8:51 AM 6/24/2008 Dad and Daughter’s Weekend This last weekend James and I took Sidney and Siena to Fort Canby (a.k.a. Cape Disappointment State Park) just south of Long Beach, Washington. Originally we were going to make this a camping trip, but at the last minute we became aware that we wouldn’t have the best weather for spending 2 days on the coast with 2 little girls. Luckily James was able to rent us a tiny cabin that helped keep us a little dryer. The girls didn’t mind staying in the tiny cabin, as far as they were concerned they were getting to sleep in a play house (it kind of felt that way for James and I too). The girls enjoyed playing on several different beaches, viewing the wildlife (raccoons, deer, and pelicans), and hiking to the North Lighthouse. Despite the on and off wet weather, it was a fun weekend for all. Here are the pictures, enjoy! -AKG
3:46 PM 6/18/2008 Updates? Wow, has it seriously been over 10 long months that this page has been left in a state of complete neglect? At least I can assure you James and I haven’t dropped off the face of the earth. For the most part we have both been busy with family (especially our daughters pictured left). I have also been playing with more advanced blogging tools as a possible alternative to the current Initial Photography Updates page. Both James and I have been learning to use new cameras: I got a new Nikon D200, then just to out do me James got a new Nikon D300. However, you should expect some interesting stuff from us over the summer. I have two trips planned to the Southwest to photograph Mesa Verde, Sedona, Grand Canyon, and Arches National Park. And James has a new daughter planned. So stay tuned… -AKG
1:01 PM 8/9/2007 Seafair 2007 This last week was another great Seafair; the pinnacle of summer in Seattle! This year I got to spend a little time practicing on my Blue Angel pictures before the big day. My friend Vigil and I went out on top of a parking garage on the University of Washington campus and snapped away as the planes flew over (the picture to the left was my favorite of the bunch). Saturday was the Magnolia Children’s parade, an annual event for our family. This year I think the parade was bigger than ever! Sunday was the hydroplane races we from the Marti household as they hold their family reunion that we crash every year. This year we went without the children (Siena thinks the Blue Angels are “too noisy and kind of scary”). Since we we were without children we were able to join our friends out on the lake later, where all the craziness was going on. You can find all the pictures here. Enjoy! -AKG
6/29/2007 10:26 AM Nadia's Baptism Again, I’m two weeks behind in posting my updates. June 16th my youngest daughter, Nadia, was baptized by Father William Treacy at Camp Brotherhood in Mount Vernon, Washington. Nadia was baptized along with her cousin’s Micheli and Natalie. Just over 8 years earlier Kathy and I went to Camp Brotherhood for our Engaged Encounter (pre-marriage counseling). You can find all the pictures here.
3:45 PM 6/28/2007 Cabo Mexico! Yes, it took me over two weeks to get around to write this up... but I'm still recovering. From June 6 to 12 my wife and I went to Cabo Mexico to attend the Shannon/Wunder wedding. This was our first big trip since my daughter was born in 2003, this was the first big trip without any children, this was the first trip to Mexico, (etc, etc, etc. This trip was a big deal for us). We stayed at the Cabo Surf Hotel; a boutique surfers hotel just West of Cabo San Jose. We partied, surfed, ate some of the best food we've ever had, partied some more, did a bit of exploring, did a lot of sitting by the pool, and we partied. Needless to say, I took hundreds of photos of the entire weekend, and you can find them all here.
4:50 PM 6/23/2007 Sheesh. Its been over 3 months since James or I have I’ve added anything to this part of the site and yet so much has happened: I got over 1000 negatives I found in an old shoe box scanned through Scan Café (most I still haven’t uploaded, incidentally the picture is an old photo of me from a Halloween party that got scanned), I made the switch from PC to Mac, I switched from Photoshop Elements to Photoshop CS3 and Lightroom, James and I started a new project to photograph the bridges along the Lake Washington Ship Canal, Kathy and I took a trip to Cabo San Jose Mexico for a wedding, and My youngest daughter got baptized along with two of her cousins. All this and no posts for 3 months, so I will try and do some catch up work over the next week or so… -AKG
10:42 AM 3/19/2007 The Alpental Randonnee Rally So this last Sunday was Alpental’s annual Randonnee Rally, and Scott Schell and I got to photograph the whole thing. It involved around 65 people attempt to be the first to skin up to the top of the Alpental Ski area and then ski down (racers actually had to go twice). There were even some world class racers from as far away as Slovakia participating. (For those of you unfamiliar with the sport, here's where you can find a quick description.) The course was steep, with one section requiring climbing a ladder and this made it a lot more fun to photograph. However, after watching the racers it’s clear that I would need to do some serious conditioning if I ever wanted to participate. The weather conditions were questionable, with drizzle switching to ran, and fog and eventually giving way to sun as the race ended. It made it rather challenging to keep my camera gear dry while still getting some good shots. After the event, the schwag give away was amazing: back packs, sleeping bags, jackets, tents! At one point I thought the give away nearly caused the race weary participants to riot as the gear was thrown out. Here is where you can find all of the pictures, enjoy! -AKG
3:18 PM 3/16/2007 The trip to the East Coast On Tuesday night I got home from our first big family trip of the year: 6-1/2 hours on an airplane, 4 hours in a minivan, and we were in Norfolk Virginia. The purpose of the trip was to visit my sister-in-law, Debbie and her husband, Mike and their new baby Micheli (who is 12 hours younger than Nadia). The trip included visits to 3 states and one district, numerous landmarks, one battleship, two lighthouses, one very long bridge, and a day in our nation’s capital. Outside of the state of Manhattan and Long Island, I have never been to the East Coast so this was all new for me. The most interesting part was doing that much traveling with a 3 year old and a 3 month old; I wasn’t entirely sure I would survive. All things considered Siena and Nadia did really well. I hope to go back again, but I might wait until my daughters are a little older before I do this again. Here are all of the pictures. -AKG
10:44 AM 2/20/2007
The Shootout in Seattle I had a really good time this last weekend meeting up with a bunch of professional and amateur photographers for Sunday shootout at the Pike Place Market. Fellow smugmug/dgrin user Ben posted to dgrin about a blog entry on local wedding photography Corry Paris's site about a dwf photo shootout at the Pike Place Market. James and I, along with other fellow smugmug/dgrin users Ben, David, and Wendell met up with the dwf posse for two hours of trying to get the best photo. For the shootout the whole city was available to us, but with all the activity at the market, James, Wendell, David, and I decided to stay in and around the market. One of my favorite sites was local musician Reggie Miles playing the hand saw!
When the shooting was done we all met up for a couple of beers at the Pike Place Brewery. Even though I don’t think I got any award winning photos, I had a lot of fun and I look forward to getting to do something like this again. Here are the photos James and I got. -AKG
5:37 PM 1/27/2007 Seattle's new Olympic Sculpture Park! I went to the new Olympic Sculpture Park last night (Friday) with Kathy, Siena and Nadia so that I could scope it out. I couldn't believe how senic the park was, every direction you looked was incredable! To the South, Mount Rainier, to the East the Space Needle, to the West the Olympics. This morning at 7 AM I returned and brought James with me. I now freely admit, 7 AM was probably too early, since James and I wandered around in the dark freezing until there was enough light to start taking pictures. You might also notice the watermark. Sorry about that, but after a friend of James and mine said that we really need to start watermarking our pictures because even he is stealing them all the time, I finally had to do something. Hope you are able to enjoy the pictures despite the watermark. Here's where you will find more of the pictures. -AKG
11:27 AM 1/17/2007 Comet McNaught photographed on January 11, 2007 Okay, I'm a bit slow in making this post. Actually I wasn't going to post anything about this photo shoot to my updates (I wasn't too impressed with my pictures, and there are so many great pics on the internet), but several friends requested I post something to Updates so here it is. My attempt at photographing comet McNaught on January 11, 2007. It was really cold out, but that didn't stop hundreds of people from crowding into tiny Sunset Hill Park. There was quite a bit of confusion at first, because the comet sat right where we could planes approaching Seattle-Tacoma Airport. Several "moving" comets with a tiny plane sitting on the front of them threw people off before McNaught showed itself. I had my Tamron 70-300mm lens and a 4" refractor telescope (which actually didn't do much for comet watching). Here are the rest of the pictures. -AKG
6:20 PM 1/16/2007 I am really enjoying getting to try my photography skills on baby photography. Probably my favorite thing to photograph is Nadia's facial expressions. Here are some of my recent efforts to try and capture her expressions. Click here to see the rest of the pictures -AKG
10:22 AM 1/12/2007 I only seem to mention my own pictures in this section about updates to the site when it is Kathy who is the person who is home most of the time with my two biggest models (Siena & Nadia). Here are some pictures that Kathy took through December 2006 and January 2007. Enjoy! Click here to see the pictures -AKG
1:30 PM 12/24/2006 Welcome to the world Nadia Drew Gorohoff. Born December 19, 2006 at 1:10 AM; 8lbs 15oz. I can’t believe it took me 5 days, 23 wet diapers, 17 poopy diapers, and 47 feedings (by Kathy) to add my update entry! After Nadia was born, Kathy told me about a list of 100+ people she wanted me to send an email to with the pictures of Nadia (sorry if you were missed in the emailing, but it was 2AM, and I couldn't see straigt let alone double check a long list of email addresses). After finding the correct picture, and downsizing it so that it was small enough for an email, I got ready to send the email. (Yes, I brought a laptop to the hospital, they have wireless internet there). Well, it turns out you can only email 50 people at a time with Hotmail. So I broke it up into 3 emails and finally sent out the email sometime after 3AM. After the 3rd email went out I realized I said the birth date was December 12, 2006 (don’t use technology without sleep). The next morning I checked my inbox and saw several angry emails from people who wanted to know why I had waited a week before telling them my daughter was born, and several confused emails questioning how Kathy could have been at Siena’s co-op school on Tuesday December 12 looking still very pregnant. So I resent the email with the correct date. Here are all of the pictures early Christmas present: Nadia! (here are a few more). Merry Christmas! Happy New Year! Season's Greetings! -AKG
3:34 PM 12/17/2006 A Sunday afternoon out! Kathy, Siena, and I decided to have lunch at Ivar's on the waterfront. As a child my father would take me there to feed the seagulls, and now that I'm a father its one of my favorite father/daughter activities. Since Kathy finds the seagulls rather disgusting, she opted to be the photographer on this outing, which freed me up to join Siena in feeding the seagulls. Here are all the pictures! -AKG
10:25 PM 12/13/2006 My 3 year old daughter got a camera! My mother in law is heading out of town for the holidays, so she gave my 3 year old daughter her Christmas present early. The present was a new camera! I have to admit, I was surprised to find out that Fisher Price makes digital cameras. I like the concept though: super durable, super easy to use, big pink plastic camera that is built like a tank (pink tank), with LCD and super high res 640 X 480 images! The camera has a fixed lens set at F/2.8, with iso 60, and has a built in flash. Here’s the camera she got So far I think my daughters best work is of her feet taken from her car seat. You can see the rest of her first pictures here. -AKG
3:57 PM 12/10/2006 This last Saturday (12/10/2006) I got up early early, James picked me up and we drove up to the little town of Rockport Washington on the Skagit River (about 100 miles North of Seattle). Every year during December and January hundreds of migratory bald eagles appear along the shores of the river to feast on spanning salmon. This is the largest population of wintering bald eagles in the United States. Their numbers reach their peak around the third or forth week of December. Last year I made a feeble and disappointing attempt to shoot the eagles with my little cheap 70-300mm. This year I stepped up and rented a 200-400mm f4 VR monster along with a 1.7 TC. I think need a bigger lens still, or at least a little more practice using big glass. Here are the pictures from that trip. -AKG
11/26/06 After much much badgering by my trusted business partner, here is my anticipated side of the story from our trip to the Washington coast portion of Olympic National Park. No these pictures were not taken in November but September when the weather was a wee bit nicer (it's presently snowing here in Seattle). The trip kicked my butt more than I thought it would but nothing that a little bit of gear won't be able help. Most notably, a second pair of socks. I think I still have blisters months later (yes Beth, you can say I told you so). So here are the pictures. Enjoy! JG
4:01 PM 11/25/2006 Siena, Alex and I went up to Pro Ski Service in North Bend to get Siena her first pair of skis. Martin Volken set up my daughter with a great deal on skis, boots, binding, helmet and goggles. Then Siena, Alex, and I went up to Snoqualmie Summit and went sledding! With all the snow we received this weekend, there was no problem finding plenty of it to play in and sled in. Next week Siena's skis will be ready, and maybe we'll go skiing! Here are the pictures (and a few movies too). Enjoy!
2:31 PM 11/21/2006 I finally got around to making another post here. Its not for a lack of taking a pictures, it has more to do with spending too much taking pictures to stop and think about what I’ve photographed and what I want to talk about. I've been the volunteer photographer at my daughter's school where I take 300 to 600 pictures per class, I've just completed another photography course, I've been attending a lot of 3-year-olds birthday parties, and I've been re-designing and re-arranging this web site (sorry about any broken links). However, the high point of it all was this last Thursday, which was Siena’s 3rd Birthday party. It was a lot of fun for everyone. Here are the pictures, enjoy! -AKG
9:49 PM 10/22/2006 It was the endless weekend of photography for me. It started off on Friday where I fulfilled my duties as class photographer for my daughters class. Then Saturday morning, I got an early wakeup call from my daughter who couldn't sleep. After that, I couldn't sleep either, so I headed over to Alki and got some sunrise photos of fog covered downtown Seattle. Finally Sunday was the second field trip in the current photography course. It was a beautiful morning, and the fall colors made it easy to fulfill the assignment "Color", but it was the little water strider bugs on the pond that caught my attention. -AKG
10/7/06 It's been some time since Andrew and I got up at the crack of dawn to capture sunrise at Alki Beach. The last time we went, my battery went dead right as the sun came up. I guess that sales guy was telliing the truth when he said I needed a backup. JG
10/15/06 Today was the first field trip for our class Photography and the Creative Eye . This class covers "The Art of Seeing by Freeman Patterson. After what seems like weeks of beautiful sunny skies, Fall returned and so did the rain. Since Patterson espouses the belief that you can take great pictures in any conditions, the weather seemed appropriate. Despite concern of short circuiting my D-50, I braved the elements and captured "line and shape," the subject of today's assignment. It's unfortunate that my trusted partner, Andrew could not make it. He did however take some nice pictures of the UW campus earlier in the week (when the weather was more inviting). JG
2:16 PM 9/1/2006 I added a new feature to our web site; you can now browser our pictures by location. Sometime ago, SmugMug added the ability to use Google Maps on our web sites, and I finally got around to incorporating that feature into the Initial Photography web site. I should mention that the pictures will not show up on the map until the picture is “geo-coded” (associate the latitude and longitude of where the picture was taken with the picture). The real key of this feature is it will get me to start scanning all of my old photos from trips to Europe and Africa! Now I just have to talk Kathy into letting me get a fancy high end photo scanner. You can find the map feature here. Now James...get to geocoding all those pictures of your pictures! -AKG
8/27/06 A trip to the grandparents This last weekend Sydney got to see not one set but both sets of grandparents. Saturday night, mom and dad came over for a bbq and then hung out with the girl while Beth and I went out on a date! We decided that Pirates were in order. While it was certainly a fun movie, I could have done without the Peter Jacksonian length of show. Sunday, we headed down to grand old Covington for the quiet and calm confines of my in-laws. I really enjoy hanging out with them as it is completely different than the chaos that is my youth's stomping grounds (note to parents, this is not a knock, just different). This particular visit saw the entire lot of us settle down for a mid afternoon nap in the living room. Sydney had a terrific time as grandma and grandpa doted on their grand daughter. This included new toys, a tour of the woods in back, and a mouthful of blueberries. The day ended with grandma giving Syd a bath. The bath was shorter than normal as Sydney decided it was a good time for a poo. I thought grandma dealt with it well. Here are the pictures . JG
8/27/06 This weekend while my trusted photo partner was busy scaling Mount Rainer, I decided to stoll down to old Ballard and see what I could see. I am still getting comfortable shooting pictures of anything not sprouting from the ground but I was pretty happy with the results. Here are the pictures . JG
8/26/2006 The First Big Red “R” Expedition This last Saturday (8/27/2006) my brother Alex, my brother-in-law Dave and I climbed up to Camp Muir on Mount Rainer. From the parking lot at Paradise at 5,400 feet elevation to Camp Muir at 10,188 feet elevation. This hike is a mere 4-mile long hike, but the last mile requires nearly a 3,000-foot gain in elevation. Despite the 3:30 AM wake up call (for the drive from Seattle to Paradise on Mount Rainier), and the 5-1/2 hour hike (just the up part), and the hazy skies due to the forest fire on the other side of Mount Rainier, it was all a lot of fun. For my brother Alex it was an easy hike (he made it up in 3-1/2 hours, then waited 2 hours for Dave and I), for me it was a bit of a struggle at times. However, this was my second hiking up to Camp Muir, and Alex and Dave’s first. I had talked Dave into the hike by telling him its an easy 4 mile hike, to which he asked, "Why do I need crampons then?" The crampons were not actually necessary, but they made the hike down a little easier. My brother Alex, who I am certain is half mountain goat managed to beat Dave and I to the top by 2 hours despite the fact he carried several Rainier Beers for us (only appropriate beer) to Camp Muir in his back pack. He also beat us down by an hour. For the last 1,000 feet of elevation, the only thing that kept me moving was Alex telling me over the walkie talkie that if I didn’t pick up the pace, he was going to drink my beer! My only regret from the whole trip was neglecting to check the settings on my camera. I had left my ISO set to 1600, and the white balance set to incandescent light, both settings from Motorik’s concert the pervious week. I didn’t catch the ISO settings until I reached Camp Muir, and didn’t catch the white balance settings until I looked at my pictures on the computer. I was able to fix the white balance, but I apologize for some of the grainy ISO 1600 pictures. Here are the pictures. Enjoy! -AKG
8/19/06 Our Day at the Market Trying to expand my horizons beyond flower pictures, I dragged Andrew down to the Pike Place Market. The market seemed like an easy place to get great quintessential Seattle photos. What's more Seattle than the market. Unfortunately, I didn't think about the fact that five million other people would think that the market is a great place to spend a Saturday when it's 80 degrees either. Given the number of them present, people seemed like a good subject matter. That said, after the first person I asked said no, I needed a little liquid courage. So of course we headed to a less crowded space for a libation. Well, I still didn't get that many people pictures, but I did get a few shots that I thought represented the market.
8/12/06 The best photography book I've read is called The Art of Seeing by Freeman Patterson. Our featured galleries all pay homage to Freeman who focused on breaking things down to simple elements and seeing the world "through the eyes of a child." Freemam Patterson is the subject of our next photography class, being taught by Robert Stahl. The three featured galleries are simplicity , light, and color .
8/12/06 Playing hookie from work : Thursday night, the Summer session of photography camp came to an end. This class featured some really high quality work by both our instructor, Robert Stahl, and the rest of our classmates. That said, having been duly inspired by some of the pictures from the night before, Friday I skipped out on work and headed zoo to take some pictures. The zoo was rather busy with both a Google company picnic and a Wamu company picnic going on (not to mention a beautiful Friday afternoon). One thing for certain, if you are taking anyting other than tourist shots, people look at you funny. While I was photographing a small leaf, a boy walked up to me to inquire what I was taking a picture of. When I told him, he proceeded to let me know that leaves were stupid. Check out the rest of my the rest of my zoo pictures here .
10:37 AM 8/7/2006 Seafair 2006 Seafair lasts a lot longer than one weekend, but since I was in New Mexico, I missed many of this year’s activities. So for 2006 all of my participation in Seafair took place during the weekend of August 5th and 6th. It kicked off for me with the Magnolia Children’s parade which Kathy, Siena, Beth, Sydney and I attended (James was off on something called a “Party Barge”). The Parade, as always, was a lot of fun. This year there was a full army band followed by a “Go Army” Hummer (recruiting at a children’s parade?). However, I think the highlight is always the Seafair Pirates. Every year the Seafair Pirates run the parade route in their DUKW (Duck) Pirate ship blasting their cannon and scaring all of the children. The newspapers had reported that this year, due to complaints the pirates cannons would be silent with the exception of a couple of shots fired at the very beginning of the parade route. However, since they are after all, pirates, they ignored requests to silence their cannons and fired it throughout the route. After the parade we all wandered over to the
9:15 AM 8/3/2006 James and I have started the process of uploading all of our New Mexico photos to the New Mexico travel section of the Initial Photography web site (note that we still have a lot more pictures to upload). However, as I was looking at the travel section of our web site, I decided it was looking a little empty with New Mexico being the only travel location showing. So I added some more of my old travel pictures: New York, Nevada, and Texas. Currently there is only one gallery in each of these sections, the pictures are no great works of art (but are fun), and the pictures are still lacking descriptions. But by starting to grow a travel section in on the Initial Photography web site, I figured I would be encourage to start add pictures from trips throughout Europe and Africa too, something I’ve been meaning to do ever since we started this web site. Where's the fun in taking travel photos, if you can't share them with the entire world! -AKG
3:28 PM 7/30/2006 I just got back from the big family summer trip to New Mexico (the plane actually landed a little over 3-1/2 hours ago). I have hundreds of photos to go thorough (over 500), but I created this gallery here as a small sampling of some of the pictures I took. Over the next week (or two) I hope to go through all my pictures, get them labeled, geo-coded, keyword-ed, etc.. and uploaded. I’ll post here as soon as I get the pictures up. -AKG
11:10 AM 7/18/2006 I found my camera! I have a small Canon A510 camera that I got for taking on hiking and skiing trips (basically anywhere where I that I didn’t want to have to haul around my Nikon D70). The camera had been missing for quite a while, and I was at the point of writing it off as lost. Then while looking through some clothes trying to find a jackets to bring with me to New Mexico, I found the the camera in a coat pocket! When I pulled out the memory card I found these pictures that I took when Kathy and I went bowling with my daughter. In hindsight, I think she might still be a bit young for bowling. There are a mix of pictures and movies here. Enjoy!
11:35 AM 7/17/2006 We have a new category for our photos, Photography Courses. James and I have been taking photography classes from Robert Stahl for about a year, and I decided I should start posting my photos from the field trips for the class. The class we are currently taking is Close Up Photography and we had our first field trip this last Sunday at Bellevue Botanical gardens, you can find my favorites from that trip here. Let me know what you think by signing our Guestbook. -AKG
10:10 AM 7/9/2006 Happy Birthday Paul Beyer! Last night was Paul Beyer’s birthday party, and he decided to have a theme for this party: Butt Rock. I was rather impressed at how far some people went in getting into character for the party. The music was loud, the BBQ was excellent and endless, the beer flowed without end, and Ultimate Fighting was on the TV. As with all of Paul’s parties it was a blast! Thanks for inviting us Paul! -AG
6:58 AM 7/6/2006 Siena got her hair cut from Spin!. Yes, this is the same Spin who is letting me display some of my framed photos on his walls. It wasn’t Siena’s first haircut, but it was her first haircut that I was able to sit in on. She was more than a little apprehensive at first, because I told her that Spin would give her a nice short haircut just like just like daddy’s. It actually took a bribe from mommy to get her to calm down (“you get a lollipop after the haircut if you’re good”). But Siena was very good and let Spin cut her hair. When everything was done she got her lollipop. I should also add, Spin did a great job! -AG
7/5/06 It's the little things that really get you as a parent. Seeing Sydney in the pool having a blast was great, but that's not got me. Tuesday was the first time that I think I actually had a real conversation with my daughter. It wasn't very long. It didn't need to be. Straight and to the point. Having sat baby Sydney on the side of the pool, I asked her if she wanted to jump in. She directly acknowledged "Ya" and nodded her head in affirmation. For more pictures click here. - JG
7/5/06 Sometimes when you don't succeed, try try again. This is a motto I've been forced to adopt with my pictures largely due to my uncanny abillity to not succeed. So Sunday night I dragged my photo partner through the overgrowth, marsh and gnats to take close-up pictures in the arboretum. After a couple of hours, tons of caked on mud, and God knows how many bug bites, Andrew and I finally gave up to no avail. So Monday, I took the day off from work to give it one more try. This time at the Ballard Locks Botanical Garden. Click Here - JG
9:17 AM 7/5/2006 Independence Day means the Sign of the Orz auction! This year I decided to make an attempt at being an event photographer. Unfortunately its difficult to be a good event photographer and an attentive father. However I did get quite a few pictures. I also decided that if I sell any of the pictures I took at the Sign of the Orz auction, I’ll donate Initial Photography’s profits from the sale to Sign of the Orz. Check out the pictures here. The quality of all picture purchases is guaranteed. As a reminder, the Sign of the Orz auction benefits: Hope Heart Fred Hutchinson Virginia Mason Medic One Cystic Fibrosis Multiple Sclerosis -AG
7/2/06
OK, I know that I am biologically dispositioned to think this girl is cute, but I seriously think that even if I were completely unbiased, I would have hard time coming to any other conclusion.
Whenever I look at Sydney's crazy blonde curls or those giant blue eyes, I can't help but wonder how my gene pool contributed to something so amazing.
- JG
6:16 PM 7/2/2006 It was a fun family weekend. Swim lessons on Friday and Siena’s first baseball game on Sunday. Friday’s swim lesson ended the first week of summer swim lessons for Siena. She was the only one in her class who went off the diving board without the swim instructor jumping with her (pretty impressive for a 2 year old). Granted the instructor was there to catch her when she landed in the water. Sunday’s baseball game was the Mariner’s vs. the Colorado Rockies. We had great seats in the Terrace Club (thank you Louie)! And the Goldsmiths joined us. Unfortunately the Mariner’s lost in the 10th inning. My daughter did last 9 innings before we decided it was time to leave. -AG
7/1/06
The trouble with nature pictures, flowers in particular, is a serious lack of vocabulary. While I would like to be able to caption this photo with it's scientific or even common name, I haven't a clue. So alas, I end up with another picture with "Red Flower" as the key descriptor. I think I will call this one, "Red Flower in Neighbor's Backyard."
- James Goldsmith
6/27/06
Here is another photo from my trip east. Like most high profile prescription drugs, sunny weather in Washington also carries a few side effects. Aside from the obvious "may cause a sudden burning sensation" and "avoid if pregnant," sunshine is also known to cause a stale air and a pervasive haze.
Haze aside, I do like the way the light and shadows cover the winding road on the right.
- James Goldsmithcolumbia gorgecolumbia rivergorgerivereastern washingtoncentral washingtonwinding roadvantagewaterwaysummerdesertaridscenicscenic lookoutviewpoint
6/27/06
Last week saw record heat in Seattle. The mercury meter climbed above 92 degrees which is crazy hot for Seattle. This meant it was even hotter on the eastern side of the state, where last Tuesday I had meeting with a client.
That said, I wasn't about to let a little 100 degree heat keep me from snapping a few photo's of one of the state's most scenic territories.
After driving down some gravel road off the highway to find the "perfect" hidden gem of a spot, I ended up taking my favorite pictures from the "tourist" stop next to the photo opportunity sign along I-90.
- James Goldsmithcolumbia gorgecolumbia rivergorgerivereastern washingtoncentral washingtonbridgevantagewaterwaysummerdesertaridscenicscenic lookoutviewpoint
8:43 AM 6/22/2006 This last weekend my wife (who took this picture) and daughter (the one on my shoulders) surprised me with a early father’s day trip to Snoqualmie Falls and breakfast at the Salish Lodge! I have lived all my life in Seattle and never been to the falls, so this was kind of a big deal for me. Of course I had to bring my camera, and tripod, and of course I had to take the trail down to the bottom of the falls. What I wasn’t thinking about, was the fact that my two year old daughter wasn’t going to be able to hike the half mile hike back up from the bottom of the falls, so I got to carry her back up on my shoulders. She may look small, but she is a heavy two year old! By the time we got back to the top of the falls, she was pretty much asleep on my shoulders. Here are a few of my favorite pictures from that day. -AG
12:51 PM 6/8/2006 Okay its been nearly a month, but I've gotten my pictures printed, labeled and put up at Spin's, go check them out if you get a chance (4501 Interlake North, Seattle, WA 98103). As summer is now in full swing, I don't think I will be taking any sunrise photos for a while. I made an attempt to take some sunrise photos a few weeks back and got up at 4:15 AM, but by the time I got to my destination, I realized I should have been out of the house at 3:30 AM. I thin the new rule is, no sunrise pictures unless I can stop beforehand for coffee somewhere better than 7-11. Since most of the coffee shops don't open until 5:30 AM, it could be a couple of months before I have to drag myself out of bed to catch the sunrise from some particular angle. ...but there are always great photographic oportunities at sunset like here or here. -AG
3:15 PM 5/12/2006 5,000+ photos later I have most of the readily available photos I want uploaded, uploaded. Now it’s all about organizing the pictures and continuing to clean up the site. However with the upcoming show at Spin’s (more on that soon) I’ve got to get all of my prints in order that I am going to display, I need to put together a gallery for people to go to if they want to buy individual prints, etc, etc… The real power of having all of your pictures on line is become more and more apparent. You ALWAYS have that picture you want to send to someone readily available. -AG
