Photog and Fashionista

It's been well documented that the boy loves to photograph things. Sometimes inanimate objects. Often times in rapid succession to where he's actually making a motion picture (if the object actually had some motion, but, on second thought, he usually provides the motion himself). One thing he loves to do most recently is take selfies that usually include an emotional face; sometimes happy, sometimes super excited. Yesterday he decided he was sad. (Nice photobomb, me!)

The other one is insisting on dressing herself.      Everyday.     Maybe she's on the cutting edge of some couture trend, but I highly doubt it. Don't know that we will be seeing long sleeve printed shirts under patterned tanks with leggings and trainers walking down a Paris runway anytime soon, but she's happy and (I'm told) that's what matters!

Photogenic family

The kids and I took a couple of selfies tonight while Eric was at bible study. Aren't we a photogenic bunch?

New Photographer!

The little guy has taken pictures for years (where did the time go?), but the baby picked up the camera this weekend and took a few shots of her daddy, me, and some furniture.

What talent!

Photographer and Trickster

The little guy has always liked taking pictures; pictures of himself, his family, his legos, still life, or.... the dirt on the floor. There are pictures and pictures on the iPad and his mom's phone of a whole lot of nothing, mostly half his head and the ceiling or whatever he was watching on TV. I found, though, that if you scroll through some of those "episodes" fast enough, he's actually made a movie.

Here's a couple of his still lives (lifes) from after I got back from the grocery store.

And here is a selfie, with an absolutely adorable photobomb.

In other news, the little guy's Kindergarten teacher brought cupcakes for her birthday for all the kids to enjoy one day last week. We got an email from his teacher asking if he was allergic to vanilla.....

What? 

So the boy told her that he was allergic to vanilla and that next time she would need to bring chocolate cupcakes so he could have one.

That child.

Morning Portraits

The little dude took all of our pictures the other morning. He even took a selfie at the end! Here we are, pre-breakfast, pre-coffee:

Our weekend was busy, but lovely. We went to a back-to-school bash Saturday morning (the little dude rode a pony!), a baseball game last night, and a friends' house for dinner tonight. The little guy is back at kindergarten tomorrow, and the baby is off to daycare with her daddy.

Backwards

The baby is following her older brother's footsteps and taking an interest in the camera. Unfortunately, she has a hard time remembering which side takes the pictures and which side she's supposed to look through. See?

Emotions!

The little one likes to tell us to express specific emotions:

      Her: Mommy! Be sad!
      Me: Fake crying
      Her: Aw, it's ok mommy. (She'll often pat my back at this point)

It's kind of sweet, but sometimes I worry that we're raising a little psychopath. Anyway, tonight Eric was running through feelings and I started taking pictures. It was amazing. The collage below (starting with the big picture, then moving clockwise) contains: happy, happy, mean, angry, surprised, and scary.

This one (same ordering) has: fish face, sad, surprised, confused, happy/confused/not sure, and surprised.

This was definitely one of our more entertaining dinners!

Smile!

The kids are practically incapable of smiling when I say "smile!" and take a picture. It's absurd.

Seriously, they can be giggling/smiling/acting like normal human beings but as soon as they see the camera...

... these faces happen.

Xtreme Selfies?

The little guy got ahold of the camera again on Friday, and there were about 10 pictures that looked like this:

Those were followed by about 15 pictures that looked like this:

I only saved one of each.

Early mornings and late evenings

As Emily has mentioned before, she's been dragging my sorry behind out of bed to work out with her in the mornings. Our wonderful son usually comes down and joins in on the "fun" by either doing some exercising or critiquing our form. The other day he had the camera out while we were working out and he snapped this awesome picture.

I really am just about as dead as I look. What you don't realize is that we were just doing crunches and we have to be off centered a little because I have stolen half of Em's yoga mat. Add the fact that you have a 5 year old aspiring paparazzo (singular of paparazzi?) flashing photos from very close range and it's a little crowded.

Last night the toddler (she's not a baby anymore, sigh) wanted to listen to some "Shake It Off" by Taylor Swift so we played it 5 times for her and the boy. They are so funny when they dance and sing!

That boy is such a goof!

Documentarian

The little guy photographs everything. It's kind of fun to see what he thinks is worth documenting. Here's his latest lego creation. We have seven pictures that are different versions of this:

It really makes me glad that we have a digital camera (as opposed to film) so he can take as many pictures as he wants.

Happy Daddy

I was laying on the couch Saturday minding my own business when Beau decided to hop up and lay on my chest. Emily decided it would be fun to take pictures while he kneaded me until I was comfortable enough for his liking. Well, you know the big kid and cameras. It wasn't long before I had another being piling on.

I'll tell you what. Life doesn't get much better. There's one happy daddy under there somewhere.

Somebody's sleepy

My baby girl has been somewhat of a night owl the last few nights. I've been putting them to sleep and her brother has been falling asleep with no problem while she remains up standing in her crib, talking to herself, grabbing things off the changing table, and throwing her pacifier on the floor with great purpose. A funny aside: last night Emily put them to bed and the boy popped up and said he wasn't tired.

"Mom, I need to do some exercise so I can go to sleep."
"Huh?"
"I need to exercise so I will be tired and fall asleep. Can I?"
"Umm... sure."
(He literally does 2 pseudo-pushups with his pelvis on the floor and only lifting his shoulders. Kind of like doing "The worm". Then he hopped back in bed.)
"Thanks Mom!"
"You're welcome. Now go t..." He was asleep.

Anyway, my little sweet pea has been up late this week. Well, it all caught up with her tonight. She was not happy after we got home from school and she fussed all evening until she went to bed. Even then she fought it about as hard as she could and man, does she have some lungs. When she is tired, she is a lot like her mother!

I'm going to get it for that one. She did manage to stop crying for a few minutes sitting on her mommy's lap at the end of dinner. But I'll let you decide how she happy she was.

At least someone was having a good time. Nice face Stinker Pants.

Photo Bomb!

Nana and Pops got the little guy a complicated lego garbage truck for Christmas. It took a day and a half, but he put it together by himself! The baby totally photo bombed his "I DID IT!!!" picture. Hilarious.

Christmas Finery!

Our church had a big Christmas-y service tonight, and the little guy sang in the youngest choir. It was adorable. Both kids were dressed in their fanciest clothes, so Eric tried to get a nice photo of them by the tree. Although the little guy makes the strangest faces, all the pictures Eric took have a beautiful softness (from a haze of peanut buttery fingerprints on the camera lens).

Light at the end of the tunnel...

The little guy got ahold of my camera again (despite having his own):

I'm going to open an Etsy store for him.

A Walk in the Woods

Another thing we did on our trip to Gatlinburg was go for a short hike in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. It was BEAUTIFUL! 

We managed to get a reasonable family picture by a really pretty waterfall. He insisted on standing over there by himself, which makes him look like both a ghost and an outcast.

The little guy really liked the hike. He kept running ahead on the trail. He's getting so big!

The baby looked around a lot and then took a nice nap in the carrier.

All in all it was a successful morning.

Official Family Photographer!

The little guy is still really into taking pictures. He snapped this adorable one of Eric and the baby yesterday.

He also took this amazing self portrait last night.

Carseats

Sometimes the little guy doesn't want to get in his carseat. Usually we can get him to race his sister, but the other night that didn't work.

I won!

Instead, I told him I was going to keep taking his picture until he sat down. It worked! Thank goodness for digital cameras, though, because that would've been a huge waste of film.

Happy Weekend!