Eric and I standing in front of a giant eucalyptus tree along Skyline Trail at Bort Meadow / Chabot Park in Oakland, CA — Feb. 4, 2012.

View Larger Map

--
You just finished reading "Hike #2 — Bort Meadow in Chabot Park" on capturinglight! I'd love to hear your thoughts about it!

Hiking with Eric at Las Trampas Regional Wilderness in San Ramon, CA — Jan. 27, 2012.

View Larger Map

--
You just finished reading "Hike #1 — Las Trampas Regional Wilderness" on capturinglight! I'd love to hear your thoughts about it!

My theme for this year is simplify. This applies to so many things in my life, but mostly, I just want to turn down the noise.

My husband, Eric, can attest to this… but I tend to overcomplicate things. I wish I could be more like him — relaxed, spontaneous, and never a procrastinator. Me? I stress about silly things, research stuff to death, tweak stuff to death, and generally feel like I never get anything done — at least not to my satisfaction. I fully admit to being a perfectionist, and I’ve got to learn when to leave well enough alone and be okay with it.

So, in the spirit of turning down the noise, I’ve decided to do a little digital spring cleaning. I’ve deleted my personal Facebook profile, LinkedIn, and a few other accounts I had out there collecting dust. I’m also combining some of my domains and deleting a few that are underutilized too, so that I can concentrate my time on things like photography and Shutter Mission.

Turning down the noise so you can focus on your passions and get stuff done? — That’s a good thing.

What are you doing to simplify your life in 2012?

--
You just finished reading "Simplify, 2012" on capturinglight! I'd love to hear your thoughts about it!

more photos from our trip on flickr »

a few of eric’s shots from our san diego trip. I especially like the ones he took during the blackout on september 8th. my iPhone battery was dead that evening, and all i took were lomos, which i’ve yet to have processed.

view his entire set on flickr »

--
You just finished reading "San Diego, CA — Sept 2011" on capturinglight! I'd love to hear your thoughts about it!

after we ran out of candy (500+ trick-or-treaters!)… we took a quick walk around the east end and were in awe of this home on broadway. the homeowner said it took him three days to set up.

this photo does not do it justice. check out the video:

--
You just finished reading "Halloween in Alameda, CA — 2011" on capturinglight! I'd love to hear your thoughts about it!

10.22.2011 — five wonderful years of marriage spent with my favorite person. we celebrated with a ferry ride to sf, dinner with a view, and some photobooth schenanigans.

<3

--
You just finished reading "Five" on capturinglight! I'd love to hear your thoughts about it!

I’ve been on an organizing streak lately… tackling the garage, closets, and the basement area. The other day, I decided to carve out some space for our most-used camera equipment so that it would be easily within reach.

Back in our Atlanta home, I used to have a dedicated photo drawer, but that was when we had more space than we knew what to do with. In our tiny San Francisco flat, we just kept all our equipment in camera bags, which is what a lot of people do. For us, we find it a bit of a pain to locate lenses, batteries, memory cards, etc, when you have to dig through numerous pockets and dividers in a bag to find what you need… especially if you just want to take some quick snaps at home, or if you only want to grab a couple of items to go out on a stroll. The solution for us? An organized photography equipment drawer!

Fortunately, when we moved to our Alameda home last fall, we found we have more than enough storage space here. In the dining room, we have this really old, built-in buffet with large drawers, and they weren’t really serving a purpose for us. So, I headed out in search of some super awesome drawer dividers. Here’s what I came up with for two of our drawers:

Photography Gear Organized in Drawers

Materials

If you want to make your own photo gear drawer, here are the materials I used:

Other Solutions

I searched around the inter-webs trying to find a similar setup to mine, and I came across this solution from Flickr user Stargazer95050 (aka Andy). If you go this route, I would suggest looking for some light colored cutlery trays, as the black-on-black makes it hard to locate what you need. If you do end up with a dark drawer, Andy suggets picking up a DIODER battery-operated drawer light from IKEA.

It is worth noting that storing camera gear in a drawer may not work for people who live in an extra humid climate. Also, some people may have dust problems with this storage method, but I’ve never had any issues, and my husband and I personally love being able to open a drawer and see all our gear, grab what we need, and go!

Do you have a special way of organizing your photo equipment at home? I’d love to hear about it!

--
You just finished reading "How to Make a Photography Gear Drawer" on capturinglight! I'd love to hear your thoughts about it!

so… i’ve been taking a much needed break from the computer in recent months… but i thought i’d share a few things that i’ve been into lately.

1. solar lights — i’ve recently become obsessed with solar lights. the design of these things has really improved over the years, and you can now find some really nice looking ones that burn for hours. the smith & hawken rock lights at target are surprisingly bright, and these mosaic lanterns are my new favorites. i have them in both orange (pictured above) and green. good luck finding them at a bay area target because i’m pretty sure i cleaned them out last week.
2. organizing things — well, let’s be real… i’ve always been obsessed with organization. but i’ve gotten extra handy with it lately. just cleaned out and organized the garage for eric… and in the house, i made us two “photo drawers” so that our equipment is easily within reach.
3. my bike — i got a new bike from alameda bicycle a few months ago and have enjoyed riding all over the island with eric. i love that it is so flat and bike-friendly here.
4. myfitnesspal — a great little calorie counting app that has a social aspect to it. i’ve connected with my sister, friends, and other family members that are hundreds and thousands of miles away, and together we’re getting healthier and losing weight. i’ve lost 9 pounds to date. woot!
5. instagr.am — i downloaded it when it first launched, then it sat on my phone, untouched. i was mostly put off by the square crop, limiting filters, and annoying borders. but i kept hearing about how great the community is there, so i’ve been giving it a try. what i’ve learned is that the people on there are really nice, and there aren’t many ‘rules’ for what you post. i’ve seen people post non-square cropped images, and many folks are even using other apps for filtering, or none at all. all in all, it’s pretty fun, and some of the photos people post there are downright amazing. look me up — i’m “capturinglight” :^)
6. pinterest — i looooove pinterest. this is one of the best go-to sources for anything design and diy related. my account is slightly underutilized at the moment, but i’m careful not to repin things that have already been pinned a dozen times, and i don’t want to load my boards with a million things i’ll never get around to doing. trying to be realistic, y’all. but i am so loving the site and the concept.
7. trader joe’s — i used to have a love/hate relationship with this place… mostly because of the insane crowds and the difficult-to-read-in-a-hurry (albeit cute) handwritten signage. but now, i think i’ve found a groove with tj’s downtimes and have discovered some products that we really love. a few recent favs: lemon verbenna triple milled soap (smells so good i might eat it), lavender sea salt body scrub (amazing), nourish spa shampoo & conditioner (this stuff is better than a lot of high-end products i’ve used, but it’s only $2.99 a bottle… score), and finally… dark chocolate peanut butter cups (which is not really helping me stay on track with item #4).

what about you? what are you enjoying these days? :^)

--
You just finished reading "7 Things I’m Into These Days" on capturinglight! I'd love to hear your thoughts about it!

our sweet cat, princess, passed away last night.

she was an awesome and loving kitty, and brought us a lot of laughs with her funny little quirks and habits.

i have owned (or rather, have been owned by) a lot of cats over the years, and i’m always so intrigued by how unique each one’s personality is. princess was no exception. even though i didn’t actually name her ‘princess’ myself (i adopted her in 2004), i always thought her name suited her. she was feisty, stubborn, and a complete and total diva. and i loved her for it.

she lived a good, long, and happy life… and she will be sorely missed.

here is a look back on our short time with her…

her favorite spot in the house.

here she is putting herself in a kitty “time out.”

every morning when we awoke, we would look down and see the shadow of a fat cat underneath our bedroom door… and when we opened it, this is what would greet us. princess begging to be fed, and burke about 8 feet behind her because he’s a giant wuss and totally afraid of her.

this is princess on what we called “bowl patrol” — her usual morning routine: sit by the bowl until one of us tops off the food to a level she is satisfied with. she was well fed, but even if the bowl was half-full, she was not pleased with it. she was also known to reach out and trip me if I ignored her begging attempts for too long. see also:  midnight bowl patrol.

princess had a dander problem, so we bathed her a good bit. most cats would not go near bath tub, but princess? she would purr the entire time.

if we didn’t have the fireplace going in the winter, this was her 2nd fav spot in the house. she kept me company a lot in my home office, as i too, am a big fan of space heaters :)

her favorite pastime… besides eating, harassing burke, and standing post on bowl patrol.

i would swear the color of her eyes doesn’t exist anywhere else in nature.

oh sweet kitty… thank you for all the snuggles and smiles you brought to us. we will miss you so.

xoxo,
amanda

--
You just finished reading "Princess" on capturinglight! I'd love to hear your thoughts about it!

here’s the entire set on flickr:

--
You just finished reading "Private Vintage Car Collection in Alameda, CA" on capturinglight! I'd love to hear your thoughts about it!