Category Archives: Mom

Animals, Becky, Blogging, Commercial, Contests, Derrick, Event, Jaycees, Mom, Music, Shannon, Shorty, Vest

06-14-08

August 4, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett

REMINDER

It is once again time for me (and by me, I mean you guys) to pick out my photos to enter in the Pufferbilly Days Photo Contest. Once again, I am going to leave it up to a popular vote.

The Pufferbilly Days Photo Contest allows you to enter up to 6 photos.

There are 4 Categories:

1. Nature
2. Photojournalism
3. Photoshop Enhanced
4. Hidden Treasures of Boone County.

I have selected 60 images for you to consider. To simplify things, I have split the 60 photos into 6 sets of 10. If you wish to exercise your enfranchisement, clicking on the link below will take you to Poll #1. Vote for one of those pictures and then move onto the next poll, until you have voted in all six polls.

The winner of EACH poll will be entered into the Pufferbilly Days Photo Contest.

Click on the link below to start voting:

Pufferbilly Days Photo Contest Nominees

Voting will end at midnight, August 8.

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TRIGGER WARNING!!! TRIGGER WARNING!!! TRIGGER WARNING!!!

If your name is Micky and you are a purpose of a cowardly disposition, be warned, snakes lie ahead!

Normally I don’t like to warn people that there might be something they find scary or offensive ahead. However, I know Micky is particularly scared of snakes. So much so, that he brokered a deal with his wife that she handles any snakes that they come across along the path of their wedded bliss.

The hype about him being a great outdoorsman might be a little overhyped.

Now that little bit of unpleasantness is out of the way, the images that come from the folder 06-14-08 are mostly from Ames on the Half Shell. However, some involve a snake. Some involve the Ames Party Bus.

Here are the pictures:

The snake was in Shorty and Doris’ flowerbed. The band that was playing Ames on the Half Shell was Burnin’ Sensations. They are still together and still playing. I haven’t seen them in several years, but back in the day, they used to be a real fun band to watch play.

By adding these pictures to the Photography Gallery, I was able to restore the following historic “An Artist’s Notebook” entries to their original glory:

Flowerbed Buddy

Burnin’ Sensations

There are more pictures from the Burnin’ Sensations that I didn’t include in this blog, but you can peruse them by clicking on the link below:

AMES THE HALF SHELL – 2008

Next week’s walk down memory lane will involve more Ames on the Half Shell, some Little League, and maybe, just maybe some tenderloining.

Andy, Animals, Baby Got Rack, Black & White, Boone County Fair, Candid Portrait, Contests, Derrick, Macro, Mom, Nature, Scottie D., Shorty, Travel

Boone County Fair 2018 Results

July 25, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett 5 Comments

I was involved in 2 contests at the Boone County Fair this year. Now that the fair is in the past and I’ve had adequate time for reflection, I think it is a good time to share the results from the contests I entered.

First, the Open Class Photography Contest. You may recall that I had people vote to decide what pictures I entered. These are the five that were voted in and what they received:

Blue Ribbon

Purple Ribbon

Red Ribbon

Purple is the best. Red is the second worst, I guess. You can also get a white ribbon. I figured the reflection picture would resonate well with the Boone County Fair “judges”, because there is no obvious photographic technique. The subject is debatable. It doesn’t follow any rules for composition. To some degree, it is hard to tell what is in focus. It is a terrible photo contest photo. But it is a cool looking photo. You could print that up (perhaps on metal) and put that on your wall.

I reiterate, that I don’t enter photo contest to win ribbons. I just like to have pictures be seen. Whatever prize comes or doesn’t come, so be it.

I will run a similar program to pick out the pictures to be entered in the Pufferbilly Days Photo Contest. It will be slightly different because people struggled to figure out how to use the website, so I will try to make it as not tech savvy as I can. None of these pictures, nor the pictures from the Iowa State Fair Photography Salon will be eligible to be in the Pufferbilly Days Photo Contest.

That is my rule, not theirs. I never enter a photo in more than one photo contest. I will be bagging these photos up and be putting them in the Photo Contest trunk in the next couple of days. The trunk is running low on space, so I will be needing to upgrade or get another trunk in the near future.

Look for your chance to vote at the beginning of August.

The other contest I entered during the Boone County Fair was the Farm Bureau Cookoff. Technically Scottie D.’s name is the name on the entry, but this was a Baby Got Rack entry. Although, let us face it. Scott is the talent of Baby Got Rack.

There was a bit of confusion with the contest as the rules had changed quite a bit from previous years and also, were not well written. At our team meeting on the Thursday before the competition, there was much discussion about not even entering the contest.

According to the new rules, set up was at 1 PM and judging was at 4 PM. That is not enough time to smoke a piece of meat. It takes a minimum of 1 hour to get the fire going and the air circulation to where you want it. Then the quickest meat to smoke is pork loin. It needs to smoke for 2 hours. 1 hour 45 minutes at the least. Then it needs to rest for at least half an hour, otherwise all the juices will be lost when you cut into it.

There just isn’t time!

We thought about just showing up and winging it. We had once made a Chili Cheese Dog Pizza on a whim. It was delectable. It was delicious. We have never made it since.

On Friday, Scott talked to the people running the contest and they told him that we were allowed to show up and set up at 8 AM. That is enough time to do a rack of ribs right.

The other major change was the limitation of only being able to enter 2 categories.

At the Thursday meeting we must have went around in circles for hours about what 2 categories to enter. When the 1 PM rule disappeared, the answer became clear:

+Combination
+Pork

Here are a few pictures from Baby Got Rack’s day at the Boone County Fair:

Photo Cred: Dawn Krause

We took 1st Place in Combination.
We took 2nd Place in Pork.

That means that we will be going to the Iowa State Fair to compete on Tuesday, August 14th. If you are at the Fair that day, I would encourage you to come by and root us on. Judging will be at 10 AM.

After that, your next chance to try Baby Got Rack Barbecue will be at Pufferbilly Days. After that, you will have to wait until my birthday. Incidentally, the theme of my 2019 birthday party is going to be cargo shorts. It was going to be cargo shorts and jorts, but I have been told that jorts are considered stylish now. I don’t believe it, but I can’t take the risk!

Andy, Animals, Birthdays, Boone FUMC, Macro, Mom, Naima, Willy, Youth Group

Happy Birthday Naima!!

July 9, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

Naima turned 7 today!

Here are some of my favorite pictures of her over the years:

I hope Naima had a happy birthday! We will do some of her favorite things any way. Sleeping. Going to the park. Eating.

Animals, Black & White, Mom, WPC - Alternate, WPC - Reminder

In 10 Minutes, I Still Couldn’t Explain What’s Inside my Brain, Don’t Mess with It!

July 6, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

A reminder that this week’s theme for THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE is HANDS.

HANDS!

A HANDS photo is any photo that involves HANDS. I would say that everybody has HANDS, but everybody doesn’t. However, I can bet that everybody knows somebody that has HANDS. This project is easy peasy.

Happy photo harvesting!

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The world wasn’t ready for these photos on Monday. I’m not sure the world is ready for them now, but I can’t hold them any longer:

Not many, but I’m trying to step back from taking so many WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE photos.

It should be pointed out that there is about 2 months left is this 52 week run of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE. As of right now, there seems to be enough enthusiasm and participation to continue for another 52 week run. If you have any suggestions for the next 52 themes, make them in the Comments section of this here blog.

You’re welcome world!

Andy, Animals, Baby Got Rack, Contests, Flowers, Football, Holidays, Iowa State, Kio, Linda, Macro, Michelle, Micky, Mom, Nature, Pastor Sarah, Photoshop, Shannon, Teresa, Travel, Vest

Freedom and Flowers

July 4, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett 2 Comments

With freedom, books, flowers, and the moon, who could not be happy?
-Oscar Wilde

Before we get into the meat of today’s blog, we need to start with…

Happy 4th of July!

I hope you had an continue to have an enjoyable 4th of July!

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Time to hit up the back log and publish more pictures from Donna Jones’s flower bed!

There are more of Donna Jones’ flowers in the hopper. For those of you that are fans of “flower porn” as Micky likes to call it.

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The votes have been tabulated and these are the photos that I will be entering in the Boone County Fair:

Technically there was a frog picture that got more votes than the picture of Shorty, but I’m not going a photo contest without entering a black & white image.

Thanks to the people that voted: Sarah Karber, Michelle, Micky, Vest, Mom, Teresa, Shannon, Kio, Aunt Linda, Jordan, Andy, and all of the fellow SmugMuggers that voted.

If you want to see the photos in the flesh (so to speak) they will be on display at the Community Building at the Boone County Fairgrounds. on July 21 and 22.

Baby Got Rack will also probably be competing on July 21. So mark your calendar!

We will do something similar when it comes to the Pufferbilly Days Photo Contest.

Animals, Art, Black & White, Flowers, Iowa State, Macro, Mom, Naima, Nature, Railroad, Road Trip, Ruins, Shorty, Travel, Willy

Boone County Fair Photo Contest Entry Selection Process

June 26, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett

It is time to select my photos for the Boone County Fair Photo Contest and you get to help select the pictures that go.

I have placed 50 images in a SmugMug Photo Gallery. I would like you to go to that Photo Gallery and vote for up to 5 images in the gallery. You can also rate the images on a 5 star scale.

I will enter the 5 pictures with the most votes. The tie-breaker will be image with the highest star rating.

You will vote for an image by leaving a comment on the image you want to vote for.

Once you are at the gallery, look for something that looks like this:

The one caveat is that you need to have either a Facebook or a Google+ account to leave a comment.

Click on the link below to go to the gallery to vote:

BOONE COUNTY FAIR PHOTO CONTEST ENTRY SELECTION

The deadline to vote is next Tuesday at midnight.

Here are the nominees:

Thanks for helping pick the Boone County Fair Photo Contest Entries!

Art, Black & White, History, Mom, Photoshop, Travel, Vacation

The Mount Rushmore of Presidents Vol. 3

June 20, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett

This is the final collection of photos from my trip to Mount Rushmore with my Mom.

Here are a few final facts about Mount Rushmore from the Wikipedia:

The Sculptor’s Studio – a display of unique plaster models and tools related to the sculpting – was built in 1939 under the direction of Borglum. Borglum had planned to make a secret room behind the hairline of Abraham Lincoln which was supposed to be a doorway to a chamber originally intended to hold some of America’s most treasured documents but was left unfinished due to his death. Borglum died from an embolism in March 1941. His son, Lincoln Borglum, continued the project. Originally, it was planned that the figures would be carved from head to waist, but insufficient funding forced the carving to end. Borglum had also planned a massive panel in the shape of the Louisiana Purchase commemorating in eight-foot-tall gilded letters the Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution, Louisiana Purchase, and seven other territorial acquisitions from Alaska to Texas to the Panama Canal Zone. In total, the entire project cost US$989,992.32. Unusual for a project of such size, no workers died during the carving.

In a canyon behind the carved faces is a chamber, cut only 70 feet (21 m) into the rock, containing a vault with sixteen porcelain enamel panels. The panels include the text of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, biographies of the four presidents and Borglum, and the history of the U.S. The chamber was created as the entrance-way to a planned “Hall of Records”; the vault was installed in 1998.

Here are the balance of pictures:

Now that the South Dakota trip is all published, might be time to get into the Independence Bowl Road Trip or finish up with the Caves Road Trip.

Art, Black & White, History, Mom, Nature, Photoshop, Travel, Vacation

The Mount Rushmore of Presidents Vol. 2

June 13, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett 1 Comment

Time to check in on more pictures from my trip to Mount Rushmore with my Mom.

One of the debate topics that occasionally rises is who is the next President to go on Mount Rushmore. Say that Washington, Teddy Roosevelt, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln were the 4 greatest Presidents of the United States before construction was started on Mount Rushmore in 1927, won’t there some day be a President as great as them, that should also be placed alongside them.

To be honest, I don’t think that they will ever add another President to Mount Rushmore. Our country doesn’t spend money on projects like this any longer.

But say that they would, the choice for the 5th President according to the Presidents & Executive Politics Presidential Greatness Survey is pretty obvious. Next to nobody else even got any votes:

1. Franklin Roosevelt – 108 votes
2. Barack Obama – 12 votes
3. Ronald Reagan – 8 votes
4. Dwight Eisenhower – 6 votes
4. James Madison – 6 votes

It would be hard to argue that FDR wouldn’t be the next President to go up. He steered the country through its greatest economic collapse and then most of the way through WWII.

Let us say that some day another face was added to Mount Rushmore, the truth is that it might not even be a President. In 1937, a bill was proposed to Congress to add Susan B. Anthony to the mountain. I’d imagine there would be a pretty strong movement to add Martin Luther King Jr. to the mountain today.

Although it would be hard to imagine putting a Civil Rights Leader on the mountain after the mountain was stolen from the Lakota in 1876 in violation of the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie.

But I digress…

There are still more Mount Rushmore pictures coming!

Alexis, Animals, Becky, Blogging, Brandon, Carla, Commercial, Elainie, Flowers, Holidays, Jason, Johnathan, Logan, Mom, Russ, Shannon, Teresa

05-12-08

June 9, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett

There are 3 sets of images to be found in the collection of pictures in the folder 05-12-08.

The first set are pictures from a Mother’s Day celebration at my Mom’s house.

The second set are a collection of pictures of flowers at my Mom’s house. A Mother’s Day Peony and a tulip.

The final set of pictures is from the first part of making a batch of Little White Lye Soap.

By adding these pictures to the Photography 139 Photography Gallery I was able to restore the following historic “An Artist’s Notebook” entries to their original glory:

The Most Fun You Can Have with Caustics

Mother’s Day Barcecue

Mother’s Day

On our next walk down the lane of memories, we will look at the first Jaycees activity I participated in. All the signs were there, I wasn’t paying attention.

Art, Black & White, History, Iowa State, Mom, Politics, Travel, Vacation

The Mount Rushmore of Presidents Vol. 1

June 6, 2018 Christopher D. Bennett

It is time to crack into the final spot I hit in South Dakota with my Mom last year. Mount Rushmore.

People (particularly bored sports talk show hosts) are always trying to make comparisons in the sports world to Mount Rushmore. Who would be on the Mount Rushmore of Iowa State athletics? (Dan Gable, Fred Hoiberg, Troy Davis, Jack Trice) Who would be on the NBA’s Mount Rushmore? (Lebron, Magic, Jordan, Wilt) Who would be on Cyclone basketball’s Mount Rushmore? (Hoiberg, Niang, Tinsley, Grayer) Who would be on Cyclone football’s Mount Rushmore? (Troy Davis, Jack Trice, Seneca, Matt Blair)

That type of thing?

But does the Mount Rushmore of Presidents have the 4 best Presidents on it?

According to the official results of the 2018 Presidents & Executive Politics Presidential Greatness Survey, they did a pretty good job.

A little about the survey:

The 2018 Presidents & Executive Politics Presidential Greatness Survey was conducted online via Qualtrics from December 22, 2017 to January 16, 2018. Respondents were current and recent members of the Presidents & Executive Politics Section of the American Political Science Association, which is the foremost organization of social science experts in presidential politics.

Here is their Top 10 Greatest Presidents

1. Abraham Lincoln
2. George Washington
3. Franklin Roosevelt
4. Teddy Roosevelt
5. Thomas Jefferson
6. Harry Truman
7. Dwight D. Eisenhower
8. Barack Obama
9. Ronald Reagan
10. Lyndon Johnson

Therefore, the creators of Mount Rushmore did manage to pick the 4 top Presidents that were available to them. FDR hadn’t been President when Mount Rushmore began. He was President when it was abandoned however. During WWII, the United States couldn’t afford to spend any more on the project. At this point, it is safe to assume it will never be finished.

Here some pictures from the trip to Mount Rushmore:

A few more pictures of Mount Rushmore are still stretching their legs, waiting for the call to get into the game.