What Have I Got Myself Into?

Well, I just got back home from the Albany Herald, meeting my new boss and learning the ropes of my new "job". For anyone out there who doesn't know, I was offered a job doing free lance photography for the Albany Herald - shooting football games. I haven't done a whole lot of sports photography (ok, pretty much have NEVER done any real sports photography) but I'm thinking..Hey, I'm a photographer, how hard can it be?

Well, I think it's hard.

My new boss was telling me this morning, in a very nonchalant manner, "if you can shoot football, you can shoot anything. Football is the hardest sport to shoot." Oh, great.
Then he asks me at what speed my flash syncs to. I reply, "don't really know - I never use it. I don't use flash" (the idea of a natural light photographer is strange to most others in the profession who are all about flashes, strobes, and studio lights). He says to me, "oh...well, you're gonna need it for nighttime football games."
So...my new big fat lens should be here tomorrow and then I'm going with him to a Friday night football game in town to shoot pictures.

With a lens I've never used. (And cost about as much as a down payment on a car).
With a lens that I will have only had in my possession for about 24 hours.
And a flash that I hate. And don't really know how to use.
At a sporting event. Which I've never officially photographed.

And thinking that I'm in WAY over my head and feeling very nervous and unsure of myself. :( sigh.

And here's a random picture that I just thought I'd share. Really, I have no idea what the heck it's supposed to mean.

Maybe this monkey is presenting me with a book: A User's Guide: How To Use New & Unfamiliar Equipment in a Pinch or How To Spontaneously Combust from Nervous Anxiety: Whichever Comes First.

Things aren't looking so good.

A Handy TidBit for My Readers to Know

A toothbrush makes an excellent (yet, gentle!) facial exfoliator.

Last week I got a tiny sunburn and today my face was exhibiting some peeli-ness. Not full, all-out peeling, but a bit of flakiness. It looked less than stellar, and as I blew dry my hair I wondered what could possibly remove this skin. And then....my eye fell upon it - a lovely blue toothbrush sitting on the counter. So I gently tested it's soft bristles on the skin around my eyes and the bridge of my nose, and wah-lah! Instant exfoliation! And so much cheaper than a chemical peel.
(*whisper* Just don't tell that guy that I live with...I think it was his)

--->*insert evil laugh here* mwwuuahhhh haaahaahaahaa!<-----

Adventures on the Laundry mountain

Well, this morning after I woke up, made the kid's lunches and got them dressed for school, I went in search of some clothes for me to wear. Namely, 1 pair of clean underwear and a shirt and some shorts that did not smell like feet.

After much digging, I finally found some shorts and a shirt (albeit it 2 sizes too large) that would suffice and I thus began the dig in the "unmentionables" drawer for some clean drawers. After rifiling through there I DID find:2 sports bras (that post-breastfeeding are undoubtably way too small), a small dinosaur toy, 3 quarters, a paperclip, and (drumroll please) 2 pairs of distinctly different underwear: Choice #1: a lovely pair of granny panties that I wore when pregnant with each of my children, thoroughly stretched out and large enough to effectively serve as a baby sling in a pinch or Choice #2: a slinky, stringly thong that Steve got me for Christmas last year (note the irony when I say he got it for *me*...come on girls, we all know who THAT gift was for). I think I could dig out some scraps from the sewing basket that would have more coverage than that overly priced piece of pink floss that some psycho male exec at Victoria's Secret deemed "women's underwear". Considering my attire and the fact that I have yet to have showered, I went with Choice #1. It fits my mood better today anyway.
Dropped the boys at preschool and hustled home to load up the laundry. Turns out there were 7 (SEVEN) baskets to be done. And that's not even counting sheets and other bedding.
Now...to my defense, here's how this got so out of hand: When we moved to this house in early March we discovered that our dryer was gas and of course, this house is electric. Trying to save us some money (single income+family of four+teacher's salary=you do the math), I ingenously put up a clothes line in the back yard. It was spring time, there was a pleasant breeze, the laundry smelled glorius, and I was pretty dang proud of my carpentry skills. So...6 months later, we still have no dryer. Steve thinks we have better things to spend $400 on right now..namely, food for our children, so we're trying to hold off on buying one until it gets too cold for line drying. Now...with an average load of clothes taking several hours to dry on the line, and currently 7 HEAPING baskets of laundry needing to be done, it would take me approximately...oh....4 DAYS to do all the laundry. The whole clothesline thing has lost much of it's novelty by this point in time (hanging clothes in a pleasant spring-time breeze is quite different from doing the same in the blistering 90 degree sun) and I'm ready to just join a nudist colony so I don't have to worry about this whole "clothing" thing anymore. All morning I've been thinking of Shari's friend Vanessa (who's blog I eagerly anticipate every day) and thought that if she ever read my blog that maybe she would be encouraged this week - hey, at least they have a DRYER. :) lol
ANYWAY....so I load up all seven baskets and make my way to the laundromat to get it all done before I pick up the boys at 1:00. I've got 2.5 hours to wash, dry, fold and get to the school in time so I hit the laundromat floor running. I have 3 jumbo washers going, and 2 small ones, plus one load in the dryer already that I had washed at home. If you've ever frequented a laundromat, you're aware of the massive amount of laundry I'm dealing with. And if you're from the south, you're aware of how much perspiration I had acquired at this point from carrying in 7 laundry baskets into the laundromat when it's already 93 degrees outside. >


I'm making change, washing, drying, and folding like a madwoman (I've got a deadline, remember) when a handsome man with a cocky demeaner plops himself down in the chair next to my folding table and asks me if it was ok if he sat next to me. I look around at the 26 other open chairs around the room and wonder why he chose the one right NEXT to me, but shrug and say it's fine (as I nudge the basket with all my clean underwear out of his sight with my foot--you never know what kind of weirdos are out there). Anyway...to make a long story short, nothing makes a girl in granny panties, sweating it out in the laundromat feel special like being hit on by a trucker. Nice as he was, I grew a little weary hearing of how on his days off from trucking he spent his time "work'n out....work'n out all day long, that's all I do" and telling me how he's dropped 30 pounds in the last few months and actually rolling up his sleeve to show me his muscles. I wasn't sure if I would gag first from the lack of oxygen in the room (his head had swollen so big it was sucking it all out) or from his nauseating pride. He asked for my number. I told him I didn't think my husband was really into three-somes. He left to go check on his laundry and never came back. heehee.

Loaded the clean laundry back into the van, and picked up Josh Groban, who crooned sweet operatic love ballads (in Italian) to me all the way back home. I have no idea what he was saying, but it was relaxing and energized me for the rest of the morning. Oh...did I say I picked up Josh Groban? I meant I picked his cd from the cd holder in the visor.

Dropped the laundry at home with a note on it for Steve for later that read: "Clean clothes - Put away or Face My Wrath" and ran back out to the car to pick up the kids. Get to school, see pictures and paintings, ooh and ahh over playdoh creations and load 'em up, bring 'em home. Write blog. End blog. Take Shower. :) The End.

Pool Party

As promised...here's pics from the pool party.

And that's all I have to say about that.




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What a Night

So, the last 24 hours have been LONG for me. Started last night with a volleyball pool party, which was fun. I took AJ with me and he had a big time swimming with the girls. I'll download pics of that onto the computer and post them later tonight.
Went home, played with AJ for awhile, had a backache and my ribs were hurting from laying on the floor with AJ. Just thought I was sore from volleyball or something and I went to bed.

2 AM I wake up unable to sleep because of blinding pain in my right side and back. Oh crap. Been there, done that - my gall bladder is acting up again. Woke Steve up, decided to drive myself to the hospital, so the boys could stay home in their own beds.

Upon arrival at the hospital, I notice there's about 12 other people in the waiting room, and I sign myself in - 2:10 a.m. And wait. And wait. And wait. Ok...so it was only about 15 minutes, but 15 minutes is an ETERNITY when you're sitting in a hospital chair writhing in pain. The triage nurse calls me in, takes my vitals, asks what's wrong, etc. etc. What's your pain on a scale of 1 to 10? she asks. "8" I reply, thinking that she would feel compassionate and hussle me along to an actual doctor. No such luck. She tells me to go have a seat again and wait for the administration people to call me up. More waiting....more writhing.....the administration people call me up to get my social security, number, address, and name of my firstborn child so they can seize him if i don't pay my bill. I'm VERY uncomfortable at this point, squirming in my chair with frequent grimacing - admin person says, "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm great - it's 2:47 a.m. and I'm in serious pain as my gall bladder explodes and you people are more concerned with getting my credit card number than getting me some Vicodin."
Okay, I actually just said, "no" but that's what I WANTED to say. We finish up and she tells me to yet...go wait AGAIN and "someone should be with you soon". Another 10 minutes go by...another female about my age stumbles in the door clutching her left side (apendix - I diagnose in my head). I give her a sympathetic look as I realize that she has no idea she's in for the long haul. At this point I'm wondering if there's a black market doctor somewhere in the downtown vicinity that could suck my gall bladder out through my bellybutton in the next 20 minutes. Doesn't the word EMERGENCY Room suggest urgency?

Finally, my name is called and I go through the whole bit....I'm handed the gown that opens in the back (so glad I had cute underwear on), which effectively renders me FREEZING in addition to being in great pain. I lay in the hospital bed, cold, writhing, wishing I had brought a book or something with me. Who knew? I consider faking a seizure so I can get some more prompt attention, but decide to tough it out. Nurse David comes in and takes about 5 viles of blood and proceeds to hand me a cup and tell me the bathroom is down the hall. At this point I don't care as I shuffle down the hallway in my sexy gown and obediently fill the cup.

At 3:57 I see a doctor. I know because I checked my cell phone for the time because hospitals wisely do not put clocks in their examination rooms because they know it would further aggravate people to watch the clock tic by minute after painful minute. He is in the room with me for a total of 37 seconds and tells me with a grand diagnosis, "sounds like gallstones"
No duh, Sherlock. I guess I just had to wait for an official DOCTOR to tell me that. They send me off to ultrasound to be sure. Ultrasound tech tells me that I have a "HUGE" one in there, blocking everything up. She explains....(I wish I had seen HER instead of the doctor - much more informative):

Your gall bladder is full of enzymes that help break down your food when you eat. But mine has 3 stones in it, that is now blocking the exit for the enzymes, and causing inflammation and thus...pain. Here's a diagram:

The diagnosis: get it removed or have it get inflammed, spread infection to your other organs and kill you. Ok..that would be extreme, but bottom line is I have to get this removed in the next couple of weeks.
So that was my night. They sent me home (at 7:17 a.m.) with some Vicodin and the name of a surgeon and I'll probably have to get this surgery done in the next week. *sigh* How inconvenient. I've got a lot going on right now. Here's a toast to inconvenient bodily malfunctions!

RAIN

Today...in History

On this day in history:

Louis XVI was guillotined (1792)
The world's largest frog was caught -3.3kg (1960)
The Beatles release "She Loves You" in the UK (1963)
Yanks & Tigers play 3-3 tie in 19 due to 1 AM curfew (1968)
Dan & Lisa were suck'n down canned cheese & hotdogs on their honeymoon night.

Happy Anniversary guys. :)

Oh...and just as a flashback (I'm sure you'll remember a LOT of these) :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMH0bHeiRNg

Strange But True

Fact: Everytime I use eggs, instead of throwing the shells away I put them back into the carton and say to myself, "I need to smash these up as compost for the garden."
What's Strange: I do not have a garden. I have never had a garden. I don't plan on having one anytime soon.

So.....what's yours?

Ayden-isms

Overheard last week as the boys played at the train table:

Owen: (with a train) "choo-choo! I'm a FAST train!"
AJ: (in a mean and growling voice) "I'm a-gonna get choo, boy. I'm a-gonna get choo"


Last night in the car:
AJ: See that mama? See that doggy?
Me: No, AJ, I didn't see the doggy. Where was it?
AJ: Noooooo, it wasn't a doggy - it was a kitty cat.
Me: Oh yeah? A kitty cat? What color was it?
AJ: Nooooo....it wan't a kitty cat. It was a (whisper) BALD EAGLE.


?????? What the....?????

This gets me every time

Ok....this story makes me sob uncontrollably everytime I see it. It's definitely one of the most moving things I've ever seen. Thought I'd share it with you too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjPrL3n63yg

The Story (from SI, the week before Father's Day 2006)

Strongest Dad in the World[From Sports Illustrated, By Rick Reilly]

Eighty-five times he's pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons.

Eight times he's not onlypushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and pedaledhim 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars--all in the same day. This love story began in Winchester, Mass., 43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cordduring birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable tocontrol his limbs.`
`He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life;'' Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rickwas nine months old. Put him in an institution.''
But the Hoyts weren't buying it. They noticed the wayRick's eyes followed them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department atTufts University and asked if there was anything tohelp the boy communicate. ``No way,'' Dick says he was told. ``There's nothing going on in his brain.'' `
`Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain.
Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of hishead, Rick was finally able to communicate. Firstwords? ``Go Bruins!'' And after a high schoolclassmate was paralyzed in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, "Dad, I want to do that."
''Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described "porker'' who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried. ``Then it was me who was handicapped,'' Dick says. ``I was sore for two weeks.''That day changed Rick's life. "Dad,'' he typed, "when we were running, it felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!''And that sentence changed Dick's life. He became obsessed with giving Rick that feeling as often as he could.
Now they've done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in Hawaii. This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston Marathon, in 5,083rd place out ofmore than 20,000 starters. ``No question about it,'' Rick types. ``My dad is the Father of the Century.'' Rick, who has his own apartment (he gets home care) and works in Boston, and Dick, retired from the military and living in Holland, Mass., always findways to be together. They give speeches around the country and compete in some backbreaking race every weekend, including Father's Day this weekend.
That night, Rick will buy his dad dinner, but the thing he really wants to give him is a gift he cannever buy.``The thing I'd most like,'' Rick types, ``is that my dad sit in the chair and I push him once.''

Sean & Jen-Don't read this

Unless you want to ruin the surprise. :)
So....for all of you who don't know what's up -- Sean and Jen decided to order a few canvases from me after I took some pretty sweet shots of the girls (if I do say so myself). Well....I got them back, checked them out and they look AWESOME. I was actually hoping that one of them would have been damaged a little in shipping so that my company would've replaced it and I could've kept one!!! :)
I'm so geeked about these...they are top notch. I had second thoughts about staying with the company that I decided to use for my canvas prints because they were so expensive....some people had said that it was TOO expensive...why buy a cadillac when you can get a kia, know what i mean? But I'm so glad I stuck with them. They look so great - and the attention to detail is stellar. They come ready to hang, with bumpers on the bottom, and hanging hardware already mounted, and the back is finished, not open. For all inquiries and to book your own session please contact Tammi for further details.
:)
Thought I'd share them here for all to see. Sean and Jen will get them this weekend, so if you can...hold out for the real thing, guys!! These pictures don't do them justice!
Oh...and the orange is for scale. :)

Cream of Elwww

Observation: Cream of Mushroom Soup smells exactly like vomit.

I discovered this last week when I was trying out this recipe. The crockpot is my friend now that volleyball season has arrived and Steve is in school all day. I had an acquaintance recommend a chicken recipe to me that required a can of cream of CHICKEN soup, but I accidentally bought cream of MUSHROOM soup. I'm not a cream-of-anything kind of girl - i don't like creamy stuff - so I thought Cream of Mushroom, Cream of Chicken -it's all the same, right? So I cracked open the can, poured it in the crock pot and reeled back in horror at the odor. I thought I had a rotten can. Turns out, cream of mushroom soup just smells like barf. Seems like this would be a deterrant to folks who actually eat it, but what do I know? MMMmmmm...nothing like spooning out a tasty bite of puke on a cold winter day.

So, today I went out and bought the right cream soup. We're having it for dinner tonight. I'll let you know if it's any good.

Ooops. A correction

Hey Amy, Thought I'd post my retraction here. CameronConant did NOT blog that article I was speaking of. It was Dan Kimball - interesting reading for sure. I'd like to hear what you and anyone else out there thinks of it.

http://www.dankimball.com/vintage_faith/2005/11/why_i_am_embarr.html

Hmmm...so I have no idea how to shorten the link to say...one precise word, so if anyone has any suggestions on that whole thing, I'm open. :)

That Darn Blankie

We had an interesting night around here last night. I got home from the volleyball game around 6:30 or so and Steve and I talked and played with the boys in their room for awhile until bedtime. If you recall, I blogged about a week ago about how their room looked like a Toys R' Us explosion, and it still looked like that last night. So we all went to work cleaning it up and putting away clean clothes that had been sitting in there in the laundry basket for about 3 weeks now and got their room look'n spic-n-span. Well, bedtime rolls around and we can't find Owen's blankie. Blankie is very special....he's had it since he popped from my womb...a gift from grandma and grandpa Teis.

He has had this thing with him EVERYWHERE...Blankie has been peed on, pooped on, spit up on, vomited on, had food spilled on it, been drug through the dirt, traveled through about 13 states, been dropped in the toilet, the street, and a pool, been loved and rubbed threadbare. There is no 2nd copy - this is The One and Only blanket. It used to be that a substitue of similar fabric would do in a pinch, but no more. When Owen is sleepy, sick, or ready for bed it must be Blankie and no other....He folds over the corner and rub rub rubs the tip of it over his fingers, face, feet, whatever until he falls asleep. Just recently has he started to grow away from it.

ANYWAY...
8:00 p.m. Jammies are on, kids are in bed, and Steve and I have been searching for Blankie to no avail for about 30 minutes. Owen asked for it several times, but he was so exhausted yesterday he didn't put up much of a fuss for it. We do our bedtime routine, and he fell asleep in about 3 minutes - much to my relief and surprise.

8:34 Both boys are asleep. The search continues.

8:59 We have systematically searched every room of the house in every nook and cranny. I've checked the kitchen cupboards, the dishwasher, the fridge, under all the furniture in the living room, behind all the doors. Steve has looked out back in the kiddie pool, up in the attic, under the boys mattresses, in the closets. I have dug through a disgusting pile of dirty laundry that's piled up about 4 feet high in the mudroom. Twice.
Steve never left the house with the boys since it had been raining all day, and he KNOWS he saw Owen with it that afternoon, so it MUST be somewhere around the house. *I* am starting to feel anxiety over the loss of Blankie.

9:05 p.m. We realize that we have combed every inch of the house and decide to take a gander in the trash. Steve took a big bag of trash outside to the trash can earlier in the day and we're left to think it's weird, but not outside the realm of possible that one of them stuck it in the trash. Steve takes a flashlight and heads outside to the curb.

9:06 p.m Steve comes back in the house demanding that I help him because there are MAGGOTS all over the trash can.

9:07 p.m. There are indeed maggots crawling all over the trash can.

What the heck are maggots anyway? And they must be nocturnal, because I've never seen them in the day before. And if your skin is crawling with the idea of a swarm of maggots and the idea that we're about to dive into them, you're right on - because it was absolutely REVOLTING. In an attempt to see if this was a common nocturnal occurance or if we were simply disgusting people with disgusting things in our trash that attracted maggots, I nonchalantly walked over to the neighbors. Yup, they have 'em too. Good, we're not nasty.
Steve blasts them with the Clorox Bleach spray but they are hardy buggers and only a few fall off.

10:00 p.m. Steve is grossed out, so being the brave Searcher of Blankie that I am, I flip the lid of the trash open and we look inside. Yup. They're in there too. We strategize our next move.
I'm not sure how, but somehow it's determined that *I* will be the one to reach my hands inside the garbage and pull out the big black trash bag.

10:01 p.m. I grab the drawstring of the trash and yank it. It gets stuck and I have to pull and twist it out of the can until it lands with a plop on the street. A maggot flies off it onto Steve's leg at which point he does this crazy jig/hop making a noise like, "EEEeeee! Eeeeee! Eeeeeh!"

I am secretly smug.


10:03 p.m. We tear open the top and begin to dig around inside looking for any glimpse of blankie. I am muttering about how ridiculous this is over a blasted blanket, but I know that if we don't look in here and the trash guys take it away tomorrow that I would always wonder if blankie was in there...rotting away in some landfill --this precious heirloom of Owen's 3 years on this earth.
As we dig, cautious of the errant wiggly maggot, Steve comments, "Fear is not a factor for us."
Hear dat.

10:05 Blankie is NOT in the trash can. We go inside and scrub our hands. Wishing we had a power washer at this point in time, because I would blast all the skin off my fingers and palms.

10:37 Steve has given up and is checking his email and sports scores on the internet. Not to be deterred, I've been valiantly looking in the meantime and am completely bewildered. Where the HECK has that blanket gone?? Too tired to look anymore, I vow to tear the house apart the next morning to find it and we go to bed. I worry and fret about the blanket as I drift to sleep. I mourn the page in his scrapbook that I intend to do at some distant point in the future with a piece of Blankie attached - a testament to his first love, her sweet blue fleece a comfort to him.
I feel the void of Blankie's absence profoundly.

Morning comes....I refuse to get my lazy carcass out of bed, so Steve gets up and makes the boys breakfast. He comes in to get me when I've got about 20 minutes left to get ready for church so I get up and get in the shower. When I get out, he says to me, "tammi - come look."

And there...in the middle of the living room floor, crumpled in a heap, is Blankie.

On the way to church I turn to Owen and ask him,"Owen, where did you find your blankie this morning?"
He says, "oh, it's at home."
"Yes, I know it's at home NOW, but remember it was lost? And we couldn't find it last night? And then you found this morning. Where did you find it?"
He says, "no, it not lost. It was righ here"
"Right where?"
"Righ here"



I guess we'll never know.

SCA Volleyball & My First (Lame) Attempt at Sports Photography

Well, I'm assistant coaching volleyball here in the great town of Albany, Georgia and yesterday our teams had their first game. It was a tri-match and, well...we lost all our matches, which totally blows, BUT it was ok and here's why: When you consider the actual hours of practice time that these girls have had this season, it probably only adds up to about a week's worth of practice. The B team has several girls who have never played before and they did great for their first game(s). They're just getting their feet wet. Varsity played *very* well their second match (barely losing to George Walton - who our awesome head coach Lisa tells me is always one of the top 5 teams in the state). These girls are a LOAD of raw talent and it will be fun to groom them into the awesome team that they are capable of being.


Well, the last match, I was 3rd coach on the bench so I decided that rather than throw out redundant instructions to the team that I would break out my camera and have a go at some pictures. This was my first attempt with any kind of sports photography, so it's sadly lacking. I'll definitely be doing some reading up on action photography in the next couple of weeks, so hopefully I can do a little better.

Steve-O's New Look

After months of letting his hair go long, in anticipation of school starting this week (ok, he actually HAD to in order to be in compliance with school dress code) , he went to the salon and had it all chopped off.

AND, here's the big change, in cas e you didn't notice --after having a goatee for...lemme think.....about 8 or 9 YEARS, he shaved it off too. What a change, huh?!? He decided to leave a little hair (at my suggestion) under his lip. At first, I couldn't get used to it....(seemed weird to kiss a hairless lip) and it just looks so BARE...but now I'm getting used to it and I think I like it. Whatcha think??
I took these right before he went to a work thing last night and he was pretty embarassed. I only got 3 shots in before he gave me this ---->

I still think he's cute, though. :)

P.S. Do these photos look dark to you?? I'm having some major monitor callibration issues. Tell me if they seem dark.

Just some stuff from today

Here's a few pictures of our half-primate, A.J, jumping on the bed. I love his little butt hanging out in this one! :) lol This was in the a.m. before I had changed his diaper, and he pees a TON in the night, so his diaper probably weighs about 12 pounds at this point. This is an everyday occurance for our boys. They each get on their own bed, turn up their music really loud and sing, jump around, and jump OFF the headboards of their beds. I estimate that they probably do this for about a combined hour and a half per day. Hey, it's exercise, right? :) And A.J. can get some serious air when he's doing it. The other day I was laying sideways on the bed up toward the headboard and he was jumping OVER me. On one particular jump, he landed clear at the foot of the bed and actually rolled off the end. He cried for about 8 seconds and then was back up and doing it again. At this point in time, you can see he's shed the cumbersome diaper and is free-ball'n it (pun intended). He also likes to practice getting his knees up really high. He'll jump on our bed and watch himself in the mirror. :)
And of course we have to have a couple of Owen, who also loves to jump, but will tire much more quickly than AJ. Although I'm not sure AJ ever tires.
I'm love'n these butt shots. :)

I'll probably make AJ pictures into a storyboard for above his bed...I've been meaning to do that for months, and now I finally have some good shots of him.

That's it for tonight....Blogger is being wonky or something and I'm suddenly having issues uploading more pics.....I'll try again later, but until I figure it out, I'll leave you breathless waiting for more. :)

Twinkies While I Pull My Hair Out

So, I've had a long day. I'm still feeling a little melancholy about yesterday's bad news, and the boys were pretty naughty like...EVERY SECOND of the entire day, I had a headache most of the afternoon, and I'm totally PMS-ing (I know, I know, that's the last I'll say of it - don't you hate when women talk about that stuff? I do...so that's the end of it. Seriously. Right here. No more of that talk. Just had to give you a little background..you know, setting up the scene for ya.)
Started the morning off bright 'n early with Owen sitting beside me saying, "mama.mama.mama.mama.mama.mama.mama." My eyes still glued shut I rasp, "yesssss, Owen?"
"I need waffles" he says.
He's so darn chipper in the mornings.

AJ is still sleeping beside me (because I usually spend the majority of my night in bed with one of the rugrats due to the fact that I have completely failed Getting Your Children To Sleep In Their Own Bed All Alone, All Night Long 101). I lay back down as he scampers off to the kitchen. I can hear him open the fridge and pull out random objects, ketchup, egg carton hitting the floor, pouring his own milk....ok, I couldn't HEAR all that, but I was imagining it and I was too tired to care). I'm thinking that I can deal with a completely hosed kitchen if I can just get 10 more minutes of sleep. Until AJ rolls over and smacks me in the face with his small, yet solid little fist. Rise and Shine I guess.

The day was a series of messes and naughty behavior that escalated throughout the day and was abated by nothing...not a trip to the library, not a trip to the grocery store, not going out for lunch. Naughty Kidlet Energy bubbled over today until I finally snapped when I caught Owen peeing on the train table and AJ giving Toy Story's Woody a "bath" in the potty. I sent them to their room (which looks as though Toys R Us has exploded all over the floor and walls) and shut the door and locked it for 5 minutes of peace (well, as peaceful as it can get when I hear Veggie Tales blasting "O Christmas Tree" at top decibal from their stereo in their room).
Earlier when we were at the grocery store, I had bought a box of Twinkies on a whim - I haven't had a Twinkie in FOREVER....like years, and now sounded like a pretty dang good time to gorge on some. I stuffed myself of 3 of them---savoring their delicious cakey goodness with the gooey cream-filled center-- in the course of about 37 seconds and instantly felt better. Twinkies may have a shelf life of 20 years, but they sure do hit the spot when you're about to jump off the nearest cliff...Now if only I had had some juiced up Diet Coke to top it off.....:)

Some Sad News Today....

I was just informed yesterday that a client of mine, Renee Pagel, was found murdered in her home in Grand Rapids over the weekend.

At this point in the blog, I feel at a loss for words. What more is there to say? What a horrible, horrible, tragedy. I had just taken photos of her and her 3 children in May and now she is gone. She was just recovering from an ugly divorce with her husband and was getting back on her feet. Her children obviously adored her and she *lived* for them, which was very evident as I took their photos -- her love for her children was extremely visible...it poured from her very being. She was an amazing woman - dedicated to her job and her children, giving and funny, with a permanent smile on her face. At the time of her murder, she was resting at home after donating a kidney to one of her student's parents. Can you imagine?

I am full of questions. Why her? What will her children do without their mother? How will her youngest understand? What went through her mind in her last moments? Who will her eldest daughter turn to as she faces her tumultous pre-teen years? How will it affect them to know that their mother was murdered? Possibly by someone they knew?? Yesterday, today... I think about this almost non-stop - my mind just can't wrap itself around something so horrible. And my words don't pay her nearly enough of the tribute that this remarkable woman deserves.

I AM thankful that I was able to take their photographs for them. Those photos are most likely the last photos that they had of all of them together and I am hoping that their her children will treasure them as their last visible reminder of their mother and her love for them.

If you want to read more about it, you can check out the articles in the Grand Rapids Press here: http://www.mlive.com/search/index.ssf?sconfig=mlive&xpath.attraction_type=-EXCLUDE+-exclude+-zzz&xpath.pubdate=08%2F09%2F06+08%2F08%2F06+08%2F07%2F06+08%2F06%2F06+08%2F05%2F06+08%2F04%2F06+08%2F03%2F06+08%2F02%2F06+08%2F01%2F06+07%2F31%2F06+07%2F30%2F06+07%2F29%2F06+07%2F28%2F06+07%2F27%2F06&count=20&xref=6&xpath.any=renee+pagel&x=26&y=8

Procrastination

I'm procrastinating on some stuff that I should be doing....so I thought I'd post some pics I took of the boys about....oh....5 minutes ago. :) They just came inside from swimming with daddy and now all three of them are plopped in front of the tv watching Little Einsteins. I'm waiting for them all to fall asleep. :)

Here's Owen....







And of course...lest we forget, A.J. (I added a film-grain action to this one, just for the heck of it).

Random Thought for the Day

So I've been thinking.....what the HECK is in Diet Coke?? I swear, it's full of crack or something because I know SO MANY people who are completely addicted to it. Just the other day my hair stylist was telling me (as she cut my hair) that she never used to drink soda at all and now she's completely addicted to it - like a 2 Liter per day. And it got me thinking of all the people I know who are complete DC Junkies...This guy at Steve's old school used to drink 2 cans everyday for his BREAKFAST. Gross.
So seriously...if you're an DC addict, fess up....get some help....before you get cancer from whatever it is that they're putting in that stuff to make people crave it. Makes ya wonder, huh??

And on a Sad Note....

So this morning while photographing the boys painting, my 50mm prime portrait lens broke. I accidentally bumped it into the patio chair when I was sitting down to take pictures. It wasn't a hard bump, but I guess it was hard enough because it immediately started acting weird and making strange noises and then the front of the lens actually FELL OFF.

*sigh* And of course I have a senior shoot scheduled for tomorrow.

I've been checking online and on ebay for any good deals. I'm considering either 1) replacing my 50mm only upgrading to a better model (which would hopefully be a little more durable!) or biting the bullet and paying some big $$ for a Tamron 28-75mm F2.8 lens, which I've had my eye on for awhile. I'm just not sure since I have shoots lined up the next couple of weeks if I should go with what's safe and get another 50 or get the Tamron and just deal with the learning curve.

*sigh AGAIN*

I really need to start purchasing back-up equipment so that when things like this happen I don't have to cancel and reschedule shoots. If anyone out there has a few grand they'd like to donate for me to get another camera body, lemme know and I'll give you my paypal address. :)

Here's a picture I took of Nala just 2 days ago with my 50mm. Notice the clarity and beautifully shallow depth of field. Goodbye dear 50mm friend. I'll miss you. (well, until I buy another one).

Our Morning

1 Queen Size Sheet from Goodwill: $2
6 Bottles of Tempura Paint: $12
2 Naked Children: free
A Messy, Colorful Work of ART and 2 Happy Boys: Priceless

Shout Out to Crocs

So....it's 1:30 a.m. here and I can't think of anything else to blog about (well, I can, but I'm not up for a deeply intellectual and thought-provoking discussion-starter so late (or early-depending on how you look at it) ) so I have chosen to quickly give props to the amazing folks (in Taiwan? China?) who have invented CROCS. And even if it was Americans who invented them, much thanks to the Taiwanese or Chinese who assembled them - I'll have to go check my label to be sure.
So, anyway....I finally got around to buying a pair of these oh-so-hip shoes/clogs/sandals whatever the heck they are - although I DID buy them about 6 months AFTER they became hip, so I guess I'm actually just a loser.

Regardless, why had no one told me of these before? They're SO comfy, completely waterproof (as in, water doesn't hurt them, but it will get your foot wet via those little holes all over the top) and did I say they're SO comfortable?? I guess nurses wear them (or medical personel who are on their feet all day) and they say they are comfy to wear even after say...12 hours of administering IV's and running around for Code Blue/Red/Whatevers. And I'm sure that bodily fluids just wipe right off - although nurses probably wear the kind without holes. Or at least I hope so.
Anyway, I may look like a duck (Thanks a lot Casey-way to burst my bubble) but I love these shoes.

Get some...you'll love 'em too.