It's Been a While

So...now that Christmas is over, I have a little breathing room to provide an update. It was so nice to be able to spend time with my siblings, their spouses and the nieces and nephews. I love my family so much. With each passing event, I grow more thankful for who God chose to be my family. We'll be visiting Kong's family this coming weekend. Can't wait to see everyone.

Christmas was a very stressful for us this year. I was put in a very tough position with the photographer I was using for the girls pictures. I was extremely disappointed at the quality of the photos, the results of my Christmas cards and the professionalism of the photographer. I did not plan to write a Christmas letter this year as I was anticipating an amazing custom Christmas card but things did not turn out as planned. Though this photographer has a great eye, and takes wonderfully artistic photos, she seems to lack knowledge when it comes to the technical aspect of photography, how to run a business and work with customers. For the final products that she produces, amateur prices is more appropriate. There's too many issues to post so I'll spare you the details.

With the recent issues with this photographer, I decided to learn more about photography. I don't plan on ever taking pictures as a professional but I want to be able to take nice pictures of my girls so that I can do fun things with the photos. Here are a few of my attempts to understand the different settings on my own digital camera, lighting, etc...I tried to take pictures during the day time with natural light, and at night time. I wanted to see what type of images I could capture. It was fun and interesting.

Here's the same shot with a different focus.













Our Christmas tree.


















Taylor's first Christmas ornament.

Highs and Lows

Well...after waiting for a year to order my Williams-Sonoma Calphalon cookware, someone stole my stuff off of the porch. I can't believe someone would do that. Over $700. Gone. Just like that. The UPS people delivered the boxes yesterday and since Kong and I had an event and was in a rush, I forgot to tell Kong the boxes were outside. Sure enough, this morning, the boxes were gone. I checked with the mail man who confirmed that he saw the boxes yesterday but that he did not take them in error thinking they were boxes going out. I was frantic.

I called William-Sonoma and they are sending me a replacement set. I was so worried they would tell me there is nothing they can do about it. Thank goodness for William-Sonoma's outstanding customer service. It pays when you do business with people whose price is a true reflection of their products and services. This is not always the case as I recently learned.

On a high note or maybe not so high note, Kong and I attended an event yesterday for the Minnesota Lodging Association and someone did something really creepy to me. I stepped out of the ballroom to make a call to the sitter because we were running late and this guy attending the event walked out right after me. As he walked by me, he stared for a really long time in a really weird way. Then when I finished the call, he came back, stared and said, "You have really beautiful hair." I wasn't sure what to do with that so I said "Thanks" and tried not to make eye contact as he approached me. Well, either he was hitting on me in a really weird way or he is gay and truly does appreciate hair. Who knows.

But today, something else happened that made me truly proud of the hard work I've been putting into working out and eating right. On my way home from having a meeting with a client, I parked in front of the house instead of the garage and this red pick up truck with a bunch of guys drove by me and repeatedly honked their horn and cat called. I think it was directed at me seeing as I was the only person around. Though I probably should have been offended, I wasn't. It's nice to know people still notice me. I guess it helps that I was dressed up both times, and made modest attempts to look presentable.

It was a nice way to end my afternoon considering that I had $700 worth of goods stolen from me. Anyway, more to come tomorrow. I'm going to try to catch up on all that's happened since I haven't been updating my blog.