The winter that never came

This winter has been unseasonably warm and it has made such a difference in my energy levels and attitude. I haven't gotten any January doldrums because I've been able to be outside a lot (in shorts!) soaking up vitamin D and getting tons of fresh air. The days are already getting longer, so Friday after school we took the boys "hiking."

Since Jon and I met, we have always gone on long walks together, talking. If we call it hiking, it sounds a lot fancier right? We went to a nearby neighborhood with a big lake and a walking trail and let the kids run like crazy. A highlight includes Nate getting a glimpse of the lake and shouting, "I AM GOING TO CHECK OUT ALL THIS NATURE!!!!!!!!!" It was a perfect start to a beautiful weekend that also included a couple of hours at a local lake beach soaking up more rays.

Tanika recently commented asking how we decide which photos go on the walls of our house. It's hard to explain the decision making process but when I see the photo, I KNOW when it has to go on our walls. This one from the hike? It will be on our walls.

Project 365 drop out. Again. Yes, again.

I've had it on my Mondo list to complete a Project 365 (take one photo a day for a year). 27 days into my fourth attempt, I am calling it quits and saying good-bye to this goal for awhile. Maybe forever.

I mostly wanted to do this because I thought this would help improve my photography. Starting my business pushed my photography more in every aspect than I ever imagined. It improved everything - my workflow, my speed, my interaction with people, my understanding of light, and creating my vision. During Project 365, I found myself taking a photo just to get it done. Those are not the kinds of photos I want.

I also had grand plans to complete an album at the end of the year. To me, it is completely unrealistic to pick just one photo a day for an album. With two kids, sometimes I can not pare it down to one. And sometimes, it takes more than one photo to tell the story I want to tell.

I wanted to show an example of what I mean, so here are some extra photos I took the day of our holiday card shoot. I'm going to just post the photos without captions to see if the photos can tell the story for me. Could you imaging picking just one of these?

Sometimes to get farther in our dreams, we have to say good bye to old dreams that don't fit us. Good bye Project 365, another time. Maybe.

Kids are dumb

This is the first week back at school after 5 weeks off for the boys. Alex has noticeably more energy every day with so little activity during the day, so we've been taking him out for morning walks before school. This morning I took him to our neighborhood playground.

Laura: Check the slides to see if they're wet before you go down them.
Alex: They are wet!

He then proceeded to slide down, head first,on his belly, completely drenching his winter coat and the entire front of his pants.

I like big prints and I can not lie

Oh Pinterest, you devil.

I've started to only check Pinterest once a week or so. After returning from Phoenix I was excited to see a new craft. A craft I could do. A craft right up my alley. Turning your photos into 3 foot tall prints. (Here's the tutorial.)

YES.

Jon set off on this adventure with me last night, sans kids. First up - a huge print. Apparently you can go to any OfficeMax or print shop and ask for an engineer's print. For $4, I got a 36"x24" print on paper (NOT photo paper).

The OfficeMax guy said I had a nice camera to take photos like that
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Then we were to head to a hardware store to get foam board. Guess what? Not 1, not 2, not 3 but FIVE employees told us the wrong location of foam board. And it would have been so helpful to know that foamboard is THIS BIG (Jon is 6'4"):




Jon: "This will never fit in the car."
Laura: "Oh it will fit. It MUST fit."
At the car
Laura: "This doesn't even come close to fitting in the car."
Jon: "Yep."

So we broke it in half and squeezed it into the back seat. How has Jon not tired of my antics after the last 12 years? I don't know.

Then I huffed some spray glue in the garage and made these:




I still need to trim the edges and paint them. I thought I might use them in my office. BUT? These prints are TOO SMALL.




These will go on the third floor and I'm back to the drawing board with what to do with that office wall. Maybe I will get inspired if I huff some more spray glue and troll Pinterest.

Anddddddddddddddd........ now I'm totally screwed

The master bedroom and my office are two of the last rooms in the house to get decorated. There is a LOT of wall space in both rooms, so I scoured Pinterest for some ideas on frame groupings. After much deliberation, I put together this arrangement and asked Jon to hang it for me in our bedroom:




The plan was to do something similar in my office with dark wood frames, light blue matting, and all black and white photos. It was going to look AH-mazing.

However. Getting the frames up on the wall in that exact pattern took Jon HOURS. Now I either need to figure out Plan B for my office or suck it up and hang the frames myself instead of getting my super organized uber detailed husband to do it for me.

In the meantime that bedroom wall looks exactly perfect to me!

A confession

I've always had an iron stomach when it comes to the boys doing physical things. Jump from a rock as an early toddler? No problem. Jump into 10 feet of water at the age of 3? Bring it. But this thing.... it scares the pee right out of me:




It shouldn't scare me. Their adept little hands and feet are safe climbing up there and back down. There's practically no way to fall to the ground without being stopped by wires. But when they're completely above my head, climbing higher and higher, I can help but feel the fear rise up in my throat and panic about MY BABIES!!!

But oh how they love it.




They are so happy and so proud doing this, and that's why I know I have to back off. Not show my panic. Let them be free and grow and spread their wings and try new things. It is one of the hardest parts of parenting, to let them get into situations where they might get hurt, even though I know sometimes the greatest risks bring the greatest rewards.



This parenting thing is tough, yo. What scares you?

Need to get this off my chest

We watched the Golden Globes at my sister's house. I love me some Angelina (here's my letter to her) but if one more person raves about her dress or how great she looked, I am going to scream at them. Or maybe junk punch them.


LOOK AT THOSE SKELETON ARMS. That is a person who is not eating. I've been very open here talking about how I used to have anorexia, and those arms? She is sick, people. I literally wanted to puke when she presented her award because you could see the bones inside her elbow.

But she was not the only offender of the night. Modern Family is one of my favorite shows but seriously, someone needs to get Julie Bowen some help. She is literally wasting away in front of our eyes, skinnier every week.


And do not get me started on the plastic surgery. So many faces were jacked up this year. Michelle Pfeiffer. Madonna. Even Helen Mirren appeared to have a facelift since the last awards shows.

What really really really makes me angry is how we, as a culture, worship this. Is this what we want for our daughters? Is this what we want to consider normal?

I sure as hell DO NOT want my sons to think the above photos are attractive. I want them to look at those photos and worry. I want them to see those women and get them help. I want them to think that women can age gracefully without having to go under the knife. I want them to think that HEALTHY is beautiful.

Who's with me?