Sharing the Magic

A few weeks ago it was getting late in the evening and we were waiting for Dan to get home pretty bored. I had tried playing hide-and-go-seek, trucks, reading books etc. but Shad was having a hard time. Brownies sounded really good and I contemplated putting Shad to bed so I could make some before thinking he might enjoy it. I recalled that making cookies etc with my mom was always one of my favorite things and it might be pretty fun for Shad too. He loved standing on the stool and wanted to be right in the middle of things. I am so glad I took the time to slow down and share it with him, and Dan is always glad when Shad is up when he gets home. It was fun to do something different with Shad and see how interested he really was in helping.

Getting started

He took his job pretty seriously, look at that concentration!

Sneaking a taste!

No point in baking if you aren't going to lick the spoons, right?

Terrible picture of me, but we had a great time!

Someone Must Have Told.

As of yesterday the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints dissolved all "Activities Committees" worldwide. All activities will now be planned by the Auxillaries in meetings that already happen. This of course means I was immediately released. They must have found out about the fire alarm. . . .

In all seriousness, I truly believe it will not only make planning events easier and more cohesive, but will also eliminate unnecessary meetings and be a great benefit. One more example of how our leadership receives constant inspiration to better carry out our Heavenly Father's will and bring people to Christ. To learn more about our faith and what we believe visit:

www.lds.org

I hope I am not in trouble for copying this picture but it is by one of my FAVORITE artists and an amazing guy, Walter Rane. Not that he needs publicity-he is well known but if you want to see more visit www.walterrane.com, or just start looking for his name on paintings in chapels, church magazines etc. There are four prints of his paintings in our chapel alone, and I have two in my house.

Family Photos 2010

Our dear friend was kind enough to agree to do our family photos recently. Not only did she have to bring her two children with her, she also had to put up with us and our very large dog who both her children are afraid of. It was very generous of her. Unfortunately, it was very last minute and we had a very typical "family pictures day". Meaning, I spent the whole day dragging Shad around from store to store to try to find something for him to wear, therefore making him eat late, miss his nap and be very sick of holding still by the time we actually showed up with an entire garbage sack of clothes to meet my friend a half hour late because we still didn't know what we were wearing. (We decided to do them late Saturday night for the following Monday . . . big mistake.) Dan was stressed that I was late and still didn't have anything planned and needless to say no one except Solo was very excited when we showed up. The fact he was certainly didn't help anything. (I had hoped to take him for a walk so he would be calmer being outside for the pictures, of course, that didn't happen). It also didn't make it any easier for her after an overcast morning when the sun suddenly broke out in full force in the middle of the afternoon, making her lighting situation near impossible. Fortunately, my friend was awesome about dealing with us and tried so very hard, but Shad WOULD NOT stay still without screaming. I felt a little bit better about it later when Jess admitted that her and her other friend were both redoing family pictures because they had the same problem. Guess it isn't just us that couldn't get two ornery adults, a tired one and a half year old and an overstimulated dog to look good. Despite all that she did a great job and managed to even make us look like the happy family we usually are. To be fair, check our her site to see her awesome work when she isn't dealing with the perfect storm to make her job impossible.

Jessica Lang Price Photography

Jess was just using Solo as a model to adjust settings, but I am sure a few years from now, when Solo has moved on to "the farm", this picture is going to make me bawl my eyes out.

Why it was so difficult working with the two of them; Solo barked so of course Shad had to tell him "no," finger-point and all.

I loved that this was actually not posed, Shad came over while Jessie was using me to adjust lighting and just gave me a hug while I was sitting there before running off. Luckily, Jess thought to actually take a picture, she captured a side of his personality I LOVE right here.

Yeah, he is definitely aware of how much of a stud I think he is right here. Knowing us well, our friend thought it would be funny to take one of me just looking at Dan while he looked straight ahead straight-faced. Unfortunately for her, he couldn't help smiling at how totally true to life this situation is.

As long as no one was trying to hold him still or make him quit moving he was happy, of course that makes taking a picture pretty much impossible, but Jessie managed to sneak this one somehow.

We both literally ran over to him for this, obviously not perfectly posed, but he was happily standing there so we tried to make it work.

The biggest benefit of working with a friend (other than stealing the clothes off her back, which absolutely happened), is that she could walk over grab Dan and force him to actually get close and touch me. It also helped get much more natural smiles as she could crack jokes we actually thought were funny as opposed to the lame stuff some people say. A stranger would have had a hard time getting us this close-the staircase shot is definitely more Dan's comfort zone.

Either Dan misunderstood the question or was afraid of my mood and figured a lie was safer when I pulled my hair back without a mirror and asked if it had any strange bumps etc. . . . Clearly, either way I could have used a little help, but I really don't care. This is definitely more true to real life than if it was somehow magically perfect.

As happy as he was doing this. . .

This was the best smile we could get out of him, right side up . . .

Best Buddies

(In Jessie's defense, she had been shooting in the opposite direction and took this candid so clearly the lighting wasn't ideal compared to 180 degrees the other way.)

Cutest Trick-or-treater ever!

Dan was not a fan of this costume, but still couldn't wait to see him when we met up at his parents for the family Halloween party.

Shad and I Saturday night. (There was a rain-drop on the lens)

Seriously?! Who taught him to peck for corn?

Him and aunt 'Chelle. They had a great time playing hair-dresser earlier in the day. Luckily, his costume covered his flat-ironed bangs and the 1/2 cup of gel in his hair.

I have always disliked Halloween, and Dan has never really been into either so we usually just lay low and try to make sure Solo doesn't escape when people knock on the door. This year however, I really wanted to dress Shad up in something really fun, so I started to think pretty early. I went through several different ideas trying to think of something that would be cheap to make but also fun. I first thought I wanted him to be a penguin, but too expensive, and all the second-hand costumes I saw online weren't what I had in mind. Then I decided a skunk would be cute, but made the mistake of googling it, seeing the cutest costume I have ever seen in my life for $60 and knew, if it wasn't that skunk, it wasn't going to be what I wanted. I then had the idea that a rooster would be so hilarious, so I called my mom to see how much she thought feathers would cost. She had no idea, and told me to look online, but in the process I explained my idea. She thought it sounded cute, wished me luck and hung up. Then called right back. Her and my Aunt who was visiting had just been at Goodwill and my aunt said they actually had a chicken costume. Perfect, she went back the next day, picked it up and mailed it. I then proceeded to cross dress my child in some red striped girls leggings and made the cutest chicken I have ever seen. Even better, he loved wearing it too and everyone got a kick out of it. I really should have gotten video of him running around in it because I bust up laughing out loud every time he did. Even better, he didn't really think he needed a lot of candy, he would just trade what he had for something out of the person's bucket. So, despite going to a trunk-or-treat both Friday (our wards disaster previously mentioned) and Saturday (my sister-in-law asked if she could watch Shad that day while I worked so he could go with them to theirs), he ended up with about five pieces of candy total. I sent a picture of his loot to my mom and she called saying she wanted to send him candy. I had to explain that he didn't really care about it, and remind her that he isn't even two and her husband is a dentist and would be ashamed. Not to mention all the candy sitting on the counter Dan and I have been eating.

I am not the church arson . . .

First off, I must mentioned that yes, my husband did point out that it was actually October when I did my last post titled, "then it was September," So, I will explain now that I am aware that it is now November. Halloween started out with quite a bang for us. As our ward activities chair I was in charge or our trunk-or-treat. Due to a small committee busy with work and families we decided to keep it simple. Apparently, not simple enough. I showed up at the church about an hour before it started to get water heated and start setting out doughnuts-gourmet I know, you wish you could have been there. . . I pulled out the massive stock pot, filled it with water, set it on the stove and proceeded to leave the kitchen and walk around the church to unlock doors. I figured it was going to take a whole lot longer than five minutes for about five gallons of water to boil, even on medium high heat. Well, as I was coming back around the corner I notice some smoke in the kitchen, and a terrible scorched smell. This was when I realized that the burner with the canister of hot chocolate was bright red and the whole thing was about to go up in flames. Why on earth did I try to heat the hot chocolate without the water you are asking?!?! The stove knobs were backwards from my house and I hadn't paid close enough attention and turned on the wrong burner. I noticed this was a problem and tried to open the door and wave under the smoke alarm to keep it from going off, and after about a minute I thought I just might have succeeded. And then it all broke loose. Of course, I had no way to turn it off, had no numbers in my phone for people who could so I had to just ashamedly stand there and wait for the fire dept. to show up. Needless to say, I really wished at that point that the whole ward didn't live just over the fence from the parking lot, but live an learn and eat some humble pie I guess. My father-in-law had come over to help watch Shad for the evening since Dan was at work and kindly asked if I had seen the sign stating that the kitchen was for reheating only, not cooking or food prep. Guess now we know why. I joked later that I guess, I was getting released but they informed me you actually have to succeed in burning the church down in order for that to happen. Guess the guy who burned the chapels really didn't like his calling. . . . It still turned out okay, but I certainly didn't want to be there after that fiasco.

And Then it Was September

It feels like summer just kind of evaporated into thin air after August. It was a busy month but a fun way to wrap up the summer. A few things we did:

• Dan rode in the ULCER-a 100 mile bike ride around Utah lake. I had toyed with the idea of doing the sixty mile ride earlier in the summer but then didn't want to pay the entrance fee for a ride that was only ten miles longer than the one I did in Bear lake. For about two hours three weeks before I thought about doing the 100 mile distance but didn't feel I could be ready in time. The day of the event I definitely wished I would have just pushed myself to train and go for it. I may not have made it to the finish but trying would have been more satisfying than standing there on the road wishing I was on my bike. Oh well, maybe next year, or the year after that, or possibly the one after that. Being female, married, of child-bearing age makes those things hard to predict sometimes. ( NO! that is NOT a hint at an announcement-not a possibility so don't get excited mother!)

• We spent a week visiting Dan's brothers in St. George and Vegas. Shad began teething on the ride there--fever, diarrhea, runny nose, crying etc. which meant he wasn't a whole lot of fun away from home and his routine but luckily he perked up the last day at Dan's older brothers house and was a bit happier in St. George. We had a great time swimming, relaxing as a family and going to a demolition derby. This included a rock crawl won by a 16 year old GIRL, my brother would have fallen head over heels if he had been there.

• Dan and I celebrated our SEVENTH wedding anniversary! So hard to believe that much time has passed. Harder to believe that among all of the stupid mistakes and choices I made when I was younger that I managed to make such a good choice to marry Dan. I am so lucky to be married to an honest, loyal, hard-working, trustworthy man who works so hard for Shad and I. I may be a little biased, but I LOVE my husband.

• Dan finished his first Triathlon. We had a great time with our friends staying in Park City the night before and the guys got up early and headed off to the race. In grand tradition I missed seeing Dan at the finish line. Having our friend come in later (He did a longer distance so it took longer) and grab his daughter to run her through the finish certainly didn't make me feel any less guilty since Dan probably would have liked the chance to do the same. In my defense-neither of the guys gave us directions to where we were going and we are both a little directionally challenged. Considering this, us girls with three kids made pretty good time.

• We started our last year of this degree, I have learned to never say "our last year of school," because Dan might be going after a degree when we are eighty. Hope we save enough somehow that our retirement can pay off our student loans, Dan might still be a student then. We are fortunate Dan is passionate about school and willing to work so hard to give us a better life. But I am grateful to see a light at the end of this tunnel. The next year should bring some exciting change following graduation. More school or not, bigger and better things await.

Sometimes Things Take a While

Apparently, I am a little thick skulled. I know, you are so surprised. However, I had to laugh at myself. I was laying in bed the other night unable to sleep when I realized an enormous irony that really should have stuck my conscious thinking a very long time ago. As a kid one of my biggest fears was being terribly burned, but living through it. A certain magazine article that came out when I was six years old showing a little girl horribly scarred from a fire was probably the beginning of this paranoia. At that age I wasn't really aware of how terribly painful the experience itself and the recovery must have been, or the miracle that the little girl survived, I was only aware that the pictures were terrifying to me and I could never imagine if I had to look in the mirror and see something like that. (keep in mind I was six years old and I had been chased around the house by my sister and her friend with said pictures only making things that much scarier.) It was so bad I was afraid I would wake up, not realize I had been hurt in a fire until I looked in the mirror and then scare myself. I had an enormous fear of house fires and had a very hard time falling to sleep sometimes and would often pray that our house would not catch fire or that we wouldn't get burned. So . . .I am laying in bed the other night and realized that without really thinking about it I had named my child after a scriptural character that was protected from fire by angels. While that part of the story is remarkable it was actually not why we picked the name and I hadn't spent much time thinking about that portion of the scripture story (obviously or I would have noticed this about two years ago.) We liked that Shadrach had obeyed the commandments even when it was not the popular thing, and thought it was neat that he was taught by Daniel. Now though, the name just has that much more significance to me. Although I hope my son doesn't have the over-fearfulness of fire that I did growing up I hope he can have faith like Shadrach of the old testament and do what is right no matter what the consequence might be.

WARNING: VIDEO OVERLOAD

Shad has been pretty hilarious lately so I thought I would post a few videos showing his silly personality. He received a football from a cousin for Christmas and has really gotten excited about it recently and loved to play his own personal game of catch involving him throwing the ball, chasing it and throwing it again. He wears himself out pretty well with this game. And yes, it looks like he is going to be a Lefty, he uses his left hand to eat with a fork too. (when he doesn't give up and just eat with his hands that is.)

He also thinks it is pretty funny to throw the ball at our dog Solo. Solo is the unfortunate playmate in one of Shad's other favorite games, doggy rodeo. Fortunately he is such a gentle and forgiving dog it usually ends with him just walking away when he is tired of Shad sitting and jumping on him. The video is actually a pretty short amount of time for him to put up with it, Shad usually gets to ride a little longer.

Shad also has started backing up and sitting down on things and thinks it is pretty cool. Once again, favorite thing to back up and sit on . . . Solo. We are lucky he is so patient because Shad really does torment him. The other day after cleaning Solo's ears I turned to see Shad hanging from one of Solo's ears with both hands trying to copy me and once again Solo was just putting up with it. I didn't however, and quickly let Shad know that was not okay. To show just how goofy Shad is, as I was posting this I heard him making noise in the kitchen and looked over to see this: What motivated him to walk around with a tupperware in his mouth covering his nose and eyes we will never know but he kept it up for probably five minutes thinking he was pretty cool.

Summer Fun

We have been having a lot of fun this summer soaking up time together as Dan is out of class. Dan planned a really fun day a few weeks back for the family to all go to the zoo. I happened to be scheduled for a Saturday which meant Dan and I were both home the Monday before and got a day off together to do something fun! (This also meant Dan's sister watched Shad for us on Saturday- thank you, thank you, thank you!! We are so lucky to have great family that is so willing to help us out!) Dan was so cute about it, he planned it as I mentioned and even packed a lunch for us and found out when the elephant show and bird show were in advance so we would be able to see as much as possible without being there too long. We had a great time and were lucky that ALL the animals were out.

Despite going to the Hogle zoo several times before, I had literally never seen ANY of the tigers before because they were always hiding, but we got up close and personal this trip.

It was a fun day, Shad was so excited about everything that when we tried to sit down for lunch he shoved his sandwich in his mouth and went running off like a dog carrying a toy. Maybe we should have him spend more time with other kids and less time with Solo . . . We have also spent a lot of time on our bikes. Unfortunately I can't keep up with Dan and it isn't safe to pull a bike buggy on the road so we trade off watching Shad in the mornings so we can each ride. Dan is always awesome about encouraging me to get out and ride my bike despite the fact I AM NOT A MORNING PERSON and usually always have an excuse. Thanks to his encouragement I did a fifty mile ride with my sister-in-law up in Bear Lake last week and felt pretty good about it. Thanks for waiting up Myndi! Getting out more got us really pumped up for the Tour de France this year, but it is pretty apparent that the US is just waiting for Shad to grow up and become the "next great american cyclist" as Dan says, we will just have to bide our time cheering for foreign teams!

As I mentioned we were in Bear Lake last week, Dan's family does an annual trip for the fourth of July. We had a good time being together with all of his family and Shad had a great time eating way too much junk, staying up late, sleeping in our bed (despite having one of his own) and spending time with his cousins. His grandparents even hauled the wagon up from their house and he had a great time riding around. He generally tried to stand up in it but we had a fun afternoon racing down a hill as fast as I could pull him and then running back up.

ride slowed down quite a bit when his cousin Zaylie joined, but he has a great time with her regardless, we frequently warn him she is trouble . . . I may not have had quite as relaxing of a time as he did during this venture but it was a lot of fun and he kept busting up when we would go fast. One of those moments where it was really fun just spending time with him and not feeling so much like "the mom". He obviously won't remember it but I took a picture so I would and can tell him about it later. They also had a pinata and Shad gave it a pretty honest effort on his own, he seems so much like a little boy in these pictures.We went swimming as well which Shad still really enjoys and had the annual talent show, prepared and presented by Shad's very organized cousin Abbie. She would be an excellent wedding planner, detail-oriented with all the enthusiasm and dramatic flair required for the job. She loves pulling-off an event. Shad was concerned we were going to leave him behind and climbed in my suitcase when I was packing up to go home again. Unfortunately, right after this picture he decided he wanted more space and began throwing everything else out of the suitcase.

We were lucky enough to see my parents over the weekend of the fourth as well since they came into town for my father's high school reunion. He is one of the few unusual people I know who would actually trade places with their high school self to be able to experience it all over again. I guess that means he had a great time at that point in his life, but a million dollars wouldn't convince me to go through those years again. We had dinner with my mom and younger brother one night and stayed up late playing card games. It was clear I don't pull late nights too frequently anymore, my brain went to bed at the usual time even if my body was still up. It made for an interesting card game and plenty of fodder for everyone else to make fun of me, not that I blame them. My dad decided to relive his high school days to the fullest and spent a lot of timing riding (and fixing) motorcycles with friends and his brothers and then got home just in time to go to bed. I am glad he had a great time but it was a brief visit for us. Friday night my older brother stopped by for a while too so it was a weekend full of family. Too bad we didn't get to see my sisters as well.

Shad has been quite the character lately, he is still all over the place and has a funny way of standing and talking to himself, looking back at you and going on in gibberish for a while as though you should know exactly what he is saying and then going back to his own conversation. This is one of the moments where he felt I should know what he was doing and let me in on the discussion. Generally in an instant such as this, one arm would be stretched back at me and the other one pointing to whatever it is he is "talking" about.

I am glad he is showing a desire to communicate but he still doesn't really use words consistently. His vocabulary keeps growing if you count all the words he has said a couple times and never repeated. He seems to feel the same way about repeating words as he did rolling over, it was cool the first few times and then not really too interesting after that. Hopefully he continues to catch on and can express himself more completely soon. One of his other favorite things is still hide-and-seek or any other type of wrestling. Despite the fact I hate to be startled or scared, Shad LOVES IT. He thinks it is the very best if I hide somewhere dark and jump out just as he finds me, practically making him jump out of his skin. I guess it is the innocence of not knowing what kinds of other really scary things are out there. This picture is during a wrestling match before bedtime. of course as soon as Dan saw me with the camera, he told Shad I had ruined the moment and proceeded to move on to something else. He only makes this face when he is feeling really silly (thankfully! It is hilarious and adorable but perhaps not the best everyday expression)

Hope everyone else is having a great summer, we have to enjoy it while it lasts and before Dan starts classes again in the fall.

Last but not least, does this hairstyle look familiar to anyone? I took this after Shad's nap one day because I liked the lighting but then noticed his hair looks just like mine when I had my "peacock" hairdo. Way back before the shaved head . . . Wish I could just wake up and have mine styled, rather than taking forty five minutes-I would still have that hair-cut if that were the case!

Big Project, Bigger Improvement, Biggest Post

So, if you happen to have read my last full post, you might have noticed a little blurb about re-doing my kitchen cabinets. As previously stated, Dan was not thrilled with the idea, but after a year of begging, and pleading he relented, the day before the kitchen disaster. As it turns out none of the cabinets had to be replaced so by the time the whole mess was completely settled, nearly a month later we were still at square one. Dan had relented on the condition that I only use birthday money (meaning I don't spend precious money from our paychecks on the project) and I do all the work myself. He kindly suggested I get to work prior to my birthday because sanding them down was going to take a while. Especially since I was doing it by hand. That lasted about two hours and one cupboard door, and then I called my dear brother and pleaded for his power sander, I promptly fell in love. With the power sander that is. It made the project doable, and it was glorious watching that awful orange finish come off. This quickly took over my life. If I was awake and Shad was asleep it was pretty well a guarantee that I was sanding down cupboard doors. I was a little hesitant to start prior to my birthday since the financing for the project depended on me getting enough gift cards to pay for primer and paint, however I figured no finish at all was better than how they were, and jumped right in. Thankfully, due to very generous family, following my birthday I had more than enough to cover the costs. THANK YOU!!!! My wonderful husband acknowledged he would like me to just get it done quickly and was very understanding to the upheaval that became our house. In the name of cupboards he didn't want (he really really dislikes white cabinets) he put up with shopping going undone, dishes sitting in the sink, laundry piling and even coming home one night to a kitchen so torn up he couldn't even cook himself dinner. He even forgave me for not calling and warning him, so he had nothing to eat at nine when he got home. Slowly but surely I finished up with the sanding and moved on to priming the cabinet frames twice, re-sanding them and painting them. I refrained from jumping around with excitement in front of Dan, but many family members and close friends got daily text updates and pictures as I completed each step. All that was left was the doors. I primed them front and back twice, then re-sanded (thankfully this only took a few hours total whereas the initial sanding took an hour per door.) The doors were finally ready to be painted and my wonderful brother came over three nights in a row to help me paint them with his paint sprayer. Friday night they were at last dry enough to touch and I brought them all in and spent well into the night putting all of the hardware back on each door while talking with my younger brother who was in town this weekend. He kept me company, although unfortunately he didn't prevent me from doing a good portion of the work with the wrong screwdriver before I finally found the correct one stashed in a cupboard. (Despite using a power drill at work before to drill into fractured bones, I was nervous to screw my hardware in with one, go figure . . .) My right hand has the blisters to prove this is a bad idea. Saturday morning I hung all of the doors back up, and put the knobs on. After looking at Lowe's and Home Depot I had been horrified to find out just how expensive cabinet knobs were. I had concluded that it would really help to finish off the look and make a huge difference in keeping the white paint clean, but didn't want to spend that much on hardware. Luckily, I decided to look at Target online and found some great ones that were half the price. Even better, to get all of them would cost me exactly what I had on a few gift cards laying around from Mother's Day and other gifts!!! That meant I still had a pretty good chunk of change left over, and decided to splurge on a beautiful new faucet. Saturday afternoon my amazing father-in-law came over and spent the better part of his day taking out my old faucet and putting in my new one. Project complete and I LOVE IT!!!! Obviously, it is far from perfect, but I feel pretty dang good about it. Nothing gives you a sense of accomplishment quite like learning something new and seeing a project through. Truthfully, there is no way I could appreciate it without doing the work myself, and if I had not had to wait a year I am pretty sure I would have struggled keeping a positive attitude throughout the ordeal. But, after over three weeks of work, and miraculously no tears (related to this project at least ;op) it is over. It was worth every bit of work to go from this:

To this:

Thank you Dan for letting me "ruin" our cabinets-especially since I had no clue what I was doing! And thanks to everyone who pitched in through gifts or even just listening to me blab about it whenever I got excited about it!!!!

This Mold House

So for the last week our house has been a disaster area, no really. I imagined this happening for very different reasons. Last Tuesday night following an intense discussion I had tried to postpone, Dan finally relented to letting me paint our oak kitchen cabinets white. I have been begging since we moved in a year ago and those who talk to me often know it became a bit of an obsession. I went to bed that night feeling a little guilty for being the more stubborn of the two of us and not exactly feeling that triumphant joy I had imagined would come when this day came. Trust me, I had imagined it plenty of times and had thought through the argument from every possible angle. Whether it was photo-shopping the cabinets in a picture to show how great it would look (the grain made this a little too tricky) or painting cabinets in another part of the house or simply painting a spare door I may have come across, I was willing to put in some serious work to win the stand-off. Unfortunately, as I mentioned I didn't feel as great about it that night as I had anticipated. Come Wednesday morning however, whole different story. I was on cloud nine and telling everyone that would listen how great it was. The excitement was short-lived. Wednesday afternoon I noticed water on my kitchen floor and to make a long story short ended up pulling out the dishwasher to discover the pipe from our kitchen sink and the two units above us was leaking under our cabinets and had formed a great petri dish of mold. I called the plumber and had the pipe fixed five hours later however, he informed me that we would need to have a disaster clean-up company come take care of the mold and the biohazardous water. They came out the next day and did a bid and then we had to deal with getting the HOA to take responsible etc. etc. finally Monday morning they came to clean up . . . and ripped out half our kitchen. This is what I came home to after work Monday night:

Come Tuesday morning Shad wasn't really fazed by the fact the kitchen had relocated to the living room but it certainly made things interesting for breakfast. We quickly gathered ourselves together with Solo and headed to my in-laws for the day. Fortunately, we came home around 8:00 PM to find almost everything put back together. There is a minor problem with the counter-top that needs to be resolved but it is nice to have this mess behind us. Now we can look forward to the next project, without water and mold.

Say Cheese!

Shad has turned into quite the little ham lately. I am starting to think this may be why people traditionally do twelve month pictures and not fourteen. He is all personality right now and has definitely perfected his camera face. Despite the fact I generally try to get candid shots and never in his life have said, "say cheese!" he seems to have grasped the idea all on his own. He absolutely LOVES the camera. He definitely did not get his affection for it from his dad and I don't really think I love pictures either other than to document our lives to a certain degree but I am afraid the creative facial expressions might be my genetics. I remember being told by a friend in college, "you know for how cute you are it is amazing what ugly faces you can make." Granted this was during an "ugly face contest" not in regards to photos but based on a picture they took of me one night when they ran into my dorm room at three in the morning while I was dead asleep and told me to smile with my hair everywhere and my retainers in I am pretty sure I outdo Shad. I swear I don't have a copy of it or I would put it on here. People didn't even believe it was me when I told them. I thought this would be a one day thing for Shad, but if you notice his clothes it is obviously here to stay for a while!

All I did here was sit and hold the camera . . .

It is pretty clear to me I am having difficulty capturing not only well posed shots but decent portraits of my child in general. A week or two ago my good friend came over to help out. Her family just moved back to the states after three long years oversees and I am so excited to have them back! She happens to do photography professionally and has a gift with kids so she offered to give me a hand while she was over. The weather turned out to be a double-edged sword, not a cloud in the sky, gorgeous day which also meant way too bright and direct for decent photos. We had a great afternoon with the kids and catching up but will have to try for frame worthy pictures another day. We got a few photos in general.

Us and the kids

Couple cute shots of Shad out playing. He looks exactly like my little sister did in the second one!

(yes I know the lighting is terrible!)

Jessie's cute kids - -yes she took these and the two of Shad right after it. Pretty obvious even with different equipment (she was downgrading to my camera) and really bad conditions she has a great eye! I would put her info but I haven't asked her. If you are interested in using her or seeing stuff she would consider actually decent (as in-her equipment, decent conditions etc.) leave a comment on my blog and I will get you in touch with her or her photo blog. And I hope she doesn't kill me for tooting-her-horn, she is just really good.

The following are just a couple cute pictures of Shad I have managed to snap myself. After the blooper reel at the beginning I figured he deserved a couple good ones on here too.