I took this picture yesterday, when the boys and I were outside for over an hour watching Damon do something “interesting” for work. (I can’t say yet because it isn’t finished. And it is work related. Is there a term for a husband being dooced because his wife blogged about his work? Because whatever that term is, I wouldn’t want it to happen to Damon.)
So anyway, we were in the cold and it was sunny and windy. Tebow wasn’t into being strapped in his stroller, but there was this moment where he was laughing and happy.
I love the sunflare and his smile. I can’t help but smile back.
Check out more sweet shots at My 3 Boybarians. There is plenty of encouragement over there!
First, I can’t believe I forgot to post this yesterday. I took the picture, uploaded it to flickr, and then got distracted.
As has been mentioned in the past, making Christmas cookies is not high on my list of fun Holiday activities. But my husband asked me to make some for his office party and since he purchased some kick-butt cookie cutters, I said “Sure!”
Since the dough requires refrigeration I made the dough yesterday. And when transferring it from bowl to plastic, I snapped my spatula. And not a cheap 50 cent spatula. It was a Pyrex, high heat spatula. And the handle just SNAPped while I was working.
Here’s hoping I can remember to post today’s picture today.
P.S. Having a blog is a great way to keep track of things you might otherwise lose or forget. For instance, I couldn’t find my copy of the gingerbread recipe (I moved, remember?) but I had it posted on the blog! Do you want my gingerbread recipe? Here it is!
Though the December Photo Project doesn’t require words for every post, I feel it important to indicate that just because it is December, I don’t think every picture has to be Christmas related. Because honestly, not every moment of the day is spent in the Christmas spirit.
You could be in the “making breakfast for the kids so they will stop screaming” moment. Or in the “I have to go out and buy toilet paper right this second” moment. Today we were in the “Auburn is in the SEC Championship and I really hope they win!” moment.
And the moment shifted from hope to reality as Auburn took a convincing lead in the first half and made the overall experience of watching the game enjoyable in the second. I put on my facebook status that we were high on happiness for all four quarters. And I think Damon’s picture shows it.
I love taking pictures of my boys. Getting them in the same picture together is a rare occurrence. Usually Tebow ends up crying, but mainly because he isn’t the only one in the picture.
Today I took a drive to Atlanta and spent a few hours at Ikea, picking up some needed closet organizing and possible gifts for Damon to pretty up. It was fun, stressful, and tiring all at the same time. The boys seemed to like it as well.
Tonight our family went to the parade. Damon and Fuller were in the parade as part of Fuller’s football team. Tebow and I waited on the sidelines, at the end of the parade route. I tried to take pictures but the vantage point wasn’t awesome and Tebow wasn’t too happy.
I’m not sure what it is, but I have become intrigued with capturing lights, in a bokeh like fashion. I find the result to be playful and dramatic.
It’s that time of year again! I signed up for the December Photo Project again, in an effort to remember to not just capture the moments of the season but to reflect on them as well.
Thanks to Rebecca for hosting again. I’ve been looking forward to it for about a month. (more…)
In life we stumble through so many “fresh starts.”
January 1st is a pretty popular one. It is a time of year for reflection on the past and planning the steps to make the next year even better. We make lists, set goals, plot paths to make sure the next 365 days are filled with greatness and meaning. “This year I’m going to travel to all states that border my state and then I’m going to…”
Some of us see each month as a fresh start, with new dates of appointments, events, and deadlines fill our calendars. “Just wait until we get to March, then things will start to change…”
Mondays represent fresh starts because it is the beginning of a new week, a whole seven days to get through until our next Monday, when we throw off the stale and find the freshness all bright eyed and hopeful for the good things to be found. “I’ll start my diet on Monday…”
And then, there is the personal fresh start we each get once a year, the birthday! Though it doesn’t get the fireworks and worldy stature of a holiday (unless you happen to have been born on a holiday), it is a fresh start I think most of us take personally and maybe even rely on to assist us in moving in a forward motion through life. “When I turn 40 I’m going to write a book…”
Today’s my birthday.
I’m 34 and while it doesn’t have the pomp and circumstance that a number that ends in a 5 or a 0 does, I do find myself using 34 as a stepping stone to give myself a fresh start and desire to pray, plan, and plot my way to 35. But I think first I have to follow some advice my husband was giving Fuller last night- “After a play, you need to look back and ask yourself, Did I do that right or wrong? If you did it right, then think about the steps you took to do it right. If you did it wrong, then think about what you needed to do to make it right.” (That is a loose transcript. Also, he was referring to football, not life pathways.)
At the beginning of 2010 I made a list of “pictures” of my life. Since my birthday is so close to the end of the year, it seems to be a good time to look at the list and see how the pictures developed. I’m not going to do it right here in this blog post, but it is one way I’m using my fresh start. I’ll see if any of those pictures are going to come out ok.
I painted stripes in my new bedroom. I really thought it would lend an elegance to the room, especially since they are only on one wall, the wall I see when I wake up in the morning.
I’m not a professional designer or painter, but I like them. I like them a lot.
Our old house was a project house, a place constantly under some sort of chaos disguised as renovation. The end result was pretty awesome, but we spaced out each project in an order that put our master bedroom last on the list. So I never had a “finished” bedroom until about a month (maybe two) before we moved. And since I was picking out carpet and paint colors for our bedroom knowing it was more for the sale of the house and not really for my enjoyment, I didn’t really get into enjoying the finished product.
Now, I’m putting stripes on the wall and getting ready to buy new bedding (once we get a bigger bed). I’m going to find that elegance for our master bedroom and enjoy the finished product.
Back in January, I suddenly had other people observing me in real life. It went from just me and the boys at home all day to co-habitating with the in-laws to opening up our home to handymen who were there for the purpose of getting our home in “for sale” mode. And with this real life observation going on, I suddenly became self conscious of my online life and what it looked like to people who didn’t participate or understand. It just became easier to step away from the laptop and find something else to do. And with our family in preparations to sell and buy a new home, there was plenty for me to do offline.
This isn’t an “I’m sorry for abruptly ditching this blog” post, just a way of typing out my justification for going MIA. It’s more for me.
If you have ever watched the web series “The Guild” then you know there is a character called Clara who is a mom who loves her online gaming. If you haven’t watched it, then I suggest you take about an hour or two out of your day to begin at the beginning and check out the series. (The episodes average 10 minutes or so.)
Anyway, Clara is an extreme caricature, but she scared me. As a mom who has (had?) an online life, I could never become someone who neglected her kids that much or alienated her husband due to the computer, but I wondered if those observing me saw me as a Clara-type mom. (For the record, Damon has assured me I am not Clara.)
In the past few months I have also seen the scales tip from balancing online life and real life in favor of real life for other reasons- one being the attention Tebow needs/ demands. While Clara is a character I dread becoming, in the episode below, starting at the 4:18 point, should demonstrate the tornado effect Tebow has when I am on the computer during his waking times. (To not watch the entire episode, just let it go through the commercial- that I don’t get money for- and the pause it to let the video load. Once loaded, you can drag the play point to 4:18.)
What those three kids did to her computer was about what one Tebow can do to mine. Or my mom’s, where Tebow recently turned off her computer while she was in the midst of typing an email.
So, I need to find the new balance point if I want to step back into online life. These two reasons are my biggest reasons for being silent until now. And it is kind of uncomfortable because I miss it. I’m going to try again… I really have no reason not to at least try.
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Sweet Shot Tuesday :: Baby It’s Cold Outside
