Big Shot

I don’t remember if I’ve mentioned this before, but in the past year, Matthew has come to really love wildlife photography. He spent most of last summer visiting places where he could take pictures of animals in their natural habitats. He has more pictures of birds than other animals, mostly because they are easier to find, but he has desires to find more wildlife for his photos. He even rented a professional quality camera a few months back and drove up to the bird refuge near Brigham City to spend a day nabbing some pics. He has a good eye and the patience to wait for the animals to appear, and his work has gotten really good. He took some pictures at a bird show last year and the non-profit who owns the birds uses his shots on their Instagram page. So, it’s not just me that thinks his work is good.

Last month a friend of Matthew’s told him that Herriman City was holding a wildlife photography contest. Matthew immediately decided to enter and spent several weeks combing through his portfolio trying to decide on which image to submit. He asked all of us for opinions and finally decided to submit a photo of a yellow headed blackbird, a picture that we all thought would be a fantastic option.

Our city is a small one and you have to be a resident of Herriman to qualify for the contest, so there were only about nine submissions. But as Matthew looked at some of the other images, he was sure that he would not win. He was looking at pictures taken by people with a lot more experience than he has and who own high end cameras that he certainly can’t afford right now. And yes, those pictures were amazing, but tonight the winners were announced, and Matthew won second place! There were cash prizes, which means he won $75, but that was not the exciting thing for him. Simply the fact that he won an award at all had him riding high! 

All the submissions will be posted in city hall for the week, which is not a super long time, but I’m thrilled that Matthew has gotten a bit of recognition for doing something that he loves and has a talent for. 

Butterflies Flutter By

There is a fairly new butterfly biosphere at Thanksgiving Point. We have been planning to visit for a while now, but scheduling has been tricky what with two teenagers going two different directions all the time. Kevin and I got to visit a butterfly habitat while we were in Texas, but the last one Matthew and Malia experienced was on our Seattle trip in 2016. Amazingly, we had no conflicts today, probably because it is a holiday and not a Saturday, so we bought our tickets last week and put our outing on the calendar. Matthew actually got there before this excursion as he and his friend Alex had a bounce back pass and visited last week, but he spent the whole time wishing he had the big camera and not just his phone camera, so he was more than happy to go again, the better camera in tow.

The traveling part of the exhibit featured beetles, and honestly, that was a bit creepy for me. I just don’t feel comfortable with the thought of beetles as big as my hand crawling around. Yes, I know that makes me kind of a wimp, but they give me the heebie jeebies. Not as badly as spiders do, but they still make my skin crawl. And yes, I purposely averted my eyes when we came across the exhibits containing black widows and tarantulas. 

I greatly enjoyed the butterfly portion though. There were some different ones than we saw in Texas, and I got to watch several butterflies emerge from their cocoons which was super cool. Matthew was in seventh heaven, taking pictures like crazy and experimenting with the camera to see how to capture the images he wanted.  On the other hand, Malia was a bit weirded out by the “flying bugs.’ She didn’t want them landing on her and she most certainly didn’t want to try to hold one on purpose. It kind of surprised me that she was so creeped out since I don’t have any adverse feelings where butterflies are concerned, but people are terrified of clowns too and I also don’t get that. To each their own aversions, I guess. 😂

Relaxation

Today was a low-key vacation day. Sometimes we get so many activities packed into our vacations that there isn’t a whole lot of time set aside for actual relaxation. One of our goals this time was to really just take it easy for a bit. So we ate breakfast at a leisurely pace (and that was only in part because the free hotel breakfast was not one of the better ones I’ve had and we were all a bit reluctant to consume the drier than the desert baked goods) and then drove over and walked the Cedar City temple grounds for a bit. That gave everyone an opportunity to take some pictures. Temples and flowers seem to be two of the kids’ most loved subjects to photograph and the temple grounds always have amazing greenery which makes it a “two birds, one stone” situation. After our jaunt to the temple, we played some games and just hung around until lunch time.

After lunch we attended our second show, the musical “Ragtime.” Kevin and I have seen this one before, but none of the kids have so it was a whole new experience for them. It was a long show, and a sad one, but it was enjoyed by all. Malia much preferred “Comedy of Errors” because it was funny, but she did a fantastic job sitting through the show and said that she liked it too. We ate dinner and then stopped at the grocery store to pick up ice cream that was safe for all, took it back to the hotel, and proceeded to eat way too much ice cream. Occasionally eating more dessert than normal is just one of those vacation things, right? We had a bit of a sugar coma after the ice cream and then we hit the pool for a late-night swim. Malia loves the pool and for her one of the perks of a hotel stay was access to the pool, so we all joined her for a dip. When we had swum long enough to have raisin fingers, Kevin and the kids headed out to do some star gazing. I was a party pooper for that activity though and stayed at the hotel for a bit of a relax before bed. It was late, after all, and I don’t do well with too many late nights in a row.

That may seem like far too many activities to make it a relaxing day, but it actually was. We didn’t need to rush from one thing to the next or hustle through meals to make sure we time for everything. We did take time to play some games and just talk. It was a good day, enjoyed by all. And there was a surprisingly small amount of bickering between my quartet of offspring. That is always a sign that everyone is feeling pretty darn mellow.

And as a parting comment, we stopped in at the gift shop and did indeed find a “book of that” which is just the right reading level for Malia: Tales from Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb. Malia has already claimed dibs as the first reader.

 

Creating a Village Out of a Mountain

Today was gingerbread day and to completely honest, I was ridiculously excited. I think the kids were all excited as well. Even the “big boys” were anxious to get going. One of the things that has prevented me from committing to real gingerbread houses in the past is the fact that royal icing is not Matthew friendly. It’s that whole egg thing. And while buttercream is much tastier, it doesn’t have the holding power of royal icing. But I was determined to at least try to make a stable cookie house, so I searched Pinterest and found several egg-free varieties of royal icing. I selected one and figured if it didn’t work, we could fall back on the less stable buttercream and at least have an entertaining time attempting to make our houses stand. And if they fell down, we could just attribute it to a Christmas earthquake. And no matter what they looked like, they would taste good.

I have a weakness for cute sprinkles and candy eyes because they mesh well with my love of fun food, so we had a bunch of different options to work with. We also purchased several kinds of candy to use as décor and had some buttercream on hand just in case. Once I set the kids loose, the creativity (and the icing) began to flow. And guess what? The egg-less royal icing worked great! It set up hard, but not so hard you would crack a tooth attempting to eat it, which just happens to be one of my pet peeves about normal royal icing. I want my caloric delights to taste as amazing as they look. I mean, isn’t that the point of dessert? To taste good?

We had a wonderful time assembling our creations. And we made a lovely mess. And once we were done, the photoshoot started. During and after the decorating process, I took the requisite blogworthy pictures of each child with their creations, but Daniel went all out while I was cleaning up. We dug out a white sheet for a backdrop, Nathan helped him hold it up, and he went to town. There were pictures of every house from every angle. There were closeups and long shots. There were shots highlighting the wreaths, the Christmas trees, and the candy cane gardens. There were even a few shots of Lego Harry Potter and Lego Cho Chang taking a stroll through the snowy neighborhood. In short, he had a fantastic time making a pictorial record of our day’s work.

I loved today. It was amazingly fun. And being with my most important people in the world made it even better. We’ve all had a rough year but taking time for some whimsy and letting ourselves find joy in the simple things was yet another tender mercy. There is good to be found all around us. And even in an abnormal time, there is normalcy in gingerbread, frosting, and family.

 

 

Five Reasons I Love My Kids

1.When family picture time comes around, they don’t roll their eyes, they get excited. 

2.If I suggest they do a picture wearing face masks to commemorate this year’s hottest fashion accessory, not only do they comply wholeheartedly, they spontaneously decide to do some very serious Kung Fu on Covid.

3.When they are not in front of the camera, every single one of them is behind a camera capturing shots like this:

Malia

 

Matthew

 

Daniel

4.Over lunch, we had a good discussion about general conference in which they all participated.

 
5.After being trapped in our house for half of this year, they still love each other…and mostly even still like each other. 😉

Shutterbugs

As I may have mentioned in the past, all my boys have developed an interest in photography. And since he no longer spends all day every day taking pictures of school age children, Kevin’s interest in photography has been renewed. He has learned to love it again as a hobby rather than a profession. A few months ago, he discovered a nearby photography studio that rents their space for photographers. They don’t take any pictures themselves, but they provide drops, lights, props, etc. for photographers who don’t have a studio space of their own. He took pictures of all our parents there in the spring and when it was time for the kids’ yearly photoshoot (and Daniel’s senior photoshoot), he opted to rent a studio space again. He and the boys had a fabulous time. One of the fun things was that while Kevin was taking the serious photos, Matthew was taking behinds the scenes shots. This is the first time my kids have been able to shoot anything in a studio and they learned some things. End result? Some really great photos…and a morning well spent.