Cute Vintage

My mom saved a ton of things from when I was little. This includes both toys and clothes. Both kids love playing with my old Fisher Price toys and Malcolm is really into my old board games right now. I have heard that they have changed Candy Land a bit and I'm glad to be living in denial and using my old board.

Dorothy has been wearing lots of my old clothes lately and many are becoming favorites. Here she is in a small sampling:


Mom thinks she picked up this top at a garage sale. It looks great with the white pants I bought and I added a red cardigan when it was colder.





I have seen photos of me in this little knit sailor dress. In her hands are an old Little Person and a car.





I couldn't believe that the elastic in the waist of these pants was still good.





This is a dress that my maternal grandmother gave me. I wasn't sure about it when I first saw it, but I just love it on her and she wears it all of the time and gets lots of comments on it.





This had a little bib overall sun romper that went underneath the top, but the plastic lining for the diaper cover bit was in bad shape. It's still pretty cute with just plain white leggings. It is hard to see here, but it is a light green gingham and there are small tulip flowers at the bottom.





This dress has some very delicate lace at the top and the lace, ribbons, and hem all needed some mending before it could be washed or worn. I found the leggings at Target and they look like they were made for this dress. The lace trim on the bottom is very similar and there is an embroidered design that is similar to the lace pattern.


There are lots of other little dresses and rompers too.  It is sort of nice to be able to dress her in my old clothes and it breaks up the more modern styles that get repetitive.  Of course, the added bonus is that all these cute clothes were free.

Photography, Week4 : Curves

So, I didn't get my post made about Malcolm's birthday.  I'll try to be better this week.  Until then, it's week number 4 of my photography journey and the word of the week was "curves."



I know flashes are evil, but the lighting inside was too dark without it. Of course, now I have that awful glare.



Yes, the door needs to be replaced and the paint is jumping ship, but I like the texture of it against the smooth handle.



This one turned out nice, but in additional attempts, I couldn't get the focus right. The camera was focusing on the background instead of the curve in the foreground. I'll have to figure out what the problem was.



Not a huge curve, but it does curve a bit at the tip. I just wanted to take a picture because I have never seen rhubarb flower before.

Photography, Week 3: Sadness

I promise to get a non-photography project post up soon, but it is Monday, and I need to keep to my schedule.

I wasn't sure I was going to have any photos for this week. The word of the week was "sadness" and there was very little sadness to be had since grandma and grandpa were visiting and a little boy turned four years old. Then on Sunday, grandma and grandpa went home and we were left with a very sad little girl.


Note the giant tears. Breaks your heart doesn't it?



Sometimes, you just need to snuggle with daddy.

Kevin asked me why sadness was one of the words I chose and I thought it was a good question.  In coming up with my list of inspiration words I wanted a variety of potential subject matter.  Some are of very tangible things, others concepts, feelings or ideas.  I'm trying to break out of always taking pictures of the exact same things in the exact same way.  I don't usually reach for the camera when one of the kids is crying, but I'm glad I have these photos now.  I never would have laid down on the ground for last week's swinging pictures if "sky" had not been my inspiration word, and now I want to experiment more with that angle.  It should be interesting to see how my photos change over time as I get some new ideas and more experience.

Photography, Week 2: Sky

When I made my list of words, I did not really take into account how easy or difficult it would be to take pictures.  This week's word of "sky" was not easy for just my second week, but I gave it my best shot.  It made me think that it might be interesting to use the same words as inspiration next year to compare the (hopeful) improvement.



Shooting into the sun was more difficult than I planned. This is the only photo that looks even a little OK.








I like the lines on this one.  It was taken looking up through an arbor at the park.






I laid down on the ground and tried to get some shots of the kids swinging over me.  My batteries died after my third shot, so I didn't get to experiment as much as I would have liked.




















I liked the curved lines of the fence against the sky.

Photography, Week 1: Faces

Here is my first installment of my personal photography challenge to improve my skills with my camera.  The word of the week was "faces" and I annoyed my kids to no end trying out lots of different settings taking pictures of their faces.  As I improve I will be going for quality over quantity, but for now, I need lots of practice and make lots of mistakes, so there is a lot to share.  The only editing I have done is to correct some red eye on a few of them. I want to work on my photo editing too, but first I need to be able to take a decent picture. Here are the (sort of) good, the bad, and the ugly:



Snack time might not have been the best idea for when to try to take photos, but it is one of the few times they are holding still a bit.

I had the best results using the "indoor, easy, and portrait" settings. Ironically, the "kids and pets" setting gave me the worst results. I'm glad I experimented since that is the setting I generally use since most of our photos are of kids and pets.



Cute picture, but out of focus. I believe it was on kids and pets.



This would have been cute if the camera could have focused on him better. This was also on kids and pets. I wanted to try the same pose on a different setting, but my model was not cooperative.



I tried again with a different model who also does not take direction. By the time I chose a different setting and got down to take her picture, she decided it was time to get up. The focus is better though.



Worst angle ever from which to take a picture.



Two faces at once!



I did get a little better about getting a decent shot in quickly for some action shots.



He was moving around and shaking his head, so I think this came out pretty well. Now if I can just remember what setting I was using. I think I need to take some notes as I'm shooting.



Two faces that were not moving around on me. Not thrilled with the composition, but I'm also not sure what I would change.

And finally, a couple of the rabbit. Do you have any idea how hard it is to get a decent picture of a solid black rabbit?

Fiyero disapproves of me taking his picture.