I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes. Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. ~ Neil Gaiman

Tonight is Camera-Learning Night here.  Mike bought me a (pink!) digital camera for Christmas, and I haven't had enough free time before today to sit down with it and figure it out.  I've taken almost every picture since 2007 with the camera on either his phone or mine and decided last fall that it was time to learn to use a real camera.  Mike's phone takes great pictures, but unless he's home with me at the time I want to photograph something, pictures don't happen.  And my own phone is an old flip-phone from 2007, so every now and then, I get lucky with it and get a picture I'm happy with, but only if I'm a few inches away from my subject, and even then, only sometimes.  Taking outdoor pictures or any kind of landscape or larger-view pictures has never really been possible for me, which has been an everyday disappointment.  To own a camera now that I can take along on my walks--it is only 3.5 inches x 2 inches, perfect to keep in my pocket while I'm out--delights me.  This one doesn't look exceptionally complicated, but there is still everything to learn with it, and that makes me quite happy as I think about the year ahead.