We use iPods for their white noise. Charlotte gets rain sounds and Cooper gets ocean sounds. They’ve (well Cooper has since he’s taller) learned how to disconnect the iPods from the docking stations. They love to play with all the buttons and they often put them to their ear and pretend to talk on the ‘phone’. Very cute.
These were sort of boring photos so I wanted to play around with editing. I modified Coffeeshop’s butterscotch vintage action to come up with the following edits.
They both threw tantrums the entire dinner. They also didn’t appreciate having a picture taken during their tantrum. I hate days like these.
I think Cooper might be tired of me taking pictures.
The joys of having two toddlers includes the extensive mimicking that occurs in our house. This is Charlotte’s take on Cooper’s lettuce leaf. (I really wish I had gotten this front facing and had better focus. I am still adjusting to the weight of my new zoom lens).
I’ve given up on ‘studio’ photos where I set things up with a backdrop. It’s stressful and frustrating, and it’s not really my style at all. So we went outdoors to a nearby apartment complex that has beautiful gardens and a putting green and took some photos.
We did the same thing last year. This is my favorite from last year…taken with my Sony Cybershot and edited in Picasa. (It’s a bit underexposed and cool for my tastes now.)
Re-edit
Here is a sample of this year’s photos. I still have several more to edit, but these are my favorites so far. (With toddlers you don’t get a choice of which shoes they wear. Cooper apparently is a California boy through and through.)
It was a very warm day today so I decided to fill up their water table. Their interest in that lasted only a few minutes once Cooper figured out it was a lot more fun to play with the hose. Cooper officially learned how to use the water hose….on Charlotte. These aren’t the best photos, but they capture the moment and that’s what I was trying to do (without getting my camera wet since he also learned to turn the hose on me!). At least she’s water baby and has just as much fun getting sprayed, as Cooper enjoyed spraying her!
She would run in the house and he would continue spraying her. She would spin all around and close the door and shutters to try to protect herself from the water. It was absolutely hilarious.
Before dinner we enjoyed playing with the hose on the patio. Cooper doesn’t listen very well yet, so I was super nervous to allow water anywhere close to the camera. I had to tell him a million times which way to point the nozzle before I would turn the water on. Then I had to be on the lookout for when he forgot and turned back toward me.
Charlotte’s attempt at the water hose.
While Cooper let me know that the water needed to be turned on first. He doesn’t even need to talk, you can ‘hear’ him ask for it with his face.
So happy he’s figured it out and that the water was on.
I love how she laughed so hard when Cooper would spray the water.
So happy!
Then Cooper decided it was time to show mommy that he is very much a boy.
At first he thought it was funny.
Then he realized it didn’t taste so good. (The angle is a bit off here, but his face is perfect!)
Cooper has learned to close the sliding door, but he can’t get it open again. He locked them out on the patio and I thought it made some cute photos. I used PW Black and White to convert them, but adjusted all the layers to my liking.
Again, can you hear him yelling ‘momma, help!’?
Charlotte looks very worried here.
And she just looks so sad here.
Still catching up on posting. We took a morning stroll to central part to feed the ducks and then have cinnamon rolls at the local cafe in the park. It was a bit of a dreary morning with a lot of cloud cover, which made it very easy to take photos. However it also made my photos look very cool, so I had fun editing. I tried some different things and I thought I would show some before and after, since I don’t do that very often.
All of the before pictures are straight off the camera. In general I took the following steps:
