Best Shot(s) Monday--Dear God, Not Now, Please...

We went to the annual Chicago Korean Festival on Saturday. I don't know why I go to this every year. I guess to get my occasional Korean fix. Unfortunately, the food just isn't up to par, and I couldn't get any paht-bingsoo this year because the line was too damn long at Outdoor Cafe. We did get to spend some time w/ Halfmama and her family and later my cousins Ben and Rachel and Baby Eden, which was nice. I felt bad the festival was so lame though.

I am in full wedding preparation mode, PLUS I'm super busy at work. Poor Cadence...She's been watching a lot of Wonder Pets these days...

To make matters possibly worse, Ted started getting sick yesterday. We don't know if it's allergies or a cold. All I know is, we don't have TIME to get sick. Ain't that always the truth?

That's not all. I woke up with a migraine in the middle of the night last night, and I couldn't fall back to sleep. By the time I got to work at 8am this morning, I had already been up for 7 hours. That is going to throw my sleep WAY off. I just hope I don't get another migraine from the lack of sleep...

See more folks' Best Shots Monday on Tracey's Picture This.

Best Shot(s) Monday--Practicing

I'm practicing my photog skillz for Auntie Lauren's wedding, which is coming up really fast now! Here are a few of my faves from this past week:

Cadence's little friend Ada at her Dr. Seuss-themed 3rd Birthday Party. Notice her little tattoo on her arm. So cute!

Adorable little Nora at the birthday party. I like how Ada and Cadence are off in the distance, and here's little Nora chasing after them.

Here, I'm playing around on Picasa, which is a google software for organizing and editing photos. I've muted the colors every so slightly.

This one is kinda dreamy. I don't think I'd want to do too many photos like this as that would probably make me want to vomit. But a few here and there I think would be okay. I'm really not so much into the effects. I like when other people do 'em, but I like to keep things simple. Probably cuz I'm lazy.

The obligatory mirror shot. I like how the color of the walls reflected are a different color than the wall that the mirror is mounted on due to the sunlight hitting the opposit walls.

I just like the light in this one. And I am a big fan of window seats! I always think of Jane Eyre as a little girl hiding away in one of these and reading for hours and hours during the cold winter months.

This happened to be in Ted's parent's fridge. It's almost 2 years old! There will definitely be a bunch of homebrew at the wedding after-party.

There's something about this photo that I really like. Part of it is because I think Becki is just absolutely beautiful, in a really pure, natural and wholesome way. The awesome part is that she's really this beautiful on the inside too. I know that sounds hokey, but it's true. Uncle David is so lucky that she chose him!

As you can see, Cadence is quite fond of her Aunt Becki, whom she called Aunt Duckie for the longest time. *sigh*. I kinda liked it when she called her Duckie...

Oh, all of these photos were taken w/ the 50mm f/1.8 lens on my D50. I'm thinking I'll shoot mainly w/ that lens cuz I just love the blur. So I guess it won't matter so much that my 18-55mm is broken. I have an older 35-55mm from my film camera that I can use on my D50, so I'll do that. I'll use my D40 for my 55-200mm zoom lens, mainly at the ceremony. I'm going to focus more on the reception and after-party and leave the main ceremony shooting to the pros. There is no way I'll get much more than maybe some artsy looking grainy B&W shots at the ceremony, since the church does not allow flash or planted lighting. We'll see how it goes...

Go see other folks' Best Shots Monday at Tracey's Picture This.

The Uncles Come A-Visiting

Now I know y'all are familiar with Uncle Dave, Ted's oldest brother.

Cadence also has a series of other uncles who dote on her, including her uncles Phil (a.k.a. Teal) and John (a.k.a. Brown). It just so happens that they were in town this week (they live all over the place, most recently in Portland, OR) and paid a visit last night.

They had a chance to get caught up on Ted's latest homebrews over dinner.

John is leaving in the next 10 days for India where he will be studing music for 6 months.

Phil may be going to Ghana with their other friend Mikey for the funeral of Ghana's most esteemed xylophone player.

Some people get to travel everywhere!

Makes me want to renew my passport...

Photo slideshow of the visit is here, if yer interested.

The Other Camera

So my D50 body that I bought just for my 50mm f/1.8 lens? I think I'm finally getting used to it. It's still clunky compared to my D40. I've only taken probably less than 700 photos on it, compared to almost 9,000 on my D40, so maybe it's just a matter of practice before I'm feeling more at home with it.

I did get to do a little photoshoot with the D50 on Wednesday of my cousins Ben and Rachel's baby daughter Eden, who is now 4 months old. We went over to their place for a 4th of July BBQ. Cadence loves going to see Baby Eden. She still gets jealous when one of us holds her, but not as much as she used to. She even told Ted, as we were getting out of the car, that he could hold Baby Eden.

The more time I spend with Eden, the more I miss that itty bitty baby stage. And Eden isn't so itty bitty any more already! Ted and I were looking through some old photos last night of Cadence at around 4 months old. It's been so long since we could actually say she was chubby that I was surprised to see her chunkiness.

I know y'all are thinking we're totally gonna have another one with all this baby talk, but that's not true. Yes, Ted and I joke about it casually, with just a little hint of yearning in our voices. Would we be happy if we happened to get pregnant right now? I think so. Are we going out of our way to get pregnant? Uh, no.

Fact is, I don't know if I'll even be able to get pregnant again. My doctor had told me in my 20s that I would need fertility treatment to get pregnant. Apparently, Ted was fertility treatment enough. But now, I don't know…I've only had a few periods since Cadence was born. Yes, I'm still nursing, but only a couple times a day, and I don't think that would be enough to keep most women from ovulating again.

It may just be that Cadence is my one miracle baby and that I'll never get another chance to give birth again. I have mixed feelings about this, but you know, as much as I bitch and moan about what a handful Cadence is, she really is a totally kickass kid, and I can't believe how incredibly blessed I am to have the privilege of being her mama. So if it turns out that she is my only child, she's the best only I could have ever asked for, and I'm thankful for that.

Three Thoughts Thursday--On Hiatus

Sorry, folks, but I haven't had a thought worth sharing in a while, and I'm so behind on photos--and let's face it; this site is about the photos (mainly of Cadence) and not about me--so Three Thoughts Thursday will have to resume next week. Hopefully, I'll be thinking again by then.

Ted's dad flew us to Madison on Saturday afternoon, which saved us quite a bit of driving. And Cadence totally loves flying with her grandpa, so it was a special treat.

Cadence was totally chatty and excited as she enjoyed her in-flight snack of canteloupe and grapes that Grandma had packed for her, until we put the headset on her so she could hear us talking to each other. Then she totally froze and barely even blinked after that. I guess hearing our voices almost inside her head freaked her out. She just held onto Grandma's hand the whole time, staring straight ahead of her. When we took the headset off as we were landing, she just resumed chattering away, almost as if we'd turned her off and on again. Weird...

My cousin Casey, who had driven up earlier, picked us up at the Madison airport. We headed downtown to our hotel, the Madison Concourse and Governor's Club, which ended up being a block from the capitol and all the fun and excitement on State Street near the UW campus.

We grabbed some dinner at State Street Brats, and that's where Cadence began her hunger strike against food with any nutritional value for the entire weekend. She wouldn't eat anything but fries there, and things didn't get much better for the remainder of the vacation.

After dinner, we walked over to UW's Memorial Union Terrace on Lake Mendota to watch the Rhythm and Boom fireworks across the Lake. Apparently, half the town also congregated on the Terrace to see the fireworks, and it was so crowded you literally had to watch where you were walking so you wouldn't step on people's fingers.

The fireworks were okay, I guess, but I once attended the Celebration of Light in Vancouver, which is the largest fireworks competition in the world, and that kind of spoiled fireworks for me from then on. Chicago also has fireworks a couple times a week because of Navy Pier, so I guess I'm just a bit jaded.

Cadence LOVED being on the Terrace, and she basically did not stop running--and by running, I mean RUNNING--around until we left for the hotel some time after 11pm. Meanwhile, Ted and Casey had ordered two pitchers of beer and were taking their sweet time drinking them. The Union sells beer only to members, which Casey happens to be, and they sell pretty damn good beer. I was so anxious for the boys to be done with their beer that I actually had a glass myself, just to speed things along.

After two-and-a-half hours of sprinting, Cadence finally fell asleep in her stroller on our walk over to the hotel. We didn't even bother chaning her into her PJs. Goodness gracious, that girl knows how to party.

So remember that little itty bitty bit of beer I had to hurry things along on the Terrace? Well, it came back to smite me the next morning. I woke up hung over with an imminent migraine. Although I managed to take Cadence swimming in the hotel pool for a little bit, by the time we were eating breakfast (it was actually more like lunchtime by then), I was in so much pain and sick to my stomach. I knew that I had an appointment with the porcelin god and that there was no way in hell I could go on the New Glarus brewery tour which we'd planned for that afternoon.

Casey and Ted dropped me and Cadence off at the hotel (after I purchased a very large bottle of Excedrin), and I somehow managed to subscribe to the Disney Channel-On-Demand before rushing to the bathroom and taking care of business. It was pretty nasty. Somebody remind me to never eat potatoes when I know I'm gonna throw up in the near future.

I was sick the rest of the day. I closed all the blinds and let Cadence watch Little Einstein and Disney Clubhouse, which she was very happy about as she'd never seen those programs before.

My head was still in so much pain that I didn't even go out for dinner, even though it was a gorgeous day outside and I was starving since I'd been cooped up in the hotel room all day. Casey and Ted came back from their brewery tour, which they were able to enjoy since they didn't have to chase Cadence around. I did make them take her for dinner though, just to get her unglued from the tube. I, on the other hand, stayed in and ordered room service. I also stayed away from alcohol for the rest of the trip.

I did manage to drag myself out of the hotel room once the sun went down (I'm extremely photophobic when a migraine is plaguing me). We walked down State Street, and Cadence was as crazy as ever, running amok. Luckily, there is no car traffic on State Street, so I wasn't as stressed out about Cadence getting flattened by a vehicle.

We went to The Chocolate Shoppe, which is where our favorite Chicago ice cream shop, Sweet Occasions, gets their ice cream. Yeah, cuz Cadence NEEDS sugar. Really, folks, we don't even give this girl juice. I have no idea why she always acts like she's got high fructose corn syrup running through her veins.

I gotta say, Cadence LOVES vacations. Clean sheets and fluffy pillows galore and TELEVISION! Elevators! Swimming pools! New territory to explore and run and run and run around in! What's not to love? Me, on the other hand? I've pretty much had it with vacations until Cadence is old enough to walk down a street unchaperoned. Can someone please tell me when that will be? Is 4 years old too young? How about 3? I suppose I should work on her potty learning first...Don't even go there, people...

We checked out of the hotel on Monday morning and stopped at the Henry Vilas Zoo before driving back w/ Casey to Ted's parents' house. And thus ended my Madison getaway.

I guess I'm a little annoyed that the bulk of my vacation was spent in bed hiding from the sun. And I hear that New Glarus is a really cute town that I would've really loved, so I totally missed that too. Oh well. I'll just have to remember to steer clear of the beer next time. Sheesh.

It was a real relief to get back to Ted's parents' house. We stayed overnight there, and it was actually like another little vacation. Ted's mom is a great cook, and Cadence could care less about me when there's Grandma, Grandpa AND Sniper the cat to play with.

We even got to visit the neighbors' horses, one of whom just had a baby a month ago. I've never had much contact with horses, having grown up in the city, but I've always been fascinated by them. I think they are absolutely beautiful creatures, and Cadence agrees.

I guess it's inevitable now that Cadence will one day want a horse of her own. We'll just have to move to a farm or something.

Alright, I'm getting really tired of posting, so I'll just have to continue some other time.