What do May showers bring?

(I wrote this article as a sample submission for a website that I'm trying to get a "job" with as a monthly contributor. The website is just for women of Utah. I thought I did a pretty good job with it and thought maybe you would be interested in seeing it.)

All of us have heard the saying “April showers bring May flowers.” But when May brings us more rain than sunshine, what do we get then? A little bit wet? Time to postpone our gardening? Depression?

I think it’s easy to get a little down when all we see are cloudy skies after a long, cold, winter. But I promise there are sunny days ahead!

In the mean time, I thought I would share some lessons I’ve learned from being a photographer that might help keep your spirits up even while the skies are a little gray. (All of the pictures below were taken on a VERY rainy day.)

1. Zoom in
Sometimes when you look through a camera lens, something that could be rather impressive to your naked eye is just rather blah. But, if you zoom in on the details, you get an interesting, artistic photograph.

Take this old church building for example. It’s a large building with tall, imposing steeples. The windows are interesting, too. But when I took a picture of the whole building I was unimpressed. The tree in front of it has no leaves, and the gray sky makes for a boring, washed-out background.
When I zoomed in on the details, though, I got this interesting, geometric shot.

Often, we go about our lives doing the same things and seeing the same things day after day (and if you have small children, saying the same things, watching the same things, reading the same things, singing the same things, etc. etc.). Our houses, our neighborhoods and our families can sometimes seem rather unimpressive just because we see them all the time.

But if you take a closer look, sometimes beauty can pop out at you in places you wouldn’t have expected.

2. Take a different angle
Often turning your camera just a little bit can make all the difference. Tilting the camera can give an otherwise stagnant shot just enough movement to make it interesting. Shifting your view point two inches to the right can bring something into the shot that brings it to life.

I thought the bright colors of these flowers was really pretty against the black ironwork fence, but as you can see, the boxy camera angle and busy background make the picture a little blah.

But, when I tilted the camera at just a slight angle, and shifted my viewpoint just a little to the left, I got something with just the right amount of contrast and a little movement. It looks much better, don’t you think?
3. Zoom out
Occasionally the key to a great photo isn’t getting closer, it’s moving away. If you are too focused on a piece of a shot, you miss the grandeur around it. By zooming out, you put the piece you found interesting into perspective, which is often what brought it to your attention in the first place. When you go to the ocean, it’s not the water around your feet that’s impressive, but the sheer amount of water compared to little old you.

Here is a farm building that I thought was interesting. I especially liked the red of the barn against the spring green crops growing in front of it.

The shot captures what I found interesting, but when I zoomed out a bit, it’s easier to see why it grabbed my attention.

There is the old saying, “Don’t miss the forest for the trees.” I think that is kind of what I’m trying to say here. It’s easy to lose perspective when faced with the worries and drama of daily life. Don’t be so focused on the dishes, and the kid crying, and the groceries, that you miss the fact that you have healthy children, a roof over your head, and the freedom to make your own choices.

Even though I would prefer warm, sunny skies to cold, drippy clouds, I think May showers can give us more than just a case of the blues; they can give us the opportunity to look at the world in a different way. When we make the effort, I’m pretty sure we’ll see something beautiful that otherwise we might have missed. The flowers hold their heads high despite the rain and so can you.

Post and photos by Sabrina Watts of Sabrina Watts Photography

Obsession

Emilia, much to her father's joy, is completely obsessed with Winnie-the-Pooh. I think I've mentioned this before. I believe I have also mentioned that she is a little genius. Here's a video to demonstrate both points.

Oh, bother!

We still do not have a place to live in Utah county, Steve still does not have a job, and Emilia is still not potty trained. But for some reason, I'm okay with all that.

Emilia can officially use a spoon to feed herself breakfast, I did get a photography job this weekend, and my wonderful hubby did pick up Papa John's pizza for dinner. Pizza can make a lot of things better. Especially good pizza.

Alison is coming to visit me tomorrow, since she still doesn't have a job either. I'm excited to have her come. She's never seen Logan before. Hopefully the weather will be normal. It was windy today, but not too cold.

Emilia...

...now uses the phrases, "Oh, bother," "Hum-dum-dum-ditty-dum," and "Silly ol' bear!" in regular speech. She takes her stuffed Pooh Bear that we found at DI to bed with her every afternoon and evening. She can say, "Tiggers bounce and Poohs eat honey," and name every character on the show. She colors in her Pooh coloring book almost every day. Can you say, "too much Pooh?"

...discovered the other day that chalk makes great face paint. :)

...LOVES the color pink. When I get out her colors, she takes the pink out and colors at least three pages pink--everything on the pages is pink. Then she might think about using one of the other colors in the box.

...loves playing "guys" almost as much as she loves watching Pooh. Every day she says to us multiple times, "Play guys? Play guys?" She's pretty good at it now, too. She'll have them talk to each other: even using phrases I understand sometimes, like "Lee, how doing?" and "Hi, Jed." Because of this, I have discovered a new talent: Little People stacking. Ta-da!

a new smattering of pictures

This whole "smattering" (I think that's a fun word) thing only happens because I am too lazy to get out the cable and hook the camera up to my computer and download the pictures and resize them so they're not atrociously huge (and take up all my blogger space) and upload them to blogger and comment on them on a regular basis. Once it gets to the point where I have to put the pictures on or there will be more than even I would want to look at do I force myself to go through that whole rigamarole (another fun word, don't you think?).

My little ragamuffin smiling for the camera. She now has enough hair for PIGTAILS! And she LOVES LOVES LOVES to be outdoors. We spent two hours at the park today (part of that time there were other kids--and moms!-- there from playgroup or I wouldn't have lasted).

On April Fools Day Mother Nature played a cruel joke on us...

...but we made the best of it. (Thanks Megan for making our snowman look so cute!) Emi doesn't hate the snow so much now. She only made the face for the picture. :)

Emi playing with her Christmas present from Uncle Ben and Aunt Haylee. She loves her "Tayo."
Me and my cutie pants. She's a little blurry in the first one, but I look cute. :0P

She just has such an expressive face...with that mug is it any wonder she has us wrapped around her little finger?

my status

I thought I would update on our status at the moment. We are still not at home. We have been gone since last Friday. I guess that's a week! Craziness. It's going to be hard to get back into our routine at home. We weren't planning on staying this long. We were going to spend last weekend with Steve's parents and then he was going to drop me off Monday at my parents' house (and he would go back up to Logan--which he did, actually), and then Wednesday, my mom was going to drive us up to Ogden where Steve would meet us and bring us the rest of the way home (Ogden is about half way between home and my parents' house). BUT...Steve called Tuesday night saying he had been contacted to do an interview in Orem on Friday afternoon (today), so it made little sense for us to drive up and come back a day and a half later, so here we are still. Steve's interview is for a technical writing job at SirsiDynix (sp?). He has interviewed with them once before, but they decided to change that position and he no longer wanted the job, but they thought of him when this new job became available, so that's a good sign. Steve also had an interview last Monday morning at Inside Sales, which is the place he worked at when we were living in Orem before. They told him they had the position ready for him if he wanted it, so that's very encouraging. It looks like we'll be moving back to the Utah valley area pretty quickly!

I don't think I've mentioned this on the blog before...nope, just checked. Steve and I have been trying to figure out where God wants us to go next. We weren't sure if Steve should go back for his PhD right away (he would ultimately like to teach at the college level), or wait for a few years and work full time to save up some money, or what. We've been praying about it for a while now, and were quite surprised by the answer we received recently. We feel like Steve should be going back to school to get a second bachelor's in Information Systems. It seems like an odd next step, but God knows better than we do what will bring us the most happiness, and opportunities (both for work and for spiritual growth). We both feel good about the change--like God is leading us to do this, and we are moving forward with it. Hence the job searches in the Utah valley area.

It's been good to know what our next step will be and to have something to move forward on, and the interviews and job offer have been encouraging. For me it has been somewhat of a challenge to figure out what my role will be in this new course. We thought maybe I could teach school while Steve was taking classes and watching Emi, but I really feel like I need to be spending my energy on MY child rather than other people's children. I know we can make things work with Steve doing both school and work, since we've done that before, but it still worries me a little. I'm not good at spending ALL day with Emi (and if Steve is working full time and going to school full time, he will have very little time left for taking her off my hands--or anything for that matter). My personality, my weaknesses, whatever you want to blame it on, make it hard for me devote so much time to the mundane things she loves to do. I love her and I want to give her the best, and although I don't think I'm great at being the mother of a 20 month old, I still feel like I, in my worst state, am better than the alternatives. I still don't know exactly how things are going to work out, though I am sure that they will. I know Heavenly Father is looking out for us, and for me, and whatever happens, as long as I follow the Lord, it will be for my good. I just hope I am up for the challenge. :0\
Love you all, Brina

hmm...

I feel like I need to do an update, but I'm not sure what to say. I have a few pictures of Emilia, but they are on my camera back home. We are at Mom and Dad Watts' at the moment, watching General Conference and celebrating Easter. I think we're going to be doing an Easter egg hunt tomorrow. And I went shopping today for like three hours thanks to the generosity of Cindy and Grandma. They watched her while I shopped because Steve was at the Priesthood session of conference. Steve and I have both applied for a few jobs, but we haven't really heard anything about them, so no new news there. I guess I'll let you know if I think of anything else. :)