Hilary

Seussical

Our House
March 2, 2011
Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

The fresh kicks are courtesy of Uncle Rodney and Auntie Patrice

Both of the girls have been talking non-stop about Dr. Seuss’s birthday today.  It’s been all things Seuss for the past several days as their respective teachers have been reading Seuss books, doing Seuss related arts and crafts and the like.  Coever came home yesterday and said that the Cat in the Hat actually came to her school.  And he brought Fish!

Fish is my favorite, actually.  The sane voice of reason in the storm that is Thing One and Thing Two.  And wouldn’t you know, those two blue-haired home-wreckers were scheduled to appear today.  Oh, what fun it is to be a preschooler!

Morgan’s class not only had a Seuss themed day, but they also got to wear their pajamas to school and read Dr. Seuss books to their stuffed animals.  There were Cat in the Hat handouts, coloring pages, and Scholastic Newspaper Magazines.  We’ve read about the Places We’ll Go, the Butter Battle Book, and Marvin K. Mooney.  If Craig were home, we’d be Hopping on Pop!

If we do any more Seuss-tastic stuff, we’ll be talking in rhyme every day, all the time!

Ooops. . .

 

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IN: ON: March 2, 2011 TAGS: , BY: Hilary
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Day One: A Photo of Yourself

Harlem, New York City
September, 2010

An appropriate choice for the first picture, I think.  Even though my hair was a little Justin Beiber-ish, I’m really digging how I look here.

I’ve come quite a way since that first shoot.  My camera is no longer an expensive piece of electronic equipment I leave on automatic.  I’m changing settings because I know what I’m trying to capture and what I need to do to get there.  I enjoy talking to other shutter-bugs about F-stops, apertures and lenses because I’m getting it. I get that you have to have a low F-stop to get that nice, dreamy quality in the background. I get that you have to dial down your shutter-speed to give the illusion of emptiness in a busy place.  I can look at photos now and puzzle out what settings they used, if they used a flash or not.  I’m not saying I know it all, but I know more than I did yesterday and I’m going to know more tomorrow.

Before that shoot, my experience behind the camera had been limited to a point and shoot. Candids from birthday parties, girls’ night out, and vacations, that was my portfolio.  This was different.  There was a story to tell through the lip balm and the clothes.  I worked closely with DH to create a storyboard.  As the models got ready that day, DH and I rigged lights, dressed the set, and set up craft services (we keeps it professional).  I had yet to even put the lens on the camera and I started to doubt myself.  My experiences with modeling were from the other side of the camera.  All I knew was head tilts, shoulder leans, and broken doll.   Could I duplicate what we had discussed?  Would I be able to re-tell this boy-meets-girl love story using angles and light?

I look at myself in that photograph now and see apprehension on my face.  Just below it, though, is some confidence, some anticipation.  I look at that photograph and I can see the story behind it.  Before, I would have captioned that photograph “Aspiring Photographer Testing Equipment” (real eloquent, right?).   Now, “Photographer, Self Portrait”, is more fitting.

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IN: ON: March 1, 2011 TAGS: , BY: Hilary
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I needed a real laugh after watching Anne Hathaway and James Franco try to pry one out of Hollywood’s finest.   I just watched an old episode of Flight of the Conchords.

Season 3! Season 3! 
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IN: ON: February 28, 2011 TAGS: BY: Hilary
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No Time Like the Present

 

Lately, I’ve been describing myself as someone who knows a little bit about a lot of things.    I’m living a “here’s-all-you-need-to-know-about-X-to-get-by” kind of life.  Fake it ’til you make it, ain’t working for me any more.  Sometimes, it’s like I’m about to travel abroad and all I learned to say is “Where’s the toilet?” and “Your mother smells like goat testicles” in a variety of languages .   You know, the bathroom location and bathroom talk,  the essential traveler phrases. 


I’m not really satisfied with that.  


So, I’ve been thinking about all of those things that I know a little bit about and the things that I know how to do just enough of.  I’m thinking, if you’ll indulge the language metaphor a bit more, I’m ready to be fluent in something. 


French. Writing.  Photography. 


Three things I really enjoy.  Three things about which I know a fair amount, though I have yet to learn the word “testicles” in French. 


I know what I want to do. Now, to get to the business of doing it and doing it with purpose.  Learning more about these things, dare I even say mastering them, this is going to be my focus.  


A year from now, I could be living in Paris, working on my second book and taking photos of the girls as they run through the Jardins des Tuileries.  And by the way, I would never tell someone that “ta mere sent testicules de chevre” unless they really had it coming. 

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IN: ON: February 28, 2011 TAGS: , BY: Hilary
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Baby Bibliophile

Morgan was selecting her bedtime book tonight and asked me if her books was “ours” or did it belong to the library.  We keep our library books in a bag for easy transport, so I selected one from the bag and said to her, “If you open to the title page, the library usually stamps its name and address in the book.”

Then, I flipped to the back of the book and showed her the library stamp there.  I know that the advances in library science and in technology have brought us to our current usage of the barcode to check out materials, but I miss writing my name on that little card that fit nicely into the pocket in the back of the book.  Seeing you checked out the book before you, examining signatures was part of the allure of going to the library and checking out books.

I pointed out the barcode at the top of the back cover, explaining to Morgan that the library uses this to scan items, like at the grocery store.  “So, if you ever want to know if a book is ours or theirs, you can check that way.”

Morgan traced her finger over the barcode thoughtfully and said, “Or, you can just look to see if the book has a call number on it or not.” She held up the spine of the book for me to see and smiled.

That’s my girl.

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IN: ON: February 22, 2011 TAGS: , BY: Hilary
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When Life Hands You Lemons. . .

Coever has been having trouble recognizing when she need to go, she really needs to go.  As a result, we’ve been burning through underpants at an alarming rate.  She, like her sister, is so afraid to miss something, she will hold it and hold it until she’s bursting.  This means, even though she’ll make it to the bathroom, in the time it takes to get her pants around her ankles, there’s some pee around her ankles, too.

*le sigh*

She’s frustrated. I’m frustrated.  We’re working on it, though.

The other day, she had another accident, and I scooped her up and dropped her in the tub.  I was tempted to stick her in the shower in my bathroom so I could have a Calgon moment of my own.  It was about 2 in the afternoon and the sunlight coming in from the bathroom window was so soft and just inviting.  Coever was rosy cheeked from the warm water and I pulled her out of the tub, I thought, “I need to photograph this!”

I’m thinking either one of us may have a future career here.

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IN: ON: February 17, 2011 TAGS: BY: Hilary
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How to Say No Without Saying No

 I don’t know when this happened to me.  I say “no” quite a bit.  Like, a lot.  Like the way a valley girls uses the word “like”.  Like, oh no!
I had read an article in Parents or Parenting magazine a while back where the author (I think it was Peggy Orenstein) said that for one day, she was just going to say “yes”, to whatever her children wanted.  I thought she was crazy like that glue from doing something like that.  Then, the other day when I was feeling kind of sick, I decided to give it a whirl in the interest of self-preservation.  
I didn’t agree to every single whim and desire the girls put forth (no, you can’t slide down the stairs on my cookie sheet), but for the most part, if they weren’t going to kill themselves or each other, it was green light city.  The next day, when I was feeling better, I was tossing out “no” like handbills to a house party.  The frequency of using “no” was steadily increasing and I felt like I had some kind of aphasia for affirmation.  If that’s how I felt, I could only imagine what the girls must be thinking.  
I realized that I need to adopt a Moto Moto attitude about it:
“I promise the answer will always be ‘yes’, unless ‘no’ is required.”  
Then I took it one step further.  I had to come up with some other ways of saying “no”. I instituted a no-ratrorium!  If I was going to say “no”, I had to do it in a way that didn’t involve any verb negations.  Gone were the mustn’ts, shouldn’ts, can’ts, won’ts, and don’ts.  It was going to be tough, but I was determined to succeed.  If I could do it, problems could be alleviated, the threat of tears and tantrums could be eliminated, and peace would reign supreme under our roof. 
My “no”s became “How about in a few minutes?” and “Maybe in a little while.”  I started to add things like “Let me think about it, ” “As soon as I’m finished here, we’ll talk about it,” and “That might be a possibility.”  The purposeful vagueness has provided awesome results.  The girls get an answer, which isn’t negative, and I get relatively fuss-free quality time with the girls.  
There are times when a firm “No.” is necessary.  For instance, if the girls ask me if they can hanglide off the roof using wire-hangers, double sided tape, and a pair of DH’s underpants, “Let me think about it,” may give them some false hope. In that case, I don’t feel as bad dishing out a steaming plate of “No.” (along with a side of the People’s Eyebrow) in order to shut the door on that foolishness. 
Although. . .that would be something to see. . .  
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IN: ON: February 17, 2011 TAGS: , , BY: Hilary
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