Garden: Before & After, ranunculus and other beauties!

My garden/patio was in much need of a mini makeover! Check out this before and after picture of our covered patio area. Eww, that brown bench is just horrible. 

I was going to throw it out, but decided it wouldn't hurt to have some extra space to sit outside. So, I spruced it up. Choosing paint was fun since the base has NO selection and German paint, well it's not the same, and plus we can't read the can!

A lot of sanding, priming and painting later, I had this! Beautiful isn't she!? I'm proud. Not only because I love the bright summery color, but this was my first project of repainting furniture. Nothing spectacular, but to me it made a huge difference. And of course, flowers never hurt!

Ariana and I (and Rich) have been doing some gardening the past week or so. Her are some peeks of the flowers we have planted.

Ariana picked these yellow ones by herself. She insisted on getting some yellow flowers! 

And, you may have seen the flower below on my Scavanger Hunt the other day, but I loved it so much I decided to share it again! I love that you can actually SEE the pollen specks on the petals.

And this baby is my favorite flower in my garden. It's a ranunculus. It's my new favorite flower. I finally figured out what kind of flower it was this year. I scooped up the last 2 that the base had for sale the other week. Love it!

Plant a garden was one of my April Goals! Check!!

xo's 

Cat

Rainbow Spring Flowers

April showers bring a rainbow of flowers!

A few weeks ago Jaymi posted about a rainbow of flowers. When we went to Gartenshau Kaiserslautern yesterday, I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to share my rainbow of flowers I captured! 

Last time we went there I posted about the beautiful Autumn leaves and pumpkin animals! Looking back, how did I survive before my D7000?!?!

Most of these shots are completely SOOC (straight out of the camera). Only a few have some slight cropping and that's it! (Of course I added my watermark to them, just in case.) It was a gorgeous day full of gorgeous Spring flowers!

Doesn't this rainbow of flowers just scream April!! 

It's perfect for You Capture/Spring this week. 

xo's

Cat

P.S. For those of you that weighed in on my zoom lens dilemma,  I'm patiently awaiting my zoom lens to arrive. After careful consideration and much searching and reading reviews I decided on the Nikon 70-300mm. My next lens....I want a macro, and I already have one picked out!!! :)

P64: Magenta

Magenta.

I kind of discovered I love magenta. It's a purplish, pinkish, redish color.

My shot this week is of some pretty flowers I have perched in my windowsill in my studio.

Find more magenta here:

xo's

Cat

Spring: Pretty in Pink!

I've said it before, but I'll say it again. Germany is beautiful in the Spring. Rich was actually sweet enough to pull over in at a German grocery store for me to hop out and run across the road to take these sweet pictures of a flowering tree. I think it may be a cherry blossom tree? What do you think?

Also, these are my first ever photo's I've put a watermark on them. I usually hate watermarks and feels like it ruins the pictures, but I decided to take a step to protect myself and my work and I'm trying them out. I tried NOT to make them obnoxious.

How do you think they look?

Do you watermark your photos?

Do you hate watermarks?

But seriously ::sigh::  I love you Spring!!

Scavenger Hunt Sunday (6)

I think I'm starting to really get the hang of this hunt each week and I'm finding  the photos are coming easier and earlier in the week! Here are my lovely finds for this week:

Hi Key

(I had never used Hi Key before on my camera. I really love the soft dreamy feel it gave these flowers)

Bedroom

(I went all abstract and creative on this one. You know how it is in the mornings, everything is all blurry and you don't wanna get out of bed yet.)

Something Tiny

(First thought, glitter. It's fun and pretty and I found out it makes very nice bokeh to boot. I had so much fun playing around to get this shot!)

Off In The Distance

(I went for a walk on the outskirts of our village here in Germany. I think I'm falling in love with the beauty of Germany. This scene was just magical. The cute German houses clustered together in the valley, the sprawling hillsides, the magnificent horse and off in the distance against a dusky sky you can see windmills spinning in the breeze.)

Stripes

(Well hello Mr. Bumblebee! Your so cute and fuzzy and striped. Can I be your paparazzi?!)

This week I feel like I rocked it!! I'm pretty pleased with how all my images came out!
As always I'm linking up here:

xo's
Cat

Macro Flower Buds

Just wanted to pop in really quick and share these marcro shots of a flower bloom.

I used my reverse ring for both of these.
No cropping, not editing. Straight out of my camera.

The ring takes a little patience to get the hang of it. But, I'm getting there. I'm really happy with the way these turned out.

Today I'm linking up with SOOC (straight out of camera)

And Macro Monday

Yes, I know it's Tuesday, I'm a day behind. Sorry.

xo's

Cat

Little Fireworks for Flowers

Spring is starting to spring up in our very own backyard. 

Who would have thought that we would have bright little  flower buds popping up in the middle of our yard!?
Just one of the little adventures of moving to a new house, you never know what you are going to get!

I'm totally loving these bright purple ones with the orange centers! How fun are they!?! I wish they were big enough (and there were more) so I could bring some inside a put in a vase. These are only about the size of my thumb, I don't know exactly, they're small.

Now for my Fill In The Blank Friday fun:

1.   The phrase or punctuation I overuse most is       Definately something I use a lot is !!! But, I don't think there is anything wrong with being excited! :) Oh and I say "that's lame" a lot.

2.  Today I am thankful for    the fact that today is the 4th sunny day in a ROW!! It's gotta be a record for Germany, at least since we've been here   .

3.  My best friend is    Well, besides my husband, it's my friend Maggie who's been my best friend since like 4th or 5th grade   .

4.  A quirky thing about me is    I salt my food first and then I pepper it. I swear it tastes different, probably not really, but I still do it that way anyway .

5.  This weekend I     will be working on a custom painting for someone special, and enjoying Sunday off with my husband  .

6.  Something that worries me is        The fact that the gas/water company for our Omaha house told us that they've been estimating our bill for the past 3 years and when we had them come check the meter they told us that they would need to tear down a wall in the basement to get to the meter. Of course they never would come when we actually lived there and now that we're aren't there to deal with it, they need to tear down a wall? WTH?!? 

7.  On my night stand you would find       a lamp, my cell phone, chapstick, lotion, a hair twistie, and The Weight of Silence, the new book I started last night  .

Happy Weekend and Happy Spring!!

Cat