In fourteen hundred ninety-two
Columbus sailed the ocean blue.

He had three ships and left from Spain;
He sailed through sunshine, wind and rain.

He sailed by night; he sailed by day;
He used the stars to find his way.

The first American?  No, not quite.
But Columbus was brave, and he was bright.

(this kinda lame poem was not written by me…….but that is my kid with his head in a barrel on the Pinta.)

In October I announced I was going to have a sale! 20% off, just for MOPS moms, in the month of November.  I booked several new customers.  Great news!  The very next week, a mom who is new to our group announced she is a photographer too!  And, will have a day where she does FREE family portraits in a local park!

And, I feel….unhappy about  this.   Now,  I have looked at her website and she is okay, but I think I am better.  I know that seems vain, but it is pretty obvious.   I know I must be getting more work than her because I would NEVER have time to do free portraits in the month everyone is getting their Christmas cards done.   I have had one family cancel, and I have no reason to think Photographer B is the cause.  But, it still makes me feel icky.

Is 20% too little a discount for women whom I love?  I am still dang affordable.  Should I have MADE time to do free portraits?  (I have three sessions booked for the day she is doing free shots.) Is this going to hurt my business?

It also makes me feel suspicious because she is doing them midday!  Outdoor portraits in the middle of the day?  Um. No.  Never.

Is there anything I can do? Anything I should do?   Grow up and welcome healthy competition?

So,  I declare it SPRING.  (Remember that episode of The Office where Michael Scott walks into the room and yells, “I DECLARE BANKRUPTCY!“) My yard may still be a dead and brown mud pit, my jacket may still be in regular rotation, but on my blog it will be warm and bright.  Have some flowers.  These were all taken at Keukenhof gardens, near Amsterdam, in April of 2007–pre-Nikon, mostly by me, but one may have been taken by the hubs.

Sigh.  Maybe we need to take up a collection to get me back to Holland.

p.s.  Grouchies are getting better–gonna step down again tonight.  The finish line is in sight!

The backyard looks so lonely.  Soon it will be a mud pit, and then we will be cursing how fast our grass grows. But, for now, I just miss hanging out barefoot in the grass.

The birds all disappeared.  For days there was no tweeting on our porch.  Then, yesterday, the sun finally peeked through and the birds popped out too, hungry for whatever they could find.

We threw snowballs, we made more snowcream, and, of course, we made snowmen.  Excuse me.  Snow PEOPLE.  Here is our snowlady.  She was ready to catch a ride to Destin, where the sand is as white as she is.  Poor thing’s head fell off because of faulty craftsmanship.  This  earned her the name Antoinette, but it has since been repaired.

We used the bottom half of last week’s snowman to make the middle of this one.  It had melted significantly, but still existed!   This is our rocker snowman–although what decade he rocked in I am unsure, he had eye make-up from the seventies, hair, gloves, and a guitar from the eighties, a shirt from the nineties, and piercings from the 00’s…..and strangely enough a Weiderkehr sangria bottle from a hardrocking party bookclub the night before.

A close up of his face shows an eye that reads less KISS and more country kitch, and an overly large tongue piercing.

The rumor is we have more snow coming tonight, tomorrow and again on Sunday.  I kinda hope not, because I think I am done with winter for this year–but just in case feel free to submit ideas for the next Huckablog family snow masterpiece.

First snow angel!

I think he was still in shock this was happening in our southern town.

“Mama, the snow won’t go on my tongue!”

There is nothing like snow days to have an impromptu play date!  W is getting huge already.

And this kid is way too cute for his own good.

I have a feeling we are going to have our hands very full!

This is O, three, one of our neighbors on the other side.

Her brother L, is five and such a ham!

On the second day we decided to drive the two miles to my parent’s house to have fun in their “un-played in” snow!  They also had the ingredients for snowcream, and the grocery stores here had BARE shelves.

First up, a snow man!  The whole family helped, even the reclusive JHJ.

I can not believe I posted a picture of myself with no makeup.

You know that my dad is a car junkie right?  We decorated our snowman exclusively with things from his garage.  His name is Greasey.

That beard really needs to go!

See that sled my baby is on?  It was my Grandpa’s when he was a little boy.  That is fourth generation tushie sitting on that sled.

Little punk hit me with a snowball!  So I tackled him and covered him with cold kisses.

The Snowcream was delish and no one was injured during the snowball fight. (no pics of that, too dangerous for my camera!)

It was a good weekend, but not good enough to move north of the Mason Dixon.

Some of the photo credits from day two go to JHJ and The HUbs, but I have no idea who took what, so good job guys!

There will be a post with more words than pictures and this month’s postcard soon, I promise.

This makes me happy. Good choice.

Exactly a year ago my hubby made the choice to buy me a very nice camera because he had faith in me.

That made me ecstatic.  A VERY good choice.

I offered to take a zillion and a half pictures of people’s kids. For free.  I spent HOURS processing them, and agonizing over tiny details instead of sleeping.

This made me tired.  Poor choice.

A few people told me I did not suck, that I needed to be charging, that I could do it.  This made me feel encouraged so I chose to throw up a website.

This made me feel intimidated and scared, so I have yet to make it live.  Probably not a great choice.

I am not happy with how my pictures turn out when printed if you must know the truth.  No matter what I do, they seem dark when professionally printed, and I can’t sell something printed at Wal-Mart.  The Husband says I need a professional grade monitor.  I hate to spend MORE money on a hobby that has yet to even pay for a lens, much less the rest of my equipment.

That choice has yet to be made.

I enjoy taking pictures.  I love seeing people thrilled with what I have done.  I know this is a good creative outlet, and that it is good for my soul to be creative.

I choose to have fun doing something I never expected to be good at.   Correct choice.

Should I scrap the photography website/business, and just take pictures of people’s kids for free and have fun, and not spend more money, and not feel bad if the pictures are not as good as I know they could be?  Should I do what it takes to be better than good, to make a little money, to be more than just a hobbyist?

I need help with this choice.

What was that?  Oh, it seems my one remaining reader (hi mom!) wants to see some Christmas pictures before we move on.  Okey-doke.  Christmas is a week long affair which covers several houses for us.  Christmas Eve  morning we make Reindeer food.  The Son and I have been doing this for three years now, and he enjoys it even more each year.

We usually try to invite friends over for this, so of course H was a must.

Recipe for Reindeer food:  Cheap oats, a bunch of  ‘em.  A cupish of sugar for each kid to dump in.  Whatever food stuffs you have laying around that a deer might eat.  This year we added Honey Nut Cheerios and some popcorn.  We have thrown in baby carrots and veggies in the past.  Next a handful of “Christmas Spirit” stars aka, red and green sweet tart stars from the dollar store.   Stir well.  THIS IS THE LAST TIME YOU CAN TASTE IT!  I had to say that a few times this year.  Okay then add a full container of  EZfly sparkles  (glitter).   Stir again.  NO EATING EZFLY SPARKLES! No! SON! NO EATING.  I don’t care if you want to fly too!  H! No, it is not funny! Stir some more.  Normally we would then go dump it on the driveway for the reindeer to eat but, this year it was raining (MONSOON!) so we left it in its bucket on the front porch.  Christmas morning the food is gone and snowy deer feet are in it’s place but see above about the rain. Instead the deer  just made a mess on the porch.

After that we all have a nap and then get ready for church.  The Husband, The Son and I were in charge of lighting the Christ candle in the advent wreath–and that went…um, well I guess.  No one ended up in the burn unit.  Halfway through my reading The Son said, “Mama! Ssssh!  We have not put fire on the white one yet!” really loud and made the whole church giggle.

Then we ate yummies with church friends and family and went home to get ready for Santa.

There was Christmas morning at our house, but I only took one blurry picture because I was busy opening presents and such.   Santa brought Buzz and Woody and we got the kid some educational games and such.  Oh! And I got my flash for my camera!   Poor Husband got floor mats for his car.  That was Christmas one.

Christmas two: Down the road, still in our jammies, to my parent’s house.  There it was really all about one thing.  One very big thing.

Here is what happens when an only grandchild says he wants a rocket he can ride in to a semi-retired, mechanical engineer.  All twelve feet of it now resides next to the swing set in our backyard.

Then over to Baby Arwen’s house for her very first birthday!  Can you believe she is one?  Me either.

Next morning we all slept way in and then headed west to the new elderbutnotold Huckablog compound for Christmas three.  What you see here is something my child has wanted for a very long time.  His very own rolling suitcase.  He has been pulling it around and announcing he is getting on a plane to the North Pole.

His Gigi and Pappaw also got him this HUGE talking Rex.  He is very cool, but we learned the hard way to turn him off or when the dog barks Rex’s chatting scares all of us!  In the background you can see S, BiL’s friend.  We all loved her, and are very sad she is back in China now.

This guy is the saddest though.  Oh! he made me YamiYami sauce for Christmas.  I already finished the jar.

Christmas four was with Shoeshe at AlmaMater–um, really it was at a Chuckie Cheese near Alma Mater.  It was my first AND LAST time in one. Mr. Cheese will just have to get along without my family.  There are no pictures of that because I was busy losing tokens left and right.

The final Christmas of the year was in Kentucky to see my Ma.  The only time my camera left it’s bag was on our field trip to Mammoth Cave.  It was big.  Really, Really BIG.  And this one sad blurry picture is all I got of my little trooper who climbed the entire trail, up and down all zillion and a half steps.

This was great–but concerning because of the big holes.  REALLY BIG BOTTOMLESS PIT TYPE HOLES.

Oh, and the huge jagged rocks of death were a wee bit concerning too.

Luckily his daddy never let go of his hand.  His daddy also never watched where, or when, his own head was about to ram into yet another low passageway.  Oh, see all that green stuff?  I thought they were lichens or something, but judging from the fact that I have had a migraine for the last five days and the only thing I am allergic to is mold and mildew–I am thinking it may not have been just lichens.

This is my cousin (actually cousin once removed, but who’s counting) Kenders.  Isn’t she pretty?

She is Gabs’s sister.  Gabs you know right?

So these two sisters are less than 18 months apart in age.  Gabs lives with my Ma  (Gabs’ great grandmother) and Kenders lives with my Aunt, who is her Grandmother.  Ya following this?  According to the adults in these girl’s lives, these girls hate each other. I spent the day with them, and they were perfectly darling to each other.  I think they are just normal teenage sisters who sometimes behave like the insane creatures we all were when teenagers.   I say this to my adult relatives–Stop putting your issues off on your kids.  The end.

And so ends Christmas 2009.  New Years Eve was spent on our way home and we celebrated midnight kissing in our entryway surrounded by suitcases.

Now that you are all caught up about us, what have you been up to these past two weeks?

This is what I was going for, but it was too cheesy-and, that is really saying something because I love cheesy-so I went with a family beach picture instead.

I decided enough was enough and bossily demanded a photo session on Thanksgiving.

MMiL?  I know that today is your birthday, but having lovely pictures of you was such a gift to me.  Thank you and Happy Birthday!  The top one is getting printed and put on the mantle ASAP.