11.07.2009


11.08.2009

11.09.2009



11.10.2009

Photo.A.Day

11.03.2009



11.04.2009


11.05.2009


11.06.2009

Don't my booys have goofy grins!!

photo.a.day.november.2009

I have made a goal to take one picture a day for the entire month of November. If you don't like lookin and pictures of my kids you may want to check back in a month!! Here goes...

11.01.2009



11.02.2009

dumont.2009.

Love Dumont. Especially on Halloween weekend. Dirty faces. Boogery noses. Sand in every nook and cranny.








Sleepy babies loving on daddies.



Gorgeous girls in Rhinos


and in shades.






Cute boys raging on rides.

Lovin on babies.

Grams

After talking to my mom and hearing that Grammy was in need of some contact, i decided to take advantage of the fact that Terry and Brett would be gone on a campout, and head up to Hurricane, UT to stay with Gram for a night. It was a really quick trip, less than 24 hours, but I am so glad we did. The kids had fun loving up Gram and she did too!

Grammy has swings out her back porchand the kids couldn't wait to get dressed in the morning to jump on those swings.

We spent Saturday afternoon at the park with my cousin Lisa's kids and Aunt Patti. It was really fun to visit with them.

Bonnie liked digging in the dirt at the horseshoe pits.

Colby thinks he's pretty hot stuff with his monkey bars ability!!

because I must

I must blog simply because I have the cutest boy EVER! I dare you to disagree. His smile and luvs get me through the days, especially when things are rough, he just knows when I need a hug!

blue

Remind me to send a thank you note to my Visiting Teachers for the container of Halloween candy!

punkin' patch

Colby had his first field trip in kindergarten today. Mrs. Cefelli's class along with a few others traveled on the bus to the Gilcrease Orchards. Very exciting for Colby, he couldn't get over no seat belt which is interesting because I can never get him to wear his in the car! Each of the kids got to pick out there very own pumpkin. They also got to have a bottle of fresh apple cider and then we went on a tour of the apple press where they make the the apple cider. I understand it is very delicious, I didn't get to try any because Colby and Bonnie drank it all!

Colby picked the biggest pumpkin he could find, thankfully CJ's mom had a wagon so we didn't have to cart it all around the place! It was a very blustery morning and Bonnie wasn't liking it, she kept grabbing my face and saying "bak-in-a-car MOM"



It was a fun day and I think I we will have to make another trip to pick our pumpkins for carving this Halloween.

Complete!

It has taken quite sometime but it is finally done. Thanks to the man in my life for sacrificing an entire Saturday to finish building it and helping my vision come to light. It all began when I saw in my Pottery Barn catalog, the solution to my disorganization problems. You see, I kinda have a little bit of scatterbrainedness (it's totally a word) when it comes to things like papers to sign, appointments to remember and who needs to be where, when! Well the beautiful Pottery Barn version was a whopping $600 or more so I kissed the idea goodbye, that is until I was blog hopping and saw Sara's version, that she did without and manly help (I want to be her when I grow up, power tools scare me) So I knew what I wanted but not a clue as to how to do it! So I enlisted my manly man of a husband to help with the power tools part and viola here you have my fabulous Message Center. The whole thing is about 4 and a half feet square. Each square is aprox. 12 inches. There is peg board, chalk board, white board, steel board for magnets, fabric padded boards and corkboard. I used my bag-o-vinyl scraps that Shannon gave to me to add my kids names and days of the week so I can remember when scouts is because for the life of me I can never remember!! I also made a re-usable calender on one of the whiteboard squares, just squares of vinyl and days of the week, so i can erase each month and write in a new month! I couldn't be happier with how it turned out and I haven't forgotten scouts or Activity days since!!

Before and After

I have been getting a lot of e-mails and questions about photography lately, which I find HILARIOUS because I only pretend to know what I am doing. I have taken classes and read numerous books on photography so I can kinda play like I know what I am talking about. One of the many questions I get is "What kind of editing do you do to your pictures?" There was a time, and if you go way back in my archives, you will find i did a lot of editing to my pictures, trying to make my pictures look better, I was never happy even after all of the fiddling I did with photoshop. It wasn't until I found out how to capture my images correctly "in camera" that I began to see the results I wanted. In the following image you will see my sooc (straight out of camera) image with a little bit of sharpening for web on the left and the edited image on the right. Now what exactly did I do to this image? I always start off with a defog (just a "pre-sharpen") then I just did a bit of a boost in the contrast and color balance to fix the redness in Sam's skin, and I bit of sharpening on the eyes to give them some sparkle then I just resized and sharpened for web. It took me all of about 1 min to edit and I am really happy with the results. Now this is my process for most of my pictures here on the blog, OR LESS (my mother of all posts a few posts down was all pretty much sooc) Now for my clients I do a bit more like skin smoothing and adding a vignette or maybe some fancy schmancy vintage action!

BTW---I'm thinking of submitting this (and some others) to the Gap Casting call!! Whatcha think? Are my kids cute enough, I think so but then again I may be a bit biased!

We're Great and getting Greater!

I love our school! We have a fabulous principal and staff and a PTA that is awesome. We had our Back to School celebration and balloon launch on Friday morning where the Mrs. Douglas, the principal spoke and read a bit from Dr. Seuss' "Oh the Places You'll Go." Mrs Douglas had such a charismatic way to speak to and inspire these young children. Our school motto is "We're great and getting greater" and every Friday morning before school when the children line up to go into school each class takes turns giving and opening ceremony on different subjects but always end with and round of "We're great and getting greater!" All of the school kids and staff shout this out and is very powerful. I know that because of the commitment of the teachers and staff of this great school my kids will be better people!

The balloon launch is a special tradition reserved for back to school and this year we released over 1200 balloons. Each child and teacher and staff member had a balloon to let go and then there were extras there for the parents and other children that attended. There was also 3 yellow balloons to represent the police, firemen and troops who serve and protect.

It was an inspiring thing to be apart of while all these balloons went up in the air to hear all the children chanting

"We're great and getting greater"



"We're great and getting greater"



"We're great and getting greater"



I searched and searched for Samantha in the crowd of kids but I couldn't find here to get some shots of her but I had fun with Colby as he got to experience this great ceremony!

Random Bits of Summer Goodness

As I was preparing for this post I came up with numerous titles. Let me start by prefacing that I blog because I don't seem to have time to scrapbook and eventually all of my blogs are put into a blurb book at the end of each year to chronicle our life with [4] conk kids! Alternate title #1 "CAUTION---PHOTO OVERLOAD"Alternate #2 "Bonus Features" Like on a DVD, the added material that only true enthusiasts will find interesting with more information than anyone can find interesting other than the maker of said "bonus material" and not good enough to MAKE IT into the original movie!Alternate #3 "I have the cutest kids in the world"Alternate #4 "I have 4000 pictures from this summer and have no where to put them!"So there you have it, my explanation of the post in 4 alternative titles! So buckle up because you are about to embark on a VERY LONG blog post with and gross overabundance of pictures. If you are not a "true enthusiast" you may want to came back on another day when you wont have to scroll through 35 pictures of my family, I'M NOT KIDDING 35 PICTURES! (If you happen to notice there is a lot of pictures of Bonnie it's because she will finally smile for the camera and not run and lick my lens so i have taken advantage of capturing her like never before!!

Picture #1 --The Bonster glowing in the beautiful sunset light after a fun day of swimming at Grandmas in the fabulous summer heat----I know you don't think the heat is that fabulous but you may be looking for it next February and wishing for a bit of that fading summer sun!


Picture #2 -- Colby In Oregon. Colby learned to ride a bike taught by his big brother, what a great big brother (he taught Sam too) I didn't get of picture of him on his bike but here is on 2 other kind of wheels.

Picture #3-- Bonnie --I just love those skinny little legs poking out the bottom of that swi-soot!



Picture #4 The swings were a huge hit this summer in Oregon

#5 Quite possibly I have the goofiest 11 year old there ever WAS!! (and I love you can see the ever present sunburn Brett had this summer, he was under the impression a "tan" makes you look tough, what he doesn't realize is that a sunburn does the opposite.


#6 Bubbles and Sammy JO, I love how her nose is wrinkled up, it reminds me she's just a little kid, sometime I forget that and I expect too much of her. I'm going to work on that!


#7 Kids and Cam, the kids love that dang dog, so i will put up with him even though he makes me sneeze and my eyes water!



#8 Bonnie eating CHIP!! This was the dinner she ordered pizza, all by herself (she's not even 2 people!)


#9 I am putting this picture in because of Colby's "spikeys" he loves his hair done in spikeys, it take time due to a cowlick so it doesn't happen very often.


#10 or was it 11, O CRAP, I'm loosing count already, I better stop countingJust me "by the river"

OK, I know not all of you will appreciate this but It needs to be documented so that he will stop telling me he needs to "cut back" come on already babe, your waisting away! And check out the manly wound on his leg from his high adventure scout camp!


My boy, 3 days before starting middle school, scared and in desperate need of a haircut! I love how you can see Sam in the background trying to ruin the picture, than heaven for shallow depth of field!





Colby and Nathan at Tuachan, Silly boys!

It has become the summer of "funny faces" for this little girl.


These are definately not the best pictures but I love what they capture, Colby trying to love in his baby sister and her pushing him away. Her favorite word is GOWAY right now, She won't be held by any one unless she want to!









My little beach bum! Bonnie loved the beach and being in her swi-soot! Terry took this picture and I love his eye for composition!




I can just smell the sunscreen when I look at this one.


Colby came out to the loft on day and said "Hey mom, do I look like a Army dude? Will you take my picture"



This baby has become the mother of all Mama's girls!








I love red, I love polkadots, I LOVE THIS GIRL!


Grandma has been crocheting like crazy this summer. She made this orange hat for Sam because she knows it's Sam's favorite color.



This picture makes me giggle because to the naked eye you think, here's Terry laughing and having a good time, but I know the truth, It's Terry saying through his teeth, "please don't take my picture

We ate LOTS of Dairy Queen this summer! Yummy dairy goodness!!


Somebody had a birthday this month!


Little things about these pictures is why I am document them, Like the fact that Bonnie's shoes are completely undone, she won't keep her shoes on and if they are they are unbuckled, she is such an independent child.



The river in the early morning light!





This is my favorite picture to close the summer, I loved how great these two got along this summer, they played together and had fun all summer long! It was out of the ordinary but I hope not forever. Someday I hope they will be as good of friend as they were this summer!

First day and all that jazz

As many of you all have experienced over the last few weeks, we have had the pleasure of returning "Back to School" today. It was a bit different this year with Brett heading off to middle school this year. He has been dreading this day for Oh about a year now. I think it was actually the first day of school last year that he said, I DO NOT want to go to middle school next year. His anxieties were heightened when the "Scholastic News" did and issue focusing on bullies in 6th grade. He has been begging me for the past 7 or 8 months to home school him for this year. All of his fears and worries were set to rest today and he now knows that there is nothing to fear in 6th grade. He does think it's a bit confusing but that will pass in time. I am proud of him for not totally freaking out and making hard on me.The first thing Brett said to me after I picked him up from school was "Mom, I'm going to get straight A's this year" to which he then added -"what would you get me?" The best thing about today- Lockers and cute girls(seriously? cute girls, DUDE your 11) Samantha was a bit concerned about her teacher this year as well, she had heard that she was mean (strict = mean) I assured her she would be fabulous and I was right.The first thing Sam said to me when I picked her up after school was "I LOVE MY TEACHER" See, Mom's are always right! The best thing about today - Recess

Our "baby" boy entered the public school system to which he lined up promptly to begin the next 13 years of his indoctrination. He was excited, much more than I was. I will miss my sweet boy coming up to me periodically through the day just to say I love you mom! It is only for 2 and 1/2 hours, so at least we still have our afternoons. Bonnie was lost without him this morning she just kept finding me this morning and saying with her hands up and a shoulder shrug "Co-by" She was soo happy when we picked him up and she said to him when we got in the car "missed you Co-by" (she did tell all the kids that today!)

When asked how was your first day Colby said "Good" with the least amount of excitement he could muster up! He then said "I missed you today mom" That's ma'boy, I wouldn't say he's a mama's boy (but he is) While I was cutting his hair Sunday night I said to him "How 'bout you stay home from school this year and we will just tell people you are 4 years old and not ready for school yet?" He said "OK, if you want me to mom" How awesome is that, how many kids would be willing to pretend they are a year younger than they are just to make their mom happy! The best thing about today- snacks Well another year and more milestones for us. After dessert at Dairy Queen it was decided that all in all, it was a good First day!

WHen did this happen?

When did my baby girl turn into a KID?
When did my baby girl decide that she can order Pizza at Chili's?
When did my baby girl get big enough to scream "YEAH PIZZA" when her pizza comes?
When did my baby girl get big enough to want panties on?
When did my baby girl decide she was old enough to call "Grannie"? (grandie)
When did my baby girl get big enough to put ME down for a nap, close my door and say "nigh night mom?"
When did my baby girl get big enough to unbuckle herself out of her carseat?
When did my baby girl get big enough to have her own opinion on EVERYTHING?

I think it was when she got bangs!