Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Valentine's Day and Photography Challenge Day #14 - Eyes


This one is my photo for Day #14:


This was Scott's Valentine's Day box.  (Thank you Pinterest.)  I did not know about this whole valentines box at school thing until Claire got to the 1st grade.  (Bless her Kindergarten teacher and her current 2nd grade teacher for just having them make containers IN CLASS.) 

I can't say I love this tradition.  Too much pressure. You find out whether your kid needs to make one with a week's notice.  And then you have to create something fabulous so that your child will LOVE it and won't feel jealous of all the other kids' boxes.  And you find yourself competing with parents who make their children life size silver robots and cupcakes the size of a laundry basket (I am NOT exaggerating).

I don't want to play.  Let's grab whatever shoebox we have around and slap some stickers on it, I say.  But I tried to be fun this year for Scott because this idea wasn't too complex.  Still a shoe box, just paint and hot glue instead of stickers.

Yah, so um, I forgot the part where letting him do it involved handing him bright green paint and a paint brush.  I just don't DO paint with my kids.  It gives me a brain aneurism just thinking about it. I wish I was more fun and relaxed.  I keep trying to pretend that I'm that fun mom who lets her kids paint.  It's not working.

And then in the end, Scott was home sick with a fever on Valentine's Day anyway.  Oh well.  At least his fun box was there to receive his valentines for him.

In other Valentine's Day related events:

In fit of ambition, I decided to do handmade valentines with the kids this year.  I used this idea I saw a couple years back.  I thought it would be fairly easy and the kids could do most of it.  I always get these delusional visions of doing fun crafts WITH them and all of us actually enjoying ourselves. 

Turns out my kids can't reliably wield a stapler.  So I did all of the stapling and most of the filling with Valentine's colored M&M's.  But they did do all the cutting, addressing, signing, and some of the filling.  I guess that's not too bad.

Scott's weren't too difficult because he agreed to print his on various colored papers:






Claire, however, insisted on printing hers out on white and coloring them all:



I tried to warn her that it would be A LOT of work.  She was making 20 valentines.  But she was determined.  And surprise, surprise, someone got really sick of coloring them after about four. 

I wish I could say that I refrained from saying, "I told you so."  I also wish I could say that I refrained from threatening and/or yelling in order to get her to finish them up.

But everything got done in plenty of time and on the day, Claire got to go to school sporting heart hair:


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I want to force myself to practice taking photos a little more, so I'll be posting for this 30 Day Photography Challenge even though the "official" challenge is over.  Posts may or may not be daily.

My rules for my self are:
1 - Take everything in manual mode
2 - No post-processing, only SOOC

Friday, February 17, 2012

Photography Challenge Day #13 - Yourself With 13 Things

This sweater is a "13 Thing."



As in, I've owned this sweater since I was 13.  In fact, I think I got it from my aunt when I was 10.  I love that this purple is so bright it's almost like fluorescent purple, if that's possible.  I tried to capture it but I'm not sure that it shows.  Just trust me - this baby is so purple it practically reaches out and head butts you.

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I want to force myself to practice taking photos a little more, so I'll be posting for this 30 Day Photography Challenge even though the "official" challenge is over.  Posts may or may not be daily.

My rules for my self are:
1 - Take everything in manual mode
2 - No post-processing, only SOOC

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Best $15 I Ever Spent

Someone FINALLY went #2 in the potty!  So off we went to let her pick out a present:
 

Of course - OF COURSE - she picked the pink fancy nightgown with princesses on it.  I keep underestimating Kate's capacity for cliche girly-ness.

Not until I had Kate did I come to truly understand that there are (at least) 3 different genders:  tomboy, ALL-boy, and girly-girl.

In other news, we're an all underwear house now!!!  Kate's pleased because all that junk in her trunk fits into her pants MUCH better now without the extra padding.

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Who Wouldn't Smile for This Photographer?

 

Or maybe snicker is more likely???

This kid cracks me up.  He rode his bike to school today and every time he was riding without having to stop, he was cheering.  Think like, "WOO!" but continuous, with slight modulation, and very high pitched.  The ENTIRE. WAY. TO. SCHOOL.  

"Wooo-oooooo-ooo-ooooooooooooooooooooo-oooooooooo-oooo-oooooooooo-ooooooooooo-ooooo-oooooooooo-oo-ooo..."

He sounded like a lunatic.  As he would come up behind people walking, they would look back to figure out what was coming at them and to determine whether or not they should flee for their lives.  Then they would realize it was just Scott and not some sort of siren.  Next they would look questioningly at me who was following about 20 yards behind him.  And I was too busy cracking up to offer any kind of explanation.