February 2009 Mosaic

Created using Big Huge Labs Mosaic Maker

Wow, another month has flown by! And yes, I missed one day, again. And yes, I haven't been quite as good about uploading daily. But that's okay, because I'm still going. Here are the fill photos with commentary.



This is the finger prick mark from going to the doctor the previous day. I don't know what the deal was, but that little sucker hurt for nearly 2 weeks!



My first attempt at a sunset photo. Not too bad, I don't think.



I thought this was going to be the photo I posted from when I went to the Fox Theatre, but I liked the exterior night shot better. Not only is the sign all classic and glitzy, but I waited until they had the Cleopatra add running on the multicolor screen below.



Luke is still taking pictures occasionally with his camera, but I think the novelty has worn off. I don't think it has left the house in over a week now. I do hope he will take some while we're gone to Disney. I think it would be really interesting to see it from his perspective.



This is the picture I intended to post from Valentine's Day, but as I mentioned with the picture I actually posted, this isn't really what I'll remember from that day. Still, it is more representative of the day, so I included it as a fill shot.



It finally rained some in February, which was nice (though it does make going out and about less fun). I was trying to get artsy with the water drops. I'm still pretty happy with how it came out.



On laundry day, we tend to have various piles of clothes laying around the house. What is the easiest way to tell which piles are clean and which are dirty? If a cat is laying on them, they're freshly washed and dried. Tigger was just helping us remember that we had already washed these jeans.

2009-02-28

This is what an entirely new wardrobe for a 4-year-old looks like (except I forgot the shoes, but you've already seen those). I've spent most of the month of February acquiring it, and I intend to pack most of it this weekend in preparation for our Disney trip, so I thought it was a fitting final photo for the month.

2009-02-27

This was the best puddle with any sort of reflection (besides sky) that I could find today. It was actually nice to see puddles for a change! It's rained some in the last few weeks, but usually only enough to make the pavement wet, not to leave pools of water. Kind-of nice for a change.

2009-02-26

I had never noticed this moss on the curb at Luke's school before today. It rained last night for the first time in ages, so I imagine it was much greener today than usual, both from a good drink of water and from having some of the grime washed off (the curb is in the parking lot). I wish I had something in the picture for scale. The "puff" is about an inch high.

2009-02-25

This was the sign posted next to Luke's room at school today. I want to know who he bribed to get this assignment! LOL He loves to pick up rocks (so did I at his age), and we are constantly having to make him leave them wherever he found them. Now we have to go out and specifically let him pick some up for school!

2009-02-24

This is some of the Valentine candy DH gave me. I intended to crop out the bowl, but I actually liked it better with the pink rim left in the photo. DH and hearts have been on my mind a lot today. DH was having some stomach problems, and he voluntarily decided to see a doctor. The fact that he did so with no nagging from me was scary enough. He came home today with a diagnosis of a hiatal hernia, a knot on his thyroid, and a heart murmur that no one ever mentioned before. There were also some anomalies on his EKG, so they have asked him to come back for a stress test next week. It's a little scary, though I know most of those conditions are not life threatening. Most of them are not life affecting in any way. Let's hope that is the case.

2009-02-23

Upgrading is good! This is for anyone who remembers the unusual family portrait I posted on my regular blog back in December. Several people begged me to get DH new shoes for Christmas! Well, it's not Christmas, but the man finally has new shoes. A great improvement, no? He should have just enough time to break them in well before we get to Disney.

2009-02-22

Look carefully at the hands using the keyboard. What do you notice? LOL I looked over there while they were playing and did a double-take; my brain just couldn't quite process what I was seeing. It seems Luke cannot play the Star Wars online game (not sure which one) by himself. He wants to do all of the attack moves, but he can't coordinate that with the positioning movies (up, down, left, right). So DH "drives" while Luke attacks, each using one hand on the keyboard. Ah, father-son bonding time.

2009-02-21

I had a hard time with this photo, getting the item of interest to show up while leaving enough of the surrounding environment so you could see it in context. See the large (tennis ball size) nearly circular hole in my headlight? DH noticed that this evening as we got out the car at home. He noticed that the right headlight looked funny bouncing off the wall as we pulled into the garage. I remember a large black rock heading for my head on the interstate earlier that morning. It lost altitude a lot faster than I thought it would and struck the front of the car instead. It didn't sound that bad, though, so it never occurred to me to check it. That is the same light that was replaced when the woman ran the red light and hit DH and DS about 2.5 years ago (wow, was it really that long ago?), we just get to replace it on our own dime this time. Joy.

2009-02-20

I really love this tree at Luke's school. I know it doesn't look like much now, but I hope to take a picture of it during each season to show its progression. I had to hurry, though. Spring is just around the corner!

2009-02-19

* this is a make-up photo

Well, I did it again. I missed another one. I know it's just two, but I am disappointed. This does, however, represent why, though it read 100.1 yesterday when I went to bed around 8:30. I was so tired, and I felt so bad. I was trying really hard to follow in the footsteps of my husband and son and be sick, but I managed to get away with just a fever and nausea. But given the choice, I'd rather do it now than while we're at Disney in a couple of weeks!

2009-02-18

Nature is putting on quite the show tonight! We watched the cloud to cloud lightning all the way home this evening, and I really wanted to try and get a shot of it. There are so many trees around our house that such an objective was difficult, but I finally found a somewhat clear spot. I'm sure there were better settings to use, but this is the best I could do in a hurry. This was also handheld with a 1 second exposure, so it is blurry, but not too bad I don't think. (There was no place to put the tripod that you could still see the clouds over the trees.) And because it was cloud to cloud, there weren't any huge blazing bolts, just a lot of highlighting the cloud contours from within. Very pretty, and I'm fairly pleased with my spur of the moment results. There was a little contrast enhancement here, but not much.

2009-02-17

A boy's first pair of Nikes. Quite a momentus occasion, from what I hear (from the guy who sold them to us; he even gave us free socks for the event!). They didn't have any New Balance styles I liked at that store, so I checked out the other brands. I was looking for something I liked that fit and was not insanely expensive, and this is what I found. Only after the sales guy brought out the box did I realize they were Nike, LOL. He's had them for about a week, but I'm just now getting around to photographing them.

2009-02-16

All three of my boys. We are evenly matched in the house with 3 boys and 3 girls, though the girls come out ahead on the number of legs (boys 8, girls 10).

2009-02-15

Luke and DH were feeling much better this morning. Luke was so chipper when he woke up at 7:40, I was expecting him to burst in to song at any moment, so we went ahead with our family excursion to the Georgia Aquarium. My parents were supposed to be here yesterday, but they avoided the house to give L and DH time to recover. They came by the house this morning, and off we went. Luke only lasts about 90 minutes at these sorts of things, but that's okay. He seemed to have fun.

2009-02-14

Not the picture you were expecting for Valentine's Day, is it? Me neither. I thought it would be of a pile of cards and candy, or of Luke with his new stuffed dog. But those are not the things that I will remember about this Valentine's Day. This is. This is the bed that I stripped just after 6 AM this morning because Luke threw up all over it. That was the second time for the night. The first time was around 2:30 AM while on the potty, at which time DH also threw up. Luke also didn't sleep from 2:30 to 6, probably because his tummy still felt bad, so everyone is exhausted. Happy Valentine's Day to us. Sheesh! I hope yours was better.

2009-02-13

Sorry, I was rather light on photos today. We saw this license plate on the way home. Gee, I wonder what they do for a living? Explains how they can afford a Mercedes.

2009-02-12

As many of you know, I had a really rotten week Feb 2-6. It was just no fun all the way around. So imagine my surprise when a box was delivered to the door by FedEx. With my name on it. Only I hadn't ordered anything. I thought maybe my husband had ordered me something for Valentine's Day, but A) that is very unlike him, and B) it would most likely have *his* name on it, not mine. Then I see that the box is from Savannah Sweets. Okay, definitely not from the hubby, but who? I open up the box, and I am greeted with a heart tin full of mini pralines and a note that says "Hope this week goes better. Love always, Jacob." Awww! It totally made my day. Do I have the best brother or what?

2009-02-11

We almost never celebrate Valentine's Day on February 14 anymore. Too many people, too long of a wait, especially this year with V-Day being on a Saturday. Not on your life! So we celebrated Wednesday instead. We went to our favorite Japanese Hibachi restaurant, Fuji Ya (at LaVista and 285, near Best Buy, for any locals). It's probably not the best or the most authentic, but we like it, and being a more "hole in the wall" type place, their prices are very reasonable compared to many other Hibachi places. Luke doesn't eat anything there (we took him Wendy's and got him a bowl of steamed rice), but I probably didn't either when I was 4. I don't remember the first time I actually ate Japanese, but I am pretty sure I was more like 8 or 9. Happy Heart Day to us!

2009-02-10

We picked up Luke's 4 year portraits today. Where on earth did my baby go?

2009-02-09

This is the exterior of the side door to The Fabulous Fox Theatre in Atlanta. It is one of my most favorite places in the city. It was one of the last "movie palaces" to be built in the 1920s, and I love going there. It is just so lush and detailed and beautiful, inside and out. I've seen opera, ballet, broadway, and movies there. If you ever have a chance to visit this beautiful downtown landmark, you should.

2009-02-08

My new favorite boy band! LOL We don't have the drum set yet (still deciding how to do it), and Luke decided today that he wanted to play guitar. DH figured it would boo him off stage pretty quickly, and he'd drop it. We put Guitar Hero on Beginner (where you just have to strum at the right time; no color keys involved), let him play bass, and off they went. He never once got booed off stage. He scored 55% on one song and 65% on the other. I think his longest consecutive note streak was 17. But still! He was *so* proud of himself, and he just looked so darn cute. (Note the new Batman pajamas, which he also loves. They're size 8, and they fit way better than they should. The size 6 ones were clearing his ankles by 3-4 inches!)

2009-02-07

We missed our regular Friday Los Loros visit this week, so we went Saturday instead. I was taking pictures of Luke, and Rodrigo asked to be in one. It turned out so cute, I had to post it. (BTW, Picasa color corrector is quite impressive. Everything was tinted blue from the booths and the stained glass, and it took almost all of the blue color cast right out!) Rodrigo is one of the people who has been there at least as long as we have been going there, so over 10 years. Next to our immediate family members, I think he was the person most excited to find out we were expecting a child, though I do think that (after 4 years) he has given up on asking when we're having the next one. Other than being a bit grayer than he was when we first met him (7 kids, including 7 year old twin girls, will do that to you! LOL), he hasn't changed a bit.

2009-02-06

Just to cap off my crappy week, this is what we found when we got to daycare to pick up Luke this afternoon. Luke's eyes were still red and his nose was still running from crying. The original bandaids were spotted with blood that continued to get larger for the next couple of hours. (This photo is of the fresh bandaids I put on after we got home, with much crying involved, though not as bad as it could have been.) Apparently, he was running outside, tripped and fell, and scraped the skin off the top joint of two fingers. The ring finger is just a couple of layers; it barely bled. The middle finger is substantially deeper. Not so bad that I feel the need to go to the doctor, but it sure will take a while to heal. Thank goodness it is his left hand, though he is currently insisting that he can't do things, like zip his jacket or pull up his pants, by himself. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure it hurts, which is why for today, we let it go. Tomorrow, maybe. By Sunday, he needs to be figuring out how to do it for himself. The real kicker here is that I had planned to leave work around 4:15 today. I ended up not leaving until about 4:40. The accident happened at 4:45. If I had just been able to leave on time, we would have picked him up around 4:35-4:40, and it never would have happened in the first place. It's just been that kind of week. All. Week. Long. I hope next week is better.

2009-02-05

I believe this is the steeple of Decatur First UMC, as seen from the parking deck of my doctor's office in downtown Decatur. I don't get the opportunity to visit downtown Decatur as much as I would like. It is really a lovely little area.

2009-02-04

Luke gets so incredibly excited when he sees the moon during the day. I guess, to a child, who has spent years learning that the sun is for daytime and the moon is for nighttime, it is a pretty mind boggling experience. I think he first noticed it in the fall sometime, but for most of Nov-Jan, it was too cloudy to see it. He noticed it again today for the first time in a while, and he was just wildly excited about it. "Look, Mom, the moon! I see the moon and it's not dark outside!" Just another reminder of how children see magic in the everyday, and so should we.

BTW, besides cropping, there no tweeking of any kind on this one, not even contrast. The sky really was that blue!

2009-02-03

Okay, so, anyone who read today's post on my regular blog knows that I didn't exactly have the best day. In fact, it's been a bad few days at work (Fri, Mon, and Tues), though we had a bit of a breakthrough today with the stalemate, so I'm hoping things will improve the rest of the week. But it could also be worse! I could have been the guy driving this Cadillac, who crashed into the back of another car, who crashed into the front of someone else, right in front of our window at Pizza Hut during lunch. I didn't actually see the impact, but I heard it, and there was still debris flying when I looked up. Thankfully, no one was hurt. When they moved the cars out of the street (it happened right where you turn from the road to enter the PH parking lot), he parked right in front of where we were sitting, and I snapped this shot. I felt really bad for everyone involved! It also reminded me that, as bad as my day was going, it could have been worse.

2009-02-02

An ear, and a Minute Clinic. Get the picture? (Sorry, I couldn't help it.) What I don't have a picture of is Luke sitting in the back seat crying because his ear hurt. He seemed fine when we got to school to pick him up, but the situation deteriorated rapidly in the car. We didn't make it to dinner or to the house. I called my dad from the car and asked him to look up the closest Minute Clinic (see, advertising does pay off sometimes!). Walked in, waited 15 minutes, were called back, and walked out 20 minutes later, and that included paperwork, H&P, and calling in the prescription to our regular pharmacy (you don't even have to get it filled at CVS to be seen!). The pediatrician's office would have involved waiting until first thing in the morning (it was 6 PM by this time), calling and getting a busy signal several times, getting whatever appointment they had available in the morning, and then having to wait 20-30 minutes after arriving. This was way better, quite frankly.

2009-02-01

Waiting for the 3-D Monsters vs. Aliens commercial after the second quarter of the Super Bowl. Not sure any of us were overly impressed. Luke kept asking what the glasses were for, even after it was over! LOL (Ignore the kitty ears in the bottom left of the photo. Cleo decided to sneak in after the timer was set.)