degrees when I took this photo at ~7:45am)

Hope you enjoyed some of the photos. Check the smugmug site soon for more.

Review of Jackson Hole, WY

Ok, so since I get lots of hits on this blog with people searching about places we have been, I' m going to continue with our review of our latest vacation.

Jacskon Hole, WY - March 2008

The Aspens Condos: Great deal for the price. We got a 1 bedroom condo for $110 a night! But I know studios were going for about $85 a night! The complex is about 4 miles from Jackson Hole Resort (Teton Village) and 7 miles from downtown Jackson. There is a shuttle bus, but we had a rental car, so we drove to the ski resort everyday. The condo complex doesn't have a hot tub, but the sports complex right next door does. I believe some of the condos include a membership to the sports complex. If not, you'll have to pay extra. I would stay here again. But if money weren't an issue I'd go with a place in Teton Village. In my opinion I'd give this place 3.5 stars (out of 4).

Jackson Hole: This was an awesome place to ski! I just loved it! The steep terrain and powder were great. Dave didn't like that the lifts seemed slow (they weren't high speed quads). But I think this kept things from getting skied out. I don't know if it was the time of year we were here, but there were hardly any lift lines at all. If you come during the mountain festival, lift tickets are much cheaper. Some of the best snow for us was on the Sublett and northeastern ridge chair lifts. Although Thunder Lift seemed pretty good too.

Food: We at at Q - BBQ. It was good, but not great. We also went to Calico for dessert and that was yummy. Another night we at at the Wort Hotel. That was completely yummy and we would totally recommend that. For drinks were really enjoyed the Mangy Moose at Teton Village. The Million Dollar Cowboy Bar was interesting, but not all that it seemed it would be. The bar was neat because each barstool was a horse saddle. However they only took cash and all the beer was in bottles (nothing on tap). Oh I almost forgot. Check out the brewery (I forgot the name right now). They had good food and pretty good beer. We heard Blue Lion was good as well, but never got a chance to eat there.

Things to Do (besides skiing):Definitely go on the sled ride to see the elk at the preserve. You get up nice and close to them and it was a great experience for only $12 each. Grand Teton NP was also good. But not to much to do during the winter. I'd suggest renting snow shoes before you enter the park. Or else enter by Moose, WY and go cross country skiing or snowshoeing there. The interesting part was seeing people ice fishing on Jackson Lake. Go to the town square. It's kinda touristy, but neat. Lots of shops and some western bars.

Dollar Rental Car:They had the best prices when we went. The downfall is that the cars are offsite, so you haev to rely on the shuttle bus to get to and from the airport. But they gave us a 4WD Rav 4.

Found: One Red, White, and Blue Ski!

Today was a great day for skiing. It started out rather cool with the temps at 7am running about -2 degrees! But it quickly warmed up some after a couple of hours on the slopes. Today was filled with Blue Skies! Which is great for skiing because it means you can actually see all the bumps in the snow. Before going down for lunch, Dave suggests that we go down Moran Faces one for time and look for his ski. Michele figures its pretty hopeless at this point with the snow being packed down but agrees to go. The snow on this trail was horrible today, so not to much fun skiing to the halfway point. Anyway we got down to the spot where we remembered the fall happening and started poking round with our poles. After about 5 minutes of poking, Dave starts frantically digging in the snow and laughing! Yes he found his ski! How amazing is that! It was like a finding a needle in the haystack. We were so happy to find the ski! This is a trip that we will never forget!

The rest of the day was great. We skied lots of great trails. Michele got to practice some moguls and we even made it all the way to the top! We can't wait to be back on the slopes tomorrow for more great skiing. It's our last day and then its back to reality.

Yesterday we drove around the snow covered Grand Teton National Park. We even got to see people Ice Fishing on Jackson Lake. In the afternoon we went souvenir shopping and headed back for the hot tub. After a trip to the hot tub we spotted 2 Moose in our condo complex!

Missing: Lefty

Height: 163cm
Weight: 4 pounds
Color: Primarily Blue with red, white, and orange
Distinctive Markings: R in a circle tatoo on the back
Last Seen:3/21/08 on Moran Face (black diamond) at Jackson Hole on Dave's Left Foot

Have you seen me? Because we sure haevn't!

So today was an interesting day of skiing with one of the worst skiing experiences we have had yet. No there was no broken bones, but after about 2.5 hours of skiing Dave and I decided to end the morning with a black diamond. This trail had about 1.5 feet of powder! Dave went down but came up with only one attached ski. However, soon he slid and flipped and the other ski came off.That ski went flying down the mountain. So Michele skis down and finds the right ski. Dave meanwhile tries to reach his left ski and realizes its been buried in the snow. Therefore Michele takes off her skies and climbs up the steep slope to help him. Dave and Michele end up searching through piles of snow for an hour and the ski never turns up! . But luckily Ski patrol was nice enough to give Dave a "loaner" ski! He turned that back in and gave his sob story to the rental place and they comped him on a ski rental for the rest of the day. So who knows when and if the ski will ever turn up! Probably in June when Jackson Hole thaws out! Note to self....stay off knee deep powder trails in the future.

Unfortunately this was the first day of skiing on a 4 day trip. So Dave will have to rent skis the rest of the time. Other than that the trip has been great!

We made first tracks this morning and when I say first tracks, I really mean first tracks! The snow fell all night long. So we were able to make our own tracks down our first run in FRESH powder!

Moose in the Median

We made it this afternoon to Jackson Hole, WY. It's just so crazy that we are in Wyoming! So far it is awesome. So beautiful! Snow everywhere! We wok up very early this morning...4:30 to catch a 7am flight. (Thanks Arielle and John for letting us stay with you last night!)

The surprise of the day was the Elk National Refuge! We knew it was here, but had no idea you could take a horse drawn sled ride out to the Elk! So of course we did that and it was awesome! I got tons of photos.

Afterwards we hit the Snake River Brewery for beer and food. After buying some groceries for the next few days, we went to the condo. As we turned the corner, I hear Dave say "ummmm...". I look up and guess what's in the road. Well I should say walking in the middle of the road...a Moose! OMG! IT was awesome. I said last night the one thing I wanted to see was a moose walking in the road. much like Northern Exposure. I don't know if its just me, but this whole place makes me think of the show Northern Exposure.

Well we can't wait to hit the slopes tomorrow. Check back for some photos of the elk.

March Madness

The month of March has been crazy for us. We've been gone every weekend and this week we are going on a small vacation!

This weekend was wine tasting in Paso Robles for the Zin Festival!!!

We had some great wine, good food, and even better chocolate fondue.

Happy Hour

I made this drink at home just to take some photos with my 5D. (I'm totally like a kid in a candy store with my new camera). I just can't get enough of shooting with this camera! and I wanted to practice using back button focus. Of course I got to enjoy the drink when I was done. The bad news was I broke the glass as I was putting it in the dishwasher.

Do you have lightroom?...

If so, check out this link for some free presets! They are awesome.

http://www.lightroomkillertips.com/2008/monday-presets-2/

Here are some examples.

Original File:

Some of the presets on this photo

Rudolph

Yeah, I'm totally Rudolph right now...bright red sunburned nose! I must have used the sunscreen at least 6 times in the 2 days we were skiing. But I guess it didn't totally work! Oh well. The price you pay for loads of fun!

We had a great time at mammoth this weekend. Dave and I decided to hit up the top of the mountain first thing sat morning since the snow is usually really nice at that time of day. He totally surprised me as we were going down Cornice Bowl...who come flying by me! Dave of course! Go Dave! I'm so glad that his level of skiing is improving and he's feeling more comfortable with speed. It really allows us to enjoy the challenging trails together. He told me that is the fastest he has ever gone on skis. Later on we decided to race down another trail. It is so fun to have us both skiing at the same speed.

Sunday I was very proud of myself. I started the day out on a mogul trail and didn't do to well. I didn't fall but my technique was not that great. So I decided to end the day on another black mogul trail. This time I did great! I nailed almost every mogul! Go me!

Sorry no photos. I don't know why I even bother to bring the camera on ski weekends, I never have time for photographs!

Photography Resources

If your an amateur photographer like me who is constantly trying to improve and you haven't seen Flash Flavor yet, check it out! I'm constantly reading photography blogs and stuff to learn and improve. This one give me high goals for flash photography! I wish I was this good, but then again if I were I'd be a professional photographer!

www.flashflavor.com

Dude Where's My Ball

I made Dave a slideshow of some of his Golf Photos. Here it is...

Weekend at Home

So this weekend we were actually home the entire weekend! The first in a while (and I think the only one this month!). It was still pretty fun. So Friday we met our friends Arielle and John for dinner and bowling! I bowled a 205 in my first game! Guess I still have some of that magic touch! Dave did well the second game (can't recall his score). Saturday we had some much needed cleaning to get done around the house and then it was off to Lake Elizabeth Golf Course. I tagged along with Dave for an afternoon of golfing to take photos with my new camera. It proved to be a good practice afternoon for both us. Dave worked on his golf game while I worked on photography techniques.

An attempt that worked pretty well at high speed sync flash with a sunburst!

I love how I framed Dave hitting the ball with the golf cart!

I completely froze though and couldn't wait to get back in the car. It was only like 50 degrees, but the wind was a killer. Gotta love those wind chills! Saturday night it was off to our friends house for dinner. It's always nice to go over there and spend some time with there kids. They are just so cute! Then we got up early on Sunday to go skiing at Mountain High. Another cold wind chilled day. The skiing was okay, the snow was not what it was a few weeks ago. But it's always good to be out on the slopes. Unfortunately the winds kept my favorite area of the mountain from opening. Then it was off to come home and watch the MD game, which turned out to be very disappointing. They were winning by 20 points and lost the game at the very end! Not a good note to end the weekend on. Next weekend we'll be skiing at mammoth. So check back for photos! The new camera is working out well. I really like it! The raw photos have been huge...ranging in size from 12-16MB!!!!

Go Terps

Wake Forest sweep for 2008 by the terps! The Terps win again. Fear the turtle.

Gist had 31 points tonight!


Yeah my 5D is here, so I was picture happy. Just had to get a shot of Dave watching the game.

Survey from Arielle's site

I found this on Arielle's site today. I never do these things, but for some reason when I saw it on her site today, I decided I'd go for it. So here it is. Enjoy.


1. What time did you get up this morning?
The frist time: 5:20 (Dave took the train this morning). 6:10 the second time

2. Diamonds or pearls?
Netiher. I don't care about those things at all. The only piece of jewlery I own is my wedding ring and it hardly ever gets worn. I've hated jewlery ever since I was a kid, and it has never changed.

3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema?
Got me. It's been so long. We netflix everything. Besides we aren't home to much to really go to the movies.

4. What is your favorite TV show?
I really don't watch TV. But I like things on the travel channel…oh an John & Kate + 8. The personalities of John and Kate so remind me of Dave and I.

5.What do you usually have for breakfast?C
ereal, and then my cat begs me for the milk

6. What is your middle name?
Lee…its my moms maiden name

7. What food do you dislike?
Lots of things…pickles, onions, peppers. Don't try and get onions passed me, its won't work. I know, people have tried it before. It never works.

8. What is your favorite CD at moment?
Angels and Airwaves!! We've seen them in concert twince within 4 months.

9. What kind of car do you drive?
Subaru Tribeca…and I love it! Handles so well in the snow!

10. Favorite sandwich?
Anyone that knows me knows this answer...Turkey

11. What characteristic do you despise?
Cockiness (Sp?) Know it all attitudes

12. Favorite item of clothing?
My jeans from The Loft and my J Crew button up shirts (they actually make these in tall so the sleeves actually fit me!)

13. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go??
Tough call…Dave and I can't even decide where to go this year. But things on the list are Germany, Greece, Australia, Japan, and Spain, although I think skiing in Chile might be cool too.

14. Favorite brand of clothing?
Banana Republic or The Loft

15. Where would you retire to?
Somewhere I can ski A LOT! Colorado, Utah, Swittzerland, etc...

16. What was your most recent memorable birthday?
My 30th for sure, we spent 12 days in Costa Rica doing lots of adventurous things. For my birthday we went waterfall rappelling!

17. Favorite sport to watch?
College Basketball…Fear the Turtle!

18. Farthest place you are sending this?
This is not being sent…I guess people in MD may read it

19. Person you expect to send it back first?
I'm with Arielle - don’t like these questions either

20. When is your birthday?
October 11th

21. Are you a morning person or a night person?
Night

22. What is your shoe size?
8 or 8.5

23. Pets?
Yup, 2 cats. Haley and Clyde

24. Any new and exciting news you’d like to share with us?
Nothing to exciting. We're going to Jackson Hole, WY in a few weeks and should be hiking to the top of Mt Whitney this summer! (21 miles round trip)

25. What did you want to be when you were little?
An Astronaut (and I still do)

26. How are you today?
Good. Excited about getting my new camera, is it Thursday yet?

27. What is your favorite candy?
Swedish Fish and jelly bellies

28. What is your favorite flower?
Calla Lilly - the purple ones - I had some of these in my wedding bouquet

29. What is a day on the calendar you are looking forward to?
Almost every weekend! We are gone a lot and have lots of exciting plans. Skiing at Mammoth, Jackson Hole, Wine Tasting in Paso Robles, etc...

30. What is your full name?
Michele Lee Schanker (used to be Lawrence until I got married)

31. What are you listening to right NOW?
Latest Angels and Airwaves CD

32. What was the last thing you ate?
Turkey Sandwhich on a wheat roll with Swiss cheese (told you I like turkey)

33. Do you wish on stars?
No

34. If you were a crayon, what color would you be?
Blue

36. Last person you spoke to on the phone?
Dave

37. Favorite soft drink?
Cherry Coke Zero

38. Favorite restaurant?
I like to eat very healthy, so we don't eat out to much. If I had to choose I'd proababy pick BJ's though. There pizza is good and it doesn’t make my stomach hurt!

39. Hair color?Red

40. What was your favorite toy as a child?
I was a Tom Boy (surprise surprise). So proabably matchbox cars or legos

41. Summer or winter?
WINTER…best season ever! But I am a skier, so I'm a bit biased. But I do love the cold weather. I'd chose that over hot days anytime. Hence why I wasn't to happy living in Florida.

42. Hugs or kisses?
Both are good.

43. Chocolate or Vanilla?
Chocolate

44. Coffee or tea?
Coffee, but with flavored creamer and splenda

45. Do you want your friends to email you back?
Sure, why not

46. When was the last time you cried?
Can't recall exaclty, although I do cry, I'm quite an emotional person.

47. What is under your bed?
Proabbaly some clothes that Dave accidnelty pushed under there.

48. What did you do last night?
Went to the gym for 1.5 hours, then uploaded some photos to the portfolio section of my website (been getting more inquires lately and looking to get some second shooter jobs as well)

49. What are you afraid of?
I try not to think of things like this, and just live my life to the fullest with lots of adventure! But I guess getting something that can't be cured, like cancer.

50. Salty or sweet?
Usually sweet, unless I'm hiking or something, then its both.

51. How many keys on your keyring?
Only two or three. House, mail, and car.

52. How many years at your current job?
3.5 years! Wow time flies! We moved out here for my job and it was a great decision!

53. Favorite day of the week?
Friday (if its one of my fridays off) otherwise Saturday

54. How many towns have you lived?
6 if you consider Palmdale and Lancaster differnet towns

55. Do you make friends easily?
No not really, I'm rather shy and it takes a while for me to open up to people. Something I'm always trying to work on. I think some people think I'm rather standoffish, but its really just that I'm shy. My best friends are the ones that tried to get me to open up and succeeded.

56. How many people will you send this too?
It's posted to the blog

57. How many will respond?
No idea..

Crash Flash

This weekend I had the opportunity to take a workshop in Venice Beach. It was all about using your flash. It was basically an 8 hour class split into 2 days. They even gave us time to shoot and practice. Now I'm more of a photojournalistic style photographer and don't get to much into umbrellas and all of that. But it was good to learn how to do some of that. The best thing was understanding flash as the Main Source and Flash as Fill Flash a lot better. I now know what I was doing wrong before and now I can fix all of that with a little practice. I'm soooo excited to go out and shoot more! I took some sample photos of Dave as my assignment before going to class on Sunday. Here's a few samples of what I took. I put Dave in our doorway (since it was pretty wet out) with him very backlit and exposed and shot in manual. Not Bad! I didn't put the diffuser on, but I will from now on. What a difference those things make!

Doesn't he look sleepy!

This class really showed me how quickly I pick things up when it comes to photography. It's almost like once its said it sticks! I'm definately a quick learner and now I want to go to more workshops and classes. I can't wait to go to WPPI conference next year. I just wish I could go this year. I may try and travel up to Seattle, WA for a weekend workshop this summer.

The Photography Equipment Pile is Growing!

Last week the two pocket wizards were delivered to our door. This week my new 580EXII was delivered! What will next week bring....my new Canon 5D! Yipee! I finally broke down and ordered the new camera body! I am soooo excited! I've been wanting this camera for over a year now. I've been waiting since Nov to see if the new version would be released. With the rumors of a release not coming until Sept of this year, I decided I wanted the second body before summer and bought the current 5D!

Tonight I played around some with off camera flash. I pulled out my vail and one shoe. Yes, only one because I couldn't find the other one at the time. Here's a sample of what I did with off camera flash. Okay not the greatedt, but I was just messing around. Not trying for some astouding shot or something. I'm pretty excited to learn more about doing more off camera flash. You can really get some neat effects with this.
Dave has returned from his trip to Florida and I'm so happy about that. I really missed him. I'm so used to having him around its hard when he's not here. But I think he's really glad to be back in the cooler weather. Apparently it hit over 80 degrees while he was there...YUCK! Luckily I bought him an Under Armour shirt for Christmas. :)

Double Black

I did it...a double black diamond! Okay maybe not completely. The top was a bit to scary with me being by myself. The last thing I wanted was some broken bones with no one to drive me home! I just had these vivid images of me falling, ski patrol hauling me down the mountain in the sled, and no way to get home because I broke my leg. So to avoid those uncomfortable circumstances, I avoided the very deep moguls at the top and traversed over from Cornice Bowl. It was still very steep and I had lots of fun with it. Although Dave says it doesn't count because
1. I didn't do the top
2. he wasn't there

But in my mind it was a double black! It so crazy, every time I go up to Cornice Bowl, the sign "Experts Only" always catches my eye. I hardly think of myself as an expert of skiing, but I do love that trail!

So as you can tell I went skiing again today. Dave is out of town (went to go visit his family, while I opted to not spend the weekend in 80 degree heat and humidity) so I headed up to road to Mammoth. Skiing by myself was so different. It was weird to not have Dave to share things with. But at the same time I just went at my pace and I went all day. (8:32am - 4:07 pm with a 20 minute lunch break). Actually feeling a bit sore now!

Let the advertising begin...

I'm officially ready to advertise! After I got my new business cards last week and fell in love with them, I ordered double sided post cards! I love these too! So now I'm going to plan on finding some places to leave my postcards as ads. A coworker suggested I leave them at bakeries. So I think I'm going to try that first. I really like the blue and brown theme!

Front

Back

Here's a photo of Dave (he got new glasses). Not a great photo, but oh well. I didn't get my flash out and the overhead lighting casted shadows on his face. I love how I blurred out his shoulders though. But with a 50mm 1.4 prime, it works great.


I've been investing in some new equipment lately. Yesterday I got a great V-Day gift...my new pocket wizards for some off camera flash! But then I discovered that the 580EX didn't have a sync cable plug. So Dave said I should just get the 580EX II..so I ordered it. Kind of disappointing that I have to wait til next weekend to play around. I needed the new flash anyway because I'm going to have 2 camera bodies. So I'm narrowing my way down my photography equipment want list!

Skiing in SLC Rocks!

The annual Salt Lake City trip rocked, as always! It's just so amazing I mean where else can you stay in a city and have the convenience of 10 or more ski resorts within a half hour drive!

Recap and review of the trip:

We stayed at the Homewood Suites in Downtown. Awesome! This hotel was pretty modern, flat screen tvs, nice bed, nice pillows, and the rooms are basically layed out like apartments. The hot breakfast was decent. Although I think I liked last year's breakfast at the Residence inn better. The location was great. About two blocks from the Gateway Center and 3 blocks from PF Changs, Bucca De Pepo, and Squatters.

The first day we skied at Deer Valley. Well, I certainly can't complain. Great snow and only skiers! Snowboarders are not allowed here. So its nice for us skiers. The resort had lots of varying terrain. So lots of greens, blues, and blacks. Which worked out well for when Dave wanted something a bit easier while I challenged myself on the moguls. The opening time was 9am, which was nice because we didn't have to get up insanely early for first tracks.

The second day we skied at Snowbird. Now this place is more challenging. Not for beginners! When they say its for intermediate and expert skiers, they mean it. Lots of blue and blacks so we pushed ourselves the entire day. Lots of great powder especially in Mineral Basin. The cool part about this place is there is a 600 foot tunnel that can take you to the backside (Mineral Basin). There were some really big moguls to on some of the trails. I really liked it here, but I love to challenge myself. The day we were here we had great weather. When we went up to the top, you could see the mountains and SLC. What a view.

Lately I've been pushing myself a lot harder with skiing. Doing more moguls, etc.. So it seems that I have a trend now of falling down! I used to never fall. I had some nasty ones this trip. At Deer Valley I was going down a diamond and somehow caught powder and fell and slide a ways down the hill with my skis still attached. How embarrassing. But I popped back up and went on my merry way. Then at Snowbird Dave and I were going down a mogul run and again I caught powder. Although this time I face planted in the snow and my ski became buried while still attached to my boot! Dave apparently yelled "women down". I think he loves/gets a kick out of watching me fall because for so long I would never fall. (he missed the fall at Deer Valley).

While in SLC I just couldn't miss the UMD Terps game. So we immediately headed to a sports bar in the gateway center. The people there were great. They put us at a table right in front of a tv and turned on the MD game. Sweet! Oh and yeah, MD won again. Beating NC State by 14 points. Next is Duke this Wednesday.

Oh an I totally have to give some props to Dave for his awesome Mogul skiing this weekend. I told him he can no longer tell me that he can't ski moguls! He has improved so much, and I am so proud of him. It's been great watching him go from a total non skier (4 years ago) to skiing black diamonds filled with moguls.

So the trip was great. Great weather, great snow, and lots of fun! Can't wait to do it again next year.

I'll leave you with a view from our hotel room. I tried my best at long shutter speeds, without my tripod!

And one of the mountains near Snowbird.

The Schankers Love to Ski

Just sitting here dreaming of our weekend in Salt Lake City...we leave tomorrow afternoon! Yipee! What I love about SLC is that you have about a dozen or so places to go skiing and they are all about 35 minutes from downtown SLC. It’s just so incredibly convenient.

Anyway, I was just realizing how lucky we really are. For the last 3 years or so we have really been able to enjoy skiing at a lot of various places.

1. Zermatt – Switzerland side
2. Zermatt – Italian side
3. Breckenridge, CO
4. Alta, UT
5. The Canyons, UT
6. Mammoth, CA (we consider this our home mountain)
7. Squaw Valley, CA
8. Northstar, CA
9. Deer Valley, UT
10. Brighton, UT
11. Snowbird, UT
12. Jackson Hole, WY (coming in March 2008)

Seriously…12 places in 3 years, and that’s not including our smaller local mountains. I love the west coast!

So just have to give another great shout out to the UMD Terps! Fear the Turtle, Baby! Yeah they are now 3^rd in the ACC with a win against BC on the road. Only UNC and Duke are ahead of them in the standings. Saturday is the NC State game and then a rematch against Duke on Wednesday. Oh how sweet it would be to beat the Dukies on their court!

Another weekend has come and gone

..but that means we are a few days closer to skiing in Utah! :)

This weekend, I realllllyyyyy wanted to go skiing. Especially after all the wonderful snowfall last weekend. Two weeks without skiing is seriously to much! So we planned for a ski a day at Mammoth but we noticed that they were expecting heavy snow (multiple feet). So we didn't want to drive all the way to ski in a snow storm. Instead we made an executive decision to ski locally. We have a pretty decent place an hour from our house and they just got 6 feet of snow! So we get up early on Sunday, drove up there, in the snow and wind, bought our lift tickets... to find out that only one lift of the west side is open due to high winds. So we were told we had an hour to decide if we wanted to stay. It took us like 45 minutes to ride the lift once and ski down. So we made another decision to turn in our tickets and go home. So now we just have to find time to go back during this ski season. What a bummer. Turns out the ski resort closed this afternoon because the weather was so bad. Oh well! We'll be skiing all next weekend.

Anyway...Go Terps! The whole reason we didn't ski on Saturday was because I just couldn't miss the Terps games, which was on at 9am. So on Saturday morning we got up, turned the game on, had some coffee, then breakfast during halftime along with Mimosas. It was a pretty good morning. And of course the Terps won! Sweet! Later on Saturday Dave and I went for a run. Yes, I said Dave and I. Dave has decided that he would really like the run the Santa anita 5k in a much better time. But I told him the only way that will happen is if he trains. So we are working on it. I take him out and we run a mile or so then walk, repeat. He's doing pretty good and proud of I'm him for putting the effort it. I know how hard running can be. After he was done with his run, I went for a 6 mile run and it felt really good.

Things I Love

Five things I heart...
1. WINTER!!! - Yes its my favorite season - it means snow and skiing
2. Our wonderful Subaru - this car handles so well in the snow.
3. Zinfandel wine with dark chocolate - the best duo ever!
4. Being so close to the wonderful Sierra - some of the best hiking and skiing of my life
5. Spending so much fun time with my husband. I love our life! :)