Star sighting!

Before yesterday, the only famous person I'd ever seen before was Ray Charles. I shook his hand in the LA airport when I was 16 and on my way to Japan for a few weeks. (A high school sister city exchange program).

But they're shooting a movie downtown with Cuba Gooding Jr and Christian Slater right now. I happened to be downtown yesterday (with my mom, sisters, a friend and 2 of my kids) while they were shooting a scene with Cuba Gooding Jr. We stopped to watch and like a good little photographer, I had my point and shoot in my purse.

So here you go!

We watched for about 20 minutes while they filmed a 5 second scene where Cuba Gooding Jr got out of a car, stood and glared at the camera, then got back into the car and slammed the door.

This is some guy that they set the whole scene up with and then did a couple takes. (somebody said it was Cuba Gooding Jr's cousin).



Then Cuba Gooding Jr got out of his car (that I was standing right next to) and did the same scene. It seriously took forever and was for about a 5 second scene. It was weird. Making movies looks incredibly boring. lol





Here he is doing the acting part. Intense, huh?



and after the scene was shot he went back to his car. He kinda smiled/waved at the group of us and shook hands with a cute little boy over by his car then got in and that was that.

Some recent Nathan funnies

Before you read these, you need to know that Nathan delivers everything with a deadpan expression. I'm never quite sure if he's trying to be funny or if he's just naturally that way. Sometimes he'll crack a huge grin after making us laugh, those are the times I think he was trying.

Anyway.

I went to Time Out for Women last weekend. While there, I received a text from Dave who had the 3 kids. Gabe had asked where Mama was and Dave said she's at Time Out for Women. To which Nathan replied, "what did all those women do to have to go to time out for SO LONG?"

A few days ago, Nathan, Aria and I were discussing marriage. They were talking about how old they'd be when they get married and that Nathan would find a girl to marry and Aria would find a boy and I was telling them I didn't meet their dad til I was 20, etc. The conversation ended with Nathan saying "I think I'll marry Delaney" (a girl in his class at school). I said "really? Do you like her?" to which he replied, "No. I just can't think of anybody else."

Then today he was talking to Dave and he says "Dad? Why do flamingos stand on one leg?" Dave replied "I don't know, maybe we can look it up." and Nathan said "well, if they lifted up the other leg, they'd fall over." (I imagine he grinned after this one).

Am I going to make it 2 more months?

I'm sure I will...but man, this baby is kicking my butt. I've spent the last 2 days monitoring my blood sugar and avoiding all carbs and sugar. Turns out I just might have gestational diabetes. But it looks like I can control it with diet. Yippee. Mix that with this yucky flu-like thing that I've had since Friday and I am not a happy camper.

Oh, and I've been trying for years to figure out this other problem that I have. I randomly get this horrible pain that radiates through my chest, shoulders, neck and upper back. It about knocks me over and I have to lay down for up to an hour sometimes before it fades. My newest guess is gallstones. I don't really know, though. I do know it's not pregnancy related, although I have been dealing with it more lately.

And I'm tired. OH SO TIRED. But my iron levels are fine, and so is my blood pressure. Then, of course, there's pubic symphasis and sciatica. My body just does not like being pregnant.

Ready for some more whining? (I'm allowed, it's my blog)....

Gabe.

My hilarious, oh so cute, cuddly, happy and drive-me-insane mischievous 2 year old.

He likes pills. He finds them and I can't figure out how. He dug through Grandma's purse one time and found some pills that looked like orange skittles. Can't blame him, I guess. After all, he is a sugaraholic. Fortunately, 1 bite and he threw up everything in his stomach.

He got into Dave's blood glucose monitor and found a pill in there once. Didn't like that one, either. Luckily it was just vitamin C.

He loooooooves Tums. I have to keep those up high or he'll just eat them like candy. I told him it was medicine and medicine makes you sick. He said "No Mom! Medicine makes you better!" He's got a point. *sigh*

But really, up high makes no difference. I had some juice plus on the highest shelf in my plate cupboard. Yesterday he dragged a chair over, scaled the drawers from the chair to get on the counter, opened the cupboard, reached up high, found the juice plus bottles, opened them, sat down and started to play. They're the kind that are capsules filled with powder. He tried a bite and wasn't too impressed but decided it would be fun to open all the capsules and spill the powder everywhere. I found him after he started yelling for me because he couldn't get down by himself. (okay, the truth is I ignored the yelling for 5 minutes because I was laying in bed feeling lousy and Dave finally went to see what the problem was.)

It'll be nice to get my non-pregnant self back and have a sweet little baby to love and cuddle. Then again, I'm not even a little bit prepared for said sweet baby. I need to get her a bed, carseat, clothes, and supplies for the homebirth.

Ok...whine over. I have to go find something carb free to eat again. Then poke my finger in a couple hours.

For Grandpa! (the last of the weekend pics)

My grandparents have a wall dedicated to pictures of their grandkids families and my family is a little slow in getting them new pictures. (my picture on their wall is over 2 years old!).

So, Grandpa, we heard you wanted new ones. Take your pick! Just click the picture to open it in a new window and then you can print it up. Mine is from November, but the others I just took over the weekend.

Love you!

Oh, and happy almost birthday!















I thought this was funny with Atreyu looking at Jovie like "what's up with you?"

Weekend pictures - part 4 - wedding sneak peek!

I had the absolute pleasure of shooting Nikki and Cody on Saturday. They were a really fun couple and so easy to work with! Here's a sneak peek of the images. The rest won't be done for a few weeks yet.

Does she not have the coolest shoes, ever?? I've been dying to do this shot for a long time! I was so excited to get to!



It was pretty cold and windy. And her brother wasn't having any of that lovey dovey stuff...



We went to get this shot and just as I raised the camera, the sun went behind the clouds. It was only a minute later when it popped back out and we got the shot!









and a couple from the reception.

Weekend pictures - part 3 - Daniel

Remember those 5 babies being born in my extended family? Well, 4 of them are here. I'm the only one left. One cousin had hers at the end of January and this is him! (I'm taking pictures of the other little guy tomorrow!)

Meet Daniel!

Here are 2 of my favorites.



I had to put a hat on this baby, too!

Weekend pics part 2 - people babies

Here's Jovie! My sweet little niece that I havn't seen since she was 2 days old. She's grown so much! And I love her chubby legs! My kids never got that. I'm jealous!



Lately I just want to take pictures of babies in hats. Love it!















I love her expression here. Cracks me up!


Jovie with Mae. Look, Mae's giving Jovie bunny ears. Like mother, like daughter, I guess!

Pictures from the weekend - part 1 - The dogs.

I was home for the weekend. I spent a day shooting a wedding (pictures of that to come) and a day shooting everyone's babies. Dog babies, people babies, families with babies....yeah. So, there are several posts coming. Hold on to your seats!

Now, admittedly, I'm not a huge yappy dog fan. (yappy, meaning small and annoying and can jump abnormally high.) In fact, I think my expression in this picture says it all. However, my mom and sister love their dogs so while I was waiting for the people babies to get ready for pictures, I played a bit with the dog babies.

Here you go.









Gabe's an old pro at sticking his tongue out for the camera, so he came over to do what the dogs were doing.

Dude, check me out!

So, I'm normally anti-getting-my-picture-taken when I'm pregnant. I don't normally feel terribly attractive. However...being my 4th pregnancy and since I'm not sure I'll do this again I went for it. I decided to break tradition and go for an urban look and I love how they turned out! (speaking of...if any of you that are reading this are pregnant and want similar pictures, I'm dying to take some for my own portfolio...just email me! There's a discount involved!)

Thank you so much to my great friend (and awesome photographer!) Lee for taking these. Also thanks to my sister and the best hairdresser ever, Rachel, for the fantastic cut and color last week.

On some of these you'll see the color and b/w version. Since they're so cool.













Before you ask, this motorcycle was just sitting in an alley. We saw it, had to use it, and hurried...I don't think anyone saw us. lol