Mama Speak

One of my strategies for enjoying the rest of winter and getting more weekly exercise is to go for a walk with the kids 2 days a week. This is working with mixed success. We are getting more exercise and I am definitely feeling better. But the kids don't particularly enjoy these outings. Walking on sidewalks is not really their thing. Hiking for hours in the mountains is more their style. I don't blame them. I like that better also. So to motivate ourselves to get out the door we are walking places we need or want to go (I am driving less errands). One of the huge benefits of living in a urban neighborhood.

Recently I had to take Celine to an orthodontist consultation (trust me you don't want to know the estimate of services) which we couldn't walk to. But instead we took a walk from the orthodontist to the library and around the downtown neighborhood of our twin city across the river. Our last and unexpected stop, "can we go in mom, please??", on this walk was Orphan Annies, a well known local antique store.

We ventured in and after reminding the kids to walk carefully and not to touch we lost ourself in glass for the next 1/2 hour.

My art appreciative kids ohhed and ahhed over, well, everything. I was constantly coming to see all the treasures they found.

We hadn't intended to buy anything and certainly most items in that store are priced way out of our reach. But shortly before we left the kiddos found the marble jar, 5 for $1.00. So they each bought a few marbles, one of their favorite toys.

That day's walk had been very pleasant. If only all of our urban walks could be so mutually enjoyable.

*You might notice on some of my recent posts and in future ones that I am experimenting with a processed photo look, like the last photo in this set. No worries, I still like most of my photos to look true to life but I am having fun with the cross processing preset in the new version of Bibble 5, the photo software I use.

Last night we had a few of Damien's co-workers/friends over to our house for a pizza, beer and card playing night. Apparently some of Damien's co-workers like to hang out on Friday night after the work week. They invited him along but my husband, great guy that he is, wants to be with his family on a Friday night. But he also doesn't want to miss out on forming relationships with the people he works with. Enter pizza and beer night at our house.

The kids drank rootbeer and the adults drank the beverage of their choice, including homebrew (a yummy Porter). We ordered pizza and we cooked up little g-free english muffin pizzas for Damien in our oven. Then we played cards, all of us together. The kiddos were our sidekicks and filled in spots as our guests left. They loved it! They jump at any chance to meet new people, drink soda and eat pizza. It was all wrapped up by 9:00pm. The scene awaiting me in my kitchen wasn't so pleasant this morning (I didn't touch clean up last night) but the memories were. If any of Damien's co-workers are reading this (you know who you are) - it was fun to have you over. I hope we do it again.

And you know what? Beer bottles littering the kitchen counter, although messy, look pretty in the morning sunlight.

If you subscribe to my blog's RSS feed you might know what I'm talking about. If you don't, I'll explain.

You see when I do a photo shoot for someone I have them download the photos from our server, via a page here on my blog. The general public does not see these pages. Unless I accidently click the "Promoted to the front page" button, as I did yesterday on Spring's page. As soon as I became aware of my error, about 10 minutes later, I (er... Damien) fixed the problem. But the damage was already done and if you subscribe to my blog with google reader (don't know if other readers picked it up) you got a FIMBY post, intended to be a personal page for a client, delivered to your reader. Ack!

I feel so foolish about this mistake. There was nothing personal in that post, just some copyright instructions regarding the photos. But still... how unprofessional of me. It's been on our list for months to install password protected pages for clients. In the aftermath of that little snafu, it became a top priority and it's now done.

If you got this private post in your reader please disregard it, I'd appreciate that. If you didn't, well then please just disregard this whole issue and know I too make mistakes.

But now let me tell you about my friend Spring and the reason we did a photo shoot. Spring is a talented musician who just released her second CD this month. You can listen to samples of her music here. She's not only a musician but she's also a homeschooling mom with 3 kiddos roughly the same age as mine. She's an amazing person and mother and I'm privileged to call her my friend.

Congratulations Spring on your CD! If you live locally you might be interested in attending her CD release concert this weekend. FMI see her performance schedule here.