Let the games begin! All instructions for the December Photo Project are here. Read about how to join up, where to get a badge for your blog, and how to “like” us on Facebook.
Note: this year’s project is open to Facebook users (if you don’t have a blog). Create a December Photo Project Album and start uploading a pic a day beginning December 1. Woohoo!
**Many many thanks to Kristen Stewart for this year’s DPP badge design!!
There were once two high school kids named Marc and Kaylee. They kinda liked each other. They grew up, and they still kinda liked each other. In fact, they truly loved each other. So Marc gave Kaylee a ring. And now he can make her happy forever. The end. (True story.)
What do you like to eat/drink when it’s cold out? Post favorite recipes for warm drinks, hot soups and filling casseroles in the comment section.
We had a really fun day yesterday. Livia has been brandishing her cutlass—“It’s a cutlass, not a rapier,” she explained to me—and donning the pirate earring and eye patch for a few weeks now. She has such a strong imagination that she got lost in her girl pirate role, explaining to someone, I can’t recall who, that she really was Livia and not a pirate. Our friends the Littles hosted a party for some school friends and it was a great time. This is the first year I’ve pulled out my camera to document the celebration! Normally I’m running from place to place, in the dark, with my costumed child.
It was also a fun day because I got to make cupcakes for Livia’s classroom. My inspiration photo shows a spider cupcake with nicely curved black legs. I learned quickly that perfectionists do not good classroom mothers make, and settled on red legs that poked out kinda straight. And then, because my child is a self-proclaimed entomologist, I told the first-graders that spiders have eight legs and the cupcakes have six. Spider mite cupcakes, perhaps?
I hope my friends had Happy Halloweens as well. Now, it’s on to November. November!! Before you know it, Christmas will be here.
Livia sat at the dining table for well over two hours, carving her little pumpkin.
If Pumpkin Carving were a class, the progress report would read:
Design: A+
Completion: A+
Use of Time: A+
Study Habits: A+
And at the bottom a note would say: Livia works well in class. She pays attention and uses tools (even sharp saws!) correctly. She asks for help when she needs to, then gets right back to work with remarkable focus. I enjoy having Livia in my Pumpkin Carving class. She is a delight.
An orange clove candle, the tunes of The Civil Wars, and photo-editing. Settling in for some work has never felt so good.
This is a shot of the gorgeous and quite pregnant Mrs. Maralee Bradley. As always, more to come.
Everyone says strong-willed kids make great adults, that their strong wills serve them well in the future. So today, as my child made Livia’s Last Stand prior to walking in the school door, I’m trying to envision what her future will look like. Will there be that After School Special moment on the empty football field where some druggie offers 15 year old Livia a joint and she, in all her strong-willedness, just says no? Will she be a future Condoleeza or Hillary and stand eye-to-eye with a communist general, declaring, again in her strong-willedness, that for the sake of her country she will not back down? Will she, in that future world that fundamentalist Christians like to imagine, declare that she will not denounce her faith in Christ before a judge and jury of her peers? People, one of these scenarios had better play out or else I’m telling you that this strong-willed kid stuff is for the birds!
There are some stinky, dirty, slinky cats that live near Livia’s school. In the beginning of the school year I broke my “no petting cats without collars” rule and let Livia caress and hug and do her Cat Whisperer thing with these felines. I had met their owners and had seen how all the school kids adore the cats and against my better judgment I opened the door to a routine that would eventually torture me.
However, because I am a 33 year old woman and thereby wiser than my child, I started to avoid the sidewalks by the cat house and thus avoided the time required for cat coaxing and cat petting prior to the school day. So guess who forgot to be wise this morning? And guess who made her Last Stand on the corner of the cat house?
Scene: School bell rings, school children enter the building. One adorably-dressed little girl is stubbornly standing on the corner. One woman, looking like she’s rolled out of bed and is wearing the same clothes for three days straight, seeks to regain control.
Bus driver looks on from his perch inside the yellow bus. Para-educators nearby offer small smiles as the duo eventually walks past. Well, the walking is questionable. It is stop-and-go there for awhile; stubborn child demanding to pet cats while haggard mom says no repeatedly. A little arguing takes place. Stubborn child refuses her mother’s hand. Stubborn child eventually has to go to the office for a tardy slip. Mother’s eyes start to do the crazy dance, and the hand-off, an apologetic one to teacher in the classroom door, takes place.
Control. Where was it and who had it?
Though I felt like I lost the battle this morning, I actually won it. No one died on the corner by the cat house. No one yelled, no one pulled, no one cried (though I kind of felt like it after our war of wills was complete). My strong-willed first grader not only did not get to pet the [smelly] cats this morning, she will have to earn the opportunity to do so again.
Oh my friends, parenthood is far more challenging than I ever imagined. It offers up the most ridiculous moments and challenges. I write so I won’t forget these absurd times—and so I can remind Livia to stay strong when she’s dealing with her own strong-willed child someday. We’re going to laugh about this, right? Right?
I’m editing several photo shoots this morning, pausing only to refill my coffee mug and, oh yes, to eat a quick bite of spiced pumpkin doughnuts over at Renae’s house. To the right of me Shiloh stretches out his furzy self on his dog bed. He is monitoring the activities of the house painters next door; like a pint-sized beastly king he gives his approval in silent tilts of the head and disapproval in slow-burning rumbly growls. I meander back and forth between iTunes and YouTube, ear buds versus the tinny speakers of my small-yet-powerful MacBrook Pro. Jeremy’s chair squeaks as he creates works of web genius from his upstairs office. I wait for his classic rock to roll down the stairs before I put my ear buds back in and disappear into Photoshop once more.
Here, on this Monday morning, is a shot of my friends Marc Koenig and Kaylee Colton. They are in love, engaged to be married before 2011 is out, and they posed wonderfully for my camera almost two weeks ago. More photos to follow soon.
I love this family and I love the shots that captured their personalities during this year’s family portraits. As I looked over last year’s pictures, I’m struck by how much each child has grown. People, this job is such a privilege for me! Spending time with you, marking the passage of time by photography, spending hours and hours poring over images and editing each one—it’s a joy.
I hope you enjoy these photos of the hilarious, photogenic and fun-loving Wittmanns!
