Meet Goofy Gus

He was grown in my Mom's garden.



He's ginormous.



My kids gutted him and Dave carved him and they popped the pieces out.



Clara did a lot of this...



We call him Goofy Gus.



Happy Halloween!

Halloween treats!

Gabe and I had some fun today. We've gotten goodies from the "Family Night Phantom" every monday this month and I wanted to do something fun when we went out to ding dong ditch people. So I thought to myself...who better than the queen of goodies? And I went to Bakerella's blog to find out how to make Cake Pops!

It was so fun that I think I'm going to do another batch for teachers and such on Thursday or Friday.



Scary ghosties. (I love the little guy in the upper left that's looking the wrong way). My edible pens that I bought did NOT work. Luckily I had some black gel frosting hanging around. It only worked for the ghosts though. The poor pumpkins had to be faceless.



I had Gabe dip apple bites into the leftover melted candy. (this whole project took several trips to several stores. I'm severely lacking in kitchen stuff...mostly because I rarely do things like this)



Happy kiddos!





Finished product. Got the little glass "bags" at the dollar tree.

These boots are made for walking!

Miss Clara got new boots and she loves them. It's just the cutest thing!



They totally helped her language skillz too. She was calling them "shwshwsh" (that's how she said shoes) for a while and then she went to "oosh" and now says "BOOTS" very clearly. lol.


I just adore that girl. Oh, she's in nursery now and a total star. No tears and she totally holds her own against the rougher kids.

no color. no fun.

We're having super schizo weather this fall and it's no fun for a photographer.

In case you were wondering.

It's bouncing between freezing and quite warm and it's freaking the trees out apparently. I have a weeping cherry outside the window by my favorite reading chair. In the spring it's pretty with pink flowers and in the fall it's pretty with yellow leaves. Except not this fall. This fall the green leaves are just shriveling up into icky brown and blackness and dying WITHOUT CHANGING COLOR.

I keep doing all these shoots and all the pretty fall colors are not there.

And I don't like it. Not one bit.

The naughty word discussion

*disclaimer* There will be mild swearing in this post.

The other day Aria was rhyming in a sing song voice. "mitchin, litchin, ditchin, bitchin, mitchen, litchin, ditchin, bitchin." So, I mentioned to her that bitch is not a nice word and people use it to be mean to other people and she probably shouldn't say it.

Fast forward to today. Nathan said "Mom, what does faggot mean?" Dave said it means a bundle of sticks and I said that sometimes people take normal words and twist the meaning so it becomes a bad word and that faggot is a mean name to call people.

I told him it was just like when Aria said bitch and that it actually means a female dog, but that people use it in a mean way now. Which then ensued this discussion between Nathan and Aria and I dissolved into laughter.

Aria: But I didn't say bitch, I said ditch!
Nathan: Nuh-uh, it sounded like you said bitch.
Aria: No Nathan, I didn't say bitch!

I could see this going on indefinitely, with bitch being said in every sentence out of my sweet kids mouths, so I stopped them at this point. Then I laughed.

Hehwo, hehwo!

Clara goes to primary with me every week because she's not old enough for nursery. She wonders around during sharing/singing time then comes to class with me. Apparently she picked up on the "Hello song" that we sing to visitors. One day she came home and put shoes on her hands and had them "singing" to each other. "hehwo, hehwo! Hehwo, hehwo!" She'll wonder around the house singing it randomly.

So I've been trying to catch it on video but she's a little stinker and when I point my phone at her she says "NO!"

But with Gabe's help I got a little in this one. Along with a couple "no's"

More soccer

My saturdays consist of soccer games these days so that's what you get. I took my camera this last saturday because it was picture day and I refuse to buy team pictures. I just stand behind the photographer and take my own.

So I figured I should try and get good game shots while I was at it. Aria's game was first and it was COLD. 41 degrees and windy.

Gabe dealt with it like this.



Clara was cold but wouldn't keep a blanket on, so I tied my coat around her stroller which really ticked her off. I let her scream because I'd rather she be warm and mad at me than cold and happily independent.



It was a good game to bring my camera because Aria made an awesome goal and I got it!

Dribbling down the field


About to kick.


She shoots!


She scores!


And she scans the sidelines to make sure I saw. lol


It was a teensy bit warmer, but windier by the time the boys games started.


I love that his tongue is always hanging out. Luckily he hasn't bitten through it too often...




I shot a bunch of pictures of Nathan's game and when I got home to look at them I just started laughing. Note the eyes that are squeezed shut and the cringing away from the ball.




I love when he looks intense, because that's not a common expression for him. He's normally laid back and content like me. lol


He got to play goalie which he loved. I remember that was my favorite soccer position too. He worked it!

You can't help but laugh when you're hanging out with Gabe

I picked him up from my friend's house after volunteering at school today and he ran out to the car ahead of me. When I got there he shouted "Mom, I can make a Y!" I looked up and saw this.

Somehow I became a soccer mom

I hated soccer as a kid. I hated soccer as a teen. I all around just don't enjoy anything about the sport. But somehow...I have 3 kids playing soccer this year. (for the record...still not a fan)

Nathan


Aria


and Gabe


Nathan and Aria's teams are at the age where the kids are trying and have a fairly decent grasp of the rules. Aria even made her first ever goal on Saturday!

Gabe's team though is 3 on 3, no goalie, kick the ball around and try to make a goal for the right team. It's pretty cute. And Gabe is a star. We got a few strings pulled to get him on the 4 yr old team even though he won't be four til next month and he's rocking it.

Except for the whole understanding how the game works thing.

We (and the coach) spent most of the game yelling at him to kick the ball the other way. lol. He'll catch on eventually.

Here he is while the coach is explaining how soccer works. See how he's paying such close attention?


And here's a video. You can watch him make a goal for the wrong side. :D

It's a blanket....with sleeves!

We're big fans of The Big Bang Theory. On the season finale Penny gave Leonard a blanket with sleeves to take to the North Pole with him and when Sheldon saw it he said "How clever!"

Dave and I both make jokes from one liners from that show all the time so in honor of tonights season premier...guess what Dave got me?



By the way, apparently I'm behind the times because a friend came over and was like "Oh, you got a snuggie!" I had no idea this was an infomercial item that everybody knew about. I'd only ever seen it on TBBT. lol

photography book recommendation

I like to keep my eye out for books that the average person who just wants to take good pictures of their family can benefit from. I always recommend Understanding Exposure by Bryan Peterson but it's more for the person who has a SLR camera and wants to learn to use it.

But today I want to recommend a book for anybody. It will give you an in depth look at 3 easy points that will greatly improve your pictures.

1. Get closer
2. Shoot more frames
3. Turn off your flash

It's called How to Photograph Your Family by Nick Kelsh. It's older and he talks about film, but those tips are exactly the same for digital photography. He has lots of great before/after shots and simple explanations. Many of the pictures in his book were taken by just regular people with a point and shoot.

Tender mercies

I forgot to mention this below, but there were some tender mercies besides my blog that I discovered after my hard drive broke.

1. I run all my photos through lightroom before transferring them to my hard drive. Lightroom automatically saves the raw files on my c drive. I had cleaned my c drive off back in June, but I still had all my pictures from Nathan's baptism forward. Including a few shoots that I had finished proofing but hadn't burned to disk yet. Luckily I had their raw files (one was a wedding!) and was able to just re-photoshop them instead of having to tell them I lost their pictures. That makes me shudder just thinking about it.

2. Our kitchen faucet is on it's last leg and has been for a while. It randomly loses all pressure on the hot water. It had been acting up for a week or so and we thought we'd have to finally bite the bullet and replace the faucet. (they're expensive!) After the hard drive broke it started working again and has been since.

3. Facebook and blogger. The pictures I uploaded there and here are still there. Granted I can't make big prints of them because they're compressed files, but I can do 4x6 prints or photo books without any trouble.

Too sad to blog...but also grateful for my blog

Wow, I haven't blogged in a while. I think this is the longest for me. I have a reason though.

A couple weeks ago Clara knocked my external hard drive off my desk and broke it. My 750 gig external hard drive that held 8 years of pictures, videos, journaling and files. I did back it up on occasion, but the last backup was 3 years ago. Coincidentally, my blog is 3 years old, meaning what remains of my memories of the last 3 years is preserved right here on my blog.

The data isn't gone forever, but it is inaccessible without a clean room. And sending a hard drive to a clean room costs around $3000. (I called several places, they all gave the same quote).

Aaaand...it's gonna take a while to save that. (we don't believe in credit cards)

So, I was sad. And left with no inspiration to blog. Which, really, is totally the wrong reaction when you consider how glad I am that I have this blog. It now holds priceless memories.

But, I was called out on Facebook for giving my cousin Katie withdrawls because of my blogging absence. I was adequately chastened and I'm back.

So...hi! Didja miss me?

This is why I always do afternoon kindergarten...

I'm not a morning person. If it were up to me, I'd roll out of bed around 9 and loll around for a couple hours and really start my day around 11. In fact, when my kids were smaller I had them trained to sleep in to 9 or 10 themselves. It was awesome. When Nathan started Kindergarten, I knew myself and put him in afternoon K. It was great. I was dreading first grade when school would begin at 9. He was late a lot that year. It probably didn't help that I was pregnant with Clara and sick the whole year. When Aria began K, I knew it would be better to only have 1 kid to get ready in the morning and she could wait til noon. I was right, it was perfect. We even managed to get Nathan to school on time for his second grade year.

But, alas, times have changed.

I now have a first grader and a third grader. That's two kids that have to be to school by 9 AM every day. That means two kids to feed, make lunches for and find socks for (we can never find socks around here). Two backpacks to load, two library books to keep track of, etc, etc. I know you'll tell me to get things ready the night before, but I'm not so good at that. It's in my DNA. I'm incapable of organization.

Most morning, it's not so bad, at the very least I can get backpacks ready the night before. And since I usually just throw on sunglasses and drop them off, I don't have to get ready for the day myself.

But today I wanted to go in with them which meant I had to shower. I didn't get much sleep because Gabe has a cold and when he coughs, he throws up. So I barely dragged myself out of bed at 8 thinking Nathan and Aria would be up at least. But they weren't. So I get them up and ended up having about 40 minutes to make breakfast, make lunch, find socks, get myself ready, etc. We got in the car at 8:55, hurried to school and barely made it. In all the rush I didn't even get my camera out for first day of school pictures. Luckily, I had my phone with me.

So that's all ya get.



Tomorrow will be smoother. It will.

Better School Picture Day - Seattle Style!

I've had some requests and as it turns out, I will be in Seattle on September 12th. So....

The Better School Picture Day
Saturday, September 12th, 2009
1:30pm - 3:30pm at Coulon Beach
$35 per child. (it's a bit more to cover shipping, if you have more than one child, it's $35 for the first and $25 for any other kids) I spend 5-10 minutes with each of your children. Just long enough to get 3-5 great shots of them. Your pictures will be fully edited and presented in an online gallery. The $25 pays for the sitting and THREE fully edited full-resolution files on a Data CD with rights to print.

BY APPOINTMENT ONLY.

Email me at mistydawnphotos@gmail.com to set up a time!

Better School Picture Day!

Do you hate school pictures as much as I do? I never get them. Usually I just take my kids out right before school starts for the year and get pictures of them. I can print them myself for pennies instead of paying ridiculous prices for the school picture guy to take a generic head shot. I know some people get them just so they have a picture record of how their kids are growing.

Well, I have an alternative for you. Why not have that same record, only more creative and cheaper? This year I'm offering a better school picture day. For only $25 per child I will meet you at Manito and will spend 5-10 minutes with your child, taking several pictures so that you will end up with 3 great images that I will burn to a data CD for you. You can then make all the prints you want! So, the info...

The Better School Picture Day
Saturday, September 19th, 09 AND Tuesday, September 22nd, 09
5:30pm - 7:30pm at the rose gardens at Manito Park.
$25 per child. I spend 5-10 minutes with each of your children. Just long enough to get 3-5 great shots of them. Your pictures will be fully edited and presented in an online gallery. The $25 pays for the sitting and THREE fully edited full-resolution files on a Data CD with rights to print.

BY APPOINTMENT ONLY.

There may be a morning session, but it depends on my kids' soccer schedules. lol. Email me at mistydawnphotos@gmail.com or call ASAP to set your appt time. Oh, and tell your friends!

Here are some examples of what you'll get.

My talk

You don't have to read this. I just like to keep copies of my talks and this is my journal. :)

Throughout this year we've been hearing talks centered around the For the Strength of Youth pamphlet. Each of us has been reminded of our standards concerning accountability, gratitude, education, family, friends, dress and appearance, entertainment and the media, music and dancing, language, dating, sexual purity, repentance, honesty, sabbath day observance, tithes and offerings, physical health and service. Today I was asked to speak on the conclusion of the For the Strength of Youth pamphlet which is to go forward with faith.

I read what the pamphlet had to say about going forward with faith and I broke it down into a few key points. First it says to ask ourselves, "Am I living the way the Lord wants me to live?" Then it tells us what to do to be sure that we are.

But before I go through those, I want to talk about faith a little bit. Because how can we go forward with faith if we can't define faith? Some people view faith as an abstract concept. Something that is hard to come by, something that people either have or don't have. I don't think that's true. I think faith is something everybody can have. In 2nd Nephi 31, Nephi tells us that we must endure to the end. To be able to endure he says we need to follow Christ's example. Then he tells us exactly what he saw Christ do that we must emulate. In verse 17, "For the gate by which ye should enter is repentance and baptism by water; and then cometh a remission of your sins by fire and by the Holy Ghost." So step 1 to realizing our faith is to repent, be baptised and accept the gift of the Holy Ghost. Most of us here can check this off the list, right? Then Nephi tells us that doing those things puts us right on the straight and narrow path. Pretty simple, right? It's like the gateway to the straight and narrow. We all started there. Then he says wait a second, are we done? Nope. We wouldn't have even gotten that far without a little something called faith. Faith in Christ. Faith in His word and "relying wholly upon the merits of him who is mighty to save."

So we started with obedience and hope, which leads us right into faith. But then verse 20 says "Wherefore, ye must press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, having a perfect brightness of hope, and a love of God and of all men. Wherefore, if ye shall press forward, feasting upon the word of Christ, and endure to the end, behold, thus saith the Father: Ye shall have eternal life." I like the phrase 'a perfect brightness of hope'. I think it's a beautiful description of faith. I think hope is easier to wrap our brain around. We all hope for things, right? Well, if we have hope, we have faith. Moroni said "Wherefore, if a man have faith he must needs have hope; for without faith there cannot be any hope."

But then we must endure to the end. The simple definition of endurance to me is to just continue to keep the commandments. We started there, if we want our faith to grow, we should keep it up. D&C 136:42 tells us to be diligent in keeping the Lord's commandments so our faith doesn't fail. Henry B. Eyering reminds us that "great faith has a short shelf life." He says we must continue to exercise obedience to build our faith. Elder Uchtdorf said "Enduring to the end is a process filling every minute of our life, every hour, every day, from sunrise to sunrise. It is accomplished through personal discipline following the commandments of God."

Now let's go back to the question posed in the For the Strength of Youth pamphlet. "Am I living the way the Lord wants me to live?" It tells us exactly how we can live in order to answer yes to that question. First, we need to pray. "To help you become all that the Lord wants you to become, get on your knees each day and express to Him the desires of your heart. He is the source of all wisdom, and you need His help. he will hear and answer you."

Second, we must read the scriptures daily. "They are a powerful source of personal revelation and a constant strength to your testimony." I know for myself, daily scripture study has more impact on my every day life than almost anything else I can do. When I take the time to read my scriptures everything else is easier to deal with. I'm more patient with my kids, I have more energy to take care of my responsibilities and I'm just happier in general.

Third, we must remember our baptismal covenants and be true to the Lord and to His Church in all circumstances. We're reminded that the authorities of the church will lead us in paths of happiness. That reminds me of 1 Nephi 11:17 when Nephi says that while he doesn't know the meaning of all things, he does know that the Lord loves us, His children.

Finally we must be humble and willing to listen to the whisperings of the Spirit. We need to place the wisdom of the Lord above our own wisdom.

Then we're given a promise that if we do these things the Lord will make much more out of our life that we can by ourself. He will increase our opportunities, expand our vision and strengthen us. He will give us the help we need to meet our trials and challenges. We will find true joy as we come to know our Father in Heaven and His Son, Jesus Christ, and feel their love for us.

I know sometimes that's easier said than done, but I have a couple personal stories that illustrate how perfectly this formula can work if we'll let it.

I'm the sort of person that follows my feelings more than any sort of logic. Some of you know this story but it's a perfect example so you get to hear it again. 10 years ago I was working as a traveling photographer. I had just received my endowments and I was doing all those things I just mentioned. I was praying daily, reading my scriptures daily and attending the temple weekly. I was very much enjoying traveling all over the western United States and getting paid to take pictures. I met a lot of great people and saw a lot of cool things. But there was one little thing that was nagging at me and that was church service. Because I was rarely in the same city two weeks in a row, I couldn't hold a calling. I attended church wherever I was but I couldn't serve in the church. Every time I opened my scriptures I would see verses about service. I was starting to get really antsy and feeling like I needed to stop traveling and hold still long enough to hold a calling but I couldn't do that unless I quit my job. It didn't seem logical to quit. I was making really good money doing something I loved, but I knew what the Lord wanted me to do, so I put in my notice. As soon as I did that I was flooded with calm. I knew it was right. The day after my final shoot for this company, I went to the First Presidency Christmas broadcast at my stake center. While I was there I ran into the institute choir director and he asked if I would accept a calling to be the pianist for the institute choir. I knew this was why I had quit my job so I of course said yes. 4 days later I went to choir practice and that's where I first met Dave.

So, I went forward with faith by quitting my job. I increased my obedience by accepting a calling which increased my faith enough for me to take another big leap of faith. Only 7 weeks after that day that I met Dave, we were married in the Seattle Temple. Now if that wasn't placing the Lord's wisdom above my own, I don't know what is. Nearly 10 years and 4 kids later, I have a much better view of where the Lord was leading me then and I'm so glad I had the faith to go forward.

Another time that we felt led to do something that didn't make a whole lot of sense was when we moved here. Dave had a great job in Seattle, but we really felt like we were supposed to be elsewhere. We came up with a few cities to consider and Dave started looking for a job. He got an interview here so we came over but as soon as we got here the company told him that they had hired someone else so they didn't want him to come in for the interview after all. But since we were here, we figured we'd do a little house hunting. We ended up finding our house and knowing that it was the right place for us to go, but Dave didn't have a job here. He didn't even have a prospect for a job. But we took that leap of faith again and made an offer on our house. It was accepted and it wasn't until a week or so later that he got an interview for the job he currently has. Again, the Lord had a plan and we just had to go with it until we could see it all.

It's not always marriage and homes that our faith will guide us to. It also says in that promise that if we have faith the Lord will strengthen us and give us the help we need to meet our trials and challenges. That's not always so fun, but it's amazingly comforting to know the Lord is on our side. There was a time when I was prompted that something was going to happen to one of my kids. I didn't know what but I knew I wasn't going to like it and I knew that the prompting wasn't concerning either of the children that I currently had. This feeling stuck with me for over a year and I just did my best to go forward with faith and hope the Lord would help me. It wasn't until I miscarried a little girl that the feeling left. It took quite a while to deal with that loss or to even understand at all but I knew I had been prepared and I knew the Lord was helping me through. It was during that time that my testimony of the savior and the atonement grew and took on a whole new meaning for me.

As I was preparing for this talk, a scripture kept coming to mind. 1 Nephi 4:6. Right before Nephi goes in to get the plates from Laban he says "And I was led by the Spirit, not knowing beforehand the things which I should do." He literally went forward with faith. So I looked up that scripture in the general conference talks (on the best talk reference website ever) and I came across a talk by Boyd K Packer that I thought was really interesting. It was from the Oct conference in 1994 and he was addressing the youth. He wanted to teach them how to obtain personal revelation. I skimmed through it and he had it broken into topics and most of the topics were things taught in For the Strength of Youth. Things like prayer, reverence, obeying the word of wisdom, sabbath observance, and music.

He has a beautiful description of faith.

"The flow of personal revelation depends on your faith. You exercise faith by causing, or by making, your mind accept or believe as truth that which you cannot, by reason alone, prove for certainty.

The first exercising of your faith should be your acceptance of Christ and His atonement.

As you test gospel principles by believing without knowing, the Spirit will begin to teach you. Gradually your faith will be replaced with knowledge.

You will be able to discern, or to see, with spiritual eyes.

Be believing and your faith will be constantly replenished, your knowledge of the truth increased, and your testimony of the Redeemer, of the Resurrection, of the Restoration will be as “a well of living water, springing up unto everlasting life.” You may then receive guidance on practical decisions in everyday life."


He ends by reminding us of our need for the comforter.

"Now do not suppose that you will be spared from sorrow, disappointment, failure, fear. These come to all. They are essential to our testing.

When sore trials come, you will learn why the Holy Ghost is called the Comforter.

You must face life “led by the Spirit, not knowing beforehand the things which [you] should do,” just as Nephi did.

You may not yet have a certain witness that Jesus is the Christ. Exercise your faith and trust in those who do.

I have that certain witness. It came to me in my youth. During those early periods of doubt, I leaned on the testimony of a seminary teacher. Although I did not know, somehow I knew that he knew.

The Lord said:

“If ye love me, keep my commandments.

“And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;

“Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
“I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you."

One of my favorite hymns teaches us to go forward with faith.

"Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom;
Lead thou me on!
The night is dark, and I am far from home;
Lead thou me on!
Keep thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene—one step enough for me."

2 Nephi 31:21 "And now, behold, my beloved brethren, this is the way; and there is none other way nor name given under heaven whereby man can be saved in the kingdom of God. And now, behold, this is the doctrine of Christ, and the only and true doctrine of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, which is one God, without end. Amen"

Fail!

I don't know if you're familiar with fail blog. Basically it's a site dedicated to funny pictures that people submit of random "fails". For example.



Well, there's another one dedicated to funny baby fails. It's called My First Fail.

I happened to have the perfect picture for them.

So I submitted it....and it showed up today! lol. Go vote for Gabe!

Just some photos from recent shoots

I'm all caught up with proofing so thought I'd share a few. :)







This is my Mom. Isn't she gorgeous?


This antique pram was given to me! I love it!










For family, if you haven't seen these yet...

Chantal's wedding pictures

Kim's Senior pictures

Did I ever link to Katies? I don't remember.

Mae's 18 month pictures

Jovie's 18 month pictures

Mom's 50th birthday pictures