Monkey Bars

My little monkey on the monkey bars at gym class.

Mr. Handsome

Doesn't he look handsome in the outfit you gave him for his birthday, Lisa? I love this pic because, well, he's smiling at me which is hard to capture, but more so because he's smiling so big you can see his dimples which I adore!

Brother's Boots

As you know, Jonathan loves to do everything his big brother does. Everything. So, of course, he wants to wear his brother's boots. It's only natural...and cute!

Reunion Tower

First Tooth

Thomas lost his first tooth last night. He was very excited about it and immediately went into the bathroom to check it out.

It seems to be impossible for Thomas to pose with his tooth, showing his new gap, and with his eyes open, so I settled for two out of three. And as and added bonus, you get to see his healing face. :-)

Buddies

Thomas and James outside the old red courthouse in downtown Dallas.

Old Red Courthouse

Here's one angle of the courthouse in downtown Dallas near where Kennedy was assassinated.

Big Boo Boo

It's ugly. Sorry I didn't warn you. And it's going to look even worse in a few days. Wednesday afternoon, I took the boys to get some ice cream at Bruester's. Thomas was laying on the top of a metal bench (as a boy is prone to do) and slipped while getting down and smashed into the metal armrest full-force. He cried and cried and the area immediately started turning blue and swelling slightly. It was more swollen and blue yesterday and even worse today. He can't even wear his glasses because the swelling is so bad (see how he can't even smile?). Believe me, it actually looks worse in person. We were concerned about possible facial fractures so I took him to the doctor today. Luckily he's ok and we feel like it was worth the 25 dollar co-pay to make sure. You can't be too careful when it's your baby! And the poor kid has a cold too which explains the red nose/lip and according to the doctor one reason the swelling is going to take longer than usual to go down.

Card Attempt

I got the boys these cute Valentine's Day shirts and I had a great idea for my Valentine's Day card...I was going to use a cool graffiti covered wall in Deep Ellum as my backdrop. Obviously this isn't graffiti covered but it is a cute wall. However, as usual, both boys wouldn't smile at the same time. Jonathan just wasn't in the mood to be photographed and wouldn't stand still. At first I was really frustrated about it, but now looking at this photo, I just laugh. So typical! BTW, thanks Lisa for the cool hats. I usually just buy them baseball caps. I need to branch out.

Silly Jonathan

And in my series of photographer screw-ups, here's another one for you. I messed up the exposure...again. But this time, I blame at least half of it on Jonathan. He kept moving from sun to shade and back so quickly I was having a hard time keeping up: changing my ISO and shutter speed every 5 seconds. I blame 40% on the sunlight because I couldn't see my light meter, so really only 10 percent was my fault. ;-) I was too stubborn to switch to Auto so sometimes I ended up with shots like this. Yesterday, I called it an artistic shot. Today, I converted it to black and white. :-)

Accidental High Key

This is what happens when you're shooting manual and forget to change your settings from the shaded brick wall background to this full sun one. I'm not sure this even qualifies as high key. It might be too overexposed even for that and not enough white on white. We'll just call it my artistic shot and leave it at that. I love this image though because each kid is doing their own thing and only Thomas is engaged with the camera.

Silly Thomas

So many neat textures and colors in Deep Ellum. We definitely only scratched the surface.

Deep Ellum

I'm taking a break from Arizona pics to post some Deep Ellum pics for a few days. Lisa and I took the kids down there today to try our hand at "urban photography." It was a lot of fun and I hope you enjoy the results!

Desert Owl

Hummingbird

I took this photo at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. We'd just come out of the hummingbird exhibit, carefully going through the double door process to exit so none would escape when what do I see? An escapee! And no, we didn't cause it, but I did take advantage of it.

Last One...For Now

Tomorrow you get to see something else. Not finished with Arizona pics, just a different subject in Arizona. But for now...enjoy!

More Cactus

You might be getting tired of looking at cactus by now, but tough. :-) I'm going to post at least one more like this tomorrow and I'm not finished editing my photos so there might even be more. But they're just so different than our scenery here. I can't stop myself.

Tram Bridge

It was only later when looking at my shots that I realized I'd photographed the water covered bridge on our way up. We shouldn't have been surprised about it but we were too busy on our ride looking up...not down.

Cactus Silhouette

The River

Dale and Thomas by the river. So beautiful this time of year.

Woo hoo! I'm all caught up! Until tomorrow. :-)

Bird Boys

As we were going down the mountain, Thomas and Jonathan were running ahead. They were so excited to be up there, I'm surprised they didn't just take off with those flapping arms.

Longhorn Cactus

Thomas wanted me to take a picture of this cactus cow.

River Crossing

We took a tram up to the top of the mountain and then started hiking down to take some pictures and throw some rocks in the water. We planned to hike down to the next tram stop and then ride it back down. We'd hiked about half a mile when we came to this bridge covered with water. Our options were to hike back UP the mountain half a mile or take our shoes off and cross the water covered bridge. We crossed. And it was COLD! I got about halfway across and the water was so cold, my feet were hurting and I was regretting our decision. We got all the way across and everyone started putting their shoes on. Everyone, but Thomas that is. He got back in. Crazy kid!

Sabino Canyon

One afternoon, we went to Sabino Canyon for an hour or two. It was so much fun, we're going to plan ahead next time so we can spend more time out there. Dale went with us this time too. Wanda stayed at the assisted living facility to spend time with her mom. This next series of photos were all taken out there.

Cactus Landscape

Ain't it purdy?

Prickly Pear

Prickly Pear Love

I'd just photographed some other prickly pear close-ups when I noticed this one shaped like a heart. Cool huh?

Saguaro Men

Family Stagecoach

Thomas, David, Dale, Kim, and Jonathan

Gunfight

Thomas LOVED Old Tucson. It was the perfect place for our boy who plans to go to the Wild West when he grows up. Hundreds of movies have been filmed there. We really enjoyed watching the shows. During this show, David had Thomas on his shoulders so he could see better. I was holding Jonathan in one hand, who kept saying, "Noise! Noise!" every time we'd hear gunshots. It was a total fluke that I got this shot since I only had one hand available. But I like it.

Log Bros

Thomas and Jonathan loved riding the log ride at Old Tucson. It's quite a bit more low-tech than the one at Six Flags. You push yourself around the track if you want to go faster than turtle pace.

Happy New Year!

Jonathan wearing David's grandma's Happy New Year crown. If it fell off, he'd ask one of us to put it back on him.