09 October 2011 (Sunday)

Blake and Elisabeth often send me photos and videos of my adorable grandson. (To Blake and Elisabeth: THANK YOU! THANK YOU!!)

This night they sent me a photo of 2^nd Peter who fell asleep on the sofa while they were watching television.

Oddly, across town 1^st Peter had also fallen asleep while watching television, but he was on our bed and he (as always) had a death grip on the television remote. I sent Blake and Elisabeth a photo of 1^st Peter.

What are the chances? It seems 2^nd Peter also was in control of the remote!

I put the two photos together for your viewing enjoyment:

Correct me if I’m wrong, but it looks to me as if 2^nd Peter has a little smirk on his lips. He’s only days old, but I have a feeling he knows exactly what is going on.

08 October 2011 (Saturday)

A good day for Woochee! Water flowed forth from that thing in the kitchen!

First, she batted the water around for a while and let it run between her toes:

Then she had a little drink:

Note to guests who eat in our home: This faucet is probably the cleanest thing in our whole house. I clean it repeatedly every single day.

07 October 2011 (Friday)

Yesterday Graham and I went to see 2^nd Peter and Elisabeth, too. When we arrived Peter was sleeping.  We transferred him to Graham where he continued to sleep:

He had a patriotic dream, at the end of which he appropriately saluted:

When we all laughed, he cried:

That’s okay. We needed him awake so I could take photos, and fire my herkin’ camera light at him, thus blowing out his retinas. Hmmm.

Change of plans—photos without the flash.

The background of this story is that I saw a cute thing on Pinterest. It was two photos side by side. The first one showed a pregnant lady’s mid-section, where she was bulging with a baby inside of her. The second photo showed the same lady in the same position and same clothes, BUT the baby was on the outside.

I took the first photo a few weeks ago before Peter's birth. Yesterday I took the second one.

Here are a few outtakes from our photo session:

Here’s the final result I put together today:

PS. I highly recommend Pinterest! It’s so informative (and so addictive).

06 October 2011 (Thursday)

Actually, it’s not Thursday, the 6^th of October. It’s Thursday, the 5^th of January in 2012. After doing 1039 posts, I sort of got tired of blogging. No, I got really tired of blogging. But I’m Type A and driven and have trouble stopping things I start. On the other hand, it’s not unusual for me to start a project and not finish it. But I feel bad about it every time I do that.

I’ve been feeling bad about my blog in general for a few months. I can’t seem to get caught up, but I haven’t been trying too hard to do so. Seriously, it is so hard to take and post a photo every day? No, unless my overachieverness rears its ugly head and I start taking 50 or 100 photos a day and try to post 10 or 20 of them.  

A couple of weeks ago I was standing on a pier in San Francisco, waiting to board a ferry for the 10-minute ride across the Bay of San Francisco to tour Alcatraz. I was trying to think about anything but the upcoming boat ride, because I have a long history of disasters on water.

Let’s see, I was in an unexpected tropical storm while deep-sea fishing in the Gulf of Mexico. I was in the Atlantic Ocean off Martha’s Vineyard (or was it Nantucket?) when an unexpected storm came up. Not only did we go faster than the theoretical top speed of the boat, but we were lost—the crew we hired had no idea where we were. There was the unexpected storm when we were in a deep-sea fishing boat off the coast of Bermuda. 

There was the ferry trip to the Isle of Capri in the Tyrrhenian Sea off the coast of Italy where we nearly capsized (really). The crew was standing by the cabinets where the lifesaving equipment was stored, so they could get the stuff out and distribute it all quickly, while most of the passengers were puking their brains out. 

I could go on about disasters I have experienced while on open waters, but it scares me to remember them.

So, as I stood on the pier, I didn't think about the ferry I was about to board; I thought about my blog. And I had an epiphany! The original challenge that prompted me to start the blog in the first place was to take a photo and post it every day for a year. I did that! YAY!! I started something AND finished it! Way to go, me!

Here’s the plan for the blog's future: I’m going to take and post photos whenever I want to. If I miss a day or two or more, it’s okay. And I won’t have to force a photo shoot just to do a post.

Here’s an example of a slow-news-day photo:

On the 6th of October Peter and I went to the Pottery Barn Outlet to buy new towels for our bathroom. Whereas I look for color and texture, Peter looks for fit. Right in the middle of the store.

Back at home Ellie Mae said, “I’m always available for photo shoots. Time spent taking my picture is never wasted. You’re really going to take less photos of me??”

Woochee said, “I don’t care if you take my picture or not. I just want to hang over the side of the kitchen sink and stare at the faucet." 

"Sometimes water comes out of it! It is very fun to watch water fall.”

“I’m still hacked you don’t want to take photos of me every single day. What about all the ones you took over the last three months?”

Good news, Ellie Mae! I am going to post some of those 100s of photos I took over the last three months. I have a lot of photos of 2^nd Peter I want to get on my blog. And a lot of photos of you, too, of course.

05 October 2011 (Wednesday)

Here are some totally random shots from today.

I practiced taking photos where whatever was in the foreground was in focus, while the background was not in focus. Here’s one of those photos:

Before I took this photo, I looked around inside for something to take outside to photograph, because I didn’t want to have to worry about the artificial light inside. Of all the millions of things in our house, why did I choose this bitsy M&M dispenser?

To take the above photo I was spread out on my tummy on the driveway. When the concrete started digging into my elbows, I started wondering what in the world I was doing. The people who drove by were probably wondering the same thing. The M&M dispenser was not visible from the street. So, they only saw me laid out on the driveway.

When I stood up to pick the little pebbles out of my forearms, I noticed these flowers:

They worked just fine for my depth of field photo.

Meanwhile back inside Woochie the Water Cat was batting the water as it came from the faucet:

She hasn't touched one of her toys since she discovered the house’s running water.

An observation: Over the years we've bought some expensive things, like furniture and cars, which are no longer with us. However, the little M&M dispenser, that only cost a few dollars, has sat on our kitchen counter in two different houses and faithfully dispensed M&Ms or jelly beans for about three decades.

04 October 2011 (Tuesday)—Photo Shoot

Presenting photos of baby Peter taken today by Sarah of Sarahdipity Photos. (Sarah is one of Elisabeth’s sisters, and she's Peter’s aunt.)

This is a special photo for me:

Peter is shown here wrapped in the afghan my grandmother made for Blake before he was born. (Back then it wasn’t common to know the sex of the baby prior to its birth, hence the use of all colors appropriate for a newborn.)

So, this afghan was made by Peter’s great-great-grandmother. If she had only lived eight years longer, she could have met her first great-great-grandchild. But she died in 2003 at the age of 103.

Proud parents with their baby:

The amazing mother who delivered this child without the use of any drugs and absolutely no screaming or hollering:

The delighted father doing a Lion King moment:

Back inside for more photos:

Then the subliminal messages started. All Gibsons must play chess:

But will Peter follow in his father’s footsteps and be an attorney?

2^nd Peter can be whatever he wants when he’s grown, because he’s already brilliant. He interrupted the photo session to practice his vowels:

The “o” sound is his favorite.

04 October 2011 (Tuesday)

Today Peter had his first professional photography session. Elisabeth’s sister Sarah is in town to see baby Peter.  She’s a professional photographer, and she does a lot of newborn shoots. 

While she was setting things up, I intended to ask her a bunch of questions. I quickly realized I didn’t know enough to ask intelligent questions. 

She graciously said I could take photos, too. So, I took this photo of one of her props—a hat:

Oh. I think she meant I could take photos of Peter. Here are a couple (that are almost in focus):

Here’s the blue bow on Blake and Elisabeth’s mailbox, the very bow Peter and I put on our mailbox when Blake was born:

If they ever get rid of that horse on their mailbox, I'll never find their house. Having the blue box on the mailbox also has been so wonderful.

Stay tuned for some photos from Sarah.