The Time I Tried To Be A Family Photag

What I learned? It's a lot harder than it looks. 

I've owned my D7000 for nearly four months and I am confident it's one of the best purchases I could have made. I am starting to get all the fun features figured out...though I have yet to figure out how to do video -- any help?!?...and really having fun with it. I am always amazed on how sharp & crisp the photos are, and you want color? The D7000 delivers.

However, I will be the first admit that I am not a professional. A lot of people think that if you buy a nice camera, you can immediately take great pictures. But it's not that simple. It takes so much time and practice to really get to know your camera, let alone perfect your craft, but I do think the camera is a start and any time I can shoot pictures, I will. It's all about learning.

So when my sister asked me to do an casual family photo shoot for Christmas card photos last fall (I know...just posting about it now!?...you don't have to remind me), I hesitantly agreed.

Don't get me wrong, I was really excited. This would be a great opportunity to practice photographing people (I tend to get a lot of practice on cows, not always people) and all I needed was one good one, right? But there was that nagging voice that kept reminding me how terrible it could go. You know, the whole "I am not a professional" thing kept dragging me down.

Then I reminded myself that Cathy wasn't paying me, so I warned her a few times that it could go terribly wrong, put on my big girl shoes and did it.

Here are some of my favorites.

 

 

All in all -- it turned out pretty well! We ended up with some photos that not only will work, but also managed to capture the personalities of my niece and nephew perfectly. (Aren't they the cutest?) That's definitely the bonus of having your sister be your photographer. We didn't have too many forced smiles, managed to escape with only a half-crabby kid and got to enjoy a beautiful fall day tromping around the woods together. 

I'll mark it down as a success.

Hopefully we can try it again in the spring and hopefully by the time my kiddos role around (in the far, far future), I will be a professional a little more confident.

By the way, a downfall (and a perk) of having a grown-up camera is all the photos you take. In less than an hour, I snapped 546 photos. WHAT?! That, friends, equals a LOT of editing.

And finally, I have no idea what settings I used to take these photos (literally, I had owned my camera for less than a month when I took the pictures), but I did do most of the editing with the help of good old PW's photoshop actions. You can download them here. 

So what do you think? I'm open to friendly critiques. When I took the photos I was so frustrated with the amount of bokah in some of the photos, but luckily Cathy liked it...and unlucky for me, I haven't figured out how to come even close to the same results again. Suggestions? I am also on the lookout for a good photography book to read this winter -- let me know if you have a favorite!

XoXo,

Here's To 2013

As we welcome in 2013 (with friends and remnants of last night's fun littered all over our house), it seems impossible not to log on to the sorely forgotten Cows, Corn & Country Girls and reminisce on a really great, nearly perfect 2012.

We were blessed. 

There are no other words that do 2012 justice.

We are blessed to have each other and our families who drive us to do better and love deeper. We are blessed to have friends that are there to celebrate our greatest accomplishments and build us back up when we need their support. We are lucky to have jobs that remind us that life requires work and dedication, but also provide us with the means to try new things, splurge every once and while and live comfortably. We are blessed to have a happy little home that afforded us the opportunity to explore a new community, find a dive of a bar that we love and enjoy Sunday morning coffee shops and quirky dinner dates. And we were blessed to have a year that allowed us to fall in love with each other and life even more than we thought possible.

{love him}

And I fully expect 2013 to be even better.

Hopefully it will bring a vacation of a lifetime so we can finally check that honeymoon off our to-do list and if we all cross our fingers (are you crossing them?!), maybe by early summer I will be looking out our window at cows on pasture and be spending my nights checking for heat and weeding the garden. (Doesn't that sound amazing!?) Oh and another potential game changer will be a legitimate craft room where I can maybe finish a quilt or two.

2013 will likely bring a lot of cattle shows and road trips to watch our little brothers and family accomplish big things and we will spend a lot of Saturdays celebrating the weddings of our friends. We will hopefully babysit our niece and nephew a little more, have more nights relaxing with our families and find reasons to laugh until we cry. And hopefully, in between the adventures, we finally find our purposes professionally and continue to grow in our careers.

There is no doubt that there will be challenges. I hope and pray that everyone I love and everyone that they love stays safe, happy and healthy, but I know that won't always be the case, so hopefully Mark and I can find trust in God and find peace in even the most heart-breaking moments. 

2012 ended with some unnecessary tragedies. My heart hurt for my friends, family and even complete strangers too many times in December. If nothing else it reminded me to love each and every person in my life to the fullest, to wear my seatbelt and stay focused on the road and cherish the life I have. Every moment is a gift.

Like every year, I hope to read a few more books, make a few new friends, reconnect with old friends, continue blogging and get high-school skinny again. Those resolutions are oldies but goodies and somehow make the list every year. Hopefully I can actually accomplish a few in 2013 (especially the high-school skinny & blogging...). But I also have a few big dreams for the year ahead. Big, scary ones. And I can't wait.

So here's to you, 2013. Let's make it a good one. I plan to love every minute.

XoXo,

Sayonara Harvest 2012

Exciting news!

The last kernel of corn has been tucked away in the bin, the combine is in the shop for year-end maintenance and my husband was home at 7 pm last night in time for supper (we had Buffalo Chicken Soup -- in honor of the Bison's homecoming win?! #BisoNation #undefeated).  

Harvest 2012 is officially over at Purfeerst Farm.

I know I said in Friday's post that it would probably be mid-week, but with the help of a few good days they were able to wrap everything up on Sunday afternoon. We even managed to slip in a quick birthday party on Saturday -- complete with a beer can cake -- for Jimmy, one of my favorite guys at the farm.

A little tidbit about Jimmy (besides his harvest birthday) is that PBR is his drink of choice. Yes, I realize it's a rare breed will that choose PBR every time, but Jimmy will. So, it only seemed fitting to make him a PBR cake. :)

{By far the easiest cake I have ever whipped up.}

Below is a picture of Saturday's crew -- some of the best people you could find. By the way, notice the hand behind Matt's head (far left, brown sweatshirt)? That's Wiggy, the one man in the world who has somehow avoided being in a picture his whole life. Maybe I will catch him next time...

Oh and another update? I learned to drive the ripper this weekend. It was the real test of my farm wife potential. I admit, I didn't pass with flying colors, but I didn't fail because I did do it solo for about 3 hours on Saturday night. And that might ask me back if they need me...maybe.

Mark's Grandma (second from the right, behind me) has been ripping all of her life. She's currently in her 80s and still does the bulk of the ripping on the farm.  

Everyone calls her Rippin' Rosie. 

She's one of the sweetest ladies you will meet and somewhat of a legend. I wasn't lucky enough to get to know and enjoy all of my grandparents in my life, but I am extremely lucky for the one I have always had (you can read about her here) and the two I gained. Hopefully one day I leave half of the legacy behind that they will.

{Here's a look at "ripping." Basically, we are breaking up the soil to prepare it for next spring.}

XoXo,

The Blogs I Never Wrote

I am sure it would be 100% appropriate to start this post with an introduction.

It could go something like, "Hi. My name is Jamie and I used to blog."

Or "Hey, I am that person who writes that blog that you stop by to read just to continously be disappointed that there is nothing new."

Or better yet, "Hi. I'm Jamie. I want to blog. I think in blogs. My mind has lists of things to blog about. I take pictures of random things to post on my blog. And then I never blog."

Yep, any of them would work.

HOWEVER, I am not posting any of that. 

I am just here to say that I solemnly swear that I am really going to give this 110% this time. Please hold me accountable.

Because here is the thing, I really honestly want to blog.

I wasn't kidding, my mind actually functions in 400-word blog posts. I drive home (on my ridiculously long drive) and write a post in my head summarizing my day. I see something at the mall and I draft up a mini-post ranting about the ridiculousness. I photograph everything I experience because I know how a picture is truly worth a thousand words.

It's how I function. I don't know if it's my education, my profession or just a weird quirk. Regardless, the result is that I have a whole library of blogs in my head that I didn't get to writing this summer.

Prime example, how did I manage not to write about the MN State Fair? I purposely took pictures of all the different food that I ate so I could share it with you. Case in point, the best food on a stick you will ever eat is below. I don't even want to know how many calories is in it. This was probably one of eight or ten servings I bought at the Great MN Get Together. And I wondered where my money went....

deep fried mashed potatoes.

Or, I don't know, maybe I should posted about the time my husband and I got to pose with a really big check and purple banner that we just won? That was a fun day. MJP Purfeerst Lut 104 (our Angus bull we have been showing this summer) had another great day in Minnesota and won Supreme Champion Bull at the Minnesota State Fair. Plus, added bonus, next year when we walk into the MN State Fair Cattle Barn we will be hanging from a HUGE banner with the rest of the Supreme Champions. Pretty darn cool.

we even had to drive to Wisconsin (no beer off sale in MN on Sunday) to get some celebratory beer!

I definitely should have wrote about our trip to Milwaukee, our week at the lake, or the Twins game we unsuccessfully scalped tickets at. And I wanted to rant for two weeks straight about how much I hated inserting my butt into my car seat just to sit in traffic for an hour and a half each way. But let's be real, there are a lot of things I could rant about, however they are probably better left unposted.

random date night at Target Field. Note to self: Don't let Mark be in charge of tickets.

Oh and don't even get me started on the P. Farms Corn Reports I missed. In short: It rained A LOT, it didn't rain for almost too long, then we got blessed and it rained again finally, but unfortunately the rest of corn country wasn't so lucky, so prices shot through the roof. This resulted in me checking corn prices every two hours so I could call my husband and convince him to sell some corn. In fact, I almost had Mark convinced that I should quit my day job and become a grain marketer. Then we remembered I have no idea how to do that. He went to school for that, not me. Fast forward a month, and now I never see my husband because we are trying to get that crop out of the field. I am officially a harvest widow.

Say hello to my husbands new home.

Lucky for you, my life as a new farm wife is something I definitely still have time to blog about. In fact, it's penciled in for this week.

And potentially the most important blog I missed is the exciting news about the new camera in my life that should make this blog 7,000 times better.

Yes, I fell victim to the beautiful things at National Camera Exchange. I am not ashamed.

However, that post is for Thursday.

And that's where I sign off.  See you tomorrow, same place, same time, for some inspiration. Lately, I have been lacking it.

Glad to be friends again!

If You Give A Three-Year-Old An iPhone...

Avery May has always been infatuated with my iPhone.  

She absolutely loves to see herself move on the screen when I flip the camera and she can easily scan through pictures, so we get a lot of this when it's in her hand: "Look at this one. Look at this one. Oh Jamie, look at this one."

Last weekend, she discovered that you can point it at someone else and take a picture, which was a major game changer in her book. However, while she might be the smartest three-year-old you will meet, she's still working on the hand-eye coordination and it was pretty darn tricky to hold the phone, point it where you wanted and press the button.

So, in turn, we got a lot of almost-there shots. I narrowed it down to a few of my favorites; I definitely think she has a future in photography. :)

{left: lots of green grass and little three-year-old foot. top right: my cute husband bottom from the chin down right: time for a close up.}

{top left: we told her to point the camera at us, instead she pointed her finger at us. Oh well, we are getting closer! bottom left: I've always wanted a picture of these shoes. top right: We finally found a subject! blake man swinging. bottom right: Mark & Blake playing. I think she was on to something with the angle!}

 So here's my take away:

1. It's fun to see the world in the eyes of a three-year-old. What if we all simplified to this?
2. Kuddos to the iPhone (I accidentally just wrote eye-phone. Editor brain is officially turned off.) for being a camera that you can hand to a toddler and they can take a decent picture.
3. And finally, can you even dare to imagine what our world is going to be like when these three-year-olds that are already obsessed with an iPhone (and that honestly understand how to use it) grow up? They will be a generation that will know nothing but file sharing through Dropbox, messaging through Facebook, immediate information and gratification online and the Apple domination. I can't even imagine the things they will create after growing up in a world where things were always bigger, better & at their fingertips.

If you're a forward thinker, it's actually pretty exciting to think about it.

XoXo

Every Three-Year-Old Should Have A Mustang

Meet the coolest three-year-old in southern Minnesota.

Yes, of course she drives a mustang. What three-year-old doesn't?

She may or may not have gotten her bright red convertible from her Daddy's friend who ordered it for her late one night after too much fun at the bar.

It's the shiniest car in her little town and she fits right in with the local golf-cart gang. (What? Your little town doesn't have a golf-cart gang? You are missing out.)

She even was generous enough to let me drive. 

As you can see, I am an excellent mentor for her with my beer in hand.

But, let's be honest, she actually might have forced me to drive, because she has already (three days in) declared herself a terrible driver. According to her, she would much rather walk. 

What more can you expect from a girl who likes her bike helmet and her safety bell more than the trike itself? She's officially Miss Safety Pants.

But, unfortunately, my butt is too big to really make this little beauty look good.

 And Blake Man might be a talented little baby, but he can't quite reach the pedals yet.

Thank goodness his sister loves him enough to give him a ride home.

Plus, watermelon was a really good bribe for driving the car back to the garage. :)

Really, this is what summer is all about - a happy baby and a juicy slice of watermelon.

Well, and Greg's Meats & Oak Meadow brats on the grill. Next time you drive down 52, you must stop and pick up a packet of Mushroom Swiss brats.  

Best. thing. ever.

XoXo

A Really Fabulous Weekend

Hello!

I hope you survived your Monday. I more than survived mine, so I am calling it a success. :)

We were cattle-show free this weekend and took advantage of our freedom. Don't get me wrong, I love hanging out on a showbox and working with cattle, but sometimes, it's nice to actually do your hair, dress up in cute clothes, sit on a patio, drink a beer and just relax.

We started the weekend with a grill-out featuring fresh guacamole, brats on the grill, watermelon and Sierra Nevada's SUMMERFEST. And of course, my adorable niece & nephew.

{Check back tomorrow for more on that shiny red car they are driving!}

Bright and early Saturday morning, we road-tripped up to St. Paul to visit Summit Brewery. I am a huge beer fan and have a goal of visiting as many breweries as possible in my lifetime. As we were pulling in, my husband informed me that he believes once you see one, you've seen them all. Glad we are on the same page.

Since I vow to hold nothing back from you, the tour itself was not fantastic, but you do get three free samples at the end, so it's good enough for me! :)

Here's your Summit Fun Facts for the day:

• 90% of Summit beer is consumed in Minnesota and 65% in the Twin Cities. As of now, it's not distributed west of the Dakotas.
• Their most popular beer is the Summit Extra Pale Ale, but my personal favorites are their new Summer Ale, their classic Pilsner and the Oatmeal Stout. In fact, you should add the Oatmeal Stout to your list of things to drink before you die...yes, it's that good.
• The Twin Cities sits on top of five excellent aquifers, meaning we have exceptional water to brew beer with, which is part of the secret behind Summit's success. Who knew?
• If you work at Summit, it's totally acceptable to drink beer on your lunch break. Do you think that is true in the marketing department, too? :)
• At any time, they have nearly 3 months supply of beer on hand. Not a bad place to get lost in. 
• And perhaps the most important, while they might not charge you anything for the tour, three not-so-small samples later, you'll make it worthwhile to them in the gift shop. Be warned.

{Of course, we all walked out with new Summit apparel and proudly wore it for the rest of the day!}

Plus, when you start your beer tour at 10:30 am, there is still a lot of day left to fill. Ours consisted of a patio lunch & bloody mary bar with Mark's Grandpa, a quick game of euchre, my first ever stop at Trader Joe's (I scooped up some butternut squash raviloi -- any tips how to make it?), another patio dinner by the river and a perfect night listening to acoustic music in downtown Northfield.

We spent Sunday cleaning, doing cattle chores and some TV time with a season of Gossip Girl.  

Sounds like a pretty darn good weekend huh?

And if you are still following today's random thoughts, here is one more. I heard on the radio last weekend about some research that shows the summer when you are 24 will be your best ever. I am 24 and last weekend was the first weekend of summer. So far, it's definitely right for me. Was 24 your favorite?

Cheers to the rest of the best summer of my life!

Summer = Cattle Shows

For most people, summer means relaxing at the lake, barbequing with friends, ect. You know...activities that involve a cold beverage and a potential suntan. Bliss, right?

But for Marko & I, summer equals cattle shows. It kind of makes me laugh how accustomed our friends our to us being MIA nearly every Saturday from June to August.

OK, I'll admit, it's not every Saturday. In fact, I have an empty Saturday in my planner as early as next week, but I promise you, this summer I will be spending a lot of time on the wash rack and a lot of quality time with my husband behind the wheel of a truck hauling a trailer. But really, we don't mind. This is our thing.

Do I have to get sappy and remind you that our love story started at a cattle show?

We kicked off our "show season" last weekend at a two-day show in Preston, MN. Two days means double the work and double the fun. :)

Saturday morning started at 4 am. Besides a quick freakout when a classic case of miscommunication resulted in us almost losing the back end of the Jeep (not a scratch, thank goodness) and a mild setback waking up our third wheel, the commute went pretty well.

 As soon as we got there, though, it was go, go, go, go, go, go...do I need to continue? The point is, we were busy. And I was a sweaty, hot mess, but folks, you don't go to a cattle show to look pretty.

Meet our little brothers - Jason & Matt. Jason had the Reserve Champion Angus Heifer on Day 2; Matt had the Reserve Champion Angus Heifer on Day 1. They are old pros at this showing thing.

Jason is showing a Style daughter this summer for Mark & I. You might have seen some pictures of her on the blog before – she's my wedding present from Mark. Yes, my husband gave me a heifer for a wedding present. Yes, I gave him a decanter. Yes, it wasn't a fair gift exchange. Don't remind me.

Matt is showing a Saugahatchee heifer our of our donor cow Molly. Jason & Matt's heifers are half-sisters and I promise you they couldn't be more different. Scarface (notice the birthmark on her face) is tiny, big-bodied, and a baby to work with. #1 (creative name huh?) is maternal, extended and crrrazzy. But in the end, we are pretty confident they are going to be really good cows and that is what matters. They are also both half-sibs to these calves I posted about before.

{Jason}

{Matt}

Saturday took forever. Let me slow it down and say it in Sandlot style...FOORREEVVERR.

I snapped this picture at 9:30 pm when the kids were just finishing up the judging contest portion of the show. At 10 pm when it finally wrapped up, we piled in the truck to grab some food...to find the only place open in town was the Casey's gas station. Jackpot!

 And then, we got up at 6 am and started it again all over again on Sunday.

And of course, we are doing it all again this Saturday and Sunday. :)

XOXO,

Why This Blogger Has Been MIA

Blogger MIA Alert!

I know I have been missing for nearly a week. So sorry friends, but life all of sudden got really busy.

And I am still running short on time, so here's your super quick review brought to you by our friend, Instagram.

I think the hectic schedule started when Mark convinced me to buy an old, crappy coffee table to refinish for him. And then it continued with a meeting up with friends, farmer's markets, graduation parties, family get-togethers, lots of cattle clipping, an overwhelming amount of stripping & sanding on a table that actually looks like it might have a future, volleyball games, judging practice, more cattle, running, lots of working and not enough sleep.

And now I am here. It's Friday afternoon, I am at my favorite (and best) mall in America enjoying a smoothie from Caribou, a tomato & cumumber salad from Noodles and finally catching up over lunch hour. Thank goodness for 60 minutes of rest. :)

Enjoy your weekend friends! I am off to a cattle show with my Marko & brothers, like I most likely will be every weekend until September! :)

XOXO,

Jamie

Corn Report | The Numbers Behind Farming

I have a Purfeerst Farms corn progress report planned for everyone soon, but in the mean time, I wanted to share this infographic from the Illinois Corn Corps blog. It was created by Erin Ehnle, who is the talented designer behind Keeping It Real: Through The Lens Of A Farm Girl – you have probably have seen some of her work floating around social media sites, but if not, go look now. She does an awesome job of creating simple, effective infographics explaining the basics of rural life and has quickly gained an impressive following on Facebook and Pinterest. She makes "agvocating" that much easier for all the rest of us.

Remember in our last crop report (you can read it here) and I mentioned how much "risk" it took to just put the plant in the ground? And then, you wait months and pray that Mother Nature doesn't throw a drought, hail, or straight-line winds at you before you get anything back This graphic does an awesome job of explaining what I meant -- much better than I ever could. It really is all about loving what you do. Take a look!

Source: corncorps.wordpress.com via Briána on Pinterest

Plus, I thought it was interesting how Mark's family almost fits the "average farmer. I think Jim is right around 57 and their farm has been in the family for over 3 generations. It's nice to keep those tradition going. Luckily, Matt & Mark are helping bring that average age down a few years! :)

If you have any questions on any of this, just leave me a comment and maybe my contributing editor (who still has done no contributing!) will help me find an answer. And, of course, make sure to go to take a look at Erin's Keeping It Real page on Facebook and give her a like!

And one last reminder, today is the LAST day to enter my birthday giveaway! I'd love for you to become a follower and enter! Click here to enter.

XoXo,