Family photos...

So I did fall behind on the uploading of family photos...
Just a little bit... Since March that is..

Here are all family photos that I finally got uploaded:

Family photos June 2009

Family photos May 2009

Family photos April 2009

In these changing times...

As you may have noticed we are in the packing/cleaning up/painting/moving mode and sometimes we find a few items here and there.

One of them sure tells you about how times are changing.

Emma got a tape from Jacki and was happy as can be since it was a tape called best friends with happy music.

When putting her to bed (me having forgotten all about the tape) she kept talking about the music that will make her sleep soo good and well I sure didn't have a clue...

The music was coming from the tape which I guess in a close to five year olds mind is something "magical". She put the tape on her jewlery box and a feather on top of it (the player) and she was "listening" to the beautiful music...

Now give her a CD, DVD, IPod, computer and she will know exactly what to do with it. A tape though... yeah that's in the magical item category. I just wonder what she would do with an LP (yeah I still have them)

Outsmarted...

As any good dad I am trying to read to Emma each night and sometimes you come across books that will teach good things.

So as I am reading princess manners (a Disney book) and come to the part where Cinderella cleans up her crafts before starting a new craft I thought that I was really clever :-)

Before reading it I scan the page and make a slight change to it. "Cinderella is good at cleaning up all her toys before getting out a new toy to play with...". Bear in mind that the book ends with "this is how princesses are. Wouldn't YOU like to be a princess???".

So you can see I am thinking this is a really good point since I know Emma wants to be a princess and they clean up their toys before getting a new out :-)

Emma's response though... "Yeah, I'm still working on that!!!". No kidding. That is exactly what she said... I wasn't quick enough to hmm "handle" that one...

It was the day after Christmas... (sort of..)

So Jacki posted a blog entry on the day after Christmas and I figured I would add a little to it as well...

Starting off Emma got a dress from her sister Emilie (in DK) and she really really liked it a lot. Couldn't get the thing off her and she was more than willing to pose... (I guess I should be somewhat concerned... hmm...)



A really great thing about Christmas is that Jacki baked as you may have read on her blog. One of her creations were these cookies (sorry they are gone by now).



ohh and for table decoration. One of Emmas favorites was the Christmas candle. It is kind of pretty.



Along with the meal we got boller. Just one of those easy things from DK. It's not much but when you get them nice and warm from the oven with a wee bit of butter they are good :-)



Ohh and as you may also have read. Emma got a new dog. This one with it's own little bag, comb, treats and pink bow in the hair. So this will be Francine (for now anyway). That naming started off when we went to Ohio for Thanksgiving and Aunt Judy got a new dog. Franco... so when Emma got home she had a little Franco and now a Francine (pink bow in the hair it must be a girl). (ohh here is Emma with the "real" Franco)



Ohh before I forget. For Christmas I got a new lens for the camera. I didn't really talk about it that much. Just about a couple of times a day for 2-3 months or so.
The old standard kit lens is ok but it does have issues with low light, clarity and sharpness compared to fast glass (ohh and yeah the sand from the beaches in DK didn't really help much... hmm).

Anyway the lens I got is this Sigma 17-70mm HSM Macro for my Nikon. If you want to read more about it you can find it here



Anyway. With this new lens I could capture a large part of the living room in low light (after bed time) hand held and not end up with one big blurry mess. The after unwrapping mess was quite enough ;-)



And speaking of capturing photos hand held in low light situations. Here is one from Emma sleeping in here tent. It's a hand held photo taken with nothing but the night light (yeah well and a slight boost to ISO 800).



Another shot I got was on Christmas day visiting with the peeps. This is from the deck as the sun was setting (yeah it was cold...)



As you can see Jacki is not the only one cooking. Here is my dear mother in-law cooking and getting some support in her hard work ;-)



One of the nice things about the new lens is experimenting with the wide angle part of the focal range. One could as an example get on the floor and capture the nephew chasing a ball like this.



Or literally get really close up and in peoples face (almost touching) to get shots like these (ps. don't tell Jacki about these photos...)



Another try with the low light and longer speed captures is this one of the train under the Christmas tree.



And finally (yeah I am going to loose a man-card on this one)...
Here is a cute reminder of what Christmas is all about



To all a Merry Christmas and happy New Year!!!!

Making of a Christmas photo

Creating the Christmas photo of the year is always an interesting adventure. It looks so easy when all you see is the finished result.

However getting the right idea and setup is just the small issues compared to getting a toddler to "play-along" with the idea and "vision"....

Just to illustrate it. Here are a series of photos from the making of the Christmas photo.

Illustration and showing what to do is always a good place to start. So mom is showing Emma what to do with all the weird stuff dad put up.

Just look in the box to see what's in there... like this



What's in there??? I don't see anything? what is it, what is it...



And a little game of peek-a-boo... well why not ;-)



Some times when you tell the most famous toddler to look what's in the box... well you know she was looking to see what she could find. Since she couldn't see much in it... yeah .... go digging ;-)

But daaaad you told me to find something in the box...



Ok Emma.... Just look in the box like this and sit still while doing it. Maybe even put on a little smile :-)



gggg I am done looking in that box.... come on.... It's EMPTY!!!!



ok ok so we are done.... Here is the resulting (picked) photo.



ohh btw. it isn't all just torture... there is a little bit of fun in there too...
like doing a little dress up



and using the timer to get both of us (yeah that's a cheese stick in her hand)




That's a wrap... eh... hmm no phun intended ;-)

What happened to November...

November sure was the month where it started getting cooler around the Northern Virginia area and the amount of outside time is going down a bit every time it gets colder...

Here is a few shots of what we did during November.

Fist up we did have a trip to the park. Emma loves going there and in particular the playground. There is just something about toddlers and swings... (more here)


We also took a trip to D.C. visiting museums and in particular got to see the live butterfly exhibit. (more here)



Getting closer to Christmas we did start setting up in the studio for some picture taking. Now Emma is good for some 10-15 minutes in the setting up part. Then after that she is like a high paid model.... That's it... no more pictures...



And then of course we had the Thanksgiving drive to Ohio to visit family. Turns out there were a bit of snow in the mountains :-) (here is Jacki's start of the story)



And you know... I threw this one in here because... well how can that be anything but cute :-)

Driving to school

Having a long commute can sometimes bring up a few fun comments on the way.
As you may have noticed on Jacki's blog we have been out looking at houses and Emma has been with us.

So driving to school this morning we are at a red light and well being slightly late guess what I am thinking about traffic and all that....
Not Emma...
Emma: (seeing a nice little bright blue house) Dad, can we buy that house?
Me: naaa I don't think so Emma it's not for sale.
Emma: But dad I want to buy that house.
Me: Well I guess the people like living there and don't want to sell it.
Emma: We can just call Gloria (our Realtor) and she will take us in there and show it to us.
Me: Well if it's not for sale we can't buy it and I think we should look somewhere else (thinking it's right next to the road and all that).
Emma: I can just play outside in the back so I don't get on the road.
Me: Now that sounds like a good idea. We don't play on the road.
Emma: No and if I have to pee I can just turn around and walk on the porch around the house and go inside to pee.
Me: ...
Emma: Dad look at that plane taking off...

ohh yeah she does talk a lot and notice just about anything...

End of the weekend :-(

So it's Sunday night and the end of the weekend.

Saturday it was raining and Sunday we got a little shopping done. Amongst all of it there was a few funny moments. And yeah Emma was the source of them ;-) As some of you may know (yeah not really a big secret) I do a bit of photography. And I just printed a few of the two kiddos on canvas to try something new and different. So as Emma was standing there looking at it I asked "sooo should we sell it?". Kids have a sometimes different view so being asked that question Emma started laughing and once done "nooo we can't sell the picture" quickly followed by "you can't sell pictures... that's silly..." hmm yeah okei... moving on... As we were going through Kohls shopping Emma was quite full of energy (hmm). So as I am sure many parents have tried she was getting "the look"... Emma tilted her head and commented with a "and what's that look for???" She also got a new word. Not that she really understands it but it does seem to hit the spot a certain times. Such as when I want her to do something and she puts her hand on the hip and does that girls head tilting thing saying "let's compromise..." I'm thinking come on now... you are 4 years old... ahh well. As I mentioned it was raining Saturday so we did watch a couple of movies. One of them (repeated a couple of times) was Winnie the Pooh. I know it may be slightly strange but I came to thinking. If I was a pooh character which would I be... I think it would probably be Rabbit. You know there has to be a plan for everything to be followed strictly (not that that ever happens... but still). How about you? If you were a Pooh character which would you be?

Vovici Online Survey Software

ohh yeah here is one of the shots from the impromptu studio session with the kiddos ;-)



Have a great start on the week everyone :-)

Første dag efter ankomst - First day after arrival

Just arrived in Denmark in the morning after a long trip with a full day ahead of us we were heading off to my parents home. In Denmark we use flags slightly different and use it when ever there is something to celebrate.

So getting in the drive way there was flags here and there and every where. Sooo good to be back home in good ole DK :-)



Being lunch time we got the table set in the usual quick lunch time way. It's with rugbrød and toppings looking something like this.



As you can see the kitchen can become quite a busy place when the "kids" come home. My sister and family joined us for dinner so here we all are getting things ready. Of course the little ones got placed at the table first with a plate so they could get started.



Every day has been nice and comfortable. Not too hot and not too cold. No rain either so everything is perfect for getting around to see things. Be that a trip around the country or just taking a walk.

Imagine you can actually get a rainbow without rain...



As some will know. Danes drink coffee so here we are at the evening coffee. Some at the table and others playing on the floor.



First night at 11 pm I got this photo outside the house. Notice how much of a difference it makes that Denmark is somewhat further to the north on the globe. It didn't really get that dark or daylight last way longer than it does in the VA area.



It's weird I know... But for some reason I got up at 5.30am the next morning. Usually traveling east being jet lagged it should be hard getting up not hard sleeping... Anyway. Not being able to sleep and with the rest of the house out for a couple of hours to go I wen for a drive and took some photos from the viking grave yard.
In the year 1000 vikings were raising stones here for their dead... it's a loooong time ago...



Sounds like I was just full of energy but by the afternoon it caught up with me and I had a little nap on the back deck with a view of a sunny garden. The sun were nice and warm without being too hot and I didn't much of cars and traffic :-)



As you may have read on Jackis blog we finished off the first day going to the summer house in Amtoft and taking a stroll by the beach.
The national bird in Denmark is the swan and luckily we have quite a few of them. Here are a few photos from the beach and the view over the waters.



I am starting to experiment with panoramic photos and even though this one isn't as wide as most of the ones I come up with here is a pano seen from the harbor. If you check out Jackis blog and the map you can see more on the location ;-)