Nature's way

When you've been a parent for awhile, in my case 9 years, you develop the ability to decipher a kid's scream as to whether there's a true emergency or not. That's why when my oldest daughter yelled through the window, "Daddy, come out here, quick!", I could tell nobody was severely injured or about to be severely injured. So, 15 minutes later I strolled out the front door to check out the situation.

The younger girls huddled around my oldest daughter, as she was holding something small in her hand. As it turns out, it was a baby bird. Not a cute baby bird, but a baby bird that was still kind of alien-looking with only a few formed feathers. It was moving though.

"Daddy, look, it's a baby bird!" she held it up so I could see better. I think it fell out of that tree over there. I am going to take care of it."

I informed her that it was going to die because that's what usually happens in nature when a baby gets separated from it's mother. I went back inside to answer a phone call, and the three bird caretakers remained outside, discussing what to do.

They came to the conclusion they needed to dig up worms to feed it, which they did. However, the worms were too big that they found. They would need to be cut. Hence, I looked out my window to see my 4 year-old daughter running through the yard holding a steak knife.

Being the experienced, responsible parent that I am, I instantly shouted to her, "How many times have I told you to be careful when you're running with a steak knife?"

Ok, I didn't really say that. I made her hand it over to me in exchange for a pair of child-safe scissors. Father of the Year.

The rest of the afternoon, the kids sliced and served up worms to the ugly little creature. I didn't want them to get their hopes up, so I kept saying, "You guys are doing an awesome job...but it's going to die."

Fast forward a couple more hours, and I returned home from doing a few errands and my wife informed me that the bird finally died. There were tears shed, I think only by my oldest daughter who took the passing personally. By the time I saw her though, the tears had stopped and she seemed back to normal. And that's when I said, "Honey, I can't believe you let that little birdie die. It's all your fault. You failed big time."

Relax, I'm kidding. But I have been calling her "Bird Killer" since then.

This morning, we got around to burying the carcass. We went out to the yard and I asked if anybody would like to say anything. I explained again that things like this happened in nature all of the time and that's just how it's supposed to be. It does amaze me though how kids become attached so quickly to something. They informed me that they'd even named the ugly thing.

So this morning after breakfast, which ironically consisted of fried eggs, we gathered in the backyard for the burial. My girls and the neighbor boy huddled around the small hole and they sadly placed the nasty lifeless body in it. My oldest daughter appeared a little forlorn, but not overly emotional. The other three clowns kept commenting on how gross the bird was.

And that's how the story ends - in a shallow grave. Which of course, I fully expect our dog to dig up shortly hereafter. I fear that was not the last we'll see of that bird. It'll probably end up deposited on our couch cushion by our curious canine.

By the way, the name given to the baby bird by my kids?

"Lucky"

Yard talk

Being a stay-at-home dad has many advantages, one of which is having the opportunity to spend an unusual amount of time with my youngest daughter. Admittedly, there are some days that I am tempted to view this very thing as a disadvantage. Kidding, kidding. Well, sort of.

But normally I really try to appreciate this time in my life. I know someday I'll be driving in my car and the song "Cat's in the Cradle" by Harry Chapin will come on the radio and I'll think back to now with nostalgic sadness. My girls have really made me into a sentimental guy, especially when it comes to watching them grow up into little ladies. Most people look at me and think, "Man, that guy's so incredibly macho, he's probably never cried in his life." But that's not the case at all. (my wife just about shot her morning yogurt through her nose having laughed at reading that last part)

So when my little girl asks if we can lay on a blanket underneath our trees and have a picnic, or just play silly games, or just watch the clouds passing by, I usually drop what I'm doing and seize the moment. It'll be soon enough that this notion will not even cross her mind so I better appreciate it now.

The other day we got out a couple blankets and pillows and spread them out in the front yard, strategically placed in the shade of a few trees. After she finally settled with the arrangement of said blankets and pillows (my daughter is very obsessive-compulsive when it comes to such things), we began talking about all sorts of important subjects: recapping her year at pre-school, her next birthday plans, what she'll be when she grows up, what I'll be when I grow up, why dogs have tails, the best flavors of ice cream, why I have hair on my legs etc. Very heavy stuff.

And then we started playing her favorite yard-lounging game. It's when I pretend that I'm some sort of animal, giving her clues as to what kind I am, and she in turn tries to guess the answer. We will play this game for quite a while. Sometimes too long. Daddy occasionally starts repeating animals or even forgetting what animal he is supposed to be. I sometimes start off as an elephant and then a few clues later I switch to a squirrel. (I do suffer from Attention Deficit Disorder. I've not been diagnosed, but my wife and I both agree that I am very ADD symptomatic.)

I like this "animal game" because it makes her think. But one particular sequence caused me some alarm. I gave her the following clues: "I'm big, move slow, live on a farm, and usually am black and white."

Her response: "A rabbit?"

"Oh my..." I thought.

"Honey, no. Ok, here's another hint. I produce what you put on your cereal," I said.

"You make sugar?" she asked.

"No dear, not sugar. Something else," slightly disturbed by the fact that this was already taking considerably longer than I anticipated.

"Hmmm...sometimes we put strawberries on cereal. You make strawberries?" she asked again.

Sweet Moses. Come on, man.

"Milk, I make milk!" I blurted.

"Oh, milk!" she shouted. "Ok. Are you a rabbit?"

"No. No. No. No. Besides, you've already said 'rabbit'," I answered becoming more and more agitated...and a bit worried. I know she's only 4, but what was wrong with her? Rabbits are large animals that live on a farm and make milk? Yikes.

"Gotcha! Dad, you're a cow. I'm just teasin'. That's an easy one," she said giggling.

I was very much relieved to hear that come from her mouth. For awhile there she had me concerned that I had failed miserably as a parent. As it turns out, she is a bright child. In fact not only is she bright, but apparently she's intelligent enough to outsmart me. Sadly, I don't think that's a major accomplishment for anybody, not even a pre-schooler.

One of those days

Ever have one of those days or moments that you think to yourself, "This kind of stuff only happens to me,"? Well, I did yesterday.

I decided to cut my hair as I routinely do about every week or so. For many years now I've been my own barber. There's not a whole lot of options for my hairstyle at this point so this is not that big of a challenge. I'm sure I've had some bad days here and there, but for the most part the quality of my clipping ability is fairly consistent. And then yesterday happened.

As I made a pass on the back of my head, I failed to notice that the rake on the razor had been jarred loose, leaving the bare blade exposed. The end result was a fairly large swath of baldness. It looked similar to somebody driving a mower one time through a wheat field. As soon as it happened, I knew it was bad. My first thought was... well..."Holy $*&#, what did I do?". (just being honest) I then positioned the mirrors so I could assess the situation. My suspicions were confirmed. I looked ridiculous.

After the initial shock wore off, I started to lightly chuckle. Finding the humor in the situation, I also knew that short of shaving the rest of my head completely bald, I was stuck with this for at least a week. It would probably appear to others as though my barber was an epileptic blind man. Thankfully I am married so that takes some of the stress caused by my predicament. My wife's stuck with me regardless of what I look like.

I then walked into our bedroom where my wife and youngest child were resting watching tv. "What do you think about this?" I asked as I turned around so she could see the mayhem I just carved. She just stared, mouth wide open. My daughter laughed loudly and tauntingly. I have the feeling this will not be the last time either.

"Any suggestions?" I further inquired.

"Oh my," my wife responded, "what did you do?" Her voiced quivered a bit, containing her urge to burst into hysterics.

I told her I might consider using a red marker to draw stitches on the bare part, giving the impression that I undergone some sort of surgery. She laughed at that suggestion. Apparently she thought I was kidding. Regardless, we both agreed that it'd be best for our family if I wore a hat for a week or so. I take that as meaning they'd be ashamed to be seen with me given the status quo of my alternative hairstyle. Thanks, people. I love you too.

Later on in the day, my wife, who evidently gave it further thought, proposed the following to me: "How about just wearing a band aid back there? That would work too,you know, as far as the fake surgery idea goes."

Interestingly, she did not laugh after making that suggestion.

Weekend Warrior

What a great weekend. We got to spend a lot of time with friends and family, finished some yard work, and most importantly, I ate quite a bit of grilled meat. Mmmmm...meat.

I'd have to say that I really enjoyed the weekend. Although on Saturday our middle child (#2) woke up with the stomach flu. She awakened us complaining about her stomach hurting, then shortly after she vomited in the bathroom. That would be the first of 7 times that day. It was horrible. I am sympathetic to stomach flu sufferers. When I hear or see somebody throw up, I instantly feel like I am going to join them. My wife says I am ridiculously wimpy when it comes to that sort of thing. Whatever.

So, much of Saturday was spent helping her cope with her stomach issues. I felt absolutely horrible for her. She was so looking forward to going to a cookout we were invited to later that evening but of course she couldn't attend. Not to mention, she didn't feel well enough to play with her pet Mexican pig I bought off of Ebay last week. So sad.

I opted to stay outside most of the day, while my wife dealt with Velma Van Vomitheimer inside. That was fine with me. I managed to get the yard mowed, although my mower began acting screwy. It started making a weird knocking sound when I was halfway finished. My mechanical skills - which consisted of me turning the mower off(very important), flipping it onto it's side, and then kicking it a few times, failed to fix or diagnose the problem. The solution? I turned my headphones up louder. The noise was not nearly as noticeable. Fantastic.

After the mowing, I tackled cleaning out the gutters. Our gutter guards work - sort of. They do prevent "whirly birds" off the trees from clogging up the gutters. As shown in this picture. However, they do present another problem. What are the chances that a small object like this could fall from a 30' tall tree and find it's way perfectly into one of these small holes?


Evidently the probability is very high...sigh.



Although a tedious task, I still would rather pull an estimated 13,472 whirly birds from a gutter than have to hold a bucket for a vomiting 6 year-old. My stomach hurts just thinking about it.

Play Dohn't

I am not a fan of Play Doh. The kids enjoy creating things with it though. None of which are ever recognizable.
For example, “Honey, what’s that you’ve made, a snake?”
“No, it’s a horse.”
“Right. Of course it is. My bad. That is fantastic.”

I’ve learned to allow the kids to inform me of their creations rather than try to guess it. I don’t want to discourage their creativity. Having said that, they are horrible sculptors at this point.

Play Doh’s smell is absolutely nauseating to me. I’ve never been able to tolerate it for very long. I’ve felt that way since I was a young lad. I can’t imagine what it tastes like. Fortunately, I’ve never caught my children attempting to eat it either. No parent wants their child to be that kid.

However, I vividly remember an incident that occurred in my 2nd grade Sunday school class that really stuck with me. The pastor’s fanatical son, Scotty, sliced up a half dozen pieces of various colors and slurped them down one by one. He even seemed to enjoy it. He was a weird kid. And apparently he lacked the ability to taste. He was a weird, tasteless kid. I’m sure paste eating was another dietary hobby of his as well. As I understand it, paste is usually the introductory drug that leads to other such experimentation. (i.e. Play Doh, worms, Chap Stick etc.)

We find this pseudo clay all over the place after the kids finish making their distorted animals and other warped abstract configurations. I frequently find the dried bits and pieces in various locations other than where the kids were using it. It seems to travel around somehow.(similar to the Easter Grass - see "Easter Remnants" post)

The crusty leftover wisps disgust me even more than the pungent freshly opened kind. Play Doh scraps always have hair, crumbs, and other unmentionables infused into them. What starts out as being a creative means for children to unleash their imaginations inevitably ends up a germ infested, unusable, rock hard clump of grossness.

Have a great Memorial Day weekend everyone. Even you, Scotty, wherever you are.

So close, yet so far away

Man, I'm pretty tired this morning. Didn't sleep well last night at all. Some time late, my youngest daughter woke up crying. Laying in my bed comfortably, I had hoped she might fall back to sleep on her own. However, her weeping only became louder and I could tell by the shadows coming from her room that she was also roaming around. Crap.

I got up and entered her bedroom where I found her pacing around in circles, mumbling incoherently to herself. She whimpered about nonsensical things and kept stumbling around as if she was looking for something. My attempts to console her failed and she only cried louder and her tempo picked up speed. And as I began to wake up more, I realized the urgency to get her to the bathroom.

"Come on, Sweetie, let's go to the potty!" I urgently suggested to her. "Hurry, go to the bathroom right now."

She nodded in agreement and scampered toward the bathroom still talking to herself. I switched on the lights and began helping her remove her pajamas.

I can't exactly remember what I noticed first...the smell, the wet warmth on my feet, or the sound of a trickling waterfall gently splashing onto our bathroom floor.

"Oh come on!" I exclaimed aloud. At that point, there wasn't much I could do but to let her just stand there and finish. Once the flood gates had opened, there was no stopping it. "Wow, that's a lot of urine," I thought to myself. Watching the sea of gold spread across the floor really accentuated it's sheer volume. I soaked up the mess with a towel and cleaned her up as well. Undoubtedly, she had to feel much better as she then jetted off back to her bed.

I don't know if she ever was awake the whole time, but by the end of the saga I was wired and had difficulty falling asleep. Hence my 3 cups of coffee this morning. Admittedly, I'm having a hard time motivating myself today. Getting peed on in the middle of the night can do that to a person though.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a bath towel that is in need of a thorough washing.

Graff kids pics

Here's a few pics from a recent shoot. These kids were great to work with as well as their parents. We couldn't have asked for a better day of weather.

Stay-At-Home Dad's observation #8

Come on, man. Seriously? Just a little effort would be nice.

April Fool

With this blog, I try to be as honest as possible. I think I owe it to my blog’s readers – all 3 of them. On occasion, I use poor judgment and make mistakes. No, really I do. I was thinking of one such instance and here’s my account of the situation. Maybe some of you have similar experiences yourselves - probably not though.

Last April 1st I had settled the girls in their beds for the night, and brainstormed the ingenious idea to prank them. As far as I knew, it would be their first April Fool’s joke experience.

“Well, girls, I have something to tell you,” I started out. “As you all know, Mommy hasn’t felt the greatest lately. She’s had an achy belly and has felt yucky. Well, she doesn’t have the flu.”

“What daddy? What does she have?” my oldest daughter asked.

“Well, she has something called ‘morning sickness’. Mommies get ‘morning sickness’ when they are pregnant and are going to have a baby,” I informed them. I could hardly say that with a straight face, believing this to be a grand joke on the three unsuspecting girls. I expected their reactions to be of shock, maybe perhaps of absolute terror at the thought of their mom having another baby.

Wrong.

“You mean, Mommy is going to have a baby?” my oldest daughter questioned with her big blue eyes welling up with tears of joy.

At that moment, I realized that her father was an absolute idiot. My heart sank, as I now knew that I horribly miscalculated how they’d receive that news.

“Ummm, April Fool’s!” I shouted, nervously awaiting their response. Fortunately, I think I confused the younger two with the term ‘morning sickness’, and they stopped listening to me a while ago. However, the elder sibling still sat there, confused as ever.

“You mean, Mommy isn’t going to have a baby? Why would you say that then? Who’s April Fools?” she asked, still trying to figure out what was going on.

I briefly described the principle idea behind April Fool’s Day and then started to sincerely apologize for the joke gone horribly wrong. She listened, still a little excited from the initial thought of having another baby in the family. For a moment, I actually considered how fun it would be to inform the girls if we really did have another baby. That brief moment gave way to reality, as I snapped out of that insane notion. Now that would have been the ultimate April Fool’s joke if my wife became impregnated. By “joke” I mean “nightmare”. If that were the case, I’d definitely have some strong words for my urologist.

My daughter, still slightly disappointed in the fact her daddy was a jerk, rolled over and undoubtedly continued to think about what might have been and never will be.

Hilarious.

Easter remnants

It's been approximately 33 days since Easter Sunday and I'm still finding this crap in all sorts of weird places -fake grass from Easter baskets. It's like a green plastic plague that refuses to go away. It sticks to the broom, the dog, the furniture and sometimes the children.

This is one of many domestic issues that I probably wouldn't have noticed before my conversion to stay-at-home dad status. I keep fighting the good fight, throwing away these annoying strands of debris, but just when I think I'm winning another one pops up someplace. It may be breeding - can't say for certain. I've even found some in the dog's piles in our backyard. Apparently she's eaten some of it before. Maybe if I don't give her dog food for a couple days she'll eat more of it.

Have a great weekend.

Lunch date

Being a stay-at-home dad has many advantages. One of which is that I can choose to have lunch with my kids at their school if I so desire. Yesterday, I so desired.

My usual weekday companion and I went to share lunch with my 9 year-old daughter. We signed in at the office and waited patiently for her class to come by. After several minutes of standing around, we met up with them and my 2 girls hugged as if they hadn't seen each other in days. In reality, it had only been a matter of about 3 hours. Nevertheless, it was nice to witness such affection for one another. Our 3 girls all really do care for each other, they're each others' best friend. But just like any other siblings, some days the "hugs" can be substituted with "chokes".

My 4 year-old and I had packed a lunch for ourselves, but the oldest child elected to buy hers on this day. The peculiar looking meat which I later learned was "popcorn chicken" didn't look real appetizing to me. She thought it was wonderful. And at the time of this blog being posted, she has yet to get sick. Yowza.

We sat on the small cafeteria benches and started making small talk. I readied my youngest daughter's lunch and we talked about how everybody's morning had gone. And then a small boy with messy hair sat down across from us. He was more than excited to talk about his day. For the sake of anonymity, we'll call him "Bob". Bob was a bit of a nervous high strung child who instantly started rapidly chatting about how he had forgotten many things already that morning.

"I can't believe this! I forgot barbecue sauce. Earlier I forgot my pencil. And guess what else I forgot? My napkins. What is wrong with me?" spouted off Bob.

"Easy there, Bob," I counseled. "We all have one of those days sometimes." I think Bob's parents probably keep an eye on how much sugar he ingests. I fear the poor kid's eyeballs would pop out of his head if he ate a whole bag of Skittles.

Trying to politely avoid further conversation with Bob, I looked at my 2 little girls and thought to myself how quickly time was going by. It didn't seem too long ago that my 3rd grader was in Kindergarten. I had several lunches with her at her school that year. And each time, she would start out sitting next to me. Then, little by little, she'd nestle closer to me until she finally just made her way up onto my lap. I loved the fact that she didn't care one lick about who saw her do it, because as far as she was concerned, it was the natural thing to do.

Fast forward a few years to yesterday. Feeling a bit nostalgic I asked her, "Do you remember how you used to sit on my lap when I ate lunch with you at school?"

For a moment, her eyes kind of widened and she looked at me fearfully. She replied, "No. I did that?"

"Yeah, but don't worry, I'm not going to ask you to do it now. But it was sure nice when you used to." She seemed to sigh with a little bit of relief at the news her father wasn't going to make her look like a baby in front of her friends. Although I don't know if anybody would have even said anything. They all seemed pretty occupied with their chicken popcorn. And Lord knows that Bob had his own issues going on across the table.

When the period was over, we said "good bye" and I gave her a quick kiss. There was a slight hesitation on her part but she didn't seem to mind too much. "I love you, Daddy. Have a good day," she said as she scurried off with the rest of her classmates.

"Thanks, Honey. You too." I reciprocated. "I'll see you after school."

In my mind, the song "Puff the Magic Dragon" started playing. Jackie Paper had just decided to come see Puff no more. I suppose that's a little over-indulgent on my part. But on occasion, certain little moments like this leave a significant impression on me. Maybe it's because I'm getting older or maybe it's just that little girls have that effect on their daddies. It's hard to say.

And then, instead of feeling depressed, I began feeling blessed to have three little girls who I adore. Apparently they dig me as well. Satisfied with that assessment, my 3 1/2ft. tall buddy and I exited the cafeteria. The nostalgic sadness quickly wore off and the rest of the day was great.

Hopefully Bob got his act together as well.

Rob & Kristy's wedding

This past Saturday I had the opportunity to photograph Rob & Kristy's wedding -what a great couple to work with. They are about as easy going people as you'll find. From a photographer's stand point, that is wonderful. It was a fun group of people to hang around with and we came away with some nice images of their wedding day.

Tooth drama

It finally happened. My daughter lost her tooth. It's been a favorite subject of hers for quite awhile now. Approximately 7 months ago she began asking us to wiggle her tooth, saying in her slightly lisped way, "I think ith even getting loother!" We didn't have the heart to tell her that the silly thing was stuck solid. And today, after all this much anticipated time, she finally got the thing to pop out after an aggressive brushing of her teeth before school.

Her eyes filled with tears (of fear, not joy) and yelled for me to come into the bathroom from my adjacent room. Blood was oozing down her bottom lip. Before I could ask her what happened she blurted out, "My tooth fell out!" It was as if the clouds parted and the glory of heaven had shined down into our bathroom.

20 minutes later the joy turned into panic when her younger sister lost the tooth. We scoured for a while and then the same sister finally found it. She went from goat to hero in the matter of about 15 minutes.

3 hours later, #3 daughter lost the tooth again. She defended herself explaining to me that, "I was only looking at it and it just fell out of my hand." Whatever. I again looked for quite awhile knowing that if the owner of the tooth came home from school with it still missing, things could get ugly. And they did. A few hours later, she returned home and was told the sad news. There was much weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth(that were still in her mouth at least).

Foolishly, I suggested that maybe we just put an I.O.U under her pillow, or maybe we draw a picture of a tooth instead for the tooth fairy. By the look in her eyes, I could see that she thought I had lost my mind. It was worth a shot I thought. However, the tooth was again discovered a few hours later and all was good with the world once more.

Hopefully the Tooth Fairy doesn't fall asleep and fail to perform his one job duty tonight.

Dance fever

Happy belated Mother's Day to all you moms out there!

The past couple days have been busy for me. Thursday and Friday I photographed a lot of little girls, sequins, leotards, and a truck load of pink. This was my first year as official photographer for Lyn's Academy of Dance. Each year Lyn puts on a fantastic finale for parents to come watch their kids display what they've learned. It's a lot of work for everyone involved. Mother's Day is not necessarily a relaxing day for my wife. She gets the responsibility of putting on the dance costumes, fixing hair, and applying a little bit of makeup to our 2 daughters. The youngest takes dance lessons as well, but she'll not have anything to do with the big stage. Or, as she eloquently puts it, "I only like the practices, I don't like the game."

So yesterday, hundreds of parents and grandparents showed up at the Lima Civic Center. Dads generally trailed behind their wives and daughters, carrying cameras and video recorders, looking like they were a little confused by the whole thing. I include myself in that group. Dads get demoted to becoming pack mules and valet parking attendants on days like that. That's the easy job though. Our girls don't even entertain the idea of requesting help from me with any of the aforementioned apparel issues. If I did, members of the audience would be whispering such things to each other as, "That's strange, the program doesn't mention that any circus clowns are in this part of the show."

But after all the rushing around, it's completely worth having the chance to observe my little girls on that huge stage. I couldn't help but think about how another year had gone by so quickly. I remember coming to the dance recital last Mother's Day. (It sticks out in my mind because our youngest daughter behaved incredibly poor that day. Sadly, we have several other various memories that are marked by the same issue. sigh.)

One thing about having all girls, they've made me a much more sentimental person. I don't know if I'd be quite so much had my wife loved me enough to give me a son. kidding, kidding. She maintains that it has something to do with me...genetics and chromosomes or something like that. Whatever. I admit that I tear up every time one of them prances around on that stage. I don't know about the technical aspect of their dancing, but it all looks perfect to me. That is, once I figure out which girl on that stage is my daughter. They all look very much alike up there. For a few seconds into my 6-year-old's routine, I discovered that I had been taping the wrong person. Yikes. I didn't feel too bad though. When talking to another father afterward, I said to him in a sort of sarcastic tone, "Your daughter was the best one up there." He replied, "Really? You could tell which one she was? Coz I had a hard time figuring it out."

Next year our girls will be 10, 7, and 5. Whether or not the 5 year old will participate in the stage show remains to be seen. Like I've said before, she's a piece of work. That reminds me, I'd like to write a public apology at this time to the woman who sat in front of us yesterday. My daughter did not mean to fling her plastic bracelet at you. At least I am fairly certain it was unintentional. It was very dark in there so I actually didn't see what transpired. Nevertheless, you have my apology. And thank you for returning it to us. A less kind person might have kept it or possibly thrown the 25 cent piece of jewelry back at her. I wouldn't have blamed you if you chose the latter.

foolish games people play

Since I spend much of the days with our 4 year-old daughter, we occupy much of our time with various types of games. One of which is "Pictureka!". This is a game that my daughter has memorized and mastered. She has developed cognitively quite a bit over the course of the year. We are very proud of how she's progressed in various ways, but especially how she's increased her capability to grasp new concepts.

On the other hand, I fear that there is a strong possibility that I may be becoming dumber. This theory is supported by the end result of a recent spirited match between #3 child and myself. My pile is on the left. Sadly, I was trying to win. Even cheated a bit. The problem is that she's an even better cheater than me. And evidently she has a better short-term memory and vision which are both required to do well at this game. What's even more sad on my part, is that I stole one of her cards from her pile and added it to mine when she wasn't looking.

IDW marketing pics

This week I took some promotional marketing photographs for I DO WINDOWS! LLC. IDW is a service company that offers window cleaning & pressure washing. Here's a few pics from that shoot...

A family by choice

Last evening I had the opportunity to photograph something unique. I was asked to be the photographer at the Foster Parent Appreciation Dinner held by Allen County Children Services.
Roughly 20 families paraded in front of my camera, one at a time, allowing me the chance to see what foster care is all about.

I didn't engage in any in depth conversations, or inquire about the difficulties involved in fostering a child. But I could only assume that it had to be challenging at times. In many cases, couples had opted to foster several children, many of whom were of different race. Additionally, most of these parents already had their own children. It struck me that "family" can take on many different meanings and definitely isn't the narrow vision that I often perceive it to be.

For someone like me, it's hard to envision opening my home to a stranger, be it a child or otherwise. I know it's hard enough to maintain our own little hooligans let alone throw somebody else's biological kids into the mix. There's a great amount of sacrifice that goes along with that commitment from the entire fostering family. Perhaps the hardest part would be when the kids were removed from the foster home for whatever reason. That would have to be incredibly hard for everybody involved. I kept asking myself, "Could we manage this?". In all honesty, I just don't really know. I suppose it comes down to if that's your calling in life, you can pretty much tackle anything.

Having thought about the difficulties and challenges, it also occurred to me that there would have to be a great sense of satisfaction involved. Intervening into a child's life and making a positive contribution to them is just about as worthwhile as anything that I can think of. And that's what these people do. They make investments in people. As one of the keynote speakers noted, not only do the individuals who find these homes benefit from the sacrifice and benevolence of the foster parents, but society as a whole does as well. A kid who is shown some love and made to feel like they matter is probably less likely to lash out against a society who otherwise would have wrote them off.

I'm not much of one to dwell on the dramatics or to overly indulge in sappiness. That's why I can't handle watching another episode of "Extreme Makeovers - Home Edition". If I see Ty Pennington tell a slobbery hardship story one more time my head will explode. Not to mention the constant bombardment of annoying excessive product placements. Ty, I miss the days of "Trading Spaces". But in the case of the foster care families, they deserve recognition for their selfless contributions to the world. I truly am in awe by what they do.

Chuck Taylor's missing

Happy Cinco De Mayo, everybody!

I don't fully understand the whole significance of the holiday but apparently it has something to do with the fact that long ago Mexico defeated the French in an upset battle. It may not be politically correct to say this, but is it really that big of a deal to beat the French in anything? It's kind of like me playing my preschool-aged daughter in basketball and bragging that I held her scoreless. (I did the other day by the way)

This morning I added a photo of my 3 girls' Converse Chuck Taylor high tops to the main page. This photo typifies our family very well. As you may have noticed, there is 1 sneaker missing. When I saw the shoes lying there, I thought that it would make for a nice photograph. I hurriedly looked around for the missing shoe but to no avail. After having searched for an eternity (in reality probably only 10 minutes) I gave up and asked my wife if she knew where it was. She did.

"Honey, the dog ate that shoe about 3 weeks ago."

Well, of course she did. Why would I expect anything different? Why we bothered hanging on to 1 shoe that didn't have a match anymore I don't know. We're just quirky like that I guess. Or maybe my wife was just assuming that our dog would eat the other one eventually too. It's hard to say.

birds & balls

I was feeling a bit ambitious this afternoon and though I'd write a 2nd post regarding a couple incidents that occurred today. First of all, I was having my morning coffee and checking out how some of my investments were doing on the stock exchange...Ok, so I was playing solitaire. Whatever. Anywho, my 6 year old middle child (referred to commonly as "#2) came into the office accompanied by her 4 yr old sister(monikered #3).

"We have a question," the oldest one asked. "Is this a bad word?", she sheepishly asked as she held up her middle finger.

I knew that anything is possible in this house but getting flipped the bird by a kindergartner struck me as a bit unusual.

"Dear, don't ever do that. And besides, who'd you learn that from?" I quipped, still a bit frazzled by the unexpected gesture. She informed me that a neighborhood friend told her that it was a bad thing to do. #3 concurred with the explanation and tried to simulate the obscenity but failed to maneuver her fingers correctly. She ended up giving me the "peace" sign instead. I knew what she meant though.

Sadly, I suppose this is another example of innocence lost for my 6 year old daughter. And in the case of #3, affirmation that her motor skills aren't quite up to par yet to be able to manage the one finger salute. However, she did manage to display some creativity later in the day.

I heard giggling coming from outside my office window that sounded a bit suspicious. I guess being a parent for 9 years now has enabled me to perceive orneriness when I hear it. So I walked outside quickly found the cause of the excessive laughter. #3 had taken 2 tennis balls and strategically placed them inside her shirt. She had instantly become a 3 1/2' tall Dolly Parton. It was a little creepy to say the least.

#2 laughed and encouraged her sister. I was more concerned with the passersby who might wonder what kind of children we were raising. Some days I wonder myself. At the very least, they give me something to write about.

Ali's senior portrait

This past weekend I shot Ali's senior portraits. It was a lot of fun and I think we came away with some good images of her. Here's some samples of what we ended up with...

blog introduction

Welcome to my blog. I hope you find it entertaining, enlightening, and a source of amusement and inspiration. I more so hope it somehow triggers you to inquire about my photography services. I actually do prefer the latter part. (just being honest)

2008 was a year of some serious changes for our family. My wife went back to work after having been a stay-at-home mom for about 7 years. I quit my job managing a small family-owned business and decided to turn my side photography job of 10 years into a full-time gig. In addition to being a photographer, I also am a stay-at-home dad. Our youngest daughter, age 4, is my trusty sidekick while the rest of the fam is in school and at work. She is my Tanto, except for the fact that she speaks better English, and doesn’t have a horse (although she occasionally attempts to ride our dog). We have interesting experiences together. She’s a trip. God definitely gave all of our kids unique personalities. This one in particular is a real piece of work. Sweet Moses is she ever.

Being a stay-at-home dad is pretty much how most people envision it. I do the cleaning, laundry, and usually have dinner ready or at least started when the other 3 return home. I would like to take this opportunity to personally thank the person responsible for coming up with the idea of rotisserie chickens available at most grocery stores. Sir or madam, you are a national treasure in my mind.

In summary, this blog will touch on a variety of issues: family life anecdotes, domesticated issues, random thoughts, of course photography, and whatever else I care to share with the world. As far as a frequency goes, it’s hard to say. Check back periodically for updates and tell your friends as well. And if you don’t have any friends maybe just inform a family member instead.

Jason