Playing with Evening Sunlight

When I went to Pensacola last week to pick up Sarah, naturally I took my camera along. I set up a little mini-shoot with her in my parents' backyard. I got in a bit of practice with that beautiful summer evening light. My mom has this really cute, fun bench in her backyard now ... its lime green with ladybugs on it. Sarah decided her lime green headband was needed for this! Of course she got tired of it after a few shots! Anyway, she was in the mood to cooperate, so we had a lot of fun. :)

Do Ya Think She's Trying to Tell Me Something??

My photographer buddy Renee L. passed on the cutest t-shirt from her daughter to Sarah. She said only another photographer's kid would appreciate it. I'm trying not to be insulted that Sarah loves this shirt so much!! Hey, at least she posed for a couple of shots with it. Thanks again, Renee!! :)

Missing Miss Sarah

It sure is quiet without Miss Sarah here this week. Sarah has been at her grandparents' for the last week. We sure do miss her! Anna keeps asking "Where Sarah?" ... then when I tell her Sarah is at Grandma's she huffs and puffs and says "Get Sarah!" Wednesday Anna and I are off to Pensacola to go get her!!

Here's one of her from back in May, laying on her teddy bear. I think I like the black and white better, with the square crop ... how about you?

Finally ... A Photo Wall for Me ... Well, Almost

I finally did it ... I ordered the photos for my photo wall! Eventually you might realize a photographer actually lives here. This is just a rough idea of how its going to look. I took my mock-up template and plopped it down on a photo I took of the wall, so I can visualize things better. I used the skew tool in Photoshop to try to make it look a little more like realistic (yeah, I know it doesn't). I wanted to take a photo straight-on, but couldn't get a wide enough angle because of the entertainment center behind me. :) Now I just have to get some frames!!

Note: Click on the photo to get a larger view.

My Ballerina

I love the light we get, as the sun comes down, by our front door. I thought it would be the perfect place to take some photos of Sarah in her ballet costume before her recital (back in May).

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes are a Comin'

I'm finally making some long overdue changes to my blog and my web site. In fact, I'm in the process of creating a new one right now. Look for it in another couple of weeks. I know, I know, the banner needs to be redone as well ... I'll get to it, I promise.

I've also got a new logo ... isn't it fun?! It's got a new home on the upper-right hand side of my blog, under the title "My Website". Thanks to Christy from Through These Eyes Creations. I am so thrilled with my new logo ... and Christy was great to work with!!

One New ... One Old

From our recent trip to Perdido Key beach, at sunset.


An oldie from a trip to Pensacola beach, back in January, mid-day.

Here are a couple more from the 4th of July. Sarah thought she was soooo funny. Ok, so she was. :)


And here's one of my honey, too.

Fireworks ... A Few Days Late

[Otherwise known as ... WHAT?? TWO posts in ONE day??! Yep. You got it. :)]

As I mentioned previously, we ended up staying home and doing our own fireworks show, after hubby spent a ridiculous amount of money buying them. It actually turned out to be the best option since Anna was asking to go to bed at 6:30 (yes, you read that right ... she ASKED). So while I didn't get the big ones I'd have gotten at the park, we still got some good ones. I set up my tripod and just experimented with shutter speeds. I wish I'd had a remote release, but oh well. Anyway, we also had a bunch of sparklers and morning glories, which Sarah got a huge kick out of.

First a couple of shots of the sun setting.


On to the fireworks ...








Note: You can see the rest here, if you want.

Just One

Just a quick one from April. We were up at Monte Santo State Park a while back, and there is this gorgeous brick window that I found. I wanted to get a different post, but Sarah was all freaked out about the fact that it was up high ... she was perfectly safe, but she felt scared so I just took what I could get. :) It was really windy, so the hair in her face is bugging me, but it was too much to clone out.

On the Mend ... AGAIN!

The medicine seems to be doing the trick ... yeah! Last night Anna slept with a humidifier and her pillow propped up. She slept all night without waking, and her breathing sounds much better today. By this afternoon she was dancing and bouncing around the house, so she seems to be feeling much better. The doctor advised us to continue doing a few breathing treatments with the nebulizer, just to be on the safe side. Anna is now so used to this thing, she insists on holding the mask herself!! :)





Apparently I am married to a pyromaniac. Once we started getting a bit more rain, the city fire chief lifted the fireworks ban for the 4th of July. My husband was like a kid in a candy store. You wouldn't believe the amount of fireworks he has ready to light tonight. Should be interesting, to say the least. Have a safe and Happy Fourth of July!!

The House of Icky Sickies

So I'm finally over the strep throat and feeling better. Seems like everyone else in the house has escaped getting it ... we're getting back to normal ... right?? WRONG! Saturday Sarah started complaining of a sore throat, her voice is hoarse, she had a fever, was coughing, and even threw up. So I'm thinking uh-oh ... she got it after all. Then that evening, Anna threw up. So Sunday morning I called the pediatrician and got an appointment to bring them both in (their office has urgent care hours on weekends/holidays). I was 98% convinced she had strep. They did a strep culture and ... NEGATIVE ... not strep throat. Apparently just a virus.

Today Sarah was feeling much better, but I made her rest most of the day and she even took an afternoon nap (virtually unheard of for her). And as if step throat wasn't enough, now I have a cold and a sore throat!

Then all day long, Anna wasn't feeling well. She woke up hoarse and with raspy breathing, and a low-grade fever. I made her rest all day. Then she woke up from her afternoon nap hacking and not breathing well. She has a history of respiratory problems, so I knew to get out the nebulizer and do a breathing treatment. Two treatments later and her breathing was still really labored, so I called the doctor. The nurse had me count her breaths per minute, and the doctor didn't like the results, so he had me take her to the Pediatric ER. FUN.

Two hours later (not bad, I was impressed with how quick and efficient they were!) she'd been seen by the nurse, given Motrin (for the fever), seen by the doctor, given two doses of an oral steroid, had a chest x-ray, another breathing treatment, and seen by the doctor again. Whew! The diagnosis: croup. A virus was the cause, and her throat and airways were inflamed, causing her breathing to be restricted. The good news is there was no pneumonia on the chest x-ray. The bad news is there were signs of asthma present, so this is something we'll have to watch for when she gets a bad cold or virus like this. Poor little Anna, she was such a trooper through the whole thing! Hopefully the medicine will reduce the inflammation quickly so that she can breathe easily again.

Oh, and did I mention that Elliot said his throat hurts tonight ...

My Two Favorite Girls

Although I've been working on post processing my backlog of photos, I didn't take a single new shot for two week ... that must be some kind of record for me. So the last day or two I've taken a few quick shots of the girls. This first one was playing around using my new light meter. The second one was Anna is a rare willing mood! She wanted to play with my camera ... of course I said "no way"! So I asked her if she wanted me to take her picture ... surprisingly the answer was "yes mommy ... take-y picher".