Sesame Street Birthday

 

 A while back I posted on my Sorority's Alumni Facebook page.  I told them I am trying to get into photography and I want to practice so if anyone would be interested in getting their picture taken, I'm their person.  I have gotten a few people interested and I took one set of pictures about two weeks ago, and I went to a birthday party this weekend.  It was a party for a 2 year old to include fabulous games and decor in the theme of Sesame Street.  My son will be two on March 1st, so it was so awesome to see all the little two year olds running around.  Alisha did a wonderful job decorating, getting many of her ideas from Pinterest, and because she loves to scrapbook, she all the tools to decorate the game stations with different characters from the show.  The party ended in an Elmo Dance/Sing off party with inflatable microphones and guitars.  It was so fun watching the kids sing and dance. Alisha, it was wonderful meeting you and your little one.  You really know how to throw a party.  Enjoy some pictures from the party!

Alisha and her husband got into the spirit too!!!  She even had a cute little hair bow with Cookie Monster on it.

Inflatable microphones and guitars

How cute are these signs she made??!

Tullys Tattoo Parlor where the kids could get Sesame Street Tattoos

Here are a few of the tattoos the children could choose from

.

How awesome are these decorations?!?!

One of my favorites.  There is something out feet and shoes that I love and I love that little David was decked out Sesame Street from head to toe.

Last but not least, my favorite image of the birthday party.  It shows so much love that they have for one another.

                                                     HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAVID!

365- 32, 33, 34, 35

Day 32:  This picture is taken with my IPhone at Kristin's house, or Kisin's house as Ashton would say it. Toys are always more fun when they are somewhere else. 

  Day33:  This picture is of Claire. She has many faces... I can't get over how much she looks like my mom.  I'll have to post a picture of her one of these days of when she was a baby and compare the two.  Picture stats 1/125, ISO 800 F 3.2 and external flash.

Same stats as the previous picture. They were taken on the same day.  I just thought it was cute.

Day 34:  This picture was taken with my Iphone. I generally  have my phone handy but don't always have my camera handy.  And pictures like these are so spontaneous that by the time I would have gotten my camera and hooked everything on it to take the picture, the moment would have been gone.

 

Day 35:  This picture was taken from a birthday party that I photographed.  I have been getting a few opprtunities to practice my photography through my Sorority's Alumni page.  I am meeting my Sorority sisters and enjoying every minute of it.  Stats of this picture are 1/150, ISO 800, F. 4.0.  

Blogging

So I am new to this whole blogging thing, only blogging for a month.  I am attempting to make a more manageable blog because I want to post things such as recipes, photographs, running and things that are just random that involve my thoughts and my family.  I want to have a navigation bar so that it makes it easier to just click on what you want.  I don't know how to do all of that, but I am learning as I go (so if anyone reading this knows how to do that, please let me know). Hopefully soon I will have all of these things on the blog. I also decided when I post my pictures for my project 365, I am going to just post the stats and a little brief description of the picture. When I want to write more than that I am going to make it a different post and post more pictures about the story.  I love blogging and I love posting pictures, I just want to write more about random thoughts and other things.  I feel like when I post a picture of something for my project, I am writing not just about the pictures, I am writing about running, my life etc. and it doesn't necessarily mix.

I also decided that I am not going to try to stress myself out about posting a picture everyday, but I will take pictures every day and post them as I edit them and make a post about a week or so worth of pictures. I think this will cut down on the randomness throughout the blog. 

I know I used random a lot in this post, but that is how I felt my blogging was going.  So another goal for the month of February is to make my blog posts lets random and more centralized to a certain subject.

That being said, stay tuned for some awesome 365 pictures coming as well as a post on a Birthday Party I am photographing today!

365-31

Today I am posting three pictures only because I want my readers to see first hand what it is like having a toddler in the house. The first picture is of Ashton's dinner plate. One would think that a toddler would like chicken nuggets and fruit for dinner, but as you can see it is untouched. At first I acutally cared whether or not Ashton finished his dinner, but then I realized I can't worry about it. If he doesn't eat what we eat or he doesn't want it, then oh well, he doesn't get anything. If he doesn't eat his dinner, he gets no snacks, no gummies, no ice cream bites, no popcorn, nothing. If he is hungry enough, he will eat it. I know some of you may think this is harsh, but you can't force a toddler into doing something that he doesn't want to do. We did leave it on the table for a while thinking he would come back to it, but he didn't. He did eat well at breakfast and lunch, so I know he got enough food today. I know that Ashton really wants to play instead of eat. Who knows how he will eat tomorrow.

The next two pictures are the bedtime routine. Ashton would NOT sit still to get on his PJs. He took off running and here are two pictures of the little stinker in action. Trying to catch him and get on his PJs takes about 3-4 minutes. I know that doesn't seem like a long time, but sometimes we just don't have that to spare. So here's to a night in the life of our household.

Ashton is too stinking cute though..

365-30

We have had a really mild winter this year. It almost scares me a little bit. I am determined to watch less T.V and have Ashton was less of it, so because we have had mild evenings, we have been going outside and playing. He loves playing outside.

For Christmas, Ashton received some sidewalk chalk and because our backyard is our drive way with an alley way, we have TONS of blacktop to draw on. Ashton kept telling me what he drew on the pavement…a monster….”A” Ashton, C “Claire”, “its blue”, “stars” etc. He puts meaning to everything that he draws even if it doesn’t look like something. He also knows some of his letters. I think that he is super smart, but I know that eventually, once he is in school that others will catch up to him and maybe he will slow down and learn all of these things now and then stop. Who knows, but right now I do know that Ashton is sponging up everything and is learning so much day by day.

This picture of is Ashton slashing the letters that I call out. I would say Ashton, show mommy the letter G. He would run over to it and slash it with the chalk. He is so proud of himself and I am so proud of him. The picture starts are 1/125, ISO 100 and F-Stop 2.2.

Monday is a rest day in the program, like I mentioned before. I have not eaten any Oreos, however, I have had cake and two mini sugar cookies over the last two days… But in my defense, I didn’t eat all of the icing on the piece of cake and the sugar cookies were mini. I have also been eating smoothies in the morning thanks to the recommendation of my sister-in-law for this small blender. I also have not bought the cafeteria food either and I am drinking waaay more water. I didn’t make it to the gym tonight and I wasn’t able to run outside because it was quite the crazy day at work. I got home late and I just didn’t make time. I am making time tomorrow even if I have to go to the gym at 9 like I did for the one week.

365-29

I think that I missed a day again somewhere.. I did take a picture though. I’ll add it in the mix soon. So today I wanted to try out my camera outside with my family. I convinced my wonderful husband to take the kids to Silver Lake to take a few quick pictures. We were there all of 5 minutes, maybe less and Ashton fell in the mud and stepped in the FREEZING water. Needless to say, I only got a handful of pictures.

I’m going to set weekly goals for my self. As some of you may know, I officially registered for my first half marathon. I’m really looking forward to it, but I really had to get down to it and train. I think going week by week will be better so I can obtain short term goals and see success. So here are my goals for the week

1. STOP EATING OREOS!!!!

2. Only buy coffee out one time this week (tomorrow for me!)

3. Do not buy breakfast out, eat at home

4. Do not eat in the school cafeteria (nothing against the cafeteria food, it’s really good, I just need to make sure I am watching what I eat more than I used to)

5. Follow the Hal Higdon half marathon plan (I’m going to give my self one slip up day if I don’t have time to run)

My picture for the day is right before Ashton fell in the mud/water. Dan is showing him how to throw rocks into the lake. Like I said, Ashton just adores Dan and wants to do everything he does. Picture stats are 1/400, ISO 100, 4.0.

365-27

Here is a picture of baby Claire.. I just can't get enough of her sweet face. Don't have much to say about the picture, and I don't have what the stats are..... I will get back to posting well thought out blog postings.

365-26

Every couple of months a group of us girls get together and do a “themed” night. This particular night we did “casserole” night. We had a variety and everyone’s was delicious. I do not have picture stats for this picture and I should have gotten a picture of the casseroles when the foil was off. But at least I have a picture for that day.

365-25

Today I officially registered for my first half marathon. (this post is 3 days late, so Thursday when this picture should have been posted is when I registered for the half marathon) I know a few people doing it so that is more motivation to begin training. I have taken a few days off from training from before (well more like 15 days ugh!), so I am going to officially officially start training on Monday. As you may have read from a previous post that Monday is a rest day, so I guess it will technically start on Tuesday. This time I am doing it, no if, ands, or buts, about it. I paid, I’m running!

For a while Claire was waking up two times in the middle of thenight to feed. She is back on the six hour stretch at night which makes me less tired during the day so hopefully I’ll be able to get to the gym once the kiddos go to bed.

This is a picture of Claire. She is getting so big. Picture stats 1/125. ISO 400 3.2 and external flash.