day one hundred seventy two

Proof that Liam's birthday balloon is still going strong, three months after it arrived at our house.  And Liam still enjoys playing with it (and plastic hangers).

I love this picture because it shows a sample of the chaos that is our home, and further evidence that children love balloons and non-toys.

Using Nikon 50mm f1.4G, manual mode, f/1.4, shutter speed 1/160 sec, ISO 800

day one hundred sixty seven

Sometimes I am surprised at how very little time I have for things I want to do these days.  Now that Liam is walking, and ultimately much more social, I find us interacting much more than previous months.  He was always an independent little thing - he would stay by my side at playgroups, it took him till the last day to finally start enjoying his tumbling class - but increased mobility gave him a greater appreciation for experiences that could not be had while sitting in my lap.  I love it, though it is exhausting, and I find us exploring the Great Outdoors much more often.

In the past few months, Liam began to enjoy interacting with his friends at playdates.  I was overjoyed, since this firstly meant that I could interact with his friends' moms, and secondly, he was having so much more fun.  I feel very lucky to have found such a great group of women to share my son's childhood with, although many of the mothers were military families - I knew I had a year or three to enjoy with them.  And then, the one family "rock" I was hoping to cling to throughout the upcoming terrible twos, the first day of kindergarten (harder for us than the kids, I am sure), puberty, engagements (I still joke about how Liam and Annabelle would make an adorable couple)..... had a once in a lifetime opportunity to own a farm, and move across state.  Please don't think I am upset for just the completely selfless reason of my son's soon-to-be-lost friendship... I am losing friends as well.  I worked with Annabelle's dad before I became a SAHM, we happily compared notes on pregnancy and infants and cloth diapers, and I then transitioned to becoming close friends with Annabelle's mom, who happily included me in her wonderful group of moms.  If not for them, I doubt I would have started this blog, since I was so inspired by Bill's pictures of his beautiful daughter.  If not for them, I would have never explored the crafty side of myself - I'll show a picture of my daughter's first handmade dress soon.  If not for them, I might be stuck home every day, since I'm very cautious about meeting new people and seeing new places.

Anyway... needless to say, I will miss Mary Ann, Bill, and little Annabelle very much.  I'm so happy that they had this dream of theirs come true (I mean, how often does that happen?), but I hope they know just how very much they will be missed.  Here are a few pictures of our group, taken last week using Bill's camera and tripod, and a timer - I just did some work in Camera Raw and Photoshop.  I'm not watermarking them, since I didn't take the photos.

day one hundred fifty two

A few candid shots taken at a local bounce house with my great friend Kate and her adorable baby girl, Mae!

I think the blogging bug has started to bite me again (along with every mosquito in the lowcountry).  Stay tuned :)

day, um, yeah.

So, it took me longer to recuperate from Liam's party than anticipated.  Along with the arrival of an early spring came a few more events, some more life-changing than others.

1) My son turned one.. .and started running.  Not walking so much, mind you, but running.  I knew he wouldn't move himself in an upright position until he felt it was faster than crawling, and he was always a speedy crawler.

2) My yard decide to commence it's attack on us nice and early this year.  We now spend many hours out there.. not with a camera, but with various devices used to prune bushes and torture vines.  I'm still not convinced the vines are on the losing side.

3) I've been feeling incredibly tired.  This is in part due to aforementioned running toddler, but mostly because..

Bill took this picture, so don't give me credit!

No it's not just pudge.  This is me at 13 weeks, and as of today I am exactly 15 weeks.  Pregnant, that is.  My poior husband has had to deal with putting my son to bed, then immediately putting his wife to bed.  I'm already using the incredibly large and oh-so-comfy pregnancy pillow, and I'm becoming out of breath if I lay on my back.  Not too much nausea (THANK YOU) but I apparently developed an aversion to chicken and blogs.  I took some pictures, sure, but the commitment of this blog irked me, and felt like it consumed too much energy.  So I decided I would stay away until I wanted to use it again.

So, here I am.  I can't promise I will post daily due to various pregnancy symptoms, but I will do my best to post, and enjoy posting.  I really did miss it here :)

day seventy eight and seventy nine

250 pictures to sort through, after a day of frantic cake decorating, cooking, entertaining, and trying to be everywhere at once.  So, so very grateful for an awesome husband and friends who came through for me.

Happy birthday, honey.

day seventy three, seventy four, seventy five, seventy six, and seventy seven

Before there is an outcry about the lack of posts - this has been an incredibly busy week.  First birthday party tomorrow, Liam decided it is wonderful to wake up three times a night, my family is visiting, and cooking, baking, etc...  I'm beat.  I should be sleeping right now, except I think I have insomnia at this point.

Anyway, I did take pictures.  I didn't take them off my camera till just now, and I will just post my favorites from this week.  Tomorrow I hope to present you with some lovely birthday shots, and resume life as normal.

You might notice my blossoming cherry tree.  I hope to take pictures of Liam next to this tree every year around his birthday.

He's still asleep, I might relax till he's up :)

day seventy two

And for today's post - another two-fer, since 1) I was so slack yesterday, and 2) now you will see some of why:

Using Nikon 50mm f1.4G, manual mode, f/1.4, shutter speed 1/800 sec, ISO 100

Using Nikon 50mm f1.4G, manual mode, f/1.4, shutter speed 1/50 sec, ISO 100

The first of of our acorn doorknocker, and the second is of some of our house numbers.  Prior to this weekend, they were a dull, deep brown.  Since my wonderful husband has painted, himself, the entire exterior of the house (love the shade of white I chose?  I do!), I decided to attack these pieces with some lemon juice, salt, a toothbrush and good old fashioned elbow grease.  They are MUCH improved.