Family Fun & Fotos on the 4th

We had a fun weekend celebrating the 4th. We tried to take it easy, for Ron's poor eye. Yesterday we took a walk on the trail near our home and stopped by the river to wade and throw rocks. Then we headed to a new public pool in our area, which received an A+ rating from the kids. We'll definitely head back there.

Today, after dropping Riley off for her 3 hours at work, we went up to Alpine to Moyle Park, hoping we could find some good backdrops for pictures. It worked, we got a few good shots, when I could get the kids to cooperate! Jared wasn't in much of a smiling mood, and Ellie couldn't hold still even for the camera to catch her with a fast shutter! We got some cute shots though to commemorate our day. I even set up the camera and let Jared take a picture of mom & dad, and it turned out better than I expected! Then off to home for a nice dinner of chicken fajitas and homemade ice cream....I need to work on my ice cream making skills a little more....it was more of a soup than a set up ice cream!(What was with that?!) Ended the night with the "Sidewalk of Fire". No pictures of that...I was manning the punk to light the fireworks as Ron couldn't see well enough to do it. Happy Independence Day!

They are so cooperative....try to get a real smile, and you just get goofy laughing! I do like this picture though, it shows their true selves!

Mom set up the shot, Jared pushed the button! I'm pretty pleased with what he got.

My favorite shot of the day. Love her eyes.

"The Little Mermaid"

Last week, Nicole's dance studio presented "The Little Mermaid" as their end of year recital. Nicole has had such fun this year taking dance. I think the funniest part about watching her dance is that she gets a little distracted by the other dancers, scenery, and what not that she is always looking around while doing her little dance steps. I guess the realization that she is part of the show and she needs to dance for the audience will come with maturity!

The show was really fun, and I enjoyed it, twice! I of course took pictures, which was interesting as I hadn't ever attempted taking pictures in a dark theater with no flash. After the first set of botched ones, I figured out where to set my white balance and such for a better looking outcome....of course once I had figured out the settings, when Nicole came out for her longer dance piece, she was right behind someone else and I couldn't even see her! Murphy's Law?!

Act 1 - Under the Sea
Nicole the Jellyfish

I love this one! She was watching the bubbles coming down from above! :)

Act 2 - "Les Poissons"

(I love her tongue sticking out! Concentrating on her moves.)

These were the botched ones, previous to figuring out where the White Balance, ISO, and shutter speed really needed to be. Oh well! Live and learn. :)

We were sure proud of Nicole for all the work she put in all year, and especially that long day at the theater (dress rehearsal, and two performances all in the same day!). She's excited to get started back into it next year.

Nicole: Class of 2020

This first lovely photo is what Nicole brought home after emptying her desk the last week of school....I'm not sure how she fit anything in there! Little bits of crayon, a dried up glue stick, markers without lids, all sorts of papers, a plethora of books, a broken pencil box, her Hannah Montana journal (wherein she proclaims her love of all things H.M.), winter gloves, and three socks(?!)...from off her feet at various times of the year.

I added to my list of things to work on with her this summer: Organizational Skills


Next we find Nicole with her teacher, Ms. Smith. Loved her. She is such a fun teacher that instills a lot of "hands on" learning and just a general excitement for education. She was also very helpful in pointing out a few "things" we needed to work on throughout the year, and was great to keep me updated on how Nicole was performing. Nicole is a very smart little girl, almost too smart for her own good, but needs to work on some social skills pertaining to working with others. Ms. Smith was very attentive with Nicole on these things and was just wonderful. She is moving into the Jr High this next year, and we are sad that Jared won't be able to have her as a teacher.

Nicole's class TA was Miss Gail. She was a no-nonsense kind of lady, which put me off a little bit at the very beginning, but she did it with enough love that the kids just loved her. Nicole especially enjoyed watching TV at Conference time trying to spot Miss Gail, as she sings in the Mormon Tabernacle Choir!


These are Nicole's little practice poses and shots for me against the black sheet. I thought hers turned out pretty cute. Welcome to second grade, my little lady!

Jared Finishes Kindergarten

Jared got better from his bout with pneumonia just in time to go back for the last two weeks of school. Every (well, almost every!) week Jared's class spotlighted a student. Most of the kids did it during their birthday week, but since Jared was born in July, he will never celebrate a birthday during school. I tried to time his week during his 1/2 birthday, but someone had already claimed that week as well. So I just waited until the end of school to get it as close to his bday as I could. We got to make a collage poster about Jared, he filled out a questionnaire, got to bring home and fill the "show & tell" box, and then we brought a treat in one day...since it was so hot that week, we did Otter Pops during recess! :) He was excited to finally get the chance to be Star of the Week.


On Friday of that week, Jared's class performed an Operetta of "Peter Rabbit". Jared played "Cottontail". He had a few memorized lines, and a bunch of songs. It was very cute. Ron did a video of it, and if you are really interested, you can find it here. This was also the day that I found out from a couple of other kindergarten moms that Jared has quite the following of "girlfriends" that are apparently going to "marry" him! So many, in fact, that one of the girls is "giving him up, because the competition is too stiff". (Little girls words, quoted to me from her mother!) The funniest part is that Jared doesn't have a clue that these little girls like him, he just thinks they are his friends that he has fun with! Now to figure out how to keep him going with this idea well into his teen years!


Last Thursday, Jared has his Kindergarten graduation. It was so cute, of course! I got all teary. This year just seemed to fly by. The weirdest part was when the presenter finished giving out the certificates, she presented them as the "Class of 2021". On to First Grade! What will I do with him in school all day?!


And last but not least, last Friday I got a black sheet to use as a backdrop...I pulled it out of the package and decided to try it out.....it'll look better (I hope) now that I've washed the fold marks out of it. Jared was only interested in doing goofy faces, so I took what I could get!

What I found....

My absolute favorite picture of Jared, ever. 1st birthday destruction of the cake. Just looking at this adorable chunk of a baby smeared with chocolate makes his mother want to eat him up! :)

Spring has Sprung, Race Results, Soccer Fun, and Green?!

Finally, Spring has sprung around this town. Although Mother Nature is still doing her bast to squelch it with wind, cold, rain, and occasional snow. It melts quickly though, when it happens. Here is our cute little Quaking Aspen putting out it's leaves. Am I the only one that finds new leaves almost as cute as new babies?! They are so fresh and clean, shiny, and are just a great color of green.


We got the results of the Fun Run the kids were in: Jared took 3rd place in the boys age 5-8 division! He couldn't have been prouder. The 2 kids that beat him were both 8 yr olds. I thought it was awesome that he stuck to his little race so well and was rewarded for it. Nicole took 11th place, and wondered why they didn't have a ribbon for her as well! ;) We are proud of both of them for doing their best.


Tis the season for soccer, and we finally had a little bit of decent weather for it. Jared had a great game with 3 goals. He loves playing soccer. I love getting fun shots with his "game face"! This weekend is supposed to be nice weather as well, and hopefully he will be able to go play. (He's trying to get over pneumonia right now!)



I'm not sure what is going on with all the lime green in this post, coincidence I suppose?!

Coming Clean

Okay, okay. The picture below was photoshopped. :) Hard to tell though, huh? ;)

We went up the the kids favorite park in the foothills last week, and they were up playing around, and Ron was taking still pictures with his new toy video camera. When we got home, we saw that picture and laughed because both of the kids were looking over at the same spot with an odd look. I mentioned it looked like they were seeing something scary like a a bear or something so he photoshopped one in! I thought for fun I'd just put the picture up to see what the reactions were! :)

I bet you all thought this was another spring cleaning post, didn't you?! I wish. But not much of that is going on with it being spring break for the kids. Lot's of messing up of the house, with toys and junk everywhere, but very little picking up, as usual. I'll get back in the cleaning groove when I'm down a few kids on a daily basis.

On slate for today, celebrating Ron's birthday. We'll make it fun for him, as he's still feeling a bit shell shocked at how old it is this year....anyone care to guess?!

My husband made me.....

a logo!

Because everyone should have a logo. :) What do you think?! (The flower is a Columbine. Which is just about my favorite flower in the world, followed by the wild Iris found in the meadow at the Upper Ranch in Arizona.....I can't wait to see if I get some in my backyard this summer!)

Not exactly sure what I'm going to do with it yet, other than use it as a watermark on my pictures. I'm playing around with the idea of making a blog/website for my pictures...just for fun. I do plan on actually taking pictures when it is warm again. That way my hands will work instead of freezing solid. That and the fact that the only colors we STILL have outside right now are various shades of brown. And various depths of white.....

Ellie's Dream House

B&W Challenge

Hope and Believe is having another fun photo challenge I thought I'd participate in. It is to take a photo(new or old) and make it B&W....I can do that! So here you go:


Funny bit of trivia with this shot: it's another self-timer deal!

Check THIS out!

Recognize these kids?!

He, he, he, he! The kids had a blast! Thanks, Nicole, and Rubberball, for letting us come play!

Go to THIS POST on THIS BLOG for more smashy face fun.

And thanks to onehm for the heads up that it was posted! ;)

Family picture out-take...

Since the leaves are great right now, and this is possibly the last day of warmish weather to get a new family picture with an "Autumn" look, we fit it in! Here is one of many out-takes. It is near (if not totally) impossible to get all six of us looking good in a picture. (This is pretty close, except for J!) It doesn't help that I am doing this with the self-timer!

Ellie's Double Take

On the "Picture Rock" in Yankee Boy Basin, San Juan Mountains of Colorado
Taken in August of 2006 and 2008

What a cute little stinker. Check out those rolls and dimples on her legs at 6 months! But her smile is still a winner, as always. I think we'll just keep taking pictures at this rock of her and eventually we'll have six Ellie's all photoshopped together!

More pairs!

My husband acquired a new possession today....Jared was thrilled about it because last week, Ron sold his dual-sport bike....

Anyway, he brought it home, and all I saw were pairs....PAIRS EVERYWHERE! So I just had to do it again! Without any further delay:

Two of a kind
f/8, 1/250, ISO 100, 28mm, action: PW Boost

Oh, and do you like Jared's watch? Yeah, my 4 yo thinks he can tell time!

Pairs.....

Hope & Believe is a fun photo-a-day blog that I like to check out, hoping the creative juices flowing there will spill onto me over the web! They even have weekly challenges, and have invited anyone to participate. So this week I finally decided to do it. The challenge this week is: a pair. On to my offering.....


Here is my little Ellie, she has lived for a pair of years, has a great pair of blue eyes, and today, is sporting a pair of pony's! :) Thanks for letting me play!

Photo info: f5.6, 1/200, ISO200, 55mm, action used: PW Boost

I Love To See The Temple...

Here's a good thing that came out of today's photo session....I caught this cute shot! This was after running a couple of actions on it(PW Vintage & a simple vignette frame). I ordered one for each of the little's bedrooms, because I've been meaning for the longest time to get a picture of the temple in their rooms. Now I've got it!

Slow week?!

Yep....not much going on around here....at least not really thrilling stuff anyway!

Monday, Nicole had her first piano recital. I am so glad to be done with that song! She's been practicing that little number since MARCH! I will really be so happy to never hear Matt, My Cat ever again in my life. :o) She did well...played her song a little too slow....and moved her mouth as she was counting, and was a bit distracted....which was evidenced by the fact that she let her eyes wander out to the audience during her playing! Oh well, she is her teacher's youngest student, and in my opinion did better than some of the older kids that started piano at the same time she did. If I get the nerve to try and upload the video we took, I'll add that later....I haven't even watched it though....that's how much I don't ever want to hear that song again! Here are some still shots though...

She's so talented, she plays with her eyes closed! just kidding....Mommy the master photographer only got one shot of her playing though, and I didn't check it close enough to notice that they were closed! Oops!

Flowers for our little performer.

The rest of this week was taken up with working on a little project for Father's Day. Which now Ron has a huge idea about, since I needed his help in editing the pictures.

We have a large wall in our dining area that has a picture on it that I'm tired of. So I wanted to take some cute pictures of the kids, blow them up, and make a picture wall. I decided to do a 16X20 of a group shot, and then surround that with 8X10's of each kid. I found some cute black frames for 50% off(woohoo!) at Hobby Lobby, and have spent the week trying to get shots of the kids...I finished off today and wondered to myself why I even try! I finally did get some good ones...but holy cow, my children do not follow instructions! I bet they will look back at these pictures one day and the only memory they will have is me freaking out at them to just look at the camera and smile! I hope that I can come to appreciate the pictures as well, as I gaze at them daily...and forget the frustration felt while taking them! ;o)

Here are some of the rejected shots....thank heaven for digital photography!

Riley really did do fine with the following of directions...it was the wind that kept "blowing" her shots! I crack myself up...

I'm pretty sure I asked for a smile....but instead I got this...

Ellie was much more interested in picking the flowers, smelling the flowers, not sitting down...pretty much anything was more interesting than looking at the camera.

Jared....in between the fake smiles and goofball poses I did get some cute shots of him.

There is the greatest place for pictures down by American Fork Hospital. Someone has a bunch of old cars, and they have built an old fashioned looking garage/gas station to store them at. The old rust buckets are outside, but the inside of the garage has a bunch of restored cars in it. Very fun for pictures!

The group shot....I have lots of these....between getting Nicole and Jared to just hold a pose and smile, and trying to get Ellie to just look at the camera....I almost gave up!

I think one of the most frustrating parts was editing all the pictures, and then downloading them to Costco for printing....only to realize that I needed to crop the pictures before I downloaded them. My editing and actions got all messed up if I didn't...so I had to go back and redo all of them...and I of course picked the photo sizes that require the most cropping (just FYI....if you are planning on printing your pictures in an 8X10/16X20 format, take the picture with a lot of extra space around it to allow for cropping. I, unfortunately, did not, so my favorite pictures that I chose to use lost a lot of their visual interest and charm because of it...dang it. Live and learn.:o) Oh, and 16X20 enlargements at Costco are mail order only. So Ron's Father's Day gift isn't going to be exactly complete when he gets it. Oops! Maybe the big print will show up next Saturday.

Fun with Photoshop

SOOC....straight out of camera....nice, but I think I'll tweak it with a little action and tutorial I found...courtesy of PW...

VIOLA! WOW! I believe this deserves a printing and frame! :)

Oh, and to be fair to Riley, she also finished school today. Had fun getting her yearbook signed by her buddies, and her dad and I are in shock that next year is her freshman year....The kid ended with 7 A's and 1 B....she's gonna have an amazing GPA for this year. Now if she can keep it up for the next 4 years, she could actually have a chance at getting into BYU! (If that's what she still wants to do in 4 years!)

What I shouldn't be doing!!!

Bless that Pioneer Woman! Along with ranching, mothering, and cooking, she's also into photography. She shares her ideas and work on a portion of her blog, and today she's sharing some free "actions" for Photoshop....now, I'm still on the way beginner end of the curve for Photoshop, and had heard of actions, but was a little scared of them...I thought they'd be too hard for me. But I downloaded these actions (and then figured out where to find them in Photoshop!), and then started playing....HELLO! SO EASY! And now I just want to forget everything on my list of things to do today and go take pictures and then come home and play with them. Here's an example using the "soft & faded" action....

COULD YOU JUST DIE OVER THAT CUTENESS?!?! I know, I'm biased, but I want to blow this up and put it in their room! Okay...I'm calming...

All I know is that I am for sure taking loads of pictures on my trip, and taking my laptop along to play.....ooooo, I'm excited!!!! Hey OneHM.....want to go take pictures?! :)

Okay...back to the real world of laundry, and general vacation prep....

**If you do download them and notice a couple of glitches in actions not completely working, Ree is aware of it and working on fixing them....but the above action didn't work completely and it still looks great!**

Photo of the Day

Good Morning sweet Ellie!

What follows is technical-ish gunk, so if you aren't interested, skip it!
Maybe if I try and do one or two photos a day for my class, I'll do a better job at getting familiar with what I'm learning, and my camera settings. I think the light worked well on this one, but my shutter was too slow. Ellie was blurred. Since my aperture was open all the way, my next step was to up my ISO, but by the time I adjusted that, Ellie was too busy to stand in front of the window again! Oh, and I did cheat and cropped the picture a bit with one of my camera options after the pic was taken...I didn't think anyone wanted to see my vacuum!