September

I'm behind again so I decided to blog about September in pictures/video.

I'm Hyrum's room mom this year and his teacher's birthday was early in September.  I took Amy with me to the school to help the class prepare a birthday gift for her and Amy made a pretty picture for me while the class worked on the project:

The elementary school had a Fall Festival fundraiser while Hyrum was sick.  Jared was out of town, so Leah watched the kids while I took Kaitlyn.  She had fun getting crazy hair and working the hula hoop.  She could pretty much go forever on the hula hoop if she wanted to.  She was also very generous and earned a lot of prizes which she brought home for Hyrum.

I started working on a Personal Progress goal this month to learn some photography.  Personal Progress is a program through our Church for the Young Women (Leah).  Mothers can also join the program to make it a bonding experience with their daughters.  Anyway, my goal is to learn enough that I can take some good portrait pictures of the kids for our wall.  I've got a way to go, but I am starting to learn a few things:

I tried to have the light give Amy a "halo" effect.

I tried to do a close up with the background out of focus.  Still working on this technic...also I should have had some light shining or reflecting up on her face to take out the eye shadows.  Hey, learning what is wrong is still learning, right?

I tried to use the rule of thirds here (Amy is not in the center of the picture).  Also not intentional, but kind of cool are intersecting lines of the buildings and hill that draw the eye to Amy.  This picture was with my iphone, so it's not with a fancy camera.

I tried to use the light to my advantage to show this spiderweb.  Blurring the background worked a lot better this time.  We know it's fall when spiderwebs like this pop up ALL over the yard!

I've also joined a church running group that meets twice a week at a park.  Half the moms go running while the other half watch the kids for about 30 minutes, and then the other moms go running while the first group watches the kids.  It's been really nice to exercise, socialize a bit, and let Amy have park outings.  Last time we went she found the water fountain, and the park became a "water park".

Jared took Leah and Kaitlyn with Sammy and two of his girls to a Braves Baseball Game for Daddy/daughter night.  They had a lot of fun and even got to go onto the field.

Amy and I also had a date this month.  I asked her what she wanted to do, and she really wanted to roll down a hill.  That was a pretty easy date!  I discovered after a few personal rolls that I get dizzy and sick in my old age, but she had a lot of fun.  It was nice to take time to just watch her be little and have childhood joy.

Finally, Jared and Hyrum also had a date yesterday.  They went to an indoor trampoline park and enjoyed time playing.