Victoria's Latest Photo Albums

John's Father Visits

During John's father's visit, we hit all the major tourist attractions and road many buses and trains.

2007 Photo Album

All about 2007.

Chicago Botanical Garden

August 26, 2007. What Victoria birthday is complete without a long trek around an expansive garden? Certainly not a 32nd!

Chicago Airshow

August 2007. Despite the gloomy -- and eventually raining -- weather, we had a good time sitting on the grass with a whole lot of our fellow Chicagoins watching tiny planes nearly crash into each other and the ground. And then eventually the F22 came along and made John very happy, but alas, by then I had to keep the camera under wraps due to the water-from-the-sky phenomenon.

Lincoln Park Zoo

August 2007. With the discovery that the Lincoln Park Zoo (free!) was just a 20 minute bus ride west of us, I thought we should check it out. Last weekend's weather was not inspiring, but this Saturday was beautiful so off we went. Between the general sleepiness of the outdoor animals and darkness of the indoor ones, I got more good video than good pictures, but it was still fun to use that 12x zoom. In a lot of cases, if only as binoculars to get a closer look than my eyes were giving me!

Loop Shopping Trip

After touring a few of Macy's many, many floors, we had lunch in the park and strolled through Lurie Gardens.

Humboldt Park, Chicago

The weather was nice, so we went for a stroll to explore the big park just south of our new place.

Darden Towe, Charlottesville, Virginia

July 2007. We first went to Darden Towe park a few months after moving to Charlottesville in 2000, so it seemed an appropriate outing for our last Charlotteville weekend, esp. since I'd been there with every one of my digital cameras except the new s3.

my nephew Jack

While his father is out to sea, his mother brought little Jack all the way from Japan for his first trip to the U.S.A. First stop: meet the adoring paternal grandparents & aunt!

Jack, film camera

My nephew Jack, this time in film. I picked up a new 50mm lens for my k1000 on e-bay a little while back, hoping to reduce the heft and bulk of my film slr and thereby end up using it more. This is 200 iso, which turned out to be more grainy than I remembered it, but I'm still pleased with how many of these turned out well considering I haven't used this camera in a year, and not regularly since the 90s.

Annual Trip West, 2007

Misc pictures from our annual trip to visit family back on the West Coast.

Willow Beach, Arizona

June 2007. Just a quick 20 mile drive over the dam from Boulder City, Nevada is this little marina on Willow Beach. I think it was bigger when I was a kid, and not just because I was smaller then! Water levels are down, and the beach is just a tiny spit. We came by to look at the fish hatchery, and ended up watching a lot of birds too.

Blackrock, Shenandoah National Park

April 22nd, 2007. Pictures from our pre-lunch hike up the short 1-mile round trip Blackrock trail, plus a few from the nearby overlook where we stopped to eat lunch.

Riprap & Wildcat Trails, Shenandoah National Park

April 22nd, 2007. After a quick leg-stretcher to Blackrock and lunch at an overlook, we decided to tackle a more substancial hike. We set out down riprap trail thinking we would do about 3.4 miles round trip, but somehow, before we'd really thought things through, we ended up more than halfway into a 9.8 mile hike, with the uphill portion remaining. The day was beautiful, as was the scenery, but we ran out of water with 3-4 miles to go, and the last half of that hike was rather brutal. We made it back to our car just shy of 6 hours after we'd left it, only an hour of which time we'd spent resting along the way.

Easter Snow

April 2007. Not much of a snow storm, really, less than an inch and all melted away by noon. But it was the Saturday before Easter that we woke up to a white dusting over everything, bringing back the look the neighborhood had last week, when all the white flowers from what I believe are pear trees were at peak blossom.

April Flowers

April 2007. A series of photos of spring finery between my apartment and work. Every Friday but one in April, I took my camera with me to work and along the way home, stopped to smell the roses. Or photograph the flowers, as the case may be. So this group represents a month's worth of spring evolution in Virginia, from April 6th - April 27th.

March Flowers

March 2007. Pictures taken on the way to and from work during the month of March. The last batch were all taken on the same day with my canon s3, but some of the early ones are with my little old 2mp nikon coolpix, which I now keep in my backpack for just an occasion.

Monticello Trail, spring

March 2007. A beautiful spring days means, time to go to a park. We were too lazy to pack food, so instead of a picnic, we ate at home and then went with a blanket. Which we call a flopnic. Or flopnicanstroll, if you count the part where we walked up the trail and back. It was really nice, though by that evening the tree allergens had gotten to me. I'm not sorry we went, but I'm not a happy camper this Monday! Who gets a Spring Day hangover?

Monticello Trail, Fall

Chicago - City Scenes

Jan 2007. Random photos from our trip to Chicago in January

Chicago - Parks & Museums

Jan 2007. Mostly outdoor shots from Chicago's Museum Campus (Field, Aquarium & Planetarium) and from Grant & Millinium parks.

Garfield Conservatory, Chicago

Jan 2007. Flower pictures from the conservatory in Chicago. The winter flower show was going on at the time I visited.

2007 Snow

Pictures from the snowfalls of 2007.

Norfolk Botanical Gardens, Norfolk, Virginia

Sep 2006. Along the way back from our camping trip in Virginia Beach, we stopped in for a visit at the gardens. We were exhausted and mosquito bitten, so not the most energetic garden patrons, but I did manage to take my fair share of pictures, including some with my film camera.

Antelope Island, Great Salt Lake, Utah

July 2006. During our road trip to Idaho for John's brother's wedding, we stopped in for a look at the Great Salt Lake in Utah from a place called Antelope Island. It's not far from the freeway, and there's a causeway, so you can drive right onto it. It's absolutely lovely and well worth the stop. Quiet and tranquil and a feast for the digital camera. We waded a bit in the lake and walked gingerly across the immense and at times prickly beach and drove around soaking in the sights for a couple of hours. The island has a Buffalo herd, and some other larger animals, but we didn't see any of those from the car, just lots and lots of birds. Hopefully someday I'll get a chance to go back for a more extensive visit, do a little back-country hiking, see some buffalo!

The Old Homestead, now with cats

July 2006. My parents have cats now! Finally a chance to take pictures of cats and post them on the internet! I think I am now officially a netizen. The pictures are great, because they, unlike the cute kitties themselves, do not instantly make my eyes water and my nose stuff up.

Lake Mead, Nevada

July 2006. John's father has a new condo right by Lake Mead, so during our stay we got to see bits and pieces of the water, including the marina, Boulder Beach, the visitor's center, and a wash/trail across the street from the condo complex. We did a little wading, but no actual swimming or boating. Maybe next time!

Ethel M Chocolate Factory, Henderson, Nevada

July 2006. No trip to Vegas is complete without a stop at the Chocolate Factory and cactus garden. Alas, the factory was not operating due to the 4th of July holiday, but the gardens were just like I remembered them from school field trips.

Hoover (Boulder) Dam, Black Canyon, Nevada

July 2006. Almost lost these to an impromperly formatted SD card, but mercifully managed to get most of them back with a piece of software. Phew! I must have been to the dam a number of times growing up, but I don't remember anything about any previous visit, besides a shred of a memory of the few minutes it took John and I to drive over it at a snails pace backed up behind semi after semi on our way across the country to the east coast after college. Now they're building a bridge so that through traffic won't have to cross the dam at all. That ought to speed things up! Before getting to the dam, we stopped in at a scenic overlook for another gander at Lake Mead, including a distant view of the marina we'd visited several days previously.

Shoshone Falls, Twin Falls County, Idaho

July 2007. Looking to kill some time before checkin time, we followed some signs off the freeway promising a 'scenic view'. Which it really, really was. I don't think these pictures quite do the scale of the water fall justice. At 112 feet high and a thousand feet wide, it was a truly impressive amount of rock and water, even in summer with a good portion of the Snake River's flow already diverted for irrigation. It was especially surprising turning that corner and arriving at this rugged gorge after how flat, tame and cultivated the land we drove through to get there had been.

Danny & Mari's Wedding

July 2006. One of John's younger brothers got married in Idaho this July, hence our roadtrip from southern Nevada where we were already visiting my parents and John's father. John enjoyed the great joy of getting to be an usher. The groomsmen's vests, however much they might latch on to the hope of being able to call them 'steel blue', were in fact, periwinkle. And finally, I was at an event where someone (the photographer) took more photos than I did.

Sherando Lake, George Washington National Forest, Virginia

May 2006. For our anniversary, we decided to go back to the restaurant that we had dinner at on our wedding day, Northern Exposure. Since that left the rest of the day, and the weather was actually nice, we decided we were overdue for another oudoorsey adventure. So we drove about 45 minutes west of town to Sherando Lake. Very pretty little lake, and bursting with families on a memorial day weekend. We did one quick little mile hike around the south side of the lake, and then ate our picnic lunch at a lunch table, and then staked out a spot in the grass half in the sun, half in the shade and spent the next several hours lounging about. Then we went for one last hike, this time up a steep and rather strenuous path for a bird's eye view of the lake. After which we went home to clean up for dinner.

Album: June 2006, Jamestown

Digital Album pages for a book about the Jamestown trip from March of this year; comic-size for printing at Lulu.com. The first two pages are the front and back cover. I tried to be a little less traditional and align-to-grid, a little more fast and loose with these layouts, and I really did crank them out. 28 pages and cover art in just a little over a week.

Historic Jamestown

This is the actual site of the 1607 landing of the three English vessels carrying 104 men, founding the first permanent settlement in the New World. We were starving by the time we finished the 2.25 hour drive from Charlottesville, so we started by eating our picnic lunch and then went on to explore the grounds. It was very cold at first, despite my 5 layers. Eventually I got down to a mere 4 layers. After exploring the "old town" (church, archeaological dig) and the "new town" (brick foundation reconstructions) we took the scenic loop drive, which was actually not particularly scenic, with plaques to read being the main attractions at each of the half dozen stopping points. At the point of the island, there was however a short path out to the water, and that was nice. On the way out of the park, we stopped in at the glassblower's house to watch some men in something that was intended to be period costume making glass mugs. Interesting to watch, and bonus, toasty warm inside.

Jamestowne Settlement

March 2006. This is the more disneyfied portion of the jamestown historical experience, a set of reconstructions peoples with costumed interpretters. More geared towards the kids than us, but it was cool to be able to board the life-sized replicas of the 3 ships that made the 4 month passage with carrying way more people than you would think possible. We also got to see a flintlock discharged, and some nails being made.

Blackrock Springs Trail, Skyline Drive, Virginia

Oct 2005.It being the last foretold day of good weather before we go back to rain, and nearing peak fall foliage season, we decided to take a drive up to skyline drive. The hike we randomly chose was not terribly thrilling, but the way back was a good little workout. Round trip, about an hour and a half. Note to self: get shoes with thicker soles when hiking rocky trails!

Cal Tech Grounds, Pasadena, California

September 2005. A few pictures of the gardens and landscaping of Cal-Tech University, featuring primarily bougainvillea, water lilies and turtles.

Downtown Charlottesville, Virginia

May 2005. After 5 years of living in Charlottesville, we finally got around to taking the Historical Society's walking tour of the downtown area. I seem to remember it being interesting at the time, but a year later, I can't seem to remember any stand out historical tid bits.

Beach in Pensacola, Florida

May 2005. A quick trip to the beach with my brother and his wife when we were visiting them.

Winging Ceremony, Florida

April 2005. Apparently, the US Navy now trusts my brother to fly them there helio-copters. And he's got some shiny gold wings to prove it.

Ragged Mountain Nature Area, Charlottesville, VA

April 2005. Sarah and John and I went hiking one morning.

Rivanna Trail, NW 250 Branch

Jan 2005. This is a pond seen along a segment of the Rivanna trail, nearby where the new Connector is being built, just off Old Ivy Road. Gotta snatch these rare bits of sun and nice weather (69!) when you can... so we decided to see if we could find the branch of the Rivanna trial that picks up across the train tracks from the one I explored a few years back. And, surprise, who knew there was a pond back there?

Cathedral Rock Trail, Mt Charleston, Nevada

August 2004. This is the trail we always went on when we went to Mt Charleston growing up, so naturally had to revisit it on this trip. Turns out all those years we'd been taking the side-trip fork that leads to a little waterfall rather than actually following the trail to its end way up on Cathedral rock itself. And so I got to see the spectacular view for the first time... It sprinkled rain off and on as we climbed, and there was even a little thunder leading to some comical back-and-forths up and down a particular stretch of trail as we wavered as to whether we should head back before the storm broke or had enough time to make it to the top. Turns out we timed it well, as it started *pouring* just a few minutes after we made it back to our car. Meanwhile the gathering storm mixed with spots of sun provided some nifty lighting over the mountains.

Red Rock Canyon, Las Vegas NV

7/31 & 8/2 2004. Just west of Vegas is a spectacular desert recreation area; a 13 mile one-way road allows you to cruise through, enjoying the scenery from air-conditioned bliss, or stepping out for a looksee at various small parking lots scattered around the circuit. There are also trails for the more adventurous. Our first visit was at dusk on Saturday evening. The weather was perfect, cool, with a wonderful breeze, and the fading light doing all sorts of beautiful things to the rock formations. The park closes at 8, so we had to rush out, but we enjoyed it so much that few days later we went back in the morning for a more thorough hike, around the Willow Springs/Lost Creek trail systems. Just as we were leaving, it started getting very dark, and actually rained down buckets once we reached town.

Darden Towe Park, Charlottesville, VA

June 2004. I took pictures at Darden Towe the first fall we moved to Charlottesville; what with the shocking coincidence of nice weather on a day we actually had time to enjoy it, it seemed time for another round... though the park is largely dominated by softball and other athletic fields, there's a pleasant if shortish hike to be had walking through a swath that's been mowed through waist-level meadow vegetation running roughly along the east bank of the Rivanna River.

Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens, Richmond, VA

August 2004. Yep, it's that time of the year again, that time when I think, hey, it's my birthday, let's go look at pretty flowers! Did a repeat visit of the same garden I went to for my 27th. Slightly nicer weather than last time, and in the intervening two years, they've finished up the conservatory and the library, so there was new stuff to look at. John was my tripod caddy, so I even got to do my first field trip with that, though it is hard not to feel a bit silly with a great big tripod for a teeny-tiny not-so-expensive digital camera. But it *really* helped the video clips to pan nicely, and I think it helped steady up my macro shots too... plus John's right, it *is* fun to pretend it's a laser cannon when you have it folded it up and hoisted on your shoulder.

Douthat/Staunton weekend Jaunt

May 2004. For our anniversary, we decided to take a quick little weekend trip, starting with a picnic in Douthat State Park, Clifton, Forge, Virginia (about 2 hours from our apartment) and then an overnight stay in Staunton followed by a matinee play at the recreated Blackfriar's, home of the Shenendoah Shakespeare players.

Blue Ridge Parkway, Virginia

Oct 2004. After a full (work)week of beautiful weather, the weekend seemed ripe for an outdoorsy adventure. Naturally, it was completely overcast the entire day. Sigh. At least it didn't rain. Anyway, we headed west to explore the Blue Ridge Parkway that runs south along the Appalachian mountains, connecting Shenandoah National Park in Virginia with Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina. Not that we went that far! (Maybe 10-15 miles from the north end.) Unlike Skyline Drive, the Parkway is free which was nice. On the other hand, on a Saturday afternoon, it was packed, whereas I tend to like my nature walks a little more sparsley populated. At anyrate, it was a good afternoon's adventure, and the hike up to Humpback Rocks was a good substitute for the step class I'm missing today because the gym's on fall break schedule.

Fort Barrancas, Pensacola, FL

June 2003. Fort Barrancas was one of several forts intended to defend Pensacola Bay. Originally built in the mid 19th century and restored for tourists in the late 1970s, it was a pretty interesting place to wander around in, if slightly reminiscent of a gigantic brick oven given the temperature the day we decided to explore it.

Pensacola Beach and Dauphin Island, Florida

These pictures were all taken with a disposable camera and scanned in. The first few are from a morning at the beach early on in our vacation, and the others are from a trip we made via car-ferry to Dauphin Island. Somone needs to tell my brother to quit being so photogenic, he's making the rest of us look bad!

Maternal Family

a collection of old photos from the maternal side of my family

Album: 1978

I sent this photo album covering my brother's first year of life to him for Christmas (2006).

Album: 1976

Layouts for my second year, age one up until just before my second birthday.

Album: 1975

It occurred to me that if I was going to put together an album for my brother's baby pictures, than I really should do one of my own, too. And so, I powered through the first year this weekend.