I know what you’re thinking.  Where the heck have you been Cindy?  And that’s not a picture of food either! Okay, I guess you’re wondering why I haven’t posted many recipes lately.  Well pull up a chair at My Country Table while I tell ya a story.

You see, it goes like this.  It’s been approximately 1 1/2 years since I launched My Country Table and it hasn’t exactly been an easy adventure if ya know what I mean.  I’ve certainly had my ups and downs.  You see I knew absolutely nothing about creating a website or taking food pictures when I decided I wanted to blog about food and share my recipes.  I had purchased a really nice Canon Rebel 5 camera a few months before launching my website and was totally clueless as to how to use it.  Learning my new camera was a big undertaking in itself.  I’ve never been good at technical things and just the thought of learning my new camera was overwhelming to me.  All this stuff about aperture, ISO, exposure compensation, shutter speed, manual or auto….oh my gosh.  I need to de-stress just thinking about it.  I even went to a couple of photography classes at my local library, but they mainly talked about outdoor pictures and family portraits…nothing about food.

I also knew absolutely nothing about navigating around my new website.  Once I got the hang of navigating and posting recipes to my website, I realized that I still didn’t know how to use my new camera.  I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before, but I also work a full-time job during the week, so all of my recipe developing is done on the weekends and I usually have time to post up to two recipes a week at most, between baking, cooking, editing pictures and working.  So anyhow, I know you won’t be shocked when I tell you that I still haven’t learned how to use my new camera, and yes…that’s right…I’ve been taking all of my food pictures with my I-phone since day one.

A few weeks ago I ran into a new problem.  Each time I posted a recipe to Facebook, Facebook was cropping down my pictures and showing the center only of my picture.  One morning I decided to post this wonderful creamy New York Cheesecake with a strawberry glaze topping.  After I posted and viewed it on Facebook, I was totally frustrated and upset, to say the least.  You see, the only part of my slice of cheesecake that was showing on Facebook was the strawberry topping.  Boy have I realized that food blogging is SO much more than just about baking a recipe!

I hope you’ll be patient with me over the next few weeks while I learn more about my camera.  I promise to make it up to you before the summer is over.  Fall, my favorite season, will be here before we know it and I want to be ready and prepared for it with new and improved food photography for you to see…oh yes, and new recipes.

Meantime, below are a few pictures this amateur photographer took while taking a break outside the other day. By the way, it was my first attempt at taking pictures outside and I was totally amazed at how they turned out.  I didn’t even bother to edit them.  I love outdoor lighting.

For your amusement…

My favorite summer flowers…orange Tiger Lillies.  I have these planted around the entire edge of my property.  Love them!

Lavender…

Purple Bee Baum…

Forgot the name of this plant, but it smells great…

Daylily…

One of my windmills.  I love windmills…

Home of my spoiled girls, Mabel, Henrietta and Wanda and Henry the rooster.  They live pampered lives.  A heater in the winter and a fan in the summer…

This is Wanda who wouldn’t come out in the sunlight for a picture.  She thinks she’s going to hatch an egg or something…

And here’s Henry my giant rooster and Mabel and Henrietta.  I think the two girls need to go on a diet…

Birdhouse…

Birdhouse…

Birdhouse…Okay I’ll stop with the birdhouses.  Don loves birdhouses.  I’ve lost count on how many he’s made…

The woods behind us.  I love being surrounded with woods and we have a great far off view behind our property. I really love it in the Fall…

Daylily…

Our tiny windmill out front…

Our blackberries…

Our latest windmill.  It goes in two different directions…Love it

Yes one more windmill…

That was the end of my amateur photo shoot.  Now I need to get baking in the kitchen and practice using my camera.  I will be posting a recipe this weekend, I promise