I learned a little trick tonight on the photography board of the baby forums I post on and thought I'd share for those of you who don't have an external flash and haven't heard of this yet.
See the difference between these three photos?
top: without any flash on "P" setting
middle: with flash on auto
bottom: with flash on auto, using the foil card trick
what is the foil card trick you ask?
I took a plastic lid from one of Harper's baby food containers and covered it in foil, you can also use an index card
While using your built in flash, hold your foil card up to it at a slight angle. For example, the flash is up like | and your card should be like /. If you have it too close it'll make the picture really dark and if it is at too far of an angle the top part of your photo will be washed out.
It isn't the most glamorous solution to not having an external flash, but it's free! There are products on the market that attach to your camera (i.e. the lightscoop) to do this as well.
This will be especially helpful since we live in a condo that gets horrible natural light, I'm excited to use it more often now!
Here are a couple more pictures I took using the foil card trick:
