Memories of Mexico

In honour of Ma’am’s birthday yesterday, I thought I should post some of the photos from the trip we took for her Big-Five-Oh last year.

The Tadpole was oh-so tiny! And oh-soooo cute! We weren’t sure how things would go, taking a 3.5mo old on a vacation so far from home, but (aside from the few days without luggage) everything was fantastical.

Wordless Wednesday (Happy birthday Ma'am!)

Monster's 1st Birthday Party

Tadpole's friend Monster turned one on Sunday, and we were invited to his birthday party to celebrate with his other family and friends.

Monster sure looked cute, even though he wasn't too interested in making a mess with his cake.

The boys were adorable together, playing "golf" and checking out all of Monster's new loot.

And last, but not least, here's a pic of Monster with his Mommy, and Tadpole with his Mummy (courtesy of Mister)... the last one of these we had taken was at my birthday part in June - and the boys sure have grown!!

iheartfaces - Week 16

Grumpy's trying to teach Tadpole to walk with his hands behind his back so he'll be the best behaved little man on the car show circut this summer. We'll see how that works out, but in the meantime, at least I got a picture to enter in this weeks iHeartFaces contest...
"Reflection" is the theme, and here's Tadpole, sitting beside Grumpy and Granny's HotRod.

Too see the rest of the reflection photos this week, check out the iHeartfaces website.

Hockey Gear

Tadpole got his first pair of hockey skates on his first Christmas. And he got his first hockey helmet for his first Birthday.
We were in Canadian Tire one afternoon when Mister decided that the Tadpole should try a few other things on for size.

First it was the shoulder pads:

Then it was the goalie mask:

I can’t wait until my Tadpole is a Timbit!

Happy Birthday...

... Crazy Auntie Anastasia!

Love you,
from the Tadpole, his Daddy & his Mummy.
We'll see you tomorrow night at dinner.
xo

Flash Back Friday #6

Cuddles with Daddy

We were still in the hospital with our brand-spankin’ new Tadpole when I snuck this shot of my Mister cuddling with his boy. I tell ya’, Mister was born to be a Daddy. He is the Daddy I always knew that I wanted my kidlets to have and I’m so proud that I get to be on his parenting team.

Family Portrait Photographer – Victoria, BC

A while ago, I mentioned that my PallyBoy and his wife were going to be my First paying clients. I can’t even begin to describe by nervousness before this shoot, but they expected and accepted it – and I powered through.
We got together over the weekend and I hope their happy little family is pleased with the results of their first portraits. Here’s a sneak-peek…

PallyBoy... you can expect an e-mail from me later tonight (or early tomorrow) with the link to your online gallery.

Wordless Wednesday

I'm an avid follower of 100+ blogs, the majority of which are photography related. They're a great source of inspiration, ideas, tips/tricks/tools, and entertainment. Recently, a few of them have started doing something called "wordless Wednesday" - their post will include a photo, but no narrative. Pretty self-explanitory. And yet I felt the need to write an entire paragraph about it...

Anyway... I love it, so I'm going to start doing the same. Next week. Because, let's face it, this weeks explanation is pretty wordy :)

Natural Light

The natural light in our house is pretty awful. There are only two spots in the entire house where we get any decent light during the day. One is in the Living Room’s bay window, and the other is the slider in the Master Bedroom. I was doing some practicing/experimenting, and the Tadpole didn’t seem to mind helping me out. I think he was just excited to get to play in Mummy & Daddy’s room for a while.

iheartfaces - Week 15

"Self-Portrait" is the contest theme this week. The website rules state that "...you must take the photo and you must be holding the camera when you take it..." No tripods allowed.
It made for a challenging assignment, but it was fun.

Here's my adult entry:

Here's my kids entry:

To see how everyone else made out this week, head on over to iHeartFaces and check out all of the other entries.

"Uncle's Day"

In honour of their new Uncle Burger, A&W has declared today, April 19th, as "Uncle's Day"; and they're running a contest called Canada’s Ultimate Uncle. Tadpole wanted to enter his Unk, but because he hasn’t reached the age of majority (and that’s the first stipulation in the contest rules), he’s not eligible.

He was a bit sad about it because he already had his entry all written. It made him happy when I told him that his Mummy would be happy to post it on her blog so that everyone would know who the REAL “Ultimate Uncle” is…

Dear A&W,

I think that I have the Ultimate Uncle.

After my Daddy, Unk was the first person to know about my impending arrival - and he was the very first person that came to the hospital to meet me.

When I was a baby and I screamed my head off for hours and hours, he came to look after me so that Mummy & Daddy could go on a much-needed dinner date. When they came home the house was a total disaster (sink full of tub water, clothes all over the floor, dirty diaper – still open – on the counter...), but Unk and I were having a cuddle and snoozing in the rocking chair.

Unk bought me my first set of golf clubs when I was just 19 days old… I’m still waiting for my lessons, but Mummy and Daddy figure it would help if I was taller.

On Christmas Eve, Unk slept over at our house so that he could get up early in the morning and see my very first presents from Santa. Santa brought me some cool stuff – but Unk gave me something really special… my very first pair of hockey skates! Mummy and Daddy put them away in my closet though. They say that my feet are still too small for them – and that I need to learn how to walk better before I can skate.

My first birthday was a few weeks after Christmas. Mummy and Daddy took me to PlayZone, and Unk came too. We had so much fun! After dinner we had cupcakes and I got more presents. My Unk gave me a super-duper hockey helmet to go with my super-duper skates! It’s already got my number decaled on it and everything.

Now that I’m a big kid, I’m learning to walk and talk. My first words were Mummy & Daddy & cheese, but “Unk” came shortly afterwards. I love my Unk. He comes to visit me every week and we have lots of playtime. He lets me wear his hat, helps me climb the stairs, and makes me giggle. And giggle. And giggle.

I have the best Unk in the universe.

Father/Daughter Outing #3

March

Last month we slung the tripods over our shoulders, and headed into Metchosin. The adorable little lambs were out in the fields, and they were so cute/curious.

From there we headed to Devonian Park and got some nice nature shots.
And I FINALLY mastered the aperture/focusing problem I’d been having… these are the two shots that best show what I learned.

Focus on the nearest flower... Focus on the further flower

Hip Hip Hooray!

Flash Back Friday #5

Tadpole's 1st Snow

It was the weekend before we left for Mexico. And it snowed. In April. What the…!? Snow in April!? As Unk would say, “Global Warming my @$$!”.

Baba, his Mama… and a little Mojito!

I took this at Potato Chip’s birthday last weekend. I still can’t put my finger on what it is exactly that I like about it. But it’s got that something.
Here's Baba, his pretty Mama, and a hiding little Mojito (who’s due to make an appearance on Remembrance Day this year).

We <3 Donnie (or: Once a NKOTB fan, Always a NKOTB fan)

Last night Lo and I headed to the SOFA for a cousin-bonding-experience 20yrs in the making… a New Kids on the Block concert. That’s right. And we loved it. That’s right too!

From the good: our first glance at the 5 Boston Boys; through the bad: Jordan’s wind-machine shirtless bit (how could anyone take that seriously? It was hysterical!); and back again: to Team Canada hockey jerseys for Hangin’ Tough… it was a night to remember.

And yes, we still And yes, we still heart Donnie Wahlberg – did I mention that he dropped his drawers to show us the Canadian flag on the bum of his boxers.
He wiggled it. Just a little bit. For the fun of it.

(I snagged this picture from Google Images)

And how sweet was it to see the Jabbawockeez?!

I had no idea that they were opening… Mister and Unk were both a bit jealous when they found out about it – but they agreed that it wouldn’t have been worth sitting through the NKOTB for. Awww, what the heck do they know? Seriously though… if you don’t know who the Jabbawockeez are, you need to go to their website to watch some video, or look them up on youtube. Incredible.

All in all, it was one heck of an evening with great company. Love ya Lo !

* I didn’t take my camera with me so if anyone happened to get some decent pictures, please e-mail them to me and I’ll add them to this post. In the meantime, this one is from today's Times Colonist...

Easter Basket

Easter might be over, but I still have a few cute pic's to post...

...Last Easter, Tadpole was too little to hunt. So at the birthday party last weekend, he wasn’t too sure what to do with the basket that he got from Potato Chip’s Mommy – but he figured it out in short order. He managed to collect an egg or two before he started filling his basket with bark and rocks. Whatever works, I guess.

iheartfaces - Week 14

"Easter" is this week's contest theme at iheartfaces, and this is my entry - a picture of the Tadpole, as usual :)

Please head on over to iHeartFaces to see the rest of this week's entries.

Happy Birthday Grumpy!

We had dinner last night to celebrate, but it's actually Grumpy's birthday today. Tadpole and his Mummy and Daddy and Unk all say:

Happy Birthday Grumpy!!