Fathers and Sons outing

So I should have realized he just turned 2, but oh well. I took Luke on his first Fathers and Sons outing last night in the mountains just east of Albuquerque. He was asleep when we got there so setting up a tent was easy. I zipped together two down bags and threw him in, sang to him and zipped up the tent to chat with the other dads a few yards away. He started crying about a half hour later. We were on a bit of an incline and looking in the tent there was this crying blob at the bottom of the sleeping bag; poor little guy. This morning it was super cold so he only took about 10 steps the whole trip.

This little face sums up his opinion of his daddy.

He finally cracked a smile when I put him back in his car seat. Rather than driving straight home, we took our truck down a dirt road which he liked. His only three words the whole trip were on that drive as he smiled. "Wow, truck, fun" over and over again... It was also not 45 degrees in the truck...

Queen of Sheba

In Florida we went to the ranch rodeo. We posted a bunch of pics (http://moregrowingpaynes.blogspot.com/2008/03/back-to-florida-friday.html), but just received a CD full of images taken by a professional photographer with his D3. Ths is the only one of our kids and we thought we would share this pic of Grandpa and Allie...
This is not Allie, but another little girl in the "mutton busting" where the kids try and hang on for dear life on a sheep. Maybe this will be Allie next time!
The big event for Allie and Luke was chasing baby pigs (see another post)
I couldn't help but post process the three photos above a bit-- this guy probably felt some voodo pricks when I did...

Pajama time for the Queen of Sheba recently:

OK dSLR fans: You may wish to check out a blog that I read for beginner technique. There is this guy in Washington state that owns a Canon 5D (same camera used to photograph Erin and KT's wedding) that goes over a bunch of basic technique and tells you exactly how he produced his shots. Even though the site is geared toward Canon dSLRS, 99% of the technique is portable to Nikon, Pentax or whatever. If you get around to it, reading though all of his posts is very helpful. Look at the print/IKEA frame combo he does for <$20... Start reading back in Feb... His blog is here: http://www.dslrcanon.blogspot.com/ It seems like not too many people know about it-- some guy in the South, Krista and I are some of the only ones who comment. He has an RSA feed setup too (we need to get around to that).

New Computer

We're working on setting up our new computer (a Dell refurb anyway). Here is a blast from the past to tide you over (looks like Jay to me)...It does not look like the Guatemalan outback. Where is this dad?

Happy Again

Jason here. Our little Lukie has sure been sick the last few days. He finally woke up feeling well this morning and ate his first real meal in three days (mom's pancakes). I have never been so thrilled to clean syrup off a little boy. Hopefully it stays down the hatch this time...

Merry Christmas to me!

For Christmas Jason ordered a copy in advance of The Host. It was released on Tuesday and my copy arrived today! I am loving it already! Yes, I know it is not classic literature... but it is so fun to read. By the way, Stephenie Meyer was named as Time's 100 Most Influential people.

Little Bits of Love

Monday night, for FHE, Jason fixed Allie's bike (a hand-me-down from the neighbors, not from the bike "swamp" as she called it). It was such an exciting long awaited day for her! She was so happy that she spontaneously gave her dad a kiss. And oh how that melted Jason's heart! It was really cute how touched he was. She was thrilled to practice riding around in the garage. So was Luke. We haven't had a chance to get outside and really give a go yet. Perhaps tomorrow. This is our morning routine. It started when we weened Allie. We got down to just the morning feeding with her and then replaced it with cow's milk. She would wake up and say "Leche cuddle". So we would get her milk in a sippy cup and cuddle on the couch and watch a little TV while we were waking up. Luke soon joined the same pattern. Now they just cannot get their day going without their morning cup of hot chocolate.

Kids love a routine (so do moms). Luke always has the red lid and Allie always has the yellow one. Allie tells us that almost EVERY morning that she wants the cup with Elmo swimming on it with a yellow lid and she wants it FULL. Funny how kids like to sit 7 inches away from the television. Honestly, they ususally sit on the couch (so they can cuddle with us).

Date with Daddy

Allie and I ran errands together yesterday. It was finally a nice day around here-- I guess we can't complain when Taylor & Krista in Logan and Vic & Molly in Park City still get snow.
We stopped at the tire shop on the way to a bike swap here in Albuquerque. I took our little Canon point and shoot. I never messed with the manual mode much other than to force flash or do long campfire exposures at night. Bored at the tire shop, I messed around a bit more. You can set quite a bit with these little cameras. I set the ISO to 80 (for utterly noiseless pics in bright light while still stopping down to f8 for sharpness) and the white balance to cloudy (on a clear day like this, cloudy warms up the photos as you can see). Here are some pics with force flash on all (Allie singing to a bunch of ugly tires). Check out her new haircut (nice job Joy; not thanks to you Wesley).
Messing around with tonal curves after the fact (Allie wanting to be held- ya right):
We did make it to the bike swap. I went so I could help 4 people buy road bikes. Evan Ottesen got a pretty good deal on his and my office mate got a nearly new Tiagra/105 bike like Jay's. Allie on the other hand was furious because we did not get over to the pink kid bikes fast enough. This one "only had 2 wheels" so she did not like it much other than the picture of Ariel, the Little Mermaid on the front. We have one the neighbor gave us; I need to put training wheels on it for her I guess.
We saw a bunch of people we know at the swap including my cousins Russ & Keri Payne who came by with their kids for PB&J at our house at the end of the swap... Maybe it will be Dad's turn at the swap next year?

Have you scrubbed your kitchen cabinets today?

Just a little update on life here. The house no longer smells of smoke. After having all the doors and windows open for two days after the fire, and sweeping, mopping, washing walls and scrubbing cabinets (wow- don't think I have ever done that. They needed it. Don't really want to do it again) the smell has faded and I really have to point out the burn mark on the cupboard. Really what I meant to update you on is the tomatoes. Of the seven that suffered through horrendous trauma, two have survived. One lost all of it's leaves- poor thing- but the little green stick is now sprouting news ones. I am hoping the rest of our garden starts to peek through by this weekend.

Luke's shirt, the white one he is wearing in his birthday post, is permanetly stained. After many spraying and washings it just isn't going to come all of the way out. My favorite stain remover I guess is not invincible. Now if he would just wear a tie again no one will know.

Those who got sunburned from the all birthday party Saturday (Allie and Jason) are now healed up but everyone came down with the annoying cold I came down with after our weekend of camping. Luke actually got a fever but now, other than their raspy voices (which that is much improved as well) they are all doing much better.

Allie and Luke still sleep in the same bed most of the time.

Now a little story. Wesley was in my room starting to fuss. Allie went in to sit with him and hold him (she is getting so good at that and he is happy to have her attention). All of the sudden I heard screaming crying so I rushed to see what the matter was. Allie was bawling! She said Wesley had pulled her hair. I looked at Wesley. He didn't say anything. And so trying to be understanding and trying not to laugh I explained that babies just do that sometimes. I told her that many mommys even cut their hair because their babies keep pulling on it. All the while I was thinking- really, it doesn't hurt that bad. Allie does have a sensitive head though. Finally Allie had started to calm down and Wes' fussing meant he was ready to eat. So as I got him into position I finally looked down at his hand and wrapped all around his fingers was this HUGE wad of hair!
Ok, so the photo doesn't do it justice. But I both felt terrible and wanted to laugh at the same time. Poor Allie. I also wanted to check her head for a bald spot. And the nerve of Wesley- still he said nothing. Yeah, that really would have hurt.

And lastly, I have a recipe to share. I love the challenge of using everything I buy. I had extra rice that needed to be eaten and also spinach that was getting wilty so we made this tonight:

SPINACH-RICE FRITTATA
2 tbsp. butter

1/2 c. onion, chopped

1 1/2 c. spinach, cooked & chopped

1 clove garlic, crushed

3 c. rice, cooked

1/2 c. Parmesan cheese

4 eggs, slightly beaten

1/2 c. milk

1 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. pepper

1 c. Mozzarella cheese, shredded
Saute onion in butter. Add spinach, garlic, rice and cheese; mix well. Combine eggs, milk and seasonings, stir into rice mixture. Turn into well buttered 2 quart casserole. Top with cheese. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until cheese is melted.

I should have taken a photo because it was really pretty. It was fast, easy and so YUMMY. Of Jay and Ilene's voting scale we gave it a 5! It is nice to have meatless meals every now and then and of course there is plenty of protein with the eggs. For those of you who don't know Jay and Ilene's rating scale it is this:

5- Can't wait to make it again

4- Will put it in the normal meal rotation

3- Good, but needs to be really cheap and easy to make it often

2- Probably wouldn't choose to make it again

1- Only Jay took leftovers to work

0- Coyote bait

I think everyone would agree that fresh tastes best but I have found that for some things, the cost and time factor can offset the taste factor (especially if it is so close) and so we may use frozen spinach instead of fresh for example. The recipe above would be great for that but I did happen to have "fresh" spinach as I mentioned.