To be a kid again!

Recently, my friend Ryan and I decided to go on a little photography excursion. We headed to Carlsbad to see some flower fields but during the drive down we found out the flowers aren't there. It's not their season. Instead we headed down to San Diego's Balboa park as Ryan had never been there before. He's learning photography and it's a great place get lost in with a camera. It was a lot of fun watching Ryan discover the art of capturing candid photos of people just sitting on a bench and seeing him try all types of different angles. While he went off on his own to play with his camera I went to make some pictures of a huge birdcage they have down in the park. The weather on this particular day was gloomy as rain rain clouds were gathering. It reminded me of an episode of the Batman cartoon (uh oh! Nerd alert!) where the Penguin was hiding out in a bird sanctuary. So that's what I was trying to capture.



Another highlite came after photographing the cage. Far away I could see a fountain and some kids playing next to it. Dusk was looming and the sky was turning to a dark blue. The light from the fountain turned the kids into silhouettes. I hurried my way down there and Ryan joined with me. I saw the kids running back and forth between the water and a couple ladies. I assumed the younger lady was their mother and asked if it was ok take pictures of the kids. She then told the kids to let me take their picture. They turned and posed for me but I wanted to take pictures of them running around. They also looked really nervous and I thought I killed my chance at a cool photo opp. I tried telling them to just act natural but they kept looking at back to their mom and the expression on their face said "who is this guy and why do we have to stand like this?" I began to fret but found some quarters in my pocket and then gave them to the kids. They ran back to the water to make their wishes and they began running and playing again. Do you remember when you were happy with just a quarter?