Friday, February 10, 2017

week five . of all the days to be over, this was a good one

Some words from Tuesday: Today was such a wonderful day to be done.

I had to clean out the play structure (The Maze, and believe me, it's aptly nicknamed) because a child had a nose bleed. For some reason he started to go down one way, changed his mind, and gone down a different way. He must have sprayed blood in every single section. And the maze takes up about half our square footage in that room, which is not only a lot to clean, but also very challenging to keep 40+ kids in about 35 ft² of space. And reduced to half the regular staff, at that!

If there's something that I should say, it's this: I hate blood.

What I really hate is the idea of the cut that caused the blood, so nose bleeds do not send that same chill up my spine, but it is definitely not far down on my list of things that I don't enjoy thinking about.

And this morning I woke up with a nose bleed. And swallowed a lot of blood.

I don't think I fully realized how much blood I'd swallowed until I got up into the highest level of the maze and started to realize just how bad the air flow is up there.

Hint: it's bad.

The taste of blood is not quickly forgotten, and, just like stomach acid, is easily perked up by the smell. Thankfully, I did not throw up.

I'll leave out the fact that I also don't like heights. Or being asked at the rate of a least (and I do not exaggerate!) three kids a minute if the maze is open yet.

Hint: No. It's not.

But it is hot and unpleasant up there and hot and unpleasant make me crabby... If you wanted to know.

But let me tell you, to go home was bliss.

I absolutely love that feeling of working really hard and then bring able to say goodnight and fall into bed so tired. I love working hard all week and being able to forget it all Sunday.

There's something so satisfying about working hard, especially when it's something you are not enjoying, and then being able to rest from your labor.

That was my (not so) fun story for the week. here are the pictures.

day twenty-eight . snow on sunday is too exciting to not play in (even if you're already dressed for church!)

day twenty-nine . life hack : rain boots double for snow boots in a pinch.

day thirty . this is my mom's bulletin board. it's got a little piece of all our history.

(oh, look. there's a picture of deryn. and TWO PICTURES of you, Janelle. you be so famous.)

day thirty-one . this is our school room. it's got a little bit of everything. It's beautiful.

day thirty-two . (february!!) lego playing has happened like every day since like the beginning of their lives.

day thirty-three . cup song like yo. (we always learn new things when lizzie spends the weekend. this time we learned footloose. we rock.)

day thirty- four . shadows.

Tuesday, February 7, 2017

week four. good BYE, January.

hint, hint: I'm not even sorry to see you go.

no, take that back. you guys all know I hate january with a passion. But. there is a small, tiny something in me that's always sad that it's over. More, I think, that we've finished the first month of the year, than that we've finished January. (there's a big difference there.) it's like the month (and motivation) of "IT'S A NEW YEAR" is done and gone are all the "GET YOUR NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS DONE THIS YEAR" blog posts and all that's left in it's wake are "what to get your soul mate for valentines day."

Rolls eyes.

No, sorry, I'm getting carried away.

Point: yay. january's done. also, it's feburary.

once a very wise person (also, very sad person. I don't know if that's causation. just puttin' it out there.) said, "February is the shortest month of the year, so if you're having a miserable month, try to schedule it for february."

*wipes tear

truer words were never spoken.

To me, February, in some ways, feels like the real start of the year, because it's like the first serious month of the year where you actually have to get down to the day-to-day grind without the romantic idealism that january brings (which is maybe ironic, I'm not really sure.) In that way, I find I almost hate february more than january.

maybe I'm just a hater. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
 day twenty-two : fairy house... tell me you didn't make a fairy house when you were a kid... once we even tricked my younger sister and her friend into thinking that all the little flowers on this one tree were actually fairies. It was never clear if they actually believed us or if they just humored us. It may have been some of both.
 day twenty-three : we had three sisters spend the week (monday, wednesday, and thursday afternoon, to be fair.) while their mom took a class. It was a week filled with sippy cups and pretzel bags.
 day twenty-four : when it's nice outside we spend the day outside because winter is a sucky time.
day twenty-five : I'm gonna be completely honest here on two things: 1.) I woke up like this, and I don't think anyone has any trouble doubting that with that lovely hair (it always does that!) 2.) I rarely wake up like this...

because I get out of bed wayyyy before the sun is up (jk, I watch it rise on the way) to go to the gym to run.

So, actually, it's a total luxury to sleep in. which I did on wednesday.

(read it audrey hepburn voice:) it was wouuuuuunderful.

and take it from a girl who used to always sleep in til like ten: it feels so good to get up early.
day twenty-six : hang out session turned tattoo parlor. (note: we didn't have henna so the natural substitute is sharpie.)
day twenty-seven : rubik's cubes have become a kinda new obsession for me. I have no revolutionary thoughts about them, except once when I came up with the idea that like it would be awesome if there was a site you could enter what you had and it would tell you how to solve that.

"yeah, they have that." thanks, mom.

In closing, I know I'm having trouble staying on time with blog posts.

But I recently saw a post somewhere that said, instead of apologizing say thanks. thanks for waiting for me. thanks for caring. instead of sorry for not showing up.

so thank you for reading.

Friday, February 3, 2017

post-processing questions

I need help editing this picture. It's totally different from really anything I've done before.

I rarely stray from my usual editing technique, but this picture calls for something a little extra.

Some pictures don't fully capture moments, but when you play around with it in the editor they turn into something much more magical. (a much more magical moment. how's that for cheesy?) Make it black and white and it conveys something completely different then when it's left in color. remove a distraction (that's true to life, but not true to your memory of it.) Or maybe you just crop and take out unnecessary distraction. Focus the viewer's attention. Use the rule of thirds or center the subject.

Point being: We hold the power of making an image, even after we press the shutter.
So I took this picture. and honestly, not all thaaaat impressive (the one at the top, in color.). On the camera screen, especially, you can barely see the girl at the top of the hill and I almost deleted it.

But here's my deal. I have trouble with having a vision for what I want the picture to be. I can put words to the vibe (the girl at the top of the hill standing for hope and change and the girl running from dark and loneliness and danger, even. The viewer's eye is drawn up the hill, the mountain of difficulty, into the hopeful future. which is represented higher and brighter.) But how do I portray that? Do I crop to focus the viewer's eye? Do I remove those lampposts and mailboxes? Do I add texture? Do I burn and dodge the area's I want different?
I still think maybe a little texture would be nice, but I'm waffling a little. maybe the trees are a little bit of a distraction, too...

your thoughts?