• personal

    Happy Halloween!

    Boy, we had a very, very busy day here with the lawyer, the PGA golfer, and Buzz Lightyear. Timmy was wearing his costume from about 8:15am until around 7pm. And when I told him he had to take it off for his nap, you should’ve seen the fit he threw. It was major! I had to peel it off his flailing body in the middle of the livingroom floor. Well, at least I know it was worth every cent!Img_5693sc Img_5701sl

    The boys came home for lunch and then had their parade at school, which was so cute and fun. Timmy loved going to the "hoorade" and seeing everyone dressed up. Here are some of the boys’ friends and teachers. Then after school, it was time for some trick-or-treating. We ended up meeting Timmy’s best buddy "O" and her parents and going out TorT’ing with them. Img_5721sl Img_5723sl Img_5776scImg_5804sl  Img_5764sl Img_5711slImg_5759slImg_5793sc   Img_5725scImg_5745sl 

    Jack looked so much like John, it was freaking me out. I mean, he looks like him normally, but with the trial bag, suit and tie (John has the same exact tie) it was just so obvious. Patrick looked super cool as a golfer and got lots of good compliments on his costume. We ran into their friends while out too. Img_5706sl Img_5709slImg_5811slImg_5801sc   

    They had a great Halloween (my foot hurts from walking so much) and have a nice haul of candy. Mostly chocolate. It’s all good.

  • personal

    the scary house

    There is a house in our neighborhood that does a huge, crazy, halloween set up with life-size (and bigger) freaky mannequins. They board up the windows of the house to really make it look like an abandoned house, with spooky music playing, flashing lights, the works… It’s crazy. They have one side of the display that is like a graveyard with zombies and the undead walking around (ripping other undead’s guts out of their chests- charming). And the other side is a combination of horror story figures (dracula, the mummy, witches, Jason of Friday the 13th fame) and clowns. Big, scary, freaking, BAD CLOWNS. Now, I must mention how I hate clowns. They scare the crap out of me. Even the friendly looking ones from the circus. There is just something wrong with clowns. Clowns are bad. And if you think I hate them, Robin is even more scared of them than I am. I think we got a lot of our clownphobia from the Stephen King book "It". Yeah, that was a good one. Loved that book…hated the clown.

    For the sake of good photography and more practice, I sucked it up and took some shots of the evil clowns from hell. They are very colorful, though. Scary as shit, but colorful.  Img_5561rc Img_5565rc Img_5573rc Img_5567rc

    Some of the clowns even come with cute accessories, like a bunch of balloons with a severed head (please note the undead/zombie guy on impaled on the lampost in the background). And here is one of the scarier undead. And my personal favorite- the birthday baby clown. Not much worse than that, huh??Img_5558sc_2

    And this is how Timmy likes to look at the scary house. He likes it, but only from far away. Img_5552sc

    Let’s go home. Img_5540sc

    Now that you are officially going to have nightmares tonight, Happy Halloween everyone!

  • personal

    pumpkin carving

    It’s that time. Not too soon before Halloween so they don’t get all rotten and yuck. We had my in-laws over for carving and dinner on Sunday night and had a lot of fun. Uncle Nelson even made a brief appearance. Timmy napped thru most of the carving, but did enjoy the end product. The big boys had fun designing their pumpkins on paper, which Daddy then carved for them. And they still gag over the pumpkin goop. Still. Img_5598sc Img_5603sc

    I saw a "cannibal pumpkin" on some website and decided to copy that one. It did come out super cute (if not a little inappropriate) but it met an early demise when being transported on to the porch. Sad. Img_5619sc

  • personal

    Full Manual, baby!

    Thank you, Karen Russell!! I am now officially working in full manual on my camera. And it’s FUN! And not nearly as scary as I would have thought. I actually really, really like it. Way more control, especially in baaaad lighting situations. We will see how it goes during an actual shoot though. I might have to revert back to AV (apeture priority) mode… some of the little ones move waaaay too fast for me to be rechecking and changing the settings all the time. I am afraid I might totally miss the shot.

    But, I had the BEST time in the class on Saturday (nevermind the fact that I had to get up at 5:30am, on the road with Beth at 6am in the pitch black pouring rain, and drove at least 1/2 an hour the wrong way) and it was so worth it in time and money. And Karen is such a great teacher…I had a few really good "a-ha!" moments in class. She just rocks. I even got to spend a little time with her after class just chatting and it really just made my day. My favorite thing about her is that she is so good at what she does but is in no way full of herself about it- she dosen’t talk down to you, no question is stupid, and she has such a way about explaining things so you really GET it. Not to mention she is so sweet. I like that she is so willing to share her knowledge and that she is still learning too. I am definitely a bunch of steps behind her in the photography department…but that works for me. I will continue to "stalk her blog" and just learn what she learns. Img_5518sc Img_5511sc So, thanks Karen! You are the best!! Hope you had fun in Philly.

  • personal

    Goofballs

    Yup, those are my boys. Goofy thru and thru. They are so good to eachother though. Today Patrick ended up missing his class (all of third grade went) field trip to a Mexican Restaurant. He came home with a terrible stomach this morning and was SO BUMMED he was going to miss the trip. After being home for a while and eating a plain bagel and being completely fine, I was going to take him over to the restaurant to meet his class, but after he and I both gave it some additional thought, we skipped the trip. Mexican isn’t exactly the way you want to go after having stomach trouble and riding on a bumpy hot school bus right after eating…not so much.

    So, we ended up taking him over to school after the trip so he could go the rest of the day. When we got there the buses were pulling up and Jack saw me and was hysterical crying. He was so upset that Patrick didn’t get to go. He had a good time, but even his teacher said he was missing Patrick and felt so bad that he couldn’t be there. Luckily, Patrick’s teacher is so sweet and picked up a gift certificate so that Patrick can go and eat there. So now his being home instead of going on the trip is going to cost me about $100 so we can ALL go eat there. He was fine the rest of the day, even had pizza and a meatball hero for dinner. Img_4324sc