Category Archives: Photography

Events, Project 365, Rachel

Rachel’s Birthday Extravaganza

8 Comments

To celebrate Rachel’s 12th birthday party, we decided to host a Sleepover Extraordinaire. First Rachel invited all over her friends (most of them from large homeschooling families), next I begged the moms to come along (“to keep me sane company”), then we convinced Rachel to let us bring the little sisters as well (that added 3 five year olds to the party), finally we made sure to grab some girls from the old neighborhood.

Yes, all of that meant we needed two vehicles (packed to the ceiling) to take everyone off for the sleepover.

How else do you have a Birthday Extravaganza?

girls with attitude

A few of Rachel’s nearest and dearest friends – Hannah, Emily, Sarah, Alivia, Bethany, Jenny, Brigette, Katie, Elizabeth and Abby. Leanne had to go home early so she missed all the photo shoots.

We had quite the assortment of entertainment for the party.

Some friends loaned us their karaoke machine (Thanks, Casey!!). It was a huge hit, playing cds at full volume (or so it seemed) while the girls sang along.

can we sing too?
The little girls were very intrigued by the Singing Machine.

For her birthday, Rachel received Dance Praise 2 which plays contemporary Christian music and includes dance steps to go along. Thankfully the girls didn’t ask me to demonstrate for them.

I’d hate to blow them away with my stunning dancing abilities.

Or scare them.

Or give them nightmares.

rachel's present

Tim’s mom gave Rachel an incredible gift for her birthday party. She made nine (yes, I said NINE!!) gingerbread houses, assembled them, and had them all ready and waiting for us upon our arrival.

On Monday morning, she came over with containers of frosting/glue, bags of decorating candy, and instructions on how to create our very own Stunning Gingerbread Homes.

Each family went home with their own gingerbread house, which had the added benefit of encouraging sisters to work together in peace and harmony.

Or at least covered in sugar.

There was even a house for the littlest girls to decorate. And, since I’m a firm believer in more is better, I made sure the last group of younger sisters came over to join Sarah’s posse.

cute girlsmore cute girls

It was so kind of Rachel to allow the little sisters to join the party. Sarah had a wonderful time with Ava, Tarah, Abby, Avery, and Elise.

I’m trying not to kick myself for missing the opportunity to take pictures of all the gingerbread houses lined up in a sugary display of yummy confection. It’s hard work being the mother, hostess, party organizer, chef, AND photographer.

I did manage to get this picture.

gingerbread goodness

Some creative gingerbread ideas:

  • A snowman made out of white gumdrops with red scarf.
  • A pond designed with blue M&M’s with a gold fish (M&M) swimming in the middle.
  • An igloo fashioned out of non-pareils.
  • A candy cane cross at the top of chimney.
  • A stone covered chimney made out of chocolate rocks.

And much, much more sugary, gumdrop, chocolate creativity.

I’m not sure the girls slept very much. You can see they look a bit blurry here.

outside girls

Oh wait, maybe that’s the photographer who was a bit blurry. I’m not sure I slept very much either.

A wonderful time was had by all.

1 Birthday Girl
11 Party Girls
6 Little Girls
3 Moms (old girls?)

Thanks to everyone who made it an AWESOME birthday party!!

Kathy
Project 365 – Day 351

Share or follow
Share

Related posts:

Parenting Tips, Project 365

A Submissive Wife

11 Comments

Tim says I have to get to bed by 11 pm tonight.

We read a lot of marriage books during our courtship and first years of marriage. During the submission chapters, I dutifully took notes, vowing to cheerfully submit to my husband. I have a wonderful mother and mother-in-law who model beautiful Christian marriages of mutual love and respect. My grandmother was a staunch advocate of marriage and believed submission was easy when your spouse was laying down his life for you as Christ did for the church.

No one ever warned me submission would involve bedtimes.

That’s going from preaching to meddling to this night owl.

Okay, perhaps Tim didn’t really say I have to go to bed by 11 pm. In fact, all he really did was make a suggestion. And, to be completely truthful (because I’m all about being honest on the blog here), it’s only because I was an emotional wreck today and am very over-tired and he’s looking out for my best interest.

Hmmm. That sounds an awful lot like loving as Christ loved the church.

Unfortunately that means I don’t have a parenting tip for the day. I could have spent some time this evening writing, but I decided to read to the children instead. If I ignore my children but compose a brilliant parenting tip, what have I accomplished?

giving tree presents

Presents for the “Giving Tree,” a project blessing needy children in the community.

So, instead of cozying up to my wireless keyboard and sharing words of wisdom, I was snuggled on Big Blue with three children, reading Christmas books, opening birthday presents and reviewing piano lesson work.

Consider that your tip for the day – relish the sweet moments with your children. Hug them, read Christmas books, play a game, bake cookies. Smile. Close your mouth and wait just a few extra seconds before speaking words of correction and discipline.

Kathy
It’s three minutes to 11 pm – I still have to publish this post, throw together a lunch for Tim, turn off all the lights in the house, run a quick load of laundry, put the last of the dishes away and start the dishwasher. Maybe I’ll make 11:30 pm. That’s pretty close.

Yep, that’s me, always one to heed good advice.
Sigh.
Project 365 – Day 344

Share or follow
Share

Related posts:

Project 365, Silliness

A Collection of Images

4 Comments

One of the joys of watching your children grow and mature through the years is delighting in their emerging gifts and skills. As a amateur photographer and obsessive blogger, I am thrilled when my children share in my hobbies.

How else would I enjoy such photographic treasures as these?

joshua working

Joshua helped me get the Christmas lights up today.

who is it?

Name this talented photographer .. creative self-portrait!!

Oh yes, and this little gem of a picture:

nice car part

I’m awfully glad they caught that on film. Nothing like looking through the eyes of a six year old boy at the world around you.

Or at least the driveway. Modern art, I guess.

And then there’s this one:

larynda's picture

Oh wait, no one in my family took that picture. I borrowed a WONDERFUL camera from a friend and this is one of her shots.

And this one:

what town is this?

What a gorgeous picture!

Of course, these family shots are much more interesting:

daniel leaps!

Look at Daniel perform stunning feats of athletic prowess! I thought that could only be done through Photoshop.

what happend to david?

Notice David crying in the background of the second picture. An injury occurred and we caught it on film! This is good stuff. It’s right up there with hubcaps and shadows.

I also ended up with 20 pictures of the boys taking apart David’s old bike.

Twenty!!

And you all wonder how I manage to take so many photos in one year.

I overheard my apprentice photographer say, “David, you and Daniel go sit by Joshua while he works so I can take a picture of all three of you. It’ll be perfect – all of the boys together.”

joshua and his pit crew

It brought a tear to my eye. They’ve already learned to stage pictures for the blog. Next time she’ll surely suggest the models run put on matching sweatshirts. One step at a time. Some wisdom is attained only through experience.

So hand your kids your digital cameras (thank goodness for DIGITAL!!!) and see what kind of photographic mysteries and beauty they uncover.

Kathy
Projet 365 – Day 342

Share or follow
Share

Related posts:

Project 365, Sarah

I Can Write My Name

12 Comments

Well, almost.

sarah and the gel paint
Sarah tries out her new Gel Paint.

Project 365 is coming to an end. Wednesday is Day 339. It’s been a long year of many pictures. No wonder I’m having trouble writing our family Christmas newsletter, I’ve already said everything on the blog.

I never thought I could really take a picture every day for an entire year. I guess I should have been more worried about taking only a SINGLE photo each day. :) Maybe the second edition of Project 365 should be: Take a meaningful picture every day. Hmmm.

What do you think?

  • Another round of Project 365 – don’t make it specific, just capture one image each day
  • Scrap the whole thing. Enough is enough, how many pictures of cute kids do we really need?
  • Change the whole focus – give each day a theme.
  • Less rambling/babbling on the blog, more pictures.

Other thoughts…

Kathy

Share or follow
Share

Related posts:

Daily Life, Project 365, Silliness

The Pictures Are Here!

11 Comments

We recently had a photo shoot, about which Kathy wrote: Why Models Never Smile. It was quite the family outing, right up there with cutting a Christmas Tree or going to the Pumpkin Patch, but with none of the fun.

Actually, the photographer was pretty funny, working hard to get us all to smile or laugh, bossing us around in fine style, and keeping a running count of the number of times Joshua rolled his eyes. She tried to steal my Diet Coke, though, which was not quite so amusing — photographers need to know where not to cross the line. :)

Today the disk with the pictures arrived in the mail. Kathy saw the mailman coming (and even tried to wait for him) but had to go out, and so the disk was left for me to discover. “It’s a good thing Tim isn’t tempted by that sort of thing,” she consoled herself. “He’ll have no trouble waiting until I come home, so we can look at the pictures together.”

I called Kathy as I ripped open the envelope and slapped the picture disk into the CD tray — I was redirected to voicemail, since she apparently screens her calls. “Hey, Sweetie, just wanted you to know that the photo disk arrived today — I’m just loading the images onto your computer … ”

As I tell my boys, wife-taunting is a major perk of being married.

I received a call back almost before I had finished leaving the message. “What?” shrieked my bride, as I hurriedly adjusted the volume controls on my phone. “You had better just walk away if you want to see another sunrise, or whatever they call it when the sun comes up in the, er, ‘morning’.” (My beloved doesn’t really believe that there are two 7 o’clock hours in each day.) As threats go, it wasn’t particularly articulate, but chillingly effective, nonetheless. I backed slowly away from her computer, leaving the mouse pointer poised suggestively over the ‘OK’ button on the Image Loader wizard window.

I guess I’ll just have to wait until she gets home. Unless I were to pop the disk out and load them on a different computer, and then put it back …

Nah, she’ll ask me point-blank if I looked at ‘em, and then I’d dig myself even deeper. I’d better just wait …

What if I only looked at one picture, would that count? I could then ‘honestly’ say, “No, dear, I didn’t look at the pictures!”

Oh, I can’t stand it. I’ll just have to post a picture, so you can all enjoy. Here it is (scroll down):

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

Keep scrolling …

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

The Highly-Anticipated Pictures
There. I shared the whole disk with you. Nobody can say I’m stingy.

Tim
Project 365, Day 334

Share or follow
Share

Related posts: