two turn tables

At the Tea House

Hula put on an incredibly informative and inspiring workshop yesterday.

I am still in a little bit of shock that I was able to attend and be a part of it all.

I had a blast and am so excited to get to give some life back to a few of my vintage cameras.

Thank you again to Andrea, as well as Stef and the gang at Tea House Studio!

What a wonderful space to learn and create.

257:365, film

I started to get worried that it wouldn't show up in time for my class on Saturday.

When I opened that package, the smell of film brought back so many memories. It was wonderful..

Twins. One to shoot the black and white film and one to shoot the color.

Tomorrow, #11 will be marked off the list!

Head in the Clouds

The late summer thunder storms are upon us and that means some amazing cloud formations in the afternoon.

And if we are lucky a refreshing cloud burst and a quick downpour of rain.

But the other kind of clouds around here lately are the ones found at the newly opened Nevada Discovery Museum.

What a wonderful place for kids of all ages to visit!

Birthday Week, 2011

Whew! The birthday week extravaganza is over, and I am pooped, pooped, pooped out from all the excitement.

My new work schedule has made it hard to keep up with things not just out here on the Internets, but in real life too. I miss the interaction and inspiration out here, but feel like I will find a rhythm to it all soon.



Here is a little recap of how we celebrated three years and one year...

I started prepping for the festivities over Labor Day weekend...

I got the cupcakes made and in the freezer.

And Fifi's birthday crown sewn up and ready to go.

Tuesday was O's actually birthday so we opted for take and bake pizza for dinner to keep it easy-
he actually wound up just eating his cupcake and barely touching the rest.
It was his birthday, so I let it slide.

He has been really into baseball lately, so I found a t-ball set that also 'pitches' the ball for you.
It was a hit (pun totally intended).

Thursday night was Fifi's birthday. Daddy-O had to be in work meetings that evening so Jojo stepped in to help me out with the kids and to celebrate.

It was pretty quite and without much fanfare, the girl was tired and a little cranky so we didn't push things much. She opened presents and I got her in her crown for her birthday photo in the chair, one quick smile and hings went down hill... oh well.

Friday night, my sister-in-law and her family came over for a sleep over.
The kids played like crazy and had a great time.

We prepped for the gang of people that were to show up the next morning for the "Balloon, Breakfast and Birthday Bash". It's hot air balloon time, so we thought it was a great way to get a celebration in and have people over. It was a fantastic morning.

 

Singing the birthday song, twice.

 

hot rod princess

 

Grandpa Buff and Mr. M and the other boy cousins hanging out in the street watching the balloons.

Playing in the back yard with friends and visiting.

Thanks to everyone who came over SO early to help us celebrate. It was a wonderful day.

One year ago today...

...we became four.
Our hearts swelled even more with love and light and joy.
I became the mom of a beautiful, little girl.
We love you Fifi.

Thank you for bringing us smiles and joy each and every day of this past year,

you have no idea how much we needed them, and you.
Happy First Birthday!!!

3 years ago today

3 years ago today, originally uploaded by NessieNoodle.

A star was born.
My life became fuller,
my heart exploded with love
and my baby boy was born.

Happy Birthday O, we love you more than all the stars in the sky!

Instantly, a winner

Guess what I won last week??

A free ticket into Hula's Instant Magic class at Teahouse Studio in Berkeley, CA.
Thank you lovely ladies from Shutter Sisters. I can hardly wait.

I am gitty and crazy-excited to be a participant in Andrea's class.
Oh, and to actually get to use one or more of my Polaroids, yep, that's pretty awesome too!

one week down...

Whew, what a week.

After heading out last weekend for a girls get away. Complete with wine tasting, and bachelor-ette party fun, (one of my good friends is getting married in two weeks) I started my new job.

My first week of (hopefully) many at the new job, I am happy to say, went really well. And all though my vacation to Limboland this summer was starting to get comfortable,  I am liking where I have landed.

I am diving right and and getting my feet, ankles and entire head into this new work, already digging through an entire county's dataset and picking up where someone left off, trying to make sense of their data and data organization is no easy task. It is strange to have new information to consume, new data to sort through and understand, but it is great to have a team of people who actually 'get' what it is you are doing, as well as to bounce ideas, problems and questions off of when needed. The team I am a part of seems really great so far and I think it will be a good fit for me.

The commute is the hardest part, as I knew it would be. An hour one way is a long haul. But the landscape in the early morning has me wanting to pull off the road and snap photo after photo... Maybe I will get brave enough and do that one day- I need to learn the road better first and spot out a good turn out point. It is a bit of a wild ride - 70 mph in some spots and 50 in others. I have been listening to podcasts and am hoping to get to the library for some books on tape to make the hour pass more quickly. Any good podcast suggestions out there??

Everyone on the home front seems to be adapting pretty well so far. Daddy-O has surprised me with his morning help and I think he is secretly really proud of his Super Dad-ness as of late. Getting the kids off to daycare and then picking them up and getting dinner started is no small feat, but he is doing great. I love that I have Wednesdays off- that helps to break up things, gives me time to soak in the kids and maybe get the house organized, errands run and veg out if time allows. I am still finding time to snap a photo every day, but I am hopelessly behind on the processing of them all. I am giving myself slack on that part since I just don't know how to squeeze it all in quite yet.

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I told myself I wouldn't do this on my blog, but I do need to apologize to any of you who have left comments and I haven't gotten back to- I am completely cut off from personal email and the like at my new job (as it should be, really) and by the time I get everything settled in at home, I want nothing more than to fall into bed. BUT, know that I appreciate all your well wishes. I really, really do! So thank you for taking the time to comment and wish me well on my new adventure.