Project 52 - Gingerbread House - Week 52

52/52

Over winter break, Riley and I got our fill of Christmas activities from visiting Santaland at Macy's to viewing Christmas lights to making our own gingerbread house. Correction... decorating a gingerbread house. We struggled a little more that I wanted to one year getting a gingerbread house to stay together so instead, we buy them pre-built. Does wonders for my sanity.

I even had a little fun with some in camera multiple exposure. I'd been trying this for a week or so, but it seemed I often got a big light bokeh over Riley's face or someplace I didn't want it, but this one worked out fine and was fun to do.

Yet, another gingerbread masterpiece done. Love these little traditions we have each holiday season.

Project 52 - Snow Fun - Week 51

 51/52

We have a house with a second story deck and a partial flat roof which means that, after a heavy snow fall, we have to get up on the roof and shovel it off. And when I say "we", I mean Jesse. We thought we could get away with not doing this until one year, when in the middle of the night, we had a drip coming in through our window. Jesse got on the roof at 3:00 am and, after shoveling it off, the dripping went away. We want to avoid visits to our roof in the middle of the night so we make sure to take care of it right away.

A couple weeks ago, I was shoveling the front sidewalk and Riley was playing in the snow when she almost got hit with a pile of snow that came flying off Jesse's shovel from the deck. Turns out she loved getting nailed by snow. She was extra excited when she got to experience this again a week later and I was sure to capture it on camera.

   

 

 

 

 

Before we went in, we stopped and caught snowflakes on our tongues... and later I had some fun adding a bokeh overlay to one of the pictures.

 

But snow fun wasn't over that day. We warmed up and dried off and then headed out to a local sledding hill. Also notable is how much more confident Riley has become in the sledding department. We still went down with her a couple times, but it wasn't because she needed us, but because she wanted us to have fun with her.

   

 

 

I would not recommend face forward. It did not end well when I attempted it. :)

 

Backwards!

And that was that. At least for that day. Riley's been sledding three times this winter which probably equals all the times she's ever been sledding prior to this year. The winter is far from over so I'm sure we'll be back again.

Project 52 - after school ritual - Week 50

And yet again, I'm behind on posting. I taken a bunch of photos, but was delayed on editing them and posting here. I've decided that while I will continue with a project 52 next year (or even a project 365), I won't be documenting them here in the same weekly format. I'll probably post some of them on Instagram and maybe on Facebook. Facebook, was my go to for posting, but after this election I needed a break from it and the time away has been fantastic. I still go on there when I get alerts and to check out some of my photography groups, but I haven't been reading through the threads each day. I'll probably go back on at some point, but I'm really trying to scale back and don't want to get sucked back in as much as I was.

Okay, back to the photos...

I decided I wanted to capture our after school ritual and I decided to do that when Riley was just about to get off the bus. If I had thought about it more I would have taken pictures of her as she came down the block. Guess I can do that another day. Maybe when it's warmer. At any rate, I set up the tripod and then used my remote on a 2 second delay to take pictures. I had the camera aimed one way, but decided to change it around to get the kitchen in there since it's a player in our after school rituals.

I work from home and on most days I'm finished with work at 4:00. My daughter gets off the bus at about 4:07 a half block away so it works out well. On this day, I had brought up a load of laundry to fold and worked on that while Riley did her homework and ate a snack.

Before homework, Riley showed me a picture that her friend, Mason, drew for her. Riley is a great lover of cats, so he drew a clever picture of a cat watching a mouse hole that's littered with cheese crumbs while the mouse (wearing a cowboy hat) sits atop the cat's head. So cute and sweet and thoughtful. I like that Mason kid.

As our ritual goes, I empty her backpack and put any necessary letters/flyers on the fridge... and then I check her homework in between folding clothes.

And then it got dark... fast. Oh, these short days get to me so. So glad longer days are ahead. I thought our pictures were done for the day, but then I caught Riley and my husband in the kitchen talking about their days and preparing for dinner and it felt like something I also needed to capture.

I love these little snippets of our life... these rituals, and need to remember to document them more.