Dreams

Dear bun,

Since finding out about you, I have been having some very vivid dreams about you.  In the first one, you were a girl, and you were about 6 months old and I realized I had never taken a picture of you yet.  Oh the horror! Now, I'm going to go ahead and warn you- you will probably have your picture taken every day.  I like to document and remember things and the best way for me to do that is to photograph them and write about it.  Ok so last night, you were a boy and you were just born- but for some reason I did not have anything ready.  No, stroller, carseat or anything.  In my dream I had you and I was holding you in a blanket running around Babies R Us (the worst place ever) trying to pick out basic things for you.  I was so unprepared!  Both of these dreams are so silly but very like me to be worrying about these things in my dreams. 

Love,

Mom

Week 6: Sweet Pea

Dear Bun,

It seems so surreal to say "I'm pregnant." I have grown you in my heart for years and now I grow you in my body. I have always known that I could not wait to be a mom, and here I am just months away from meeting you. You still have lots of growing to do though. In fact, at this point, I have not told anyone about you except your dad. We are waiting a few weeks to tell our parents, and then a few more to tell our friends. For now, it's our little secret and I could not be happier.

I am feeling pretty good, except for being really tired. It's hard to wake up some mornings and I would love to be able to take an afternoon nap everyday, but that's only for the weekends. Oh, and I have a really huge appetite these days and I find that I have to eat something small every few hours. There's a lot more going on with you though. Right now, you are growing like crazy. You are about the size of a sweet pea, and you are starting to sprout eyes, ears, nose, a mouth and chin. Your little hands are still webbed at this point and blood is starting to circulate through your tiny body.

I am going to try and take weekly "bump" pictures as well. This is mostly for you and my family since I know this will be hard for them to be away while we grow. I am already thinking about how many more phone calls I am going to get once I tell my mom (your grandma) about you. I think she will probably check in on us daily. Kidding mom, kind of. So here I am, 6 weeks along- no change yet.

Love,

Your mom

Ice Cream

Dear Bun,

You are being pretty good to me so far... last week I came home and saw this in the freezer.  How did you know Mint Chocolate Chip was my favorite?

Love, 

Mom

The Big Announcement!

So, on July 27th, we found out we are going to be parents!  Right now, I am about 13 1/2 weeks along and we have a due date of March 31, 2011.  Since I try to document our lives as much as possible to help preseve memories, I decided to use this blog as the channel for my pregnancy journal.  This will also help keep our family updated on what's going on and will allow me to share pictures with everyone.  Hopefully, once we have our bundle in March (or April) I will be able to publish this as a gift for the baby. 

I have been keeping weekly updates since week 6 and will publish those right after this.  I usually update them on Sunday's so next Sunday will be week 14 and I will be all caught up and in "real time" - everything I wrote up until this point has been hidden since we did not tell people right away. 

Here are some questions I have been asked, and maybe some that you have been wondering too:

Was it planned? We decided to start trying in July (mom, you can thank John, I wanted to wait another year or so) and got pregnant the first month.  So, while we knew it was possible to get pregnant, we figured we would have at least a few months before it happened. Wrong.  This is one of the reasons we did not tell people right away, we wanted to get used to the idea ourselves before sharing it with family.  Of course we are excited for this wonderful blessing, it just happened a little quicker than we thought!

How did you tell John? I always knew I wanted to do something a little more creative than just show him the pregnancy test, so I thought I should enlist the help of our first "baby."  I decided to make her a shirt so that she could tell him the news. 

I called John upstairs because I had to show him something.  Morgan and I were at the top of the stairs, and I had the pregnancy test, the flip, and was holding her.  Anyway, he came up and read her shirt and his response was "so we're getting another dog?" Um, not exactly John.  It still took him a minute and then I showed him this and I think he finally got it:

Of course, I made us get a family picture right afterwords:



Are you going to find out the sex? Absolutely, I don't like surprises.  Plus I want to start shopping.

What sex would you prefer? Of course we want a healthy baby above everything else, but yeah we have a preference, and it's not the same gender, so one of us will get what we want :)


Do you have names picked out? I have tons, but I love baby names- I have been obsessed with finding the perfect names for babies and it all started with my dolls- so I have been naming my babies for about 20 years now, ha!  I always have a rotating mental list of potential baby names- this will be a post of it's own once we find out the gender- but it will be a timeless classic name, that's not too popular or trendy.

How are you feeling?  This is actually the first question people ask me, and so far, I have no complaints at all- I was very tired the first few weeks, got nauseous once or twice when I smelled something, but never got sick or experienced morning sickness. So far, so good! 

What are you craving? I wish I had a crazy answer here like you always hear about- women wanting pickles and ice cream or something, but I haven't had any real cravings I don't think.  I do drink chocolate milk every day and all meat sounds bad to me.  I have been living off of cheese, fruit, and nuts.  I also want to eat sweets more than I usually do.  So maybe instead of cravings, I have just had aversions.

How are you decorating the nursery?  Once we find out the gender, I will be all over this.  So far, I have just been collecting images of nurseries for inspiration, but I don't have anything set.  It will not be gender neutral- if it's a girl, it will be girlie (not pink) and if it's a boy it will be boyish. 

When are you due? March 31, 2011 although my mom was 2 wks late with both me and my sis, so I expect to be late.


Ok, I think that's most of the questions I have gotten, I'll keep updating weekly with the progress.  Please pray for a healthy baby and pregnancy!

12 weeks to better photography: landscapes

This week's lesson is on landscapes.  I usually don't photograph alot of landscapes, I think people are much more interesting! But, since I'm going through the whole 12 weeks of this, I did not want to skip over it.  I think the #1 rule when shooting landscapes is that you want a large depth of field.  Here are other tips:

1. Use a wide angle lens to include more of the setting
2. Find a bird's eye view- Here is a pic I took from an airplane as we were flying from San Juan Islands into Seattle:

3. Locate a focal point- This was taken last January in Sarasota

4. Consider composition & the rule of thirds- this was taken on our honeymoon in Belize- this was right outside our cabana!

5. Pay attention to the time of day- sunrises and sunsets are a great thing to capture and always seem to make landscapes more appealing- this photo below was taken of Ayers Rock in Australia- world's largest monolith.  It was taken before sunset, apparently this is the best time to see the colors come out on the rock and die-hard photographers were really into it.  I was just using my point and shoot at this time but I still think it's a pretty neat shot.

12 weeks to better photography: portraits

This week was about portraits, something I found useful because I love pictures of people (and dogs).  I learned some great tips for taking photos of individuals and groups.  My favorite tips are below:

For individuals:
- consider your subjects height- if they are taller than you, have them sit or squat so that they are directly in front of you, or looking up at you * I need practice with this because whenever I take a picture of John standing, I always seem to be angling it up at his neck/chin which is not the most flattering for most people.
- keep the background simple so it does not detract from the subject, or use a backdrop (fabric, large roll of paper, or artwork) or natural elements (barn door, brick wall, or a grassy field)

For groups:
- take the same number of photos as there are people in the group to have a better chance of a good photo of everyone
- take both full length and a relaxed head and shoulders shot that allows you to see everyone's expression


The assignment was to take a portrait of an individual or group, or convert a photo to black and white (since b&w is especially nice for portraits)


This week, instead of me pulling out my camera*, I grabbed some photos from our wedding that I think illustrate good portraiture.

*ok, I got lazy

Welcome Fall!

My favorite time of year is starting and I have almost made it though the awful NC summer!  I love getting out all my fall stuff and burning pumpkin candles to ring in the season.  Confession... I have had fall stuff up since mid-August, but since it's now September and football has started, it seems ok to share the pictures now. So, here is some fall love, from our house to yours!  Looking forward to a great season of crisp apples, changing leaves, football, sweaters, cider and cozy nights burning candles at home.

Sidenote- I have a slight addiction to Slatkin & Co candles from BBW and accidentally brought home 5 fall candles.  I love them.

Happy Fall!