Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground

Mark and I took advantage of the beautiful weather this weekend and went camping! We went to Ohiopyle State Park, home to beautiful Appalachian mountains, picturesque waterfalls, and all sorts of fun outdoor activities, including hiking, biking and kayaking. It's also home to Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater.

A rare photo on the blog: It's Mark!

I went here a lot while I was in AmeriCorps, because there were all sorts of fun projects to do! We built a new bike trail once, and did maintenance on other trails during other visits. It was long overdue for me to go back, and it Mark's first time there as an adult! We mostly stuck to hiking and camping this time around, but I've gone biking and rafting in the past. The best part was seeing the foliage begin to change. There was specks of color here and there, but not full-on fall leaves yet.

Fall is my favorite season, so I'm pretty exciting for the leaves to change, hot drinks, pumpkin carving, and Halloween! I'm lame, I know. :) Temperatures reached the upper 70s during the day, so that's probably the last time the weather will be that warm until next year. I'm glad we were able to take advantage of it.

Do you have any favorite camping spots nearby?

June in Instagram Photos

I've always loved taking photos, ever since I was a kid. I've had disposable cameras, Polaroid instant cameras, and later, digital cameras and my trusty DSLR. So when I got a smartphone for the first time last year, the first app I downloaded was Instagram.

I hope to post more on Instagram, but for now, let's look at the highlights from the last month:

I got my first journalism award! It's from a paper where I no longer work, but they were nice enough to frame it and send it in the mail to me. :)

I finally got to try out a new brunch place with a friend. She was actually in town that weekend from Portland, Oregon for a job interview, and turns out, she got the job! So she's moving back to Pittsburgh later this month.

Who can resist a good cow butt? I passed this scene on the road while I was driving back from an assignment. I turned around and pulled over to get the shot. Maybe a little pathetic, but I was safe about it, right?

While Mark and I go to Pirates games a lot, this will probably be the only games I went to with my mom, dad and sister. Couldn't resist the inevitable mom selfie.

Besides the photos themselves, I'm kind of obsessed with creating new hashtags. Lame, right? But it does help organize the Instagram photos a bit. For instance, as often as we can, Mark and I post a Pirates game selfie. I tagged it under #obligatorypiratephoto and now I have a slowly growing collection. Also, earlier this year, I documented every Lenten fish fry meal we ate with #pghfishfrytour2014. I love exploring different fish fries in the area. It's such a big deal in Pittsburgh that there's a Google map listing them all.

If you use the app, what kinds of photos do you tend to post onto Instagram?