loving this warm weather!

yesterday i shipped off my old camera (canon rebel XTi) along with some other ebay items. i hope the camera's new owner loves it as much as i did (once upon a time). ashton thought he would help by crawling and standing on top of the boxes. thank goodness i had my camera near by. anytime he does something like this and i run to get my camera he stops whatever he is doing.

then we went outside for some water table fun! although in this picture ashton doesn't seem to be very impressed with it, but i promise you it was a hit.

see!! i told you!

then ashton told me a story...

he's so expressive with his hands!

it was a gorgeous day. afterward i packed up my little bunny (complete with tail and david) and headed to the botanical gardens for an easter shoot. toddlers are really hard to photograph but i was able to muster up a few images that are worth sharing (will post in different post).

oh and i reserve the right to have a change of mind. i know i blogged about getting a 24-70L zoom lens. but i've been struggling with the fact it's f-stop is at 2.8 (i'm a bokeh addict) and some owners/users are implying that it's not worth the $800 more than what the tamron zoom lens cost. soooooo, i might just get the 35L. i rented it last fall (on my crop camera) and LOVED it! i need a wider angle that is good in low light (now that i got rid of my flash) that is capable of amazing bokeh and sharp sharp sharp. i don't think i can ever be a zoom girl. i think my heart is set on primes. i don't know. i'm not in a big huge rush really to get the lens. ok i lied. i am in a rush. i just don't know which to do. :o(

PS. i am having seller remorse selling my 50mm. :o(

100% pure joy! and some video too.

his face says it all! ashton can go down the "toddler" slide by himself! and boy is he proud.

can't you just feel the JOY!?

he couldn't stop grinning.. he lovessss slides (you can see he still has NO teeth at 15months!)

I AM...

GOING TO...

EAT HIM!!!

really.. ashton truly loves slides. i found this park for workouts and it has one of the most amazing trail systems ever. we go here almost 5 times a week. he starts squealllllling the second he sees the playground. then he gets upset because we still have a ways to walk before he can get out and well that's no fun for either of us. but it's worth it!

PS. i love baby squats....... a lot. as much as ashton loves slides!

PSS. please enjoy this photo of ashton sampling the dirty (probably has 10 different kinds of animal feces) sandbox. he gagged. it's okay to laugh. we did. ;o).

PSSS. VIDEOS! (at the request of my mom). first one is of him going down the big kid slide. the second video is actually TWO videos merged together. i'm not sure how that happened exactly and frankly i am too lazy to figure it out. so the first part is ashton going down the toddler slide by himself (such a big boy ::tear::) and the second is ashton being.. well ashton. :o). the annoying high pitched noise is me. sorry about that.

yay! spring finally made it!

pulled the rest of the weeds today and mowed the lawn. looks so nice and inviting now. can't wait for the bluebonnets to show up.

practice makes perfect.

i know i posted this a long time ago. but i promised i would share some pictures from my good friend tara's maternity session. if i could go back and do it all over i would have had the light (from the window) on her side and not from the front. the shadows would have showcased her cute belly bump. i was unaware there is a thing called flat light. but that's why you do these kind of practice shoots. to learn from your mistakes. lol. either way she enjoyed the pictures... plus it was free. i also wish we had more time to go out to the gardens so i could get more natural shots. but bless her heart (literally). this pregnancy hasn't been easy for her. she really really wanted some maternity shots with her in jeans and that's what we did. i can't wait for her baby boy to finally arrive so i can practice some more. i wasn't able to with ashton since at the time i lived in a tiny apartment with NO light. now i live in a big house with tons of light ha. figures. PS. if i did this over. i would have gone with seamless paper and not fleece. photoshoping out the wrinkles was a PITA. and even now looking at them i still missed some spots. ugh. i processed all images in lightroom then in CS3 for sharpening and to fix wrinkles. settings all over the place.

i've been busy around here (ebay, spring cleaning, chasing a very mobile toddler around. no kidding i caught him standing on our dishwasher door getting into the clean dishes this afternoon! yadda yadda yadda). which is why i haven't really updated. that and the fact i sold my lenses (!!!) so now i only own the 85mm and it's a bit long for indoors. gah. now i just need money to buy the zoom. i'm still a few hundred short. not sure what i will do but it will work out. :o/ i hope. and mandy, thank you thank you thank YOU for lending me your backdrop stand. i know i've said it a million times but tara wouldn't have these pictures had you not let me borrow your backdrop stand. love you!

ashton used to hate bathtime...

not anymore!

i can't believe it. but the above images were done without a speedlight (at night!). i almost regretted selling the speedlight since i mostly used it for bath time. i am relieved now that i know i am still able to capture cute bath shots with ambient light.

P.S. today it snowed.... again. i am ready for spring already!

photo info:
canon 5D
85mm 1.8
SS - 1/200-250
ISO - 800
f/1.8

happy st. patty's day!

i had something completely different in mind but ashton wasn't having any of it. so, $1 worth of stickers, white onesie, and a green blanket = st. patty's day pics. :o) which almost didn't even happen. ashton didn't want to sit still for the pictures. so i gave him a yummy earth sucker (above). btw. they are SO good and probably the healthiest suckers out there. they are made from 100% organic ingredients, no corn syrup, gluten, wheat, dye, tree nut, peanut, GMO, soy, and diary free. 100% natural flavors. i have a stash of them but i'm on a diet where i can't have sugar :o(. i probably shouldn't have given one to ashton because he was bouncing off the walls this evening and we only let him have it for a few minutes. ANYWAY. some outtakes. before and after the sucker. fun stuff i tell ya! they are never too young for a little bribery! ;o)

PS: a picture of ashton one year ago today ;o)

big FAT fail.

ashton refuses to drink cow milk. i've pretty much tried everything except for formula. i had some free stuff laying around (toddler formula) and thought i might try it. if he liked it i could mix it with some cow milk and wean him (don't get me wrong i enjoy nursing, but he is only nursing in the mornings, nap, and bedtime for short periods. hardly enough). it didn't exactly work out. he was begging for something to drink (pointing to his sippy cup on the counter) so i handed him the formula. he took one sip. looked confused... well more like, "WTH IS THIS CRAP?!", started coughing (slight gagging. i'm not kidding), and threw it across the floor. okay lol. that didn't go so well. but i thought i would leave it out for an hour just to make sure. after an hour and realizing the sippy cup i put it in has a tendency to leak, i went to pick it up before it leaked everywhere. i could not find it anywhere! i looked in his room. the kitchen anywhere ashton has access too. then i checked the oven drawer.. and there it was. ashton hid it. he has never hid anything before. i went to grab the camera (i document anything). ashton was still pointing to his sippy cup of water sitting on the counter and followed me into the kitchen thinking i was finally getting his message. he saw his other sippy cup where he left it and excitedly went to it.

i thought.. he was either going to drink MILK on his own OR i get to capture him gagging on it.

he didn't gag but he remembered how horrible it was. you can see the disgust all over his face (view sightly larger). he promptly placed the sippy back into the oven drawer..

and shut the drawer! LOL. i was laughing so hard. poor kid. ::sigh:: i don't know how i am going to get him to drink cow's milk. i ended up giving him some water where he drank as if he hadn't had water in ages.

50 1.4 vs 85 1.8

shot with 50mm

a few weeks ago i realized i would need a zoom. problem is i don't have any money to purchase a zoom. ashton is getting to the point where i can't step back very far to take a picture without him walking out of my reach, and although I LOVE my primes it's just too much effort to step back to get a shot i want. the only way i can afford a zoom (i am getting the 24-70L) was to sell both my primes. it killed me to get rid of them. i debated back and forth for TWO WEEKS. talked about it non-stop with my friend mandy (also a photographer. probably drove her nuts). finally it hit me last night. keep ONE prime and sell the speedlight instead. i hardly ever use my flash. you look back on my blog and it's hardly ever been used. i consider myself a natural light photographer anyway. i could always rent one if i needed it for vacation or a certain shoot (it's way cheaper to rent vs. a lens that's for sure!). plus with my 5D, high ISO is pretty damn decent. now my problem was which prime to get rid of? today i took both out to the botanical gardens and did a mini shoot to figure out exactly which one i should stick with. i'll tell you now, i am keeping the 85mm 1.8.

how i made my decision was based on how fast it AF, which lens is sharper, and bokeh/DOF quality. not only is the 85mm better built. it's USM is SILENT, unlike the 50mm 1.4. something i really like. i also noticed in lightroom that color was even better on the 85mm. something i hadn't noticed before. mostly i had fun shooting with the 85mm. i knew the second i started shooting with it this evening it was the lens i would keep. here are my comparisons:

i shot wide open on all images. both lenses have sweet spots (sharpest) but i wanted to know which was sharper and better performing wide open. no sharpening was applied to any of the these images. my camera doesn't apply sharpening when i shoot RAW, so i am pretty amazed how sharp some of these images came out SOOC.

notice how smoother the background appears on the 85mm?

testing sharpness. 85mm is clearly sharper in all images than the 50mm. 50mm is pretty sharp but 85mm is even better.

100% crop of the above images:

testing DOF.. i prefer the look of 85mm (again). the background is very creamy compared to the 50mm.

so... yeah. the 85mm wins in my book. i'm so in love with this lens. i'm so happy i get to keep it!

here are some other shots (shot with the 85mm)that i just love. it was ashton's first time back to the botanical gardens since he learned to walk. it was very exciting for him. he loved every moment.