3 years old today!

I have a 3 year old boy!  How is this possible?  I think he was just born.  I really do.  So how is he walking and talking and turning 3 today?  Inconceivable!  He was just born.

He was just a tiny baby that I could comfortably hold.  Not 37 lbs of hugeness.

Or maybe he was just turning one year old.

I swear he turned 2 just yesterday.

How can he be 3? 

It's just impossible. 

He's excited to be 3.  And he's excited for his "train party" this weekend.  I've really lost my mind this, time, let me tell you.  I'll show you what I've done after the party.  I'm practically certifiable, I swear.

Happy Birthday to my big boy, Fletcher on the event of his 3rd birthday.  I can't believe it, but you are 3 indeed.  And you are funny, cute, charming, and above all so loving.  You make my life a million times better just by being in it.  Your hugs and kisses are sunshine on my days.  I love you.

i heart faces: let's hear it for the boys

Again, you're welcome for that awesome earworm.  I took this picture over the past weekend at the Highland Games Festival near us.  Fletcher was way more into the kiddie area than all the bagpipers, dogs, and games.  I loved that this older man driving the kiddie train was so into it, all dressed up and greeting each child, and was so child-like himself.  Like a forever boy, still in love with trains.  The look on Fletcher's face says it all.

To see more "boys" head over to i heart faces!

friday facts: find the sweet spot

Sometimes photographing inside can be a challenge.  I don't have a super-fancy camera, and I don't have any super fancy lenses.  For the record, I have a Nikon D3000.  Don't get me wrong, it was bought at a great expense to us and it has taken great family photos for us, too.  But I'm saving my pennies for the next camera for my bag.  And I'm going to be taking some classes, too.  (p.s. can I practice on you or your family?  thanks in advance) 

Ok, back to taking pictures inside.  There's not much I can do at night without better lenses/camera, but during the day I have found that my house has some sweet spots.  I particularly like the light that comes in the afternoon on the west side of our house, but the morning light might work better in your home depending upon how your house sits, or if you have trees that cast shade on your home.  Phew, run on sentence!  We have a lot of windows on the west side too, which helps.  But I have recently found a new favorite sweet spot.  You've already seen this picture I took of Fletcher, but let's look again.  What's great about this flash-free (of course!!!) photo is that it looks like he's being lit from below and above, just like in a photo studio.

You can see why the light is so great in this picture of Rowan.

{wearing mama's vintage top}

See the light that is cast from the window onto the floor?  That's doing the job of lighting from below.  The light from the window is lighting up her face, and the light bounces off the floor to light her from below.  Free studio lights!  But proceed with caution.  It's hard to get a baby to stay where you want.

So you don't want the subject to actually get into the light that is being cast onto the floor.  Obviously.  You might end up with a really ugly foot in your picture.  And a dog body coming out of your baby's head.  Not to mention the rainbow on the baby's face.  If you have a photo editing program, you can try and fix this, but why bother?  Scoot that baby back, pull that foot out of the frame, shoo the dog away.

Here's another I took the other day in the same spot.

I probably should have gotten lower in this picture so she didn't have this big head-little body problem.  The dreaded lollipop head.  Ah, hell.  Let's throw in one more from the sweet spot.

{Rowan: all teeth and eyes}

I would like to insert here that I am not sharing this knowledge with you because I have an extensive knowledge of photography.  I am just learning from trial and error, and when I find something that works for me, why not share it with you?  This trick will work with any camera, really.  Trust me.  Find your sweet spot.

perspective

The host of You Capture, Beth, lost a good friend to cancer earlier this week, so she's taking the week off.  Her friend was also an amazing photographer.  My prayers go out to both Beth and Samantha's family.

the long goodbye

We bought our house 4 years ago, thinking we would be spending at least 10 years in it.  If not more.  We poured love (and money) into making it a home for us and for our future children.  1 dog, 2 babies, 4 Christmases, a thousand family dinners, 43 cookouts... just kidding, I have no idea how many cookouts we've had here.  A lot.  We live in the kind of neighborhood where when it's a really nice day, all the neighborhood kids are gathered in one backyard and someone suggests an impromtu cookout.  Or someone starts passing out margaritas.  Or someone drags out the kiddie pool and the kids pile in.  I know there are probably millions of neighborhoods that are like this out there.  But this one felt like mine. 

Okay, I'm done crying in my coffee.  It looks like we may not be selling the house after all.  At least not yet.  So just maybe we'll be back here one day.  Brian can retire from the army in about 10 years.  So if we carefully rent it out for 10 years, I guess it's possible that we'll be back.  But it won't be the same neighborhood. 

I'm just hoping that I can find a home wherever we go.  Not a house, a home.  My kids are going to be army brats, so now it's going to be my job to make everywhere we go a home for them.  Even when we're only there for 6 months.  New adventures await!  But I will miss my cute little kitchen.

i heart faces: bright and vivid

Well, I'm pretty late with the photo entry this week.  But we were pretty busy with realtors telling us that our house is worth roughly $75,000 less than what we paid for it.  And we'd like to stay, we really would, but you know that army.  Always moving us around like we're... uh... soldiers.  Such is the military life!  We'll figure something out, though.  We're good little soldiers like that.  So back to i heart faces.  Bright and vivid this week!  Here's what I got- Rowan and the car.  Pretty bright and vivid for sure.