I guess I can guarantee at least two posts a year to this blog, and they’ll both come in September. Today was Mary’s first day of preschool. After watching Simon go all last year and constantly asking when she would get to go, today was the day. It’s a fun exercise to compare the kids at their various different milestones, so here’s a link to Simon’s first day of preschool. She’s so little compared to him! Requisite pictures below.

I officially have no more pictures that need to be processed. Well, I have no more pictures that *I* feel need to be processed. Others may disagree. Never mind the fact that I haven’t really shot anything in about a month and a half. I’m caught up, that’s all that matters. It may be another decade before it happens again.

My new year’s resolution is to blog more often. Waiting for the laughter to die down. . .

Okay, that’s not really my New Year’s resolution. Somehow everything I want to say has recently been magically condensed to 140 characters or less. Because my attention span wasn’t short enough to begin with. Darn you twitter and facebook. So to start 2010, I present you with a picture of my whole family, taken at our Christmas celebration this past weekend.

View Large, On Black

I’ve discovered that taking a picture of one kid is pretty easy, compared to getting a picture of two. Today we took the kids out to try and get a decent picture or two for our Christmas cards. In keeping of the tradition of posting outtakes, here’s a small taste of what we had to deal with.

I’m a full 3 weeks, 4 weeks, well, let’s just say I’m WAY behind on my Adventures in Produce posts. The thing is, I’m not really that sad about it. This has been a frustrating project for me for several reasons, and I’m happy to throw it under the bus. All my fault, for sure, but frustrating nonetheless.

The problems that stand out most in my mind are:

• Logistics and Time Constraints – I simply didn’t have the time I wanted to put together these shots. Everything seemed rushed. I didn’t really anticipate the craziness of walking in the door from work and trying to set up and shoot the weekly produce picture with kids were underfoot in the 30-45 minutes I had before dinner. Additionally, Kate was sometimes needing some of the produce we got for that week to cook dinner.
• Lighting – I was extremely frustrated with the lighting in my house. Our house doesn’t get a lot of natural light, and the little we do get is difficult to work with. I was having all sorts of issues with exposure and white balance that I just didn’t have the time to mess with in the short period I had to take the pictures (see item one).
• Equipment – When I started this project, I fully expected to be purchasing the beginning of my strobist-inspired lighting equipment. I planned on having at least one strobe, one lightstand, and one umbrella with which to light. Er, yeah. . . about that. We had a couple of unexpected expenses this summer. Air conditioning, medical bills, auto stuff, hi-def television. . . you know, all essentials. What’s that? YOU try saying no to your wife when she tells you that it’s okay for you to go buy a replacement TV. I mean really, the GALL of that woman! Kidding hon, TOTALLY kidding. As an aside, now that football season has started any buyers remorse I had over that TV has been magically cured. Funny, that.

  So anyway, the flash equipment purchase got put off indefinitely, and I haven’t been experimenting with any of the light stuff I wanted to experiment with.

• A Generally Disappointing CSA Experience – In general, I have been a little disappointed by the quality of the produce we’ve gotten from the CSA. The fruit has generally been very good, but I have not been thrilled with the veggies, and we have gotten a couple of items that have been downright dreadful (the green beans from a couple of weeks ago qualify). Being not super-enthusiastic about the produce we were receiving made me even less motivated to take pictures.

  That being said, we LOVE our trips to the farm to pick our own produce, and the farm itself is a really fun place to visit. I’m not sure if we’ll do the CSA again next year. We still have a month or so of late summer and fall produce to go, so I’m going to withhold final judgement until it is all said and done.

So as of now, my photography goal is to get caught up processing all the pics that I’m backed up on by a couple (almost 3?! Ack!) months. I’m not even considering another “project” until I get caught up on the family shots.

Kid is growing up ridiculously fast.

‘Cause she eats her spinach! This is a bonus Mary picture, taken earlier this month, that didn’t qualify for Picture of the Week.

A Beginner’s Guide to Troubleshooting Light

This is an excellent, easy-to-read introduction to getting the correct exposure from a DSLR, and is the perfect follow-up to my 2008 Lessons in Photography post.