New Camera Lens

January 13, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Jesse bought a new lens for the camera with his birthday/Christmas money. Pause… I just tried to have Jesse explain to me the difference between the old and new lens. I don’t really understand except that it’s “better.” I’m still learning about how to make use of all the fancy features this new camera has. I’m still a beginner. However, Jesse has been practicing with it constantly! It’s like the paparazzi has moved into our house.

Me in kitchen

Can you tell how much I love having my picture taken so often? Although, if it wasn’t for so much practice we wouldn’t have captured some wonderful memories… like me eating celery and playing cards. So glad to have these photos!

Celery with cranberry sauceEating celeryFull mouthFull mouth 2Game faceGame face 2Game face 3Card gameHappy face

Hopefully you picked up on my sarcasm. I am enjoying the new lens too. Did you notice how well it focuses while the background stays blurry? Bokeh is our favorite technique right now, we use it all the time.

Filed Under: General

Thankful Thursday – Printing and Peanut Butter

January 12, 2012 By 4 Comments

It can be very easy to think about things that you want that you don’t have. But how about taking time to be thankful for the many things that we do have? Thanks for the reminder Ronnie and Mandi. On this thankful Thursday, here’s a few things I’m thankful for:

Thankful

1. I love our ability to have flexible schedules. Of course, Jesse still has deadlines to meet and sites to deliver on time, however we enjoy being able to break up the day now and then. We are so lucky to be able to step away from the computer when we need to, take a little TV or snack break, and then continue on with our day. Being able to be comfy at home sure makes the stress of a busy week easier to handle.

2. I love our new printer. We had been without one for a while, until this week. We realized that we were spending too much on ink for the old one which would stop printing when it decided the ink had expired even if the cartridge was still mostly full. We finally moved on to a better printer, and I don’t think we realized how many things we were holding off on printing. Let’s just say we’ve tested it out quite a bit already.

3. I love Skippy natural peanut butter. The cheaper store brand peanut butter we always used to buy contains soy, so I stopped eating it when I was diagnosed with food allergies. I guess I didn’t read the other brands’ labels well enough to realize that there were plenty of choices without soy. It’s a little more expensive, but SO tasty. I guess I had forgotten how yummy peanut butter is.

Big or small, what are you thankful for right now?

Filed Under: General Tagged With:

Nuggets: End of Holidays

January 11, 2012 By 3 Comments

Well, the holiday season has definitely come to an end in our lives. Our home decorations are back to normal and work is back in full swing. We worked last week too, but we never felt like we got back into our normal routine after having last Monday off. After two super full work days this week we both feel like it should be closer to Friday already. Life goes on, with a few random nuggets…

:: Un-decorating. Boo! It’s soo fun and exciting to put up all the Christmas decorations, but taking them down is such a pain. I always have to take our stuff down right after Christmas, I feel like I can’t relax knowing that I have to do all that work eventually. But then again… it’s nice to have things back to normal too.

Christmas decor

:: Ramekins! I’ll bet that you have no idea how useful ramekins can be. My mom got a great deal on a set of ramekins and has since decided that they should be used constantly. Over the holidays we enjoyed a variety of foods served in ramekins. Eventually, “ramekin” became the answer to any and all questions. Just a few examples:

Our New Year’s Day meal and one of my favorite dishes… tourtiere.

Tourtiere

Allergy-free version… in a ramekin.

Tourtiere in ramakin

Crust-less pumpkin pie… in a ramekin.

Pumpkin pie

Dip with appetizers… in a ramekin. You get the idea? How did we ever live without them?

Dip in ramakin

:: Pomegranate seeds. Yummy! My sister introduced me to this new snack. We’ll have to enjoy them again soon.

Pom seeds

:: Ashley. She is on a plane headed home as I write this. The rest of my family returned to work and school this week, and she had to return to California. We like when she is able to visit, and we like all the game nights we get to have when she’s here. It’s always fun when we can all be together.

AshAshley

Happy hump day. Ramekin!

Filed Under: Family, Nuggets