Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival at Saint Paul

St. Paul Festival & Heritage Foundation is conducting an annual winter carnival at Saint Paul, Minnesota, USA. They are conducting this carnival around January of every year. This is a spectacular festival featuring ice carvings and snow sculpture. I've visited the 2011 carnival. The carvings and sculptures were amazing. Below are few of them.

Responsible Sister

One day my 5 yr old daughter was saying to my 6 week old son "Thambi, nee big boy aana udane naan leapfrog cd pottu unakku phonics cholli tharuven. Ippo unnakku 'A' ku mattum than phonics theriyuthu. Eppovum ah..ah..ah... nu sollite iruka"

Translation - My brother, after you grow up i'll put leapfrog cd and teach you phonics. Now you just know the phonics for 'A'. You always keep saying ah..ah..ah...

Photographic Experiments with Canon PowerShot SX40 HS

With our new camera (Canon PowerShot SX40 HS) I and my wife took lot of experimental photos. I was amazed by the quality of the photos and the camera's features. below are few of the sample photos. All the photos were taken with manual settings.This is the first time we are using manual settings and got unbelievable results.

My little boy's tiny feet:

 Apple with Macro  (ISO-100, f/2.7, Exposure-1/4):

Below two photos are the same building taken few seconds apart in the night. The first one with  ISO-100, f/3.5, Exposure-2". The second one with  Exposure-15":

Our building parking lot at night:

A plant in our balcony with Macro  (ISO-400, f/2.7, Exposure-1/40):

Flower with Macro (ISO-400, f/2.7, Exposure-1/30):

Evening near medicine lake:

Minnehaha falls (ISO-100, f/8, Exposure-1/4):

Minnehaha falls , Night view (ISO-200, f/4, Exposure-1/4):

Few more macro shots.

Moon from our balcony (ISO-100, f/5.8, Exposure-1/60):

with ISO-100, f/5.8, Exposure-1/250: