The next two weeks in Texas are going to be a bit of a whirlwind of trying to see everyone, but the trip had a very intentional slow start - a girl's weekend in Fredericksburg with Theresa! We have been planning it for months and I was so excited to see her and get some girl time away from the kids. (Nonni and Grandpa were more than happy to watch the boys for me!)
We booked a winery tour for Sunday and the best part was we didn't have to do anything but walk downstairs at our hotel, the limo picked us up right at the front door. The driver, Paul, was a retired cop from Portland and we all left it up to him as to which places we visited.
There was only two other people on the tour with us - a couple named Aaron and Laura who were super friendly. I warned them that part of the girl's weekend was to play with our cameras and we had even rented a Nikon D750 to play with. It's the step up from our camera, a full frame that has great reviews. We figured we should try it out before we add it to our wish list!
Aaron and Laura were totally cool with the camera time. I even thought to ask them before using my flash to take photos indoors. I had no intentions of pointing it at anyone, but it always startles the kids, so I thought it would be nice to warn them. I flipped it up and backwards like I always do, then titled the camera up to take a photo of these wine bottles.
Which is you are paying attention, would put the flash right in their eyes. Whoops! I pretty much blinded all of them. I felt so bad, but they just laughed it off and said maybe I should point it up instead. I decided I could just make it work without using the flash for the rest of the day...
We went to four different wineries throughout the day. Grape Creek was the one everyone who had been to Fredericksburg recommended. I can see why - the wines were good and the whole winery was so pretty. There was even a nicely shaded patio that our new friends hung out on while we wandered over to the vineyard to take photos. Win-win!
The second winery, Santamaria Cellars, was literally in a garage. But it was awesome and by far our favorite! The guy was from Argentina and he knew how to make great wine! But if you are 6' or taller, you are going to have to stoop to do your wine tasting...
The third winery, Becker Vineyards, was not so hot. Which is why there is a photo of bath salts. Their aromatherapy selections off to the side were better than their wine. Though they won for the most scenic, so we still got a lot of photos from there.
Last but not least, Paul took us to Kuhlman Cellars which had a food pairing with their tasting. I may have fallen in love with their seasoned almonds... Which, of course, were also available for purchase! Plus they had a wine named after alluvium, that speaks to my heart as a geologist! :)
But enough about the wine, how about the camera play time? It was a totally sunny day, which isn't always the best for picture taking, but we had fun with it anyway. Plus I got some awesome sun flare with this windmill!
I may have left Texas, but I still love a good Texas flag shot. I can neither confirm nor deny I started humming "the stars at night are big and bright.." while I was framing out this shot. ;)
The flowers from Becker - I told you they had nice scenery! These fields of zinnias went on forever! We've already lost of all of our flowers in Alaska, so it was so nice to see such a colorful display. :)
This sign was especially funny because we were on a selfie mission! I was packing up all of my bags and gear for the trip and Matt noticed that I hadn't set the tripod out. He started giving me a hard time about how he spent all this effort picking out this super nice tripod and how I didn't seem to be using it much. When I relayed this to Theresa, she responded with "Well lets take a ton of selfies then!!!"
As a side note, I do love my tripod! I just don't need it all that often. And of course there was the whole incident when I drug it along to Hawaii and forgot to pack the piece it needed to connect to the camera. Matt made sure I had that piece this time! :)
Unfortunately, the fancy schmancy rental camera was so not cooperating! On the D7000, you just swivel a ring at the base of the shooting dial to put it in remote mode and you click away. It's a little more difficult on the D750 and we couldn't figure it out. It's probably a little obvious I was getting irritated with the fact it was only partially listening to the remote.
I thought maybe it was me, so Theresa gave it a shot. I know it looks like the remote is working here, but it was listening to about one out of every ten "clicks".
The last shot I got before we ended up giving up on the rental camera and putting Theresa' camera on the tripod. At least we knew that one would work! And this is quite possibly my favorite photo out of the 200 or so "selfies" we took. :)
Success! And although we are obviously posing, we are genuinely this happy to be hanging out together. We had a few photos standing side by side, but the one where she hug attacked me was by far my favorite. Miss this girl so much!
Scenic Becker again! Why was it so pretty when their wine was so "meh"? And Theresa guilted me into taking my sunglasses off for the rest of the "selfies". I never take my sunglasses off, but I figured I could make it since she had hers off. Shockingly, I did not go blind! ;)
Every time we switched locations, I had to redo the camera settings before we could use the remote. This meant I was taking a bunch of test photos while Theresa patiently waited for me to get it right. This time we were joking around with each other and I caught her mid-laugh on a test shot. I think she looks way better than the selfies we took at this particular spot, so that's what I'm sharing.
Plus I apparently gave up and put my sunglasses back on... In my defense it is sooo bright outside!!
Last stop for the day! The lighting was starting to work against us on our selfie quest, but I think we managed to pull out one final cute one. I'm sure we looked silly to all the cows and goats that were hanging out nearby, but I'm actually glad we took so many photos of the two of us. Given that we are usually the ones holding the cameras, we rarely make it into the photos. So many photos with each other in one day? Awesome!
Thanks for the motivation, Matt! And thanks to everyone who helped watch our kiddos so we could get away for a weekend. :)