Tis the season to get back into the swing of things!

As you know, its been a while since I last blogged. I have to be honest with everything else going on around here, blogging found its way to the bottom of the pile. Sorry folks.

So where to start? How about Hawaii!

I was able to take a fantastic trip to Hawaii this past June with friends and snapped some LOVELY shots. Some will be featured in my card line this year. Those that I haven’t had a chance to really look at will have to wait until next year’s shows unfortunately. I was also able to travel to NOLA in September with my sister and that was a field day of photo opts! People, places, things…you name it and NOLA provides it!

Next week officially kicks off the “show season” with the Holiday Marketplace at Capital One! November 16th, the Capital One Women’s Network is sponsoring a Marketplace for women artist open to Capital One employees only. The juried show yielded 60+ artists who will share their wares and hopefully enable the many Cap Oners (like myself) to begin their holiday shopping a little early.

I am hoping for a stellar turn out this year as last was phenomenal ! I have lots of new images to share this year in the card line! Also anything you see in the cards is also available in a framed or matted piece upon request!

More to come later this week on the other shows lined up!

A morning in the yard can yield so much

I have started a new ritual in the morning between my trip to the gym and my departure for work. I wander the yard with my camera. I must admit I am using the digital rather than my 35mm or my Holga but I enjoy the instant gratification! Especially when I am also trying to eat breakfast – also a multi-tasker.

So I have to admit I was quite thrilled when I posted some of these pictures on Facebook and was greeted with Oh’s and Ah’s of appreciation. That is not why I am a photographer but it’s always fun to hear when people connect with my images!
I have already received a few orders for new card sets based on the few images I posted so I can’t wait to see what I have once I get through all of the images I collect this year!

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Thanks for your support

Thanks to all that came out last night and made the Spring Sale such a success!

We had 6 fabulous artists and a great stream of people enjoying the offerings!  We are planning several more through out the year so please let me know if you would like to be added to our mailing list!

So what’s next!? With the 2010 card selection well underway my next focus will be on presenting more of my black and white framed pieces.  I hand print all images and do my own matting and framing as well so please check the website frequently for new images!

Also, please don’t hesitate to contact me directly you some thing strikes your fancy or you have a request for a subject matter!

Shows, shows and more shows!

Tis the season for spring shows and I, of course, must join the frenzy! Tomorrow night is my first show of the season. 6 different artists displaying their wares for an evening of shopping and fun!

I am really excited about my new selection of framed prints and cards this year. 2010 has already turned out to be a good year for the camera and prints!

Tomorrow’s show focuses mostly on travel photography however I am working on my new Holga images these days so next go round be on the look out for newly framed Black and White pieces! 

Check out my new images at jrebeccawilliams.com!

If you are interested in attending tomorrow’s show, please contact me through my site or call me at 804.307.5228.

The last days in Tahoe

Last day of skiing made me sad.

Oh, what a wonderful day but sad in the same right.  Yesterday  was our last day on the mountain. We started the morning off early and bright. A nice breakfast to fuel the day and a bit of sun peeking out of the clouds started everything off right.

We all headed up and came down at varying speeds;) Ryan had some fantastic spills while Graham and I explored the trees. Hope enjoyed her new coat and joined Graham and I half way down the hill.

Given the size of the mountain it’s not surprising we got separated. Graham and I had lunch on the Nevada side and then headed over to the CA side where amazingly we came down a trail and almost literally ran into Ryan!  We skied a while longer until a heck of  storm rolled in and forced us down.

Some of the more comical moments of the day were:

1)      Little snowboard board kid that almost took out Graham at the knees. Fortunately Graham was fleet of foot and got out of the way in time for the little snot to zoom by with no “I’m sorry,” “My bad, ”nothing.

2)      The man who took out the “slow” sign!  So for every lift area you are supposed to slow down after the sign. This dude apparently could not do so in time and ran into the sign to slow himself!

3)      The little girl on the lift that was a speed racer – not only did she try and take us out in the line getting on the lift….at the top her instructor advised that she should not cut us off. She quickly advised her instructor if we were too slow, she would have to. Mind you she was about 5 years old;)

Once back down, we hit up the hot tub with an ice bucket of beer and to-go cups! I think Ryan most enjoyed the hot tub, his bruised and battered bones were thankful for the respite.

After a dinner of pasta and salad we settled in to enjoy our last evening in Tahoe: on the couch.  Lame I know, but heavenly none the less (no pun intended.)

Today we leisurely packed and then set out to run some errands and grab some souvenirs (Lee Ann – you are in for a treat.)  Hope’s friend Ben was nice enough to play tour guide for us  and took us up to Emerald Bay which was magnificent! (More pics to come)

We had a last meal in Tahoe and then headed out for Reno on the Shuttle one more time.  Once in Reno we found a great Sushi place that had All you can eat Sushi (Ryan was in heaven) and we are now settling down to enjoy the opening Ceremonies!

So there were definitely a few quotes of the week we should mention:

Graham:  “Down…” (When asked, “Which way do we go?”)

Ryan “I did a summersault, splits, a face-plant and belly flop” (When describing his first day on the slopes sans instructor.)

Hope: “Hey Mr., wrong bathroom” (to the woman who responded with “I was born with a vagina.”)

Becca’s: None – just continuous giggles through out the week.

Also, our rooms did have some pretty interesting features:

1)      the spinner ejecting washing machine

2)      The stove vent that just re-circulated the smoke onto the sprinkler head (fortunately we realized this before setting it off)

3)      The kitchenette that consisted of a Microwave and a sink

4)      The Fireplace blower that only blew cold air

5)      The TV with no channel guide

6)      The mysterious panel in the wall that ended up being the lint duct for the entire floor.

We hope you have enjoyed the trip along with us! We leave tomorrow morning at 6am and hope to back on the East Coast tomorrow evening:)

The Day of Rest

I think the trip finally caught up with all of us and we actually slept in today!  I hit the gym early to work out the copious amounts of wine I drank last night and felt like a million bucks coming out of there!

We began the day with a round of leisurely shopping. Ryan was on a quest for new goggles and I was seduced by the Patagonia store! It ended up being one of those mornings where we went from store to room, store to room a number of times. I of course had to go back and swap out my camera gear into my new Patagonia Bag…for those of that know, I have a serious bag addiction and am always in the market for something new and cute.

Ryan had to grab his helmet in order to get the full effect of the goggles he was scoping out. He ended up with new Oakley’s that didn’t squish his nose. You never want goggles that prevent breathing! Very dangerous and uncomfortable.

We ended up the Hard Rock for lunch which I have to say was over rated and expensive. We were a little surprised the featured artist in our booth was Hoobastank though…I mean really.

We attempted to check out the Lake which was supposedly “straight down the road from our hotel.” Well….we headed down the pointed path and ran into a Closed Marina and a lot of fencing. No public beach access for us. The views were still lovely but the photo ops were limited. Hopefully we can try again Friday.

Tonight we hit up the Naked Fish which had incredible Sushi! The Sunburn roll was AMAZING – Spicy Tuna, Avocado, Cream Cheese and Tempura fried. Yummy!!!!

Tomorrow is another sweet day on the mountain! We are starting early and staying late! CAN’T WAIT!

A Hazy Shade of Winter

Holy clouds batman! That is essentially what we had to deal with for the better part of the day!

We started on the California side where there was sun and beautiful views. The vistas of Lake Tahoe were absolutely breath-taking! And then the clouds started rolling in so we decided to head back over to other side of the mountain – which was Nevada. So we soon found out why Nevada is notorious for foggy days. The top of the mountain was completely entrenched in a giant cloud! We stuck to the “easier” trails but it was still had an interesting time navigating.

I have never experienced zero visibility, until now….wow! Coming down the mountain I would say we could see about 50 feet ahead of us and then it was a guessing game!

We finally decided to take a break at lunch and download to the Condo (downloading is taking the Gondola down to the village.) We checked the skis and hit up Wolfgang Puck’s for lunch– yummy!

After lunch we headed backup to meet up with Ryan and his class! As we headed up the mountain, the top was still hidden from us but we were optimistic that things were going to burn off by the time we got up there….not so much.

We took a couple more runs and headed to the umbrella bar – which is essentially a Yurt on the mountain side stocked with alcohol. Very entertaining crew in there. Our favorite was the trophy wife hanging out drinking Frangelica and making lots of friends.  Her other half soon joined her and they were something out of Nip and Tuck.

Once back down the mountain we hit the hot tub where who other than Nip and Tuck were hanging out. They ended up being very nice but very Barbi-like and drunk – Highly comical.  Graham attempted a snow angle however quickly found out the snow was packed down and unwilling to yield. Instead of a snow angle we ended up with snow pillows for the hot tub. Whatever works;) Tomorrow we rest and shop!

Heavenly is heavenly

First day of skiing – incredible!

First of all the Gondola ride is amazing. Our condo actually connects to the Heavenly Mountain Gondola so we literally walk out of our door and there we are! The gondola ascends 2.4 miles up the mountain in 12 minutes while we got to enjoy views of Lake Tahoe!

Hope and Ryan took a lesson as this was a reintroduction of skis to their feetJ

Graham and I met up with another Roanoke Alum (Alex) and his friend Frank for a fun morning of exploring the mountain and breathtaking vistas. We had a great time wandering around and scouting out runs and such. I have started to venture timidly into the trees but they are still scary and I don’t spend too much time in there;)  I did however have a really fun tumble today on Ridge Bowl – just picture a turtle on its back flying down a shoot…that was me sliding down a section of this run on my back! I was caught off guard by another downed skier half way down the hill and tried to avoid him and just bit it! It was hilarious!

Graham and I adjourned early in favor of the hot tub and beers.  Apparently we choose the un-bubbly hot tub but it still relaxed our weary muscles and created two worthless people for the rest of the evening!

Hope and Ryan had a much more entertaining day in the “training ground” where they were corralled for their lesson all day. They had the enjoyment of witnessing at complete wipeout where in the individual careened down the training ground only to rack himself on a directional sign in front of everyone…there are some instances where you have to laugh.

They arrived at the room raving about their day and headed to the hot rub where they were run out by the family of 6 invading the hot tub including kids with water wings, POOR FORM! Stick to the pool people when inflatables are required.

Apparently Ryan is now hooked on skiing and Hope was too advanced for their group.  Tomorrow, she skis with us and Ryan is hitting up another lesson to solidify his mad skillz. The new snow is supposed to start tonight and continue into tomorrow! Woo Hoo!

Superbowl at Harrah’s

Given we are still partially on East Coast time we woke up at 5 and refused to get up – forcing ourselves to sleep in at least until 6am.

Hope and Ryan ventured out to get their rentals and I of course hit the gym! We woke up to another round of snow and it’s just absolutely beautiful.We made our reservations for the Chart House Wednesday night and got the scoop on the best sushi places in town. Next steps, grocery store and Superbowl!

We ended up at Harrah’s for the Superbowl which was a blast! $12.50 buckets of beer and prime seats at the bar! Graham and I won back our wagers and Hope and Ryan came out way aheadJ A casino is definitely good locale for people watching! A quick summary – some of waitresses were wearing sparkly brown mini dresses appropriate for middle school dances (there was one in particular that kept scratching her hind parts that was quite amusing), other wait staff were decked out in ref outfits, there were a host of various NFL jersey’s and ski outfits! It all provided for good laughs but we are also SO EAST COAST! Our pants were not tight enough, faces not plastic enough, and overall we are pretty boring but perfectly ok with that.

Afterwards, Hope and Ryan went to meet up with an old friend of Hope’s from high school at Lakeside Casino. Where dollar beers are served for happy hour (11pm -4am) and Hope had a giant case of mistaken gender identification:) She tried to tell this individual he was in the wrong restroom.  He turned out to be a she and informed Hope she was born with a vagina thank you. They later headed to a house party where we understand there were shots going round and BB gun shooting;)

Graham and I had a less eventful evening after bolting for some grub and settling in for some TV and snoozing!

TOMORROW WE SKI!

The Start of the Tahoe trip!

As the alarm went off at 3am Saturday morning I questioned what on earth we were thinking, then I remembered

TAHOE!!!

A scrub of the teeth, a quick shower for Graham, a cup of coffee for everyone and we were headed to Norfolk by 3:45ish…Our flight was scheduled for 6:50am and the roads weren’t bad at all fortunately. We made good time and were checked in and waiting in the Security line by 5:30. I will say there were far more people at Norfolk int’l airport at this hour than I had imagined! There were zombie like walks and waits everywhere!

So we make our way through the security check, Hope and Ryan sail through with ease. I stroll myself up, apparently looked iffy, required a pat down in the little glass box, was then pulled aside since I had forgotten my Gatorade in my backpack, thus requiring re-scans and several dubious looks from the security scanner. Once that ordeal was over, I put my boots back on and waited for Graham.  He made it through without requiring a pat down however apparently he too tried to smuggle contraband into the airport in the form of his 3 inch pocket knife! The sheepish look and the comment of:  “I have been looking for that” summed it all up. Bummer about losing the knife but luckily we weren’t delayed too long!

 

We high tailed it out of Norfolk and hit Atlanta around 9am starving and happy to have one leg of our trip complete! After a brief stint at a recharge station for our electronics (between the 4 of us we have every cool gadget you can think of)  we cruised on over to the Stylin Heinekin Bar (which by the way still has a smoking session – Yowzers that was smoky.)  We ordered up traditional “start of vaca” beers and had a bite to eat while watching the goings on of the tarmac below – very exciting.

Pre-flight beers!

 The SLT leg was uneventful and we landed in Reno tired but excited to finally be done with the flight portion of our journey. Mind you we had been traveling since 3:30am EST time and it was now 4:30 Reno time (6:30 our time.)

After 17 hours of travel - we are almost there!

Now Reno is about an hour and a half away from Tahoe and we had booked seats on the South Tahoe Express to take us the rest of the way! The driver advised it was snowing on the mountain and we would have to stop ½ way to put chains on the bus to make it up! Craziness;)

We finally got here around 7pm to gorgeous snow and fantastic rooms. After a round of Grilled Cheese and Tomato soup and a glass of wine – we hit the sack in hopes to acclimating to the time and making up for lost sleepJ

Tomorrow is the SUPER BOWL & exploring;)