willette's joy of love: day 8

Read about the joy of LOVE here.

So I got a day ahead, and then I fell a day behind. I will probably catch up over the weekend. Things are hectic here.

Day 8 assignment: gift from the heart



After my husband asked my mom for her permission to ask me to marry him, she gave him her engagement and wedding rings. My dad had passed away 8 years prior, and my mom had long stopped wearing her rings (not to mention the fact that she was remarried). He knew that having the rings meant a lot to me, but that I didn't want them as my engagement/wedding rings because I would always look at them and see my mom's hands. That's not a terrible thing, it's just not me.

We talked about having the diamonds reset into a different design, but that wasn't possible. Some of the diamonds have been in my family for generations. They are in bad shape. The center diamond had a huge crack in it, and our jeweler said that he expected it to fall apart if we took it out of the setting.

So he took the setting as-is (as-was?), had it mounted on a pendant and bought a chain to go with it. I wear it almost every day to remember the two most important men in my life. I don't have a lot of material things to remember my dad by. That's okay because I'm not a material person. This is one of the few material possessions that I have that has significant sentimental value to me.

I love it, and I love him for giving it to me.

Edited to add: the more I look at this picture, the more I hate it. The color is all wrong. My hand is not orange, I promise. I think it would be cool in black and white, but I don't have a photo editing program that can convert it. I wonder if the weird coloring is because I used spot metering. I'll have to look that up.

Edited again: okay, I "fixed" the orange hand.

willette's joy of love: day 7

Read about the joy of LOVE here.

Yes, I am doing this a day early. Mostly because I already have the picture I want to use (yes, I am cheating again) and I figure this is more fun than attending to the laundry.

Day 7 assignment: generations

My husband doesn't have any other family nearby except for the the kids and me, but I took this one of him, his father and B in December.



I feel like I am learning a lot about photography. I don't know if that shows in the pictures that I take, but I am learning. I feel good about my progress.

willette's joy of love: day 6

Read about the joy of LOVE here.

Day 6 assignment: the ones they love (this one is a twofer, mainly because both kids weren't awake at the same time much today...actually I cheated and the picture of E is from yesterday).





It was a pretty slow weekend around here. In a good way. :)

willette's joy of love: day 5

Read about the joy of LOVE here.

Day 5 assignment: what you love to hate

I am a really slow eater. Growing up I was often harassed by my brother and sister because they weren't allowed to get up from the dinner table until we were all finished eating. Since I was always the last one eating, they used to try to get me to finish by all means necessary. I never met anyone who eats slower than I do...until I met my husband. Now I know the pain that my siblings felt growing up. His slow eating is especially annoying these days because we have an antsy three-year-old who isn't very good at waiting patiently for his father to finish eating.

willette's joy of love: day 4

Read about the joy of LOVE here.

Day 4 assignment: what they wear

Almost every Friday during the winter, my husband wears a sweater with a collared shirt underneath. For some reason, the collared shirt never really matches the sweater.

willette's joy of love: day 3

Read about the joy of LOVE here.

I'm learning that it's really hard to take pictures on the weekdays. We're gone until dark and then it's a mad dash to get everything done before bedtime. However, it is nice to have the camera out and accessible at all times. I've taken a ton of pictures of the kids since the camera handy.

Day 3's assignment is then and now.

Then, January 1, 2006 outside the Rose Bowl:


Now, February 3, 2011 at the dinner table:


I don't typically prefer black and white photos, but B's face was really red and rashy.

I really feel like I'm kind of phoning it in on these pictures, but I think just doing this project will help me take better pictures. I have no aspirations to be a professional photographer. I just want to take more pictures and better pictures of my family. At least, it's helping me do the former. :)

Favorite January pictures of the kids

These are in reverse chronological order because that's the way that blogger uploaded them, and I don't feel like flipping them around. I really wanted a better one of them in the snow, but E did not want anything to do with the cold.

Here are my favorite pictures of the kids together during January 2011:

willette's joy of love: day 2

Read about the joy of LOVE here.

Day 2: how they look





Yes, he is cuddled up in the Charmkins blanket that I have had since I was 6 years old.

willette's joy of love: day 1

Read about the joy of LOVE here.

Day one: take a picture of your loved one doing the thing they do.

Okay, so this was a dud. Nothing about February 1 was normal. I had something important to do in the morning, so there was no time for pictures. Then I worked late. Then my sister showed up when I got home. The only thing I really saw my husband do that day was do dishes, so I snapped a few photos. In my pictures you can't really tell what he's doing and the lighting is all wrong, but I figure it just leaves room for improvement.

Here's my day one photo:

January down!

2011 is 1/12 of the way over, so I wanted to update my progress (or lack thereof).

1) Take a photography class: I'm about 2/3 of the way through my photography class. I am learning a lot. I need to put what I learn into practice more. I have also signed up for willete's joy of love online class, which runs the month of February. More on that tonight, hopefully.

2) Take pictures of the kids every month: well, I'm doing this, but still struggling to get the kids to cooperate. I have some great shots of them individually, but not a fantastic one of them together. Since E started crawling at the beginning of January, it has been so hard to get her to sit still or even stay anywhere near her brother. She is off and into everything! I plan to upload some pics tonight from home

3) Create - and actually stick to - a budget: I created a budget, and then blew it out of the water. It's not tragic because we also sold a car that we don't need to replace. The main cause of us going over budget was both of the kids outgrowing their clothes at the same time. I feel like I am doing better at keeping spending down though.

4) Plant a vegetable garden in the spring: Have the broccoli started, but I may have screwed something up. The Square Foot Gardening book that I am using said that you could plant 5 or so seeds per cup when you start the seeds. I tried that, but I put 5 seeds all in the same little hole in the cup, so I think they are too close together. I am going to try to salvage at least one of that plants this weekend by moving it into another cup. I am not too hopeful since I am a first-timer, but we'll see how it goes. I am also going to start my onion seeds this weekend. Hopefully they will fare better.

5) Build a bookshelf for E's room: I haven't started this yet. Still haven't finished the ledges I am building for the kitchen. We have all the supplies needed for that project, but our garage is too messy.

6) Organize the garage and bonus room. My sweet husband is working on these two tasks. I really wish I had taken before pictures of each. Sunday he tore down a huge, not-functional-for us shelving unit in the garage. Our hope is to put in shallower shelves and a work bench in another part of the garage. Right now we don't really have any work space, so it's difficult to do some projects. The bonus room looks a lot better since we move all the Christmas decorations and boxes into the attic, but it still needs much improvement.

7) Run a 5K. This is off the table until June. I don't run while nursing.

All in all, I am pretty pleased with our progress. The kids were sick for a couple weeks and my husband worked non-stop for the first couple weeks of the month, so I'm happy we accomplished what we did. Heck, I'm just happy to have survived this month.

Bring on February!

11 days in

I am doing really well with my goals!!

1) Take photography classes
2) Take pictures of the kids every month

I had my first photography class this weekend, and I learned a couple great tricks. I also have been taking a lot of pictures, mostly of B playing in the snow. I haven't gotten a great picture of both kids together for this month, so I need to keep working on that.

3) Create - and actually attempt to stick to - a budget

I have been doing really well sticking to our new budget. I haven't bought hardly anything except food, and I have even dialed my food spending way back. Hopefully we can keep this up.

6) Organize the garage and bonus room

My husband's Christmas present was a work bench for the garage. Well, it was supposed to be, but we decided to wait until it warms up a bit and we clear out some space for it in the garage. This is moving way up the priority list. The bonus room is a wreck. Christmas decorations need to be put away, as does our luggage from our trip to the west coast over Christmas. My sister is coming to visit on Friday, and that's where she sleeps, so maybe I'll be motivated to work on it later this week.

Say Cheese: Goals 1 & 2

My first two goals go hand in hand. I don't take enough pictures. I bought a dSLR camera a year ago, but I hardly know how to use it. I have two extremely cute kids. But I often forget to take my camera places. Or worse, I'll take the camera somewhere, I'll carry it around and then forget to take pictures.

In March, I spent a week in Vancouver with my brother, sister-in-law, niece and nephew. My sister-in-law had just been released from the hospital after having a stem cell transplant to treat lymphoma. I was 30 weeks pregnant with my daughter. It was an emotionally-charged time, and I had a wonderful visit. But I did not take a single picture. I lugged my camera all the way across the continent just to sit in my brother's hallway for a week.

When I do remember to take pictures, they aren't great quality. I would like to learn how to take better pictures, and I would like to remember to take pictures more frequently. Since this will be my first full calendar year with both kids living outside my womb, I think it would be fun to make sure I take pictures of them each month. Then at the end of the year, I can have some of those pictures made into a calendar for 2012.

I have gotten a head start on these two goals.

I have signed up for photography classes starting in January. At this point, all I need to do is show up once a week for six weeks, and I can check my first goal off my list.

I also put a reminder on my calendar to take pictures. My phone will now alert me on the first of the month to take pictures of my kids. My plan is, once the first rolls around, reset the reminder for a day that month when we are doing something fun. Yeah, I can take random pictures one Wednesday after work, but if we're going to the zoo two weeks later, it would be more fun to make sure we get a pictures at the zoo (or even better, I could do both).

Next steps: Go to first photography class. Think about when I want to take January picture.