The rest of the photos are on SmugMug as usual.

More on SmugMug

Our first family trip to the city, and it was a great time. We did a lot of walking and enjoyed the weather.

You can find the rest on SmugMug

But, I would argue that pregnancy can be very beautiful even if you don’t feel beautiful. After all, it is the miracle of life that’s being created. Pregnant women often have a glow to them that’s quite beautiful. I’ve seen this in Brenda, and what’s funny is when I’ve complemented her on it she’s always shocked.

Recently I had an idea of how to shoot a photo of Brenda, making it very clear that she’s pregnant, but in a more artistic way. Let’s say, to try and capture the beauty instead of focus on the discomfort of her condition. I got the idea from another photo I had seen recently in an ad that I really liked. What I did was a bit different, but inspired by that photo. I also captured a few candid moments along the way.

On Tuesday of this week I took the day off of work, and as soon as the boys were dropped off at daycare I cleared out the living room and setup a small studio to capture my “artistic vision”.

So with permission from the mother to be, here are the only photos that I liked in the bunch. It was a bit of an experiment for me so I took a lot of really bad photos before I ended up with a few that I actually liked. And while they fell a bit short of what I wanted, I’m still pleased with how they came out. After all, photography is all about trial and error and learning as you go.

The photos in black and white are the ones I planned on doing. The ones in color were a last minute thought based on where the couch had been moved and the light coming in at the time. Looking at them I already know what I’ll do different next time to improve on the look.

I hope you enjoy them. I think in years to come we will be very glad that we did this.

The baby is now 5 lbs 12 ounces, head is down and all of the body measurements were normal. The baby is also moving a lot more as time goes on. Brenda said a lot more then with the twins (probably because they didn’t have all that much space).

If the baby grows at the usual half pound per week, the birth weight should be between 7 and 8 lbs.

We’re getting excited! I have a feeling the next few weeks will go by fast. We can’t wait to meet our little guy/girl!

This past Saturday we didn’t know what to do with the boys. The weather wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great. We had spent the previous weekend at the mall since the weather was so nasty, but didn’t feel like being indoors again.

The boys really loved it and we ended the trip with a ride on one of the Fire Trucks. All and all a great way to start the day! The rest of the photos can be found on SmugMug.

As with the library clip, this is unedited footage so it’s a bit longer then the 2 minute clips I normally put up. But you might find if you start watching it you can’t stop! TRT is 10 minutes.

[See post to watch QuickTime movie]

We left on Saturday at 10am, went to see a movie, checked into a nice hotel downtown, had lunch and then just relaxed in the room and ordered room service. We didn’t return until Sunday at 1pm and then spent the rest of the days with the boys at the park.

She was kind of upset about it since it is an automatic $100 ticket and argued that we should contest the ticket and see if they would let her off on account of her good driving record.

I started thinking and remembered that most of the time now, you can actually go on-line and see a small movie of what happened.

So I said “You know what, you’re right. Let’s go on-line and watch the video of what happened and then we’ll have what we need to fight it”. She turned around and said “What video?”. I explained, and slowly a sly smile appeared on her face.

So we both went over to the computer and I typed in the website listed on the notice and entered her license plate and violation number. Up came the following video. Her car is the black one all the way on the right.

You make the call. Did she make a proper and complete stop?

Needless to say, we paid the ticket.

There are more photos on SmugMug.

On Saturday we decided to try again getting some photos of the boys as well as an updated family photo. They boys were GREAT and just seemed to love not only being outside, but playing with leaves (a new experience for them). 

You can see the best of them on SmugMug.

Here are a few photos, and you can find the rest of them on Flickr. 

Because I have not been feeling well since getting back from the Thailand trip, we decided not to make the trip to MI this year for the annual family reunion. I think we made the right call even though we were both disappointed that we didn’t go. The boys were really looking forward to it, it’s all they’ve been talking about. 

So, instead we took a much shorter trip down to Chicago’s Millennium Park and walked around with the boys and just hung out on the grass for awhile. 

There are more photos here of Andrew only because Max was still sound asleep in the stroller when we stopped. By the time he was awake they were both ready to eat so we didn’t have time to get more photos of him. 

Here’s a short movie clip as well of them playing in the grass for the first time. 

Not much. But here it is anyway.

It has only been 8 weeks but it seems like at least a year. It’s just hard to remember what things were like before they came along. 

This weekend we had our friend Don over on Saturday and it was his first time meeting the boys. We all just hung out and relaxed with some pizza and beer while playing with them (as much as we could between sleeping and eating). It was a nice relaxing evening.

This week Andrew was weighed and we found out that he’s almost 11 lbs. now. Max has grown as well but we don’t have an official weight on him.  

They are both smiling now. It just melts your heart when you pick them up, they make eye contact, and then just smile from ear to ear. Yesterday when I picked Andrew up he was mad and crying, but a few seconds later he was just looking at me with a huge grin. What’s not to love! 

I have more video then I have time to process right now, so I’m not sure what else I’ll have posted this week.  

Have a great week!