Best Shot(s) Monday--Just The Two of Us

Here we are at Day 4 of 10 Days Without Daddy. So far so good, I'd say. We went to the Children's Museum on Saturday, where Cadence had a blast as usual.

The nice thing about this age is that she's still young enough that she doesn't get bored of doing things over and over again. She loves this blue car and kept going back to it over and over again throughout our several hours there.

Cadence loves seeing herself on a TV screen, that's for sure. Yeah, she's the kid who loiters at entrances to grocery stores making funny faces at the security camera.

Cadence developed a fever Saturday evening. I was worried she was getting sick, so we stayed home Sunday morning and just chilled. Her fever seems to come and go, and she's got a bit of a cough which manifests mainly when she's sleeping. I'm hoping it's nothing serious and goes away without any other symptoms popping up.

We tried to go to the zoo on Sunday...wait, let me back up. We tried to go to the Pride Parade on Sunday, but I realized that leaving the house 10 minutes before the Parade was supposed to start would most probably mean we'd miss the whole thing. That's when I asked Cadence if she'd like to go to the zoo instead, and of course she said yes. Unfortunately, I wasn't the only one who thought the zoo would be a good idea on a lovely Sunday afternoon. The traffic was SOOOOOOOO horrendous, and parking was virtually impossible, so I gave up and decided to get a cupcake at Bleeding Heart Bakery instead.

Oh well. At least I got my cupcake. Next time, we'll take the bus...

For more Best Shots, visit Melody of Slurping Life.

Best Shot(s) Monday--The Father's Day Edition

Since yesterday was Father's Day, here is a photo of Cadence and her Daddy. This was taken at a Trader Joe's crew party where Ted had 4 kegs of his homebrew available for tasting.

He also had a keg of root beer available, which he brewed w/ Cadence's help just a week or so ago.

And this is the photo I used for yesterday's Shutter Sister's post in which I said some very nice things about Ted.

Boy. He never takes that hat off, does he?

Speaking of my Stay-At-Home-Daddy of a hubby, Ted and his gang of merry musicians (a.k.a. The Tim Lowly Ensemble) will be heading off on a 10-day tour of the Eastern States starting June 27th. So they rehearsed last night, on Father's Day, because they really need to I guess, and I'm ashamed to say that we didn't actually do anything special for Father's Day except go to church. I didn't even make him breakfast. In fact, he made ME a delicious breakfast that involved english muffins, cream cheese and wild salmon. And then I had the beginning of a migraine after church, so we all took a family nap until 3:30, and then I sent Ted out to eat a late lunch w/ his brother Dave at their favorite Indian restaurant Bhabi's Kitchen, which I'm not too fond of as Indian restaurants go. I guess that was a Father's Day break for Ted, being able to have grown-up brotherly conversation AND his favorite food. He sure deserves it.

So I had Cadence all to myself last night, and we took a nice long walk to a park and played until the sun went down.

You can see more folk's Best Shots on Tracey' Mother May I.

Friday Confession

I have the distinct honor and pleasure of photographing my friend Alana's wedding tomorrow. She is a talented designer, photographer, musician, and hot rock 'n' roll mama. I'm so happy for her and her almost-hubby-Dave. It's going to be a beach sunset wedding in Michigan, so no stuffy boring wedding here.

So why the need for a confession? Well, two things. First of all, this will be my first wedding as THE photographer. That scares the bejeebus out of me. I've had butterflies in my stomach for over a week now. I know I should just get over myself, but I still get that, "What if I totally f*ck up?" knot in my brain every time I do a semi-important photoshoot. Wanna know why I'm not shooting photos for a living? This is why. The stress would kill me, I think. And still, I know I'm just second guessing. So like I said, I should just get over myself.

Second, Ted couldn't get off of work for the wedding. Since bringing Cadence to the wedding without someone to watch her would spell potentially disastrous results for my shutterbug duties, I reluctantly decided to leave her at home. What's the big deal? Well, this is an overnight trip, and I've never spent a night away from Cadence since she emerged from my womb. Ok, there was that one Wilco/Detholz! concert in Urbana that I photographed when she was five months old and I didn't get home until the middle of the night, but I was only gone a total of 12 hours then. I skipped Wilco's encore AND pumped breastmilk in the car while Ted drove to keep our time away to a minimum.

I know a bunch of you are laughing at me that I'm actually not jumping up and down with glee that I get a night all to myself in a waterfront hotel in lovely Saugatuck, MI. I know I'm being silly, but I can't help it. I know Cadence will be just fine. I should just embrace this opportunity to be alone to do whatever the heck I want (within reason, of course). Still...I'm gonna feel mighty out of place without my family in tow.

Oh, and this is totally off topic, but some old high school friends and I got together last week while our friend Steve Elliott was in town. Steve has been making quite a name for himself as an author, and was even awarded the Stegner Fellowship @ Stanford University a few years ago, which is a far cry from his teenage days as a ward of the state or homeless in Rogers Park. Anyhoo, it was fun to hang out and catch up.

Happy weekend, everyone!

Best Shot(s) Monday--Back to the Cadence Channel

I feel like I've lately neglected my duty to post an adequate amount of photos of Cadence, so it's a good thing I took a whole bunch of photos of her this weekend. Here she is sporting her new Woody Guthrie dress that I made on the train last week. It just so happens that Woody has been a long-time dead celebrity crush for me, along with the likes of Nick Drake (hopeless, I know) and Dostoevsky.

Okay, I realize this isn't a photo of Cadence, but just take my word for it that Cadence was only a couple feet away from where this shot was taken. Besides, I just couldn't resist posting a photo of Baby Jack double-fisting shakey eggs. Just look at that stance, that grasp, those curly locks!

And this may SEEM like a photo of Rudden, but if you look carefully, you will notice Cadence right behind him, like a little crown upon his head. I just couldn't resist the synchronicity of this shot. It's like the kids are performing an intricately choreographed dance of BLUR.

OK, back to the Cadence Channel. We decided after church yesterday that it would be a good idea to let Cadence run around some more in Giddings Plaza. Since Cafe Selmarie is right there, we lunched on their delectable oatmeal chocolate chip cookies (just two--one for me and one for Cadence; Ted's on a really party-pooping liver cleanse this week) and fresh squeezed OJ. Talk about a sugar high. At least I got this sweet shot of Cadence. I usually hate photographing in bright sun (and yesterday's light quality can only be described as blindingly bright sunshine), but I caught this moment when some light was inexplicably shining onto her face, and she actually WAITED for me to press the shutter! She must've known she looked good or something.

While walking back to our car, Cadence happened to spy this sad looking dandelion growing in a sparsely green dirt patch, and I just love how she bent down to smell it, as if it were the most fragrant blossom to ever grace her path. Then she picked it and showed it to me.

Then she tried to blow the wishes away, but alas, they were all gone already. Oh well. I just love how good Woody looks in this photo...

And now I reveal to you my most embarrassing photo technique, just discovered yesterday, and that is the Laptop Reflector. I realized that the glow of the laptop on Cadence's face as she numbed her mind on some Nick Jr. was quite suitable for photographing her in our dimly lit dining room.

Can you just SEE the brain cells taking a flying leap into oblivion? Eh, I still happen to really like the effect.

Her face looks much better lit up like this, believe me. And the glow is so subtle, it's...perfect.

We did get outside before the sun went down, since it was a beautiful day and all. Cadence even got to find some more "flowers" that actually had wishes left on them.

Since dandelions breed like bunnies in our neighborhood, Cadence was able to gather up armfuls of them.

I just love how some of our neighbors let their weeds grow wild. Well-kempt lawns are so over-rated. If it weren't for those cars in the background, you'd think this photo had been taken in the country, or forest preserves, at least. And I bet if I hadn't said anything about those cars, you wouldn't have even noticed.

Back indoors, Cadence had some nekkid time. FYI, I don't post totally nekkid photos of my kid for the whole universe to see because, believe it or not, I have SOME boundaries. Well, actually, it's to save folks out there with REAL boundaries the trouble of wasting their time judging me. I see it as an act of charity and not self-censorship.

So you'll just have to take my word for it that the sight of a totally nekkid Cadence banging on her toy piano while doing Max's Wild Rumpus dance was quite the visual extravaganza. And I know she's doing the Wild Rumpus dance because while she's jumping up and down and hopping from foot to foot while her hands do the same on the piano, she's yelling, "AND now, let the WILD RUMPUS START!"

Gotta love this kid.

You can see more folk's Best Shots on Tracey' Mother May I.

P.S. I have a post up on Shutter Sisters. Check it out to find your chance to win a totally awesome photo book.

Coming Up For Air

This is usually a quiet time of the year for me at work, but something came up that's thrown me into temporary busyness resulting in working while on the train, through lunch, at home, in the middle of the night, etc, and that's put a serious damper on my ability to post here. So here I go again with the random thoughts/updates and random photos.

Remember my voluntary simplicity mantra for the year? Well, it's the end of May, and I feel like I've gotten nowhere with that. I feel really pathetic saying this, but I think it would take an intervention like getting on a Reality TV show to get my butt in gear in terms of purging and decluttering our lives. But it's not just the physical stuff. It's my mind that needs decluttering too.

I find that I simply rush through my day, seldom taking time to notice the little things, such as these delicate flowers on the side of the pavement, these little encapsulations of purity and beauty. I don't take the time to breathe in deeply, or to quiet myself, or to connect to myself, let alone God or those around me. I wonder what it would take to change that?

So I was in the dining room the other day when I heard Cadence's voice coming from her room, saying, "Oh please don't go! We'll eat you up, we love you so!" I grabbed the camera to capture this photo of her "reading." It's the first book that she's taken to reciting, and now she walks around our home saying in the same cackly voice I use, "...And they GNASHED their terrible teeth, and they GNASHED their terrible eyes, and they GNASHED their terrible claws..." She apparently really likes the word GNASHED. It really tickles me so that she loves this book so much, because she is most definitely My Wild Thing, and that's what I love so much about her.

Speaking of Cadence, she's been under the weather the past couple days. She doesn't get sick very often, so when she does, I tend to get a little bit anxious. It hasn't been too bad so far. Just some head congestion. She tried to nurse yesterday morning and just couldn't breathe so she gave up. She later made a comment that I was "empty" and that she just couldn't do it. That made me wonder if that's how she'll self-wean, as my supply continues to dwindle, and it gets harder and harder for her to get a let-down. She must be breathing better by now because she was able to nurse last night and this morning, which I'm glad about because I prefer her to get as much breastmilk as possible when she's sick so I can pass on my antibodies.

Ted's been busy brewing up all kinds of beer. We've had lots of it in kegs lately, which is a whole new way of drinking homebrew. For those who know the joys of drinking draught beer, especially really good draught beer, you can believe that this is probably one of those no-turning-back experiences. For Ted, at least. I only drink the foamy part (and you sure can get good foam when you can control your own carbonation in a keg).

In case you haven't noticed, for the past couple months, the only shoes Cadence will wear unless cajoled otherwise are her black sparkly ballerina flats. She wears them to church, to the park, to the grocery store, to the children's museum, to the library, to the cafe, and yes, when she's driving in her little car. Needless to say, they're starting to fall apart. I finally took her shoe-shopping last night, and she INSISTED on a pink version of the sparkly shoes. Then I showed her a little less showy pair of floral canvas ballerina flats which she agreed to buy instead, and I convinced her to also accept a pair of gender neutral black canvas slip-on sneakers for the playground.

When we got home, however, she said some stuff that kind of gave me pause. She said something to the effect of "I'm a girl, so I like these shoes [meaning the flowery ballerina flats]," and she expressed less enthusiasm for the black gender neutral sneakers. As I've mentioned before, we're trying hard not to raise a little princess who will be looking for her prince in shining armor to "save" her. This is something I feel strongly about because when I was a young girl, I wanted to be a photojournalist for National Geographic, and my mother told me women don't do things like that. I know I shouldn't get too worked up about it, but it scares me how quickly this whole gender socialization thing happens.

Oh, I forgot to mention that I had a post up on Shutter Sisters last Sunday. You can read all about it here.

Also, one of my photos from 826CHI's prom was picked for Gapers Block's Rearview for Tuesday May 20th. My friend Justin saw it and told me about it. That was kinda cool.

Alright, I think that's enough for now. Happy long weekend everyone!