Park time

I joined the girls' good friends Jaliyah and Kamiya at the park on Sunday.  All girls knew I would be randomly photographing them.  I love that on the stones, they kind of created an indi album cover.

Also, WHAT THE HECK ARE MY KIDS WEARING?!!?   I've long stopped battling about their clothing choices.  Sheesh though.  Any time the girls were still, I took photos. It was more about them playing than me photographing them.

I don't know what is up with me and noisey pics lately, but I'm getting to the bottom of it.  It's bothering me. And it turns out, little girls like to get as close to you as possible when taking photos.

These last pics of Claire were just for my amusement.  We were joking that she was sunning herself on this tall rock to get warm like a lizard.  Then all of a sudden, she was queen of the rock!

Such a proud stance

Again.... I have no clue what she's wearing.....

Sick days....

Olivia's sick.  Its minor - just fever and cough.  Enough to keep her home from school, and make her kind of lumpy on the couch.  It's really unfortunate, because Tuesday she seemed perfectly fine...

But she work up Wednesday with a temperature of almost 103.  Wednesday she was so mad she missed school.  Apparently it was gym day, and that's her favorite day of school (she is so not my child, but good for her.)  Today she was more ok with staying home, and actually fell immediately asleep on the couch once she was dropped off at the house.

Otis is LOVING having a couch buddy

Olivia is enjoying Otis' company as well....

... as long as she can see the TV

I love how Otis is looking at me like "Please, ma'am, no more pictures" and Olivia is just craning around him trying to see the TV.

Hopefully this is all over with soon, and she can go back to school tomorrow.

Happy St Paddy's Day!

I'm curious as to how they'll look after school.......

Jenny jenny jenny

Jenny and I worked together at MedSpeed, and once she found out I was a photographer, Jenny had been asking for me to take headshots of her.  When I picked up my camera again, Jenny was my first call to get some much needed practice on.

I say much needed for a reason.  I decided to have exposure issues today.  I used to fall into this bad habit, where I tend to get excited when I shoot, and I don't pay attention to my meters when the sun changes.  When it comes to exposure, you have to pay attention to three things:  your ISO, your Aperture, and your Shutter Speed.  All have to be working in harmony to get a properly exposed shot.  If you take multiple shots in a row in the same lighting, and the first shot is exposed properly, the rest will be as well.  But once you change lighting, you have to check you meters.  If not, this happens

Dangit.  I only took two photos like this before I caught myself waay over exposing.  Still very sad, though, because I love Jennys expression in this one, and the other shots in this set up just weren't as cute.  Poo.  But we got a lot of great shots.  We joked it was like taking senior photos for adults.

I love someone not afraid of a camera, and Jenny loves herself a camera.  We started just laughing and joking around, and Jenny broke our emoji posing

Overall, I'm pleased. Still some cobwebs to shake off when it comes to shooting, but I'm so glad to be doing it again.  

Thanks Jenny for being my guinea pig!

next up in dogs I know

I'm apparently on a 'photograph dogs' kick. Or, I'm just encountering a lot of dogs in the beginning process of me getting back into photography.  Tomato tomato (that doesn't exactly work in print.....)

Anyways.........  Here's Milkshake!

Milkshake is my friend Emilys dog, and might also be considered a frequent flyer in the Nesser household of watching dogs.  Milkshake is some kind of mutt of a Bichon/Poodle/Cocker Spaniel grab bag of fun.  Milkshake is also still very much a puppy.  For ever shot I would get like this....

(randomly trying my hand at making the cluttered living room disappear.... dang that yellow pillow!)

But for every nice shot of Milkshake, there were about 10 of the 'real' him

Oh yeah -- there's the Milkshake we all know and love.  Got to love Otis in the background there (getting some sugar from his mommy) giving Milkshake some epic side eye.

Milkshake doesn't know any commands yet, and isn't as treat suggestable as I'd like, so I mostly just tried to catch him when he would rest from zooming around the room.

Sometimes the couch worked in my favor

Sometimes the couch was just a great way to lunge at me

Emily joined us on the couch for some mugging.

Thanks for letting me photograph you two!

We have a visitor

Meet Otis

What up Oat!  Otis is currently staying with us while his 'mommy' is recovering from a nasty compound ankle fracture. 

Otis is an old dude, and a little dude, so of course the girls love him to bits.  It was raining today, and I wasn't keen on going outside and taking photos.  I figured I could give Otis a run for his money though.  I kept breaking off little pieces of treats and only gave them to him little bits at a time.  This made for fun expressions.

While Otis loves it at my house, I am POSITIVE he prefers it at home.  Like I said, he's an old dude, and the girls keep him up and moving the entire time they're around him.  So every opportunity when they're not around, he sleeps.  I think he misses his quiet home.

But we enjoy him during the times we have with him.