The Basket

A few more from the basket shoot...

We tried using his cute bucket hat that is *almost* too small, but he didn't like that one bit.

Just to show you the extent of the ridiculous hair that I'm not allowed to cut.

And my parents have requested more videos. I'm happy to oblige because I have millions on my phone. :) This one doesn't get good til around 0:25, he always takes a little while to warm up on screen.

PS - I've been feeling weird lately about uninspired posts. I apologize and have all kinds of ideas to begin blogging about once my life and my business settle and calm down a bit. Bear with me!

Baby in a Basket

Ohmygosh.

Prepare yourselves for cuteness.

I can't even handle it.

The Slide! The Slide!

Going a little video crazy lately, I know. I got a new phone with video capabilities, so it's always with me. Hopefully these are fun for other people to watch. :)

This one's for Auntie Rach and Uncle Matt. The laughing and flailing is pretty tame compared to what he was doing just before I started recording...

Fun with a Laundry Basket

Sutton { 14 Months }

You thought we were done with the monthly updates. So did I. But...he's been changing so much lately, I thought it would just be wrong to not document it.

First, I wanted to show you what I have to work with. He has no attention span. Getting him to look at the camera? Good luck. But this shoot actually went well - he didn't try to crawl away. :)

And the photos we got from it:

 

So at 14 months, Sutton:

*You're starting to talk. Your words include dada (your clearest word, you actually say it TO him), mama (only if you're feeling especially generous, and it's usually only something you yell just to hear your own voice), all gone or all done, water, blankie, hello, uh oh. Most of these you won't say on command, and sometimes we don't realize that you've said a word because you don't articulate very clearly. :) It's mostly just inflection more than actual words, but I can understand you.

*You also like to yell when I yell. Like if Daddy's in the other room and I yell "Adam!" you immediately think you need to yell "AAAH!"

*You mimic everything we do. You love putting our phones up to your ear and saying "Hello?" Come to think of it, you do that with a lot of things that aren't phones, pretending they are.

Such a doll baby. :)

*Your walking is getting better every day! I think we had about 5 steps in a row today, and some of the time you'd stop in between, get your balance, then take another step, stop, etc. We got so proud of you, and then you got so proud of yourself!

*You're ticklish under your chin and on your belly. You have the most awesome belly laugh.

*Your hair is ridiculous but your Daddy won't let me cut it.

*You eat LOTS and all the time. Breakfast is oatmeal and a banana. Lunch and dinner are a protein, a fruit, a veggie, and some yogurt. You get an afternoon and a nighttime snack of goldfish. Even if you've just eaten and you see us eating, you think you need our food. You take out your pacifier and reach for our food and whine when we don't give you any.

*Meal and snack times go like this: we set you in your high chair, you take out your pacifier and have to set it on the table (not on your tray), and we give you your water. You drink your water and then have to set that on the table and THEN you can begin eating.

*Since I've been working out 3 times a week, you've been going to the nursery at the Y. You do really good there and I've seen you crawling around by yourself on their jungle gym thing. The ladies there all know you and you seem like you know them. We've also been able to take you to the nursery at church. Hooray for being able to go to church again!

*You love being at Becky's twice a week while I work at home. I hear good things about you laughing and playing and trying to feed your veggies to Shep.  :)

*You're really into cuddling lately. We sit or lay with you on the floor a lot and you like to crawl over to us, lay your blankie on us, and then lay your head on that. It's really cute. You also like back scratches and you LOVE us to play with your hair, it just mesmerizes you.

I was thinking back to how things were a few months ago and how they've gradually changed without me even noticing. You don't ever sleep on me anymore and you used to take your afternoon nap on my chest every day I was home with you. You don't let me hold you like a baby unless you're extremely tired or sick. You're becoming more social with other adults and kids and you used to ONLY want me. I love that you're growing into such an amazing little boy. I miss your baby habits, but hopefully we took enough photos and videos to remember it all.

The Moment We've All Been Waiting For

These are literally his first steps ever. I can't believe I was videoing. I was mostly just testing out the video on my new phone, and then he WALKED. :) He's done it one more time this weekend. So exciting! He's getting to be such a big boy!

Lens Caps & Airplanes

The boy was in desperate need of a photo shoot today. He was just looking so cute. I SHOULD be spending this time that he's napping working, but alas, his cuteness overrides my better judgement.

He stole my lens cap, and then he thought I needed it back. I let him keep it.

Look at that baby with his feet crossed and his chubby cheeks + chin.

Uh oh, We lost the bottom lip again.

He really thought I needed the lens cap.

"Mama, don't you need THIS?"

"FINE. I will come make you take it." This was a big deal - he's never crawled in grass before, he doesn't like how it feels.

"Oh wait, I hear an airplane."

"There it is!"

Gotta make the airplane noises.

My sweetiepie looking handsome as ever.

And on another topic...I've lost 6 pounds in the past few weeks! Hooray! I only have 4 more to go til I'm at my college/wedding weight. After I was done breastfeeding, I really was determined to get not only the baby weight off, but also the extra few pounds I'd gained since we got married. I've been exercising three times a week (step aerobics classes at the Y, elliptical, stair stepper), and eating around 1300-1400 calories per day. The Livestrong app is my best friend for counting calories!

The Scoop

Goldfish: Check.

Water: Check.

Blankie: Check.

I was working in my office at home a couple days ago, and needed to occupy the boy. It was snack time, so I gathered all this things and set him in the Bumbo so he couldn't move. (He can't get out of the Bumbo without help...his legs are toooo chubby.) :)

My office at home.

Did you catch that?

Well, it's true! I've moved my office back home and am in the middle of transitioning back to working on my own, as Gina Dreher Photography.

Technically, I've always been Gina Dreher Photography, just working out of the Gingeroot Studios building, but most people thought I worked for Gingeroot.

I moved all of my office stuff back home two weeks ago today, and I gotta be honest, it feels really good. I'm still keeping my Gingeroot website (along-side my new one) and meeting clients at the studio through November. Why the change? Read on...

1 - Money. Money's usually the culprit. We had a pretty great space for the studio in downtown Wichita, and rent was pretty high. In order to afford to keep paying rent, I would've had to start working more, and I just wasn't willing to sacrifice my time with Sutton and Adam for work. I'm a strong believer that family comes before career.

2 - I'll be able to charge lower prices to my clients. Pricing has always been a struggle for me. It's a hard line to draw because there is so much time, effort, and talent put into each and every photo shoot I do, but often people think "Why is she charging that much to click a shutter...doesn't seem that difficult." HA. Little do you know. That aside, I'm not an extremely wealthy person, so I know what it's like to budget and to have every penny be precious. It's been hard for me to charge the high prices we had to in order to cover studio expenses. My move back home will allow me to lower prices some, which will give me such a peace of mind.

3 - I'll get to have more personal relationships with my clients. I'll start this off by admitting that it was a very awesome thing to have a front desk gal at the studio to field phone calls, return emails, check in orders, and do lots of other little things. BUT it really ended up making my client relationships not as close. I'm excited to be able to have more face to face (er...phone to phone, email to email) time with people and get to know them and their families more!

The transition is and will be somewhat messy and difficult, but I'm genuinely excited to be working at home again, and to kind of re-start this little photography business of mine.

I wouldn't be where I am today without all of my repeat clients, who've become some great friends. If you are ever in need of photos, please keep me in mind! I have no idea how this transition is going to affect my business and income, but I can only hope for the best and trust God with it all. I have such a peace about this decision...I feel like that can only be God telling me this was definitely the right move.

So, just a little self-promotion to end this post. :) I'd LOVE to take your photos. I'll be starting to advertise my lower prices for 2012, and I will be running specials now and again via facebook and Twitter, so be sure to "like" my facebook page by clicking here, and follow me on Twitter - @GinaDreherPhoto.

My new website is in the works, www.ginadreherphotography.com, and will hopefully be good to go within the next week. And you can always reach me via email, gina {at} ginadreherphotography.com, and by phone, (316)619.8536.

If you got through all that, good for you! Thanks for reading and caring, and I hope to snap your photos sometime soon. :)

Details & Snacking

I'm kind of obsessed with Sutton's mouth. It's just like his Daddy's...the top lip sticks out above the bottom one. And his mouth is so expressive, it has different positions when concentrating, sleeping, peering. I also love his little hands with the indented knuckles. Oh my gosh, and the feet. The cute cute feet with MY toes on them. And the bedhead. Love it.

I was taking these during snacktime today, so I also got some photos of the feeding habits. You know what I mean...the fingers going ALL the way in the mouth when shoving in a goldfish cracker. Awesome.

 And this has nothing to do with anything, but there's this flower that randomly came up in the middle of our bed of mulch in the front yard. So crazy that this thing could survive and thrive in 100+ degree temps with no water, coming up through the mulch. Just a little reminder of God's miracles.

(That red stuff in the mulch is dried paint. Which is covering our driveway, courtesy of Adam and one of his many projects.) :)

Reading with Dad

Do you ever get in a "cleaning mood" where you just HAVE to clean your house?

Yeah, me neither.

But tonight I did for some reason. I think it has just been a mess for too long.

In my defense, I have excuses. I've been busy. I've moved my office back home (will explain in another post) and Adam started back at school last week, and I've been without a babysitter in the middle of my busiest season of the year. So my house got put on the back burner.

Tonight, I just went at it. So Adam spent some time with the baby. They played downstairs for awhile and then when it got close to bedtime, Adam pulled out a book to read. This doesn't happen very often at our house. Sutton's not really into reading books. He likes to turn the pages obsessively, but he rarely lets you read to him. So it was camera worthy.

Fox in Socks by Dr Seuss. Have you ever read this book? Wow, it's ridiculous.

After a short while, Sutton was over it. He climbed down and went to play piano.

On another note, do any of you have experience with night terrors? We think Sutton may have had one the other night. If you have any stories or advice...I'm all ears. It's only happened once, but I know it's best to be prepared.

How One Dog...

...can take up an entire queen-size bed.

Step 1: Lay horizontally, perpendicular to the bed.

Step 2: Stretch legs out so they're straight.

Step 3: Do not, under ANY circumstances, do NOT move when a human comes over to the bed and would like a spot to sleep.

Bonus: Use pillow for head. Those humans really know what they're doing.

Family Photos

I don't think I ever blogged about this, but back in June, on the hottest day of the month (which was nothing compared with what was in store!), we had the lovely Jaclyn take our family photos and Sutton's one year photos. Neither of my boys was in a good mood, so check out how amazing Jaclyn is to be able to get these photos out of us. LOVE them!

Working on getting some large prints for the house. Can't wait to see these in print!