My Sweet Things

It’s hard to believe we are once again back in the Holiday Season! One week away from family gatherings, and gift exchanges. Sparkly bubbly, sparkly lights, and wide, happy smiles. ‘Tis the Season! I have spent some time with my camera, practicing bokeh. That lovely, blurring, un-focused background of a photograph due to lens blur. Would you like to get lovely, blurry, Christmas light bokeh? I am no pro, but here are some tips that seem to be working for me. I use my 50mm, 1.4 lens and use a wide open aperture of  f/1.4 or f/1.8.  I found that the farther my subject is away from the lights, the larger orbs appear.

Manual focus 1.4, flash not used. I don’t normally shoot on manual focus, mostly because my eyesight is not that great, but here I simply turned the focus ring until the lights were blurry and snapped this shot.

50mm, 1.4

I used auto focus on this shot, focusing on Justin’s hand. The tree was a few feet behind him. Focusing on the subject with the light source a few feet behind the subject will give you this effect.  50 mm, 1.4, no flash

50mm, 1.4, manual focus ~ Simple white lights.

50mm 1.4 – auto focusing on the snowflake

Holiday Cheer Beer!

Ginobili was sitting on a table by the window. The Christmas lights were reflected in the window pane. She is such a pretty girl! I tell her that all the time. Yes, I talk to my cats and tell them how lovely they are. Crazy cat lady? Maybe. Anyhoo, I love learning new techniques and with all the sparkly Holiday lights, this is the perfect time to keep working on that bokeh!

It’s all good ~ Donna

This year, I am changing up the Holiday color scheme in our dining room. I am loving the silver, blue, and green decor and I have picked up a few items to get me started.

Thank you Martha Stewart for this lovely, sparkly, glitter craft yarn. It’s called glitter eyelash. Super Cute!

I picked up these tree shapes at the Dollar Tree and the glitter ribbon at JoAnn’s. I had planned on using the ribbon on the trees but did not use it. I do love that sparkle!

This project is super easy! Wrap the glitter yarn around the tree…

Use a fabric or craft glue to attach the yarn.

I only applied the glue at the top starting point and at the bottom where I cut the yarn.

Tada! I had some candle sticks in my stash and I placed the trees on top. I used some double stick tape across the top of the candle stick for support and they won’t tip over so easy.

On the left of this photo you can see where I stacked two candlesticks together. I used double stick tape on them since I did not want them to permanently be glued together.

Here is the color scheme I am working with. I love that little bird! This serving piece was a wedding anniversary gift from my Mother-in-Law.

I took a quick snapshot so you can see those little sweet trees on the buffet. I still have more decorating to do but it’s a good start! Do you have a Christmas color scheme? I have red and gold in my living room. What are you planning for Holiday Decor? I’d love to hear your plans!

I’ll be linking up to some great parties this week! Hop on over and get those creative juices flowing!

Today’s Creative Blog, Tip Junkie

It’s all good. ~ Donna