A large number of bees at Shelley's parents' garden afforded me some nice models to experiment with to learn more about macro photography.

These photos are all shot hand-held using the 180mm macro lens and flash (with +2 compensation in most cases) and manual camera settings to ensure a fast shutter speed and increase the depth of field. The setup is capturing pretty good detail.

If you look closely you can see the individual pollen grains clinging to the bees. I did not realize bees have 5 eyes.

Click here for the rest of the bee macro shots.

Installed WordPress for cholul. WordPress is blogging software. It works something like a diary and makes it quite easy to add entries.

It complements the Gallery2 software (for managing our photos) really well. Both of these are now available from the Fedora repositories, making it very easy to install and keep things up-to-date. Fedora 7 has been working very well and is highly recommended.

The image on the right is a screenshot of the custom theme I created
for WordPress that matches the theme I created for Gallery2.

Will got to visit Regina for the first time. He stayed at the Radisson Hotel and got to see most of the downtown (Regina is not very big!). Regina even has a few skyscrapers. To view more shots, click here.

Well almost all the tulips were gone at this time of year. Some of the rhodos were out. Still beautiful to see but not as spectacular when the tulips are in full bloom. With the cooler temperatures, most of the flowers are still only starting out.

To see more flowers click here.

We drove over to visit one of Boston's oldest estates established in 1793. The Lyman family used this location as a summer retreat. Now you can go for a tour in the mansion or have a private party/wedding there.

The grapes and camellia trees found in the greenhouses are over 100 years old. See the plants inside the greenhouse.