I don’t take as many “real” pictures as I used to. Pictures of my kids just doing their thing and not knowing I’m taking their picture. I feel I’ve gotten lost in making sure I’m following the rule of thirds and that I have the perfect lighting (or as good as I can do), etc.
My iPhone has a bajillion of selfies and funny pictures & videos of my kids being my kids but I have a new goal of getting my real camera out to take more pictures like that of them. Sometimes I’m afraid of the extra computer time …
Category: cousins
Lime Island – 2013
In August 2013, my dad took his favorite daughter and most of the grandkids (Shane, Lauren, Mallory, Liam & Carson) up north to Lime Island to go “camping”. My sister offered to let us take Cameron too but we were all set.
Lime Island is located in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in the St. Mary’s River and you can only reach it by boat. It took us like eight trips to get all of our crap across – no thanks to my engineer dad’s inability to do anything “rustic”.
We were camping in cabins without electricity and plumbing so my dad …
Minivan Concert ~ September 1, 2012
It is so helpful to always have a spare camera to record the impromptu concerts that may take place in your backseat.
Grandpa’s Field of Dreams
In the summer of 2012, I found this Fisher-Price thing that allowed you to use it as a tee (for t-ball), or have it pop the ball up to you, or lob it to you like coach pitch. My dad ended up buying it (because he is the biggest kid ever – remember the zip line in the back yard of his old house?) and that weekend organized a baseball game in his backyard. He bought bases and a pitcher’s mound too, and invited all of his grandkids over for a game.
Gigi took care of the concessions – providing …
Tobogganing
One of my dad’s favorite winter activities to do for the grandkids is to haul them around on a toboggan behind his tractor. Since we’ve had so much snow this winter (for fake), my dad takes the kids tobogganing when we only get just an inch or two of snow.
That happened back in January…and we all headed to Grandpa’s. Carson wasn’t a fan of tobogganing, especially after he fell off the toboggan on the first turn.
Lots of Cousins
We went to Chicago this weekend (more on that later) for a Cubs game (more on that later too) and got to meet up with lots of my cousins for dinner on Friday night.
The restaurant was noisy which was good for covering up my “not handling the time change well since we didn’t eat dinner until 8p Michigan time” kids but not good for trying to catch up with my cousins.
It was fun to see everyone though, and we’ll see them all again in October when Michigan plays at Northwestern!
Imam (my cousin Whitney’s boyfriend), my cousin Whitney, my cousin Rory, …
Brave Girl
Father’s Day / Sunday June 19, 2011 / Clear Lake Michigan
Guest Post by Grampa
This Father’s Day, I took my favorite daughter {Samantha}, my two favorite granddaughters {Lauren & Mallory} and two of my favorite grandsons {Liam & Carson} to my co-worker Judi’s house on Clear Lake. Two other little girls that were at Judi’s house (her granddaughter Brynn [7] and her friend Mia [5]) wanted to go tubing so I said I’d tow them around the lake a few times with my boat. My favorite granddaughters Mallory and Lauren wanted to ride in the boat also, and the adult spotter …
The Baby Boys
My sister & her husband had stuff going on yesterday so I was supposed to watch Lauren & Cameron for the day. Mallory & Lauren were excited to have a whole day together.
When my mom got here with all four of Emily’s kids (Shane was headed to a friend’s house for the afternoon, and my mom was going to take Liam) – Lauren & Mallory decided they wanted to go shopping with my mom & Liam, which left me with just the two baby boys – Carson and 8-mo old Cameron.
I almost had to call in reinforcements to help hold …
Punta Cana–the end
Here are the last of the pictures from our big vacation. We had a great time – once we got past the leaky ceiling and long day of travel. We spent all day everyday at the pool, except when we were at the snack bar or lunch buffet eating enormous amounts of french fries, pizza or nachos with nasty liquid cheese. My dad & Emily did go scuba-diving one day, and the grown-up boys went deep-sea fishing (Rick also did some deep-sea puking…)
Um, can you say sunburn? My only sunscreen screwup of the week…
Me & my darling sister.
My mom. She …
More from my Zoo
Mallory: “Mom, what time is it?”
Me: “10.46.”
M: “Hmm. That’s weird. 10.46? That’s really weird.”
* * *
Mallory saw me holding Cameron one afternoon at the pool and immediately her baby radar picked up on it. “Mom! Can I hold baby Cameron?” I told her that later, after she got out of the pool, that she could hold the baby. That night at dinner, Mallory went over to my sister. “Um, Aunt Emily? Um, can tomorrow, um, can I hold…?” Emily interrupted her and said “do you want to hold him right now?” Mallory was in heaven.
* * *
Her cousin Lauren is …