May 20th update

Apr

My blog is still broken

I just wanted to say hi. Because i miss the blog life and I miss some of you that I really only connect with here. So, hey – what’s up? I think we’ve figured out what’s wrong and we’re trying to transfer our site to a new host. Apparently I reached the database limit with the old one. Oops. But the transfer is not going so smoothly and we haven’t had a lot of spare time to focus on it. The plus side is that I get about 50 emails a day from wordpress. Joy. Anyway, I hope to have this fixed by next week. That’s probably optimistic given the fact that when I say “we” I actually mean MB. He’s the one migrating the site. Because he is nice and helpful.

ANNOUNCEMENT: MY BLOG IS BROKEN

Right now I can’t post anything new, but it appears that I can edit my previously published posts. And how creepy is it that wordpress keeps sending me phantom comments? I don’t know what happened (I didn’t mess with anything this time) and MB and I cannot figure out what is the problem. I have no idea when it will get fixed. Until then, be comforted that I share all of my unsolicited deep thoughts via Instagram.

And actually this makes me more sad than I’m letting on, because I think we’re going to have to do a complete re-install and that does not bode well with me.

“…most of the time, all you have is the moment,

and the imperfect love of the people around you.”

― Anne Lamott

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brain dump

Apr

Wait, did you know I was out of town? Or did you miss me clogging your IG feed? ha ha ha! And to think I restrained myself. Well, one thing is for sure, MB and my travel companions quickly figured out it is super annoying to go anywhere with me. I make you pose, I make you crawl in weird spaces, I make you eat stuff, I take pictures when I’m not supposed to, and I generally just don’t care if you’re not into it. It’s part of my charm.

4 days away – a much needed break. And even though I got sick the day before we left (and mended around return home time), I feel great. I think I left this space with a big dark cloud hanging over it and I’m back to say I’m fired up. (In fact, Dutch and I are actually singing Girl on Fire at the top of our lungs right now. I’ve got better arm expressions than her though.) And my kids needed a break from their rut, and Grandpa took care of that. In fact, I’d like to hire Grandpa as a manny. The kids enjoyed eating out and extra attention, and he got them to clean their rooms up EVERY day AND they still like him. Before we even left, he spent time with each kid in their room asking them to give him a tour of their room and explain their stuff. I mean, who knew? The kids were so thrilled to give detailed info about the ins and outs of their space and their favorite things. All it takes is time, right? Don’t worry, I’ve totally made all kinds of new mom commitments and am certain I will be better from now on.

(Can you believe that the fair haired warrior was helpful and lovely the entire time we were gone? And that she got all teary cause she missed us???)

So we were in South Carolina for a few days. MB had a work conference that we morphed into our 14th anniversary trip. 14 years! We tried not to get into the statistics of it all – 3 kids, 5 states, 8 residences, jobs, degrees, and lots of deodorant and milk runs. And cookies. We’ve gone through a lot of cookies. Thousands. And I still believe it is the best decision I ever made to throw myself at MB until he noticed me. (Young girls, please don’t throw yourself at men. It’s a bad way to be. And mostly unattractive.) I love being married to MB.

What does one do in Columbia, South Carolina? Foooooood. That’s what traveling is about to me. We got ourselves lots of fried chicken, green tomatoes, pimento cheese, meatloaf, ribs, succotash, slaw… you name it, we ate it. I had the best bread pudding of my life. exclamation points. If you are in Columbia, please eat at the Oak Table and Cafe Strudel and Mr. Friendly’s. And there was some exploring of Bull Island in the Cape Romain Refuge so I could see boneyard beach. Then there was the alligator incident. We survived. And like all idiot tourists, we have video footage and photos of said incident. We made lots of friends and visited some old friends. I wandered around the city, checking out their walls, the library, the art museum, the creepy antiques stores. We spent a day in Charleston, marveling at the south’s fascination with the civil war and wondering if things really are slower there, or if it was just the vacay fooling us.

Is it weird that the highlight of our visit might have been the discovery of the rad Robot Candy store? I mean, candy and robots – how can you lose with that combination? We loaded up on lego candy, ninja bread men, origami robots, ice wands, japanese pokey sticks, and mustaches. The mustaches are like gold around here.

I’m back. I’m getting the house up and running. And then there’s the computer housekeeping – so behind on email and fb groups, but luckily, I got pinterest covered while hanging at the airport yesterday. I love going and then I love coming home to my own space. I’m so freaking positive right now.

I just want to hug you all! And I’m not a hugger.

Happy Friday!

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living life

Apr

This is one of my favorite photos I’ve ever taken. I should print it out because I’m frequently pulling it up to look at on my computer. The light was perfectly diffused into the bleak and cluttered church kitchen. All I did was straighten the image and make it b&w. And when I have to do so little to an image, it feels like progress. But that’s not actually why I like this image so much.

This, as some of you may know, is my mother-in-law. And we all feel lucky and blessed to know her. I like this image because it is saturated with life. Here she is arranging the zucchini muffins, batches and batches of muffins. There was no one else in the kitchen as she prepped the refreshments for this event, the baptism of one granddaughter and the baby blessing of the newest grandchild. There was no time for me to style this image – the industrial size dish soap and canola oil loom large. And the microwave is not my favorite back drop. Laminate counter tops, faux wood cabinets – it’s a room meant for utility and not making an impression. But I wouldn’t change it, even if I could. Unedited, captured in its essence, our lives are meant to be of use. We are bound to our families by blood and responsibility, but our love is what drives our simple actions. Our gatherings and family milestones play out in ordinary venues with ordinary people, doing what they can to be of use to the people they love.

And today after a week of awful nights, of feeling like I cannot do anything to be of use to my own family, I have to remind myself of these things. I’m trying to avoid the news for fear of being sucked into the awfulness, and I’m wishing we lived far away from big cities and crazy people. I really wanted to come back to the blog with a feel good family story, because I’ve been such a whiner. I cannot report that we’ve made progress, it was not a breakthrough. I am completely drained and out of ideas. I can’t even find sarcastic energy. I have to remind myself that the feel good is just that – moments, and not events or days, and wiping the slate clean is so hard today, but so necessary for our relationship.

Maybe what I really wish, is for life to be truly black and white.

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chocolate cake solves problems

Apr

I’m going to try writing a post as a distraction technique. I really want to bake a chocolate cake right now, with rich and gooey chocolate frosting. My baking has been curtailed. Because it makes us fat. And usually I can find a mini photo shoot lurking somewhere in my house, but that’s not presenting itself either. So. Here I am.

We had a a doozy of a weekend. It’s so disheartening when you work so hard to create a comfortable family environment and yet just one single person (or child as the case may be) can send the whole system into defcon 5. (Is that the right level? I need nerd support.) I’ve reached this state of hopeless parenting – like it will just take its own course and I will just hang on for the ride.

Our middle child has reached new levels of intensity. I did not expect a 7 year old to yell at me, “this is my life, and I need more freedom! You can’t tell me what to do!” while slamming her bedroom door. I was thinking that was 8 years or so down the road. This latest explosion was just the result of enforcing bedtime. I know, cray cray that we would ask her to go to bed. We are unreasonable parents, she assures us. You’ll be happy to know that her greatest defense to date is claiming religious persecution – we are taking away her right to choose. If she is not escalating, then she assumes mocking attention to your helpless parenting situation. I find myself staring at her often, absolutely angry to my core, and unable to think of anything to do. She also claims her life is miserable, without joy, that our family is terrible and that we should give her away. Gentle responses send her into tears and emotional talks that drag on until I have no idea what we are talking about anymore. Anger sends her to new hysterical heights. How can this small person control herself all day and then lose so much control? She has nary a problem at school, other than some reading difficulty. Her teachers often report she is quick to respond, pays attention, follows directions, works well with others.

How do you tell a kid that her life is sheltered and protected and privileged and she has NO idea about the atrocities that exist daily for children throughout the world?

The hardest of all is the strain it puts on our marriage. No two people parent the same. Our expectations differ, our methods vary, but most of the time we work through it. We had one of those gut-wrenching-we’ve got-problems-with-each-other talks. Highly unusual, and emotionally draining. I think we both felt hollowed out and judged and incapable of coming up with a solution that feels like it will work.

Do you see why I need cake?

I continue to emphasize that her actions affect all of us, that we each have a responsibility to make our family better. I resolve not to get angry, knowing that even if I don’t know what to do, I’m pretty sure rage isn’t going to solve anything.

After another PSFO (power struggle freak out) last night, I noticed how hard she is trying to get control. So I started asking about her anger and low and behold our conversation calmed as she cried and cried about mean girls at school. The level of manipulation these girls are using is highly disturbing, and effective. I don’t think I can figure out exactly what role she plays in the spider web of 2nd grade girls, but I see how difficult it is for her to extricate herself from the sticky web that entangles all of their interactions. She holds onto her feelings all day and then explodes at home. That’s how she’s coping. We talked and she cried and she seemed better. My hope is that we’ve made a break through, and even though I don’t have many answers about how to handle girls with cruel intentions, I think more than anything she just needed to be heard. I need to do more listening. And I probably shouldn’t march down to school, grab that one girl by her pony tail, and tell her what I’ll do to her the next time she messes with my kid. But I’ve definitely thought about it.

I do have a working title for my upcoming book, though. Parenting: exploring the depths of your selfishness, losing all control, and expecting your children to behave as adults.

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save the date

Apr

If you ever want to have a in-depth conversation about what you would do differently about your wedding, I’m your gal. I think we all learned a few things about what worked and what didn’t. I did not have a cake at my wedding, and I’ve never regretted it. I do however, remember having friends take my engagement pic. Which was okay, but I ended up printing it on transparent vellum for our invites, and MB’s ugly tennis shoes were front and center. And my invites were pretty avant garde back then, so it was an amateur call not to get a professional photo for it. So, when Luna said her sister needed a photo for her save the date, I was eager to help her – as some sort of rectification for my earlier wedding sins. Wedding Sins……band name.

PS – those of you planning weddings, I cannot get over how many great resources there are to personalize and create cool weddings. Remember when all we had were bridal magazines?

These are my favorites from our quick jaunt to Washington’s Landing.

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moments

Apr

There are moments in life that you don’t want to forget.

Sometimes they happen in small movements and gestures – imperceptible to the casual eye.

Our eyes meet, touch lingers, smells surround. There is sweetness in the chaos and change and enormity of it all.

Small and simple. Big and huge. This is your life.

[click to continue…]

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the future of social media

Apr

I’ve been thinking about this blog and other social media recently. A lot of trying to channel the powers of good ideas, good writing, and finding ways to connect with people via the glorious internet. And then Wendy of Blue Lily posted some of her thoughts on their blog, and it got me thinking more, and apparenty it stirred something in others b/c now our GoPro group on FB is talking up a storm about what we see as trends, implications, and the future of social media. Specifically blogging, instagram, and FB. I guess it’s mostly a conversation about how we use these things as photographers, but it interests me on a sociological level. Do you think blogging is passe? Is it on its way out?

You all know I’m a much-too-vocal FB hater. I just can’t sift through everything on there without feeling I’ve lost part of my soul and my life. The groups on FB are where it is at for me, hence I rarely post anything on my own timeline. People just want more privacy, and that is what I hear more and more about instagram. I’ve noticed several comments lately about how people feel that they have a bit more control in instagram. (And that may be just because all of their FB friends haven’t found them there yet.) I also like having my FB business page so I can post recent work – it’s a quick way to get things out there and I’m hoping it will actually help me more as I try to establish myself as a photographer.

Insta is addictive, and it’s probably because you can get immediate responses. That’s nice. But more than that, I feel a growing sense of community among the creatives that I’ve found on instagram. I know, it feels cheezy to me when people talk about virtual communities, but I have to admit it’s felt that way for me the last few weeks. I see now how people form a group of encouragement and familiarity. I love being able to follow people in Jakarta (hello @anyotherwoman), and the backwoods of Minnesota, and the epic grammers that are traveling the world and taking pictures at every stop. There are just a lot of ways to use it, and I know there aren’t any “official” rules, but I love to use it as a way to show people what I can do with my phone and as a way to share snippets of daily life. Okay, I really just like to be snarky and sarcastic, but that’s not news around here.

As far as trends from my POV, FB is for people 30 and up. The younger crowd is on tumblr and IG (and probably VINE, but I can’t handle that right now). Blogs seem to be a community that has created itself. There was a surge and everybody who liked it opted in and they all network among themselves now. I think bloggers read blogs, for the most part. People are tired of reading, and everyone wants visual content – curated photos and images that we can scroll through at a comfortable pace. And commenting has been replaced by liking. We are all lazy, and we are all saturated with media. We don’t know how to keep up, and so the things that take more time, like reading, are getting cut out as we try to manage and keep up with our social networking. Over the last month I have cut a majority of blogs from my reader and stopped following blogs that post multiple times a day. I can’t keep up and I don’t like the compulsion I feel to do so.

I find this all to be a bit disheartening, because the aspect of blogging that I like, that is really why I started, is the story telling. The sharing and the input and the discussion about topical matters and the stuff of life. That feel is gone, in my opinion. The big bloggers have turned off comments so they don’t have to moderate their fans or the trolls. And the comments that remain are generally of the “I was here and I acknowledge your existence” variety. WHICH IS TOTALLY FINE. I personally, miss people’s voices and their thoughtful expressions. I know there is certainly still a lot of debate and what-not on forums and conglomerate blogs (I probably made this term up, but you know what I mean – a mass of contributors) but it mostly seems like people are working out their anger and issues. Comments are made not to change minds, or to engage discussion, but to prove, to belittle, or to assert one’s absolute correctness. Clearly, i’ve given this a lot of thought. Ahem.

I have fallen in line with most people and I try to not post too much text. And I don’t know why. I’m not exactly sure who I’m trying to please, but I do know that the calculating of how to use my blog is not how I want to spend my time, or rather I don’t want to waste time trying to keep up with the blogging Joneses. Back to my original pondering about trying to harness good ideas, I’ve wanted to do something more collaborative and I’m not sure how to do that. Or perhaps I need to start a photography project of some sort. I realize what a windbag I must be after 3 years. (Congrats to those of you that win that merit badge.) What I’m saying is that I want this blog to be worthwhile, and not a chore – for me or for anyone reading.

And so the answer is, I don’t know if blogging is dead. I think content is king. The platform may change, but if you are producing good (and relevant) content, then I think that’s all that matters.

Now here’s your visual reward for making it this far:

Attitude may be all it takes.

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the donut cake

Apr

It gets its own post.

I just can’t keep MB from getting older. And I can’t keep him from preferring donuts and cookies to just about any other baked goodie out there. So, I know when his birthday comes around that I should not spend energy making an elaborate cake.

The past few years I’ve contacted our favorite bakery to make one big giant donut for us to chow down. It’s the same conversation every year,

“You want what?”

“A huge donut. The biggest one you can make – like a cake.”

“But all one donut?”

“Yes.”

“How many people should it serve?”

“Well, at least 5, but I’d like it as big as you can make it. Please.”

You would think that my annual call would at least earn me a suitable nickname. “Oh, it’s you. The crazy donut lady.” Or something like that. Anyway this year I blame pinterest for what happened.

I saw this at some point and felt a burst of fried dough inspiration. (It’s from the BHLDN site and I can’t find a current link.) I love the simplicity of the stacked donuts. The height, the plain galvanized stands. I knew I couldn’t recreate it exactly, (the biggest reason being that MB just doesn’t care how his donuts are presented) especially since we have no business having that many donuts in our vicinity. And I only have one cake stand. But I came up with my own version, using the mini donuts from Peace, Love, and Little Donuts, our latest donut dealer. Fortunately, MB is a man of plain flavors, so I didn’t have sprinkles or bacon to contend with.

Behold, the donut cake.

Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

Anyway, I knew you would all want a DIY and since it’s very complicated, and you’re not going to remember it all, I thought I would write this all out for you.

INSTRUCTIONS:

Get your favorite donuts
Get something to put them on (ie, cake stand)
Stack them up in aesthetically pleasing fashion
Light the sucker up

MB was very nervous about my candle technique. Especially when I persisted in using every candle I could find in a haphazard manner.

You will notice that the cake looks, um, a bit unsteady. A word about stacking donuts: It’s tricky business. I may have lost a maple to the dark crevices of the buffet while working my photo ops. Once you build it, don’t plan on moving it. ( I’m pretty sure that BHLDN pic has some behind-the-scenes adhesive going on.)

And that, my friends, is how you make yourself a donut cake.

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the unhappy easter

Apr

I should be working on my next vscocam tutorial, but I’m doing that thing I like to do to avoid my real life. Taking and editing pictures. Whether it’s with my phone or the big camera, it really puts the O in my CD.

So, those of you on instagram may have picked up on our less than stellar Easter. I thought I had learned the “managing your parental expectations” lesson. I could go into writing mode and give you the blow by blow, but I’m ready to be over it.

It was the easter egg hunt.