Pictures

This is one of my favorite pictures I have taken in the last couple of days. When I look at it on my camera or computer it's really pretty. Somehow this doesn't look as nice. I just can't figure out what I'm doing wrong. Oh, well. It's still nice. Here are some others.

The boys were pretending that they were refugees, or homeless, in the rain the other day. It was funny.

Here the guys are making breakfast on Saturday. Abraham is an excellent bacon maker. I think I will leave the bacon to Abraham until he leaves home. Then we will either have overcooked bacon from me, or someone else will save us. I'm hoping for the latter.

Some pictures from last week

The boys went with Peter to work while I was a crazy person (actually cleaning!) this week. They were supposed to be doing school work, but instead they learned about engineering.

Samuel watched while his brothers went up in the front loader. There are pictures of them all the way up helping secure part of the new greenhouse. I didn't put them on here because grandmothers of various generations read here and I don't want to give them heart palpitations.

Esther fell asleep on the floor near her bed because, while being crazy cleaning lady, I forgot to give her a nap. But it was cute so I forgave myself and went to get a camera to take a picture.

Clouds around my house

I enjoy looking at the clouds here in the desert. Since Peter gave me a tripod for Christmas I haven't had a chance to use it yet until tonight. When I was taking out the trash tonight I noticed the clouds. Awesome!

Look, it's a monster coming out the darkness! Ah! Run for your lives!

A tunnel.

This is the view across the street. This is the first view that made me want to take the pictures.

Halloween Pictures

Here are some pictures from Halloween this year. Esther was a snowflake. She got food on her shirt to go under her tutu, so she just took pictures with the boys. Peter decided to dress up too. He said he got a lot of looks, but I think it's great he dressed up. Everybody should be able to pretend, not just kids! I am bummed the pictures are so grainy. Next time I will save them at a higher quality so that they look better. I didn't want to wait for them to upload.

Boise

So over Memorial Day weekend we went to Boise, well kinda.  We planted watermelons on Monday,  and by we I included myself this time.  I helped Peter do the planting--in the greenhouse.  But onto fun, we did this a little anniversery present to ourselves and made a family weekend of it.  I only took pictures of one day because as I mentioned our camera is broken and were using Micah's.  He hadn't recharged his battery and there were a ton thrown away to boot.  

But we had a lot of fun!  On Saturday we went to Cracker Barrel and then headed to the Discovery Center.  The interactive items were mostly about kinetic energy.  The boys enjoyed manipulating all the displays.

This is not your typical arcade grab the toy game.  It was an actual robotic arm with shoulder and elbow joints included.  Micah did much better than I did.  Who's surprised?  No raised hands, hmm.
This was, umm--I can't remember, but I did have to pull him away from it.
Esther's favorite item.  She was learning about being even cuter, oh wait-- no, it was reflections.
Abraham learning about centrifugal force.
Esther spending more time being cute.  When I shot this I thought, "What if there really were four of her?"  Mommy would be in big trouble!
If you look closely you can see the bubble that Samuel is blowing.  The kids really liked this one.
Then we stopped by some friends' house.  They moved to Boise in December.  They are all really happy there.  It was nice to see how settled and happy they are, as well as getting a chance to visit.

Then we checked into our hotel and went to Red Robin for dinner.  It was a hit with everyone!  

I didn't get any pictures from Sunday(the battery problem), but it was mostly shopping and swimming.  We got some Krispy Kremes before we left Boise.  It was nice to get some real donuts, but they aren't as good as Dunkin'.

Playing with black and white

I wanted to try something new with Elements.  Peter's picture looked a ton better when I had it surrounded by black.  I definitely like the lower picture better.  Better contrast.  The top one has too much sky and not enough contrast.  I used two different methods of conversion to black and white.  The lower method wins hands down for me.  What do you think? 

Easter

Some Fun

Waterford

The first time I saw this village ten years ago I was sad.  Not because of any emotional thing but because I didn't have a camera.  Fortunately this time I brought a camera.  And I am so pleased that it didn't change in the past ten years.  The city is starting to encroach but hopefully the village will be able to keep it at bay for as long as possible.  It was in 1733.  The first thing I noticed ten years ago was the height of the doors.  And the charm of the village spoke to me in general. 

This is the schoolhouse there, I wonder if the children might still use the school.  

Look at how short the doors are on these houses.  Most of the houses in the village were built before 1840.  These I believe were most likely built before 1800.  

 

This snowy day

It is 10 degrees outside right now.  Esther, Samuel and I are hanging out doing laundry and learning some.  I am doing more learning than my kids.  Samuel is playing "constructor" and Esther is learning to type.  I learned not to lighten pictures too much, maybe.  The top is the lighten copy and the bottom is SOOC.  I can't decide which one I like better.  




Here is Samuel playing dress up.  I seem to be having a hard time correcting things.  This seems too light as well.  I will have to work on it more.  I just used the quick fix option and it looks quite different here than it did in my window on my computer.  It seems that I have much more to learn.

Pictures from Peter's trip

Here are some pictures from Peter's trip.  The pictures are descending in order date wise.  The pictures start in Israel and end in Turkey.

Fun pictures from the last couple of days

Here are some photos from the last week or so. They aren't in any order.

We got some good snow the last couple of days.  

The kids practiced at Logos for singing on Sunday.

On Wednesday at Logos the tables were decorated with manger scenes.  This one was made in Kentucky from coal. 

 

Making crayons with the kids.  Here Micah and Samuel are helping to take the wrappers off the crayons.  

Thanksgiving pictures

Some more pictures

This is at Redfish Lake. It's about 2 1/2 hours north of us in Stanley. We had a great time camping.

This is Samuel's birthday party. We did a campout theme.

The first day of school. Aren't they handsome!
Esther and Reveille getting to know each other. She is such a patient dog, when Esther grabs her ears she just stands or sits there until Esther lets go.