Fisheye View: House

Welcome!  We've made a few changes.  Always seem to be rearranging the furniture, but it's in our blood: we're movers.

We purchased a new lens -oh, what fun!- and I tested it out this morning while capturing some new furniture configurations and a small person who kept bouncing around the house.


You walk in...


Look to your left.



Be afraid, be very afraid.



And... this is probably my favorite.



Now you're standing in the corner.
Why?  Oh... the small, blonde monster scared you?  Yes, I did say he was rather frightening.
But he's bouncing on the couch in the other room.  You're safe.  Come see more.



And there you go!

What a fun lens!  So excited to use this outdoors with clients.

Now, off to chase down that little rascal!
Thank goodness the other one is napping.

Sshh! It's Saturday Morning.

Brian nipped out to run in a local 5k, so I had the morning with Wilder (and Waverley, but she's still asleep.)  Classical music played softly, the freshly brewed coffee coaxed me into a happy state of caffeination, and I pulled out the camera to capture a bit of morning around the house.



IKEA mat, helps keep (most of) the cars/trains in one spot.  Wilder loves it.






"TOBY!"



Momzilla.



FYI, I *think* we're good on toys.  Yeah?



If I was a cat, I'd be here.



Settling in for Fall.



By the kitchen computer nook.



Fine, I'll pretend to be a cat.  With coffee.  You'll find me bathing in the sunlight right about here.

Happy Saturday!

Sorry, Try Again

About a month ago I turned Wilder on to PBSKids.org.  He hadn't used the computer before and I wasn't sure how much he'd be able to do on the site.  NOW I see why little kids can pick up multiple languages; their learning curve is as steep as a cliff.

Wilder is now a computer whiz.  And he's picked up some rather funny sayings along with his mad skillz.

This happened about a week into Wilder's computer exploration.  I was taking a break, sitting on the living room couch trying to get Wilder to hang out with me and watch one of his movies.  Wilder walks in the kitchen, sits on the bar stool in front of the computer, pokes his head over the screen to yell at me while waving, "Mama, it's okay.  Wilder's working.  Wilder's working," and he begins to play learning games with Elmo. I wonder where he got that...

And now Wilder has a new catch-phrase.  (And thankfully PBSKids.org is one polite program.)  Whether playing by himself with his trains or getting one of us to help him fix something, if our strategies are not what he had in mind, "Oh, saw-y, twigh again!"  It totally cracks me up -he sounds like a game show host.

(On a side note, we finally got rain yesterday and the sky is still overcast this morning.  Wilder walked up to the back door window and said, "Awh maaaan, it's waining!")

Thankfully he's playing super polite computer games that teach sharing, cooperation and educational skills instead of jumping on mushrooms and defeating large gorillas (or far, far worse.)  He's such a stinkin' wiz at this computer- and did I tell you he is a Mac Nazi?!  If Brian or I try to use the kitchen computer for 2 minutes, he runs in from ACROSS the house and yells at us to get off, "HEY, why you do dat?!  Get off!  I pway PBSkids!  I need PBSkids!"
Yep.  Computer Nazi, but a smart one.

My two minutes are up and I don't want to get yelled at.

Date Night: It's Kind Of A Big Thing

It's been three weeks now.  Three whole weeks since we started our regular weekly date night.  We drop the kids off at the sitter's and then it's 5 WHOLE hours of just the two of us.  So far we've tried out several Mexican restaurants and found the best margaritas in Georgetown, but what we've also found is that this whole "just the two of us" time is WONDERFUL.  And much needed.

And the kids love it, too.  The lovely gal who watches are wee ones has three of her own.  Her 9 year old son stocked her up on Thomas the Tank Engine gear when he was little so Wilder is in heaven.  Every morning after a date night, Wilder wakes up and immediately asks to go play at our babysitter's house.  Particularly to play with "Spencer" -one of the Thomas characters.  He's a hoot, that Wilder.

That stretch of time together is long enough to enjoy the evening and not feel the rush to "hurry up and have fun 'cause we have to pick up the kids."  We have time to drive into Austin if desired, do dinner and a movie, just hang out at home, go for an mini-adventure.  Who knows what the next weeks hold for our deep pocket of quality time?  It's worth every penny, in my opinion, and I have loved looking forward to Us Time on a regular basis.  Our weekly vacation.

You know, it wasn't uncommon for us to go three months between date nights.
Yep, this is purdy big.

And, as McD's says, "I'm lovin' it."