I took some cute photos of Mitchy today as we were playing around the house. Here they are:
Playing with his animals
Looking into the shoot through umbrella
Mitchy's animal friends
In other news, Mitchy loves singing and dancing at the moment. We sing this song about seeing animals at a farm and he is always asking for "Cow! Farm!' or "Donkey! Farm!". Sometimes he gets confused as says, "Train! Farm!".
My work situation is no closer to being resolved. It just drags on.
This afternoon while Mitchy and I were playing on the deck we found a Praying Mantis. It was Mitch's first experience with one. He couldn't say, "Praying Mantis" so he just called it "creature". He'd get very close to it and then it would run and he would jump back and then get close to it again.
Mitchy checks out the "creature"
Standing Guard
Peeking over the railing
I couldn't quite get the focus I wanted unfortunately, but these shots are the best I could get. Mitchy was fascinated for about 20 minutes and then he started to get a bit too friendly (which with little boys means the creature normally ends up getting squashed) so we said "Goodbye" and left the little guy alone.
It's been a while since I posted some pictures of Mitchy, so this afternoon while we were playing in the park I took a few photos. First Mitch coming down the slide ...
And then he went back up again ... and down and up and down and up ...
It was quite overcast and it was getting a bit dark when we moved on to the swings so the flash came out.
Then it was playing amongst the trees ...
Then just as we were about to leave, Mitch found a little ladybug.
I should say that when you take a photo with the flash it is meant to just fill in the light, not make it look like we were taking photos at night! I'm still learning :)
I was at home today so while Mitch was sleeping I decided to play with the camera and some flashes I bought on eBay. Having no "model" to practice on I decided to enlist the help of Mitch's Horsey Bob. Firstly here is Horsey Bob lit with the on camera flash. The harsh shadow behind Horsey Bob's head is ugly and the light is very flat. It makes the face look one dimensional.
Then lit with the two flashes and a white refelctor - not perfect, but much better I think! There is some interest, there is light and shadow, Horsey's head is separated from the background
After that I decided to move on to something a bit different. We have a vase with some electric Christmas lights in it. With the on camera flash it is just ugly and you can't see the lights - note also the harsh shadow behind which make it hard to see what's going on.
But with a bit of creative lighting it looks much better, as least I think so anyway. The only thing I don't like is the reflection in the right hand side frame. Oh well, I'll know for next time.
So about $100 worth of equipment bought from eBay and lots of help from The Strobist and I'm getting better at taking photos. Yay!
Mitch and I went to the park this morning and had a long play. The weather has been so horrible lately we could not waste the sunshine. This is the same park from this post and this one. It's amazing to see how much Mitch has grown and how much more he can do on the play equipment.
After lots of playing and "Runny, runny" it was time to go home for lunch and a sleep, possibly for both of us!
I have been a bit slack on the posting of late. My apologies!
Mitch is just growing up so fast at the moment. His vocabulary has exploded. He now pretty much repeats everything you say ... well he tries to repeat it. It's very cute. The number of times he says something and Meeks and I look at each other and say, "Did you teach him that?" is amazing - I should just refine that comment to say that he is not saying bad things and we are accusing each other!
His favourite game is "Runny Runny" which is basically chasings around the table on the back deck. He will quite happily run around the table 50 times, every once in a while slowing down and stopping if he thinks we have gone too long without catching him. He runs quite quickly now, certainly faster than a comfortable walking pace, so you are getting some exercise too. In fact he likes playing "Runny, Runny" pretty much anywhere. Give him a open section of a shopping centre and he's off. Nana had to chase him across the outdoor courtyard at Hornsby shops the other day. Quite amusing!
In other news, Meeks and I are going to be running a Marriage Enrichment Course at church over the next 7 weeks. We did the course a few years ago and found it really helpful so we thought we'd try and run it at TCBC. Neil agreed and after quite a while of getting things together, we're starting this week. We have 7 couples attending this first session. Meeks has been amazing with the organisation and preparation. Definitely her gift!
iStockPhoto continues to go well. I've now sold 22 photos and learnt heaps along the way. I took some photos of the Smart children the other night and they came out quite well. I still have a lot to learn!
Not much has changed on the work front, I had a meeting with someone lasst week in which we basically established I was interested in listening to an offer, but that is about all at this stage.
Normally I have Wednesday's at home with Mitchy but we had a reshuffle this week so I'm at home on a Thursday. This morning Mitch and I went to the park next door and played for a while. We started off on the swings:
Then moved on up to playing on the fort.
Looking down the big slide.
It was a fun morning in the park!
Mitch is growing up so fast! His speaking is getting better and better and he's stringing two or three words together to make little sentences. Last night I was trying to encourage him to eat his dinner, but he wanted to give it to me and he said, "Daddy ... food ... mouth!" ... Cheeky monkey!
Tonight Meeks and I are going to see The Police (supported by Fergie) with Phil at ANZ Stadium (which used to be Telstra Stadium which used to be Stadium Australia!). It should be a great night.
In other news, my work is very much up in the air at the moment. At the end of last year CBA decided not to extend it's Application Development contract with EDS. That obviously impacts me, but it could work out well. CBA has apparently targeted me because I'm a Subject Matter Expert which is knowledge they want to retain. How exactly that will play out I'm not sure, but it may end up with the CBA or the new vendor offering me a position. Please pray for Meeks and I about it, because it's a bit stressful!
iStockPhoto is going slowly. I've sold a whole 14 photos now! Whoo hoo! Obviously it's not a viable alternative career yet!
It's been a very hot weekend in Sydney and we're all a bit over it. It's been a busy weekend too. On Saturday morning Meeks, Mitchy and I went for a little bush walk. It was mostly on a concrete path or raised boardwalk so it wasn't too tough, but it was in the bush! Mitch loved the chance to run around. He kept on trying to run ahead but as we were the first people on the track that day there were huge spider webs everywhere, so we kept on having to pull him back. He wasn't happy but he got the message. At the end of the bush walk (all 400m of it) was a park so Mitch had a play. It was very hot though so it didn't last too long and he sat down for a drink and a banana (or "manana" as he calls them).
Mitch also got the chance to practice his balancing.
After that we went home because it was very hot! Saturday afternoon we went for a swim at Nana's place.
Meeks was trying to teach him to walk slowly the other day and the result is this kind of exaggerated stepping action which resembles a sumo wrestler striking his pose. It's very cute! I'll have to get a photo of it.
In other news we're currently doing a bit of a renovation of our laundry. Another of the smallest rooms in the house after the bathroom ordeal of November 2006. It's only a very basic reno this time. Basically we're going to strip everything out, paint everything plain white, get a new slimline tub, shuffle a few things around and build some shelving to make it a bit more of a practical space. This weekend we achieved the stripping and most of the painting and we've moved the washing machine and dryer back in (the dryer is now mounted on the wall). The new tub needs a bit of pipe and we're back to a functioning laundry. Then I have to build some shelves and move the stuff back in and we're done. Needless to say the rest of the house is a bit of a mess.
As usual it's been an eventful week or so. Mitch has been up to his usual capers, including playing in the park next door
Click on the image to see Mitchy climb the ladder. Clever boy!
Picking flowers
Playing "Peek-a-boo"
And a visit to Fagan Park where we had a picnic and fed the ducks
There were some other birds there too which were a bit aggressive. Mitch was fearless though and wanted to go up and pat them. We thought perhaps that wasn't the best idea. His little fingers could be mistaken for juicy worms.
What other news is there? Mitch has learnt to count ... well kind of ... if you start at "one" he will say "two" and "three" and even "four" (which sometimes sounds like "bore") on a good day. He has trouble with "five" it comes out as "fight" or "fard" so he usually skips it and goes straight to "six". "Seven" is another problem number so he normally jumps to "eight" and then gives himself a little clap and cheer. For some reason he gives you a clap and cheer if you say "ten". It's his way of saying "Well done Mummy" or "Well done Daddy!". Either way it is very cute.
That's about all the news. I've sold 4 photos now which is very exciting. This duck is my highest seller!
We were having dinner with Nana and Poppy last night and Mitch made a couple of break-throughs. He pointed at himself and said "Mit", so he finally knows his own name, and secondly he pointed at Poppy and said, "Pop" which was the first time he had done that. We were all very excited! Poppy was very relieved because he's been able to say "Mummy", "Daddy" and "Nana" for ages but had never said "Poppy" before.
Later on he looked at himself in the reflection in the window and said "Mit" which was very cute. He also found his shadow on the wall and tried to point to it and say "Mit", but it kept on moving (because he was moving). Later on he tried to find his shadow on the same bit of wall, but the sun had gone down so there was no shadow, he was very confused. He pointed at where the shadow had been earlier and turned around and looked at us and said, "Mit?". Very cute!
I sold my first photo on iStockPhoto today. Someone, somewhere in the world bought this photo of Mitchy drawing on his easel, what a cutie!
The weather in recent years at Copa hasn't exactly been great, however this year it was beautiful
We had Lilly's second birthday up there too. Here Mitch is helping her open presents
Although she did open some of her own too.
Mitch spent some time playing with Ganny
Then it was time for Lilly's cake
Little Miss Chocolate!
Finally the sunset on a lovely day at Copa
Forgive my slowness, there are a wealth of Christmas and post-christmas photos to show off!
Firstly Mitch opening his presents on Christmas morning
Riding his hobby horse at Nana and Poppy's house
Mitch and Lilly playing together at Mike and Mandy's house
Uncle Rob playing with Mitch at Mike and Mandy's. Rob spent a heap of time playing with Mitch and Lilly in Mike and Mandy's backyard.
Lilly did some big jumping by herself too
Also with Ganny
In fact everyone stood around just watching Mitch and Lilly playing.
From Mike and Mandy's we moved on to Ganny and Grandad's house where we had a lot of eating and present opening, but I had put away my camera by then.
