the sweetest thing

It was such a nice day here today!  I went to a wedding shower this morning, and when we pulled into the hostess’ neighborhood, I saw a great field of weeds wildflowers.  Our afternoon/evening was wide open, so I gussied the kids up and headed to the field to get some pictures.

Let me just say, for the record, that I really love taking pictures for other people.  Really love it.  But taking pictures of my own kids?  Don’t love it so much.  Love my kids…no doubt about that…but I find it so much harder to take pictures of them!  I flat out offered Connor and Logan $1 each if they would just listen to me, cooperate, and have fun.  We did have some moments of fun and got a handful of cute pictures.  But we also had many moments like this.

I feel your pain, sister.  I feel your pain.

When I got back home, I was feeling very frustrated and hungry (which is never a good combination.)  I was so happy when I downloaded the pictures and saw several that brought a smile to my face.  And while most of these won’t be enlarged or put in a frame, I love them.  And that’s what photography is all about for me.  It’s not about the perfectly posed picture.  It’s about capturing my kid’s personalities in a still frame.

No children were hurt in the following picture.  You go, Camryn.  She holds her own, that’s for sure!  And the bored look on Connor’s face cracks me up!

I love this next one.  My kids are for real a crazy bunch of little people, and this just captures it perfectly.

Sweet brothers.  Today was one of those days where they were the best of friends.  I wish I could say that is normally the case,but not so much.   But today was a good day.  They played and played and played at home all day, and then they played and played and played in this field.  It was great.

Is he a handsome kid or what?  Love this picture of him.

So, while it wasn’t as fabulous a photo shoot as I had made it out to be in my head, I will still count it as a success.  But it did confirm what I had been feeling for quite some time: it is so much easier to take pictures of other people’s children!

I mean, really.  It’s almost March??  How is that even possible?

Tonight, Derek caught a glimpse of my desktop and commented on how much stuff is on it. I had to agree that it is looking a bit cluttered…

So I started taking a closer look at what’s on there and realized that I have pictures resized and saved on the desktop so I can blog about that time we went to the farm and cut down our own Christmas tree.  Yes, it was 3 months ago, but I always like to think it’s better late than never.

It was our second annual Thurman Family Christmas Tree Adventure.  We headed out to Dewberry Farm, which is a different farm than the one we had gone to the year before.  It was really fun with lots of extra things for the kids to do, but the tree was more expensive and I didn’t really appreciate the black widow spider friend that I’m pretty sure came home with our tree.  I’m not even sure I blogged about that.  I still get the heebie jeebies just thinking about the huge web it built under our desk (a few feet from the tree) and the sound it made as Derek stepped on it, and then the horrible realization that he had just killed a large, poisonous spider.  Yuck.

Anyway, one day many months ago, we loaded up the party van and headed to the farm.

We looked for quite awhile until we found the perfect tree.

And after a careful inspection, we knew this was it.

Camryn and I looked on as the boys did all the work.

And just like that, the Christmas tree hunt was over.  I also can’t decide if I’m sad this shaggy hair gone or not.  Connor’s hair is in a bit of a funny place right now…shorter than this, but not really short.  I had forgotten just how long and shaggy it had gotten!

We were one big, happy family, all ready for Christmas (and, judging by the short sleeve shirts, all this fun stuff happened before the Winter That Would Not End settled upon us.)

I have way more pictures of this day, but apparently this is as far as I got in getting them blog ready.  We did lots of the other farm activities and the kids played hard core for hours.  It really is a fun place to go.

Minus the black widow spiders, of course.

And with this post, I will officially declare the Christmas season behind us.  It’s time for spring.  (Do you hear that spring??  Come on already!)

Check out this movie of Camryn getting down.  She cracks me up!

(you may have already seen part of this on Facebook, but I had to put it on the blog for grandparents and non-facebook people, too.)

And perhaps just as funny as the dancing is Logan’s new favorite kind of music.  He keeps the radio in his room tuned to Tejano music and falls asleep every night listening to it.  I love it!

I just watched a 2 minute video of my 5 year old sister, Rebecca.  My eyes welled up with tears as I watched her jump into a puddle and leap into the waves.  “Daddy?”  she said in her little Australian accent, “do you have socks on?”

“Yes, I do.” my dad replied.

“Well, can you take them off?”  Rebecca asked.

“Why?”

“Because I want you to come into the water with me!”

My dad laughed, and Rebecca sprinted down the beach into the water while my dad video taped her.  I’m sure he was smiling behind the camera.

She is beautiful, this little sister of mine.

I have only met her a handful of times.  She literally lives on the other side of the world.  She’s made a few trips to the States in her 5 short years, but it’s been about 3 years since I’ve seen her.  I can’t believe how much she has grown up.  Her little voice captivated me.  She no longer has the toddler voice, there is no more baby sign language.  She is a little lady.

My eyes welled up with tears as I watched her with my dad.  I’m not even sure why.  It was the eagerness in Rebecca’s voice.  It was the he sweet way she said “Daddy.”  I recognized it.  The memories from my childhood flooded back.  He lived in North Carolina for a few years, and we made our own beach memories.  We would spend countless hours in the water, so many hours that I would still feel the rise and fall of the waves as I fell asleep that night.

I’m proud of my dad.  He’s doing a good job with her, and gets a another chance to raise a daughter.

Dad (if you read this still) keep on posting videos of Rebecca.  Tell her that her sister in Texas loves her.  And someday, I hope you get the chance to bring her back this way so we can get to know her.  I love you!

I’ve been really lacking on the old blog.  Life has just been so busy!  And a lot of it feels like the same old, same old.  I’m really not complaining about that.  There is a certain amount of comfort in the normal.  Here’s a kind of random run-down on what’s up with all of us.

I had two photo shoots last week,   a newborn and a 1 year old, and those kept me busy with editing.  They were both really fun shoots, and I can’t wait to do more!

Okay, now I am completely blanking on what’s been going on!

One funny little story…Connor made a sign for his room door that said “The Rules of this room are…No Smoking Allowed!  No Shoes Allowed!  Extras: 1. Before entering, please read the sign.  2. When leaving, watch out for tacks.”  He has taken it down now, which has made me a little uneasy because what if I forget to watch out for tacks when leaving?

Okay, really?  I can’t think of anything else to blog about?  This is sad!  Logan, Cam, and I made a trip to Goodwill one day last week and we totally scored.  I got a small wooden step-stool for $5 that will be perfect for kids to sit on for pictures.  I painted it a fun turquoise color and I love it!  I also found a Little People dollhouse for Camryn that looked brand new and was only $6.  It is her new favorite toy.  We love Goodwill!

I started a new chore-chart system.  We are only on day 1, but so far, so good.  An effective chore system has been eluding me forever!  We have started several different things, but they never last.  And I go back and forth between thinking kids should just do chores because I said so, to just doing all the chores myself because it’s faster and no one fights it, or letting the kids earn money for their hard work, just like we, as adults, earn money for our hard work (unless your a stay at home mom like me…no actual money, but the pay off is still pretty great in my opinion!)  I want to teach the kids about money…about how to save and give…anyone have a system that really works for them?  Like a lot of kids, they constantly want things at the store, and I do think it would be nice if they had their own money for those things (then they could actually get them because I say no 9 times out of 10!)

Anyway, Here’s what we started today.  Each boy has a chart with all the days of the week and 10 different chores listed.  Each day they do a particular chore, they mark it on the chart.  They can only do each chore once per day (which will eliminate constant bathroom mirror cleaning just to earn the money.)  They will get $1 for every 5 chores, and we’ll have “pay day” once a week.  Logan has already done 5 chores today, the little overachiever!   Some of the chores can be done daily (like clean room and make bed), and some cannot (like put away laundry.  I try to do it daily, but it’s really more like every other day.)  And I can guarantee that Connor won’t be vacuuming a room daily.  And if he does, then I suppose he really deserves that 20 cents!  Tithing is something that Derek and I do and want to teach our children, so we are going to have the boys give a portion of their earnings to our church every week.  We’ll see how this goes…I’m optimistic about it!

I guess that’s about it for now!  Hope everyone has a great Valentine’s Day!

And to my Valentine, I love you a million miles past the Star Wars galaxy.  I’m so thankful that we’ve had 14 Valentine’s Days to share (more or less…we were probably broken up over at least one or two of them but in my heart of hearts you’ve been my Valentine since 1996.)  I am so thankful you chose me.  You are the best, and I know I don’t tell you nearly enough, but you are amazing and there is no one else on earth I’d rather share this life with.

We love the new found freedom that no training wheels brings us.  Last Friday, the boys rode and I jogged with Camryn in the stroller to Connor’s school playground.  It was about 4 miles round trip, and it was a really great outing for a beautiful Friday afternoon.  Yesterday, the weather wasn’t quite as beautiful plus I wasn’t really up for a long run, so I walked and the boys rode around our neighborhood.  They loved riding through puddles as much as they love when I drive through them.

And Camryn was happy as lark in her jogger stroller.  I bought this baby at a garage sale for $25.  It’s one of my best and most used garage sale finds ever!  She loves it so much.  On our 4 mile trek last week, she never once complained or wanted to get out, and since this week was much shorter, she wasn’t even ready to get out once we got home.  Sometimes she just sits in it in the garage, without anyone even pushing her, just for fun!

Not too much going on this weekend, which is pretty nice.  Connor has a birthday party this afternoon, and I think we are going to go finally buy our new mattress and go out to eat tonight.  Wish us luck taking all the kids mattress shopping!  Two boys in a mattress store…that just seems like a recipe for disaster.

There was way too much excitement for my taste yesterday.

None of my children took baths all weekend, and they really needed them before school yesterday.  So I popped Camryn and Logan in the bathtub.  Camryn usually loves baths, but yesterday morning I guess she just wasn’t in the mood for one because she was trying to climb out and I was trying to keep her in.   I guess I should have just given up on the much-needed bath because she lost her footing and slipped.  She hit her head on the way down, and when she stood back up and I saw the blood pouring down her face, I knew it wasn’t good.  I quickly got her out, and after getting her dried off and dressed, checked out the gash.  It was pretty big and open, but the bleeding had already stopped.  Maybe I overreacted at first when I told Logan to get out of the tub and get dressed because we were going to be headed to the hospital.  I decided I needed a second opinion, so I called a friend who used to be a nurse.  By this time, Camryn was calm so I was able to get Logan’s things ready for school, feed the kids, get myself dressed, get Connor dressed (he was home sick yesterday running a high fever and just in general feeling yucky), all the while keeping an eye on Camryn’s gash.  By the time my friend got there, I was pretty sure that it was going to need some stitches.  Stephanie agreed with me, especially since it’s on her face, so off to the hospital we went.

Let me just say that I have the best friends.  Stephanie offered to keep Connor, and another friend met me at the hospital to get Logan and take him to school.  So it was just me and my girl at the hospital.

We got the royal treatment because it’s the hospital where my brother is the pediatric ER doctor.  He wasn’t working, but they took great care of us.  They took us right back to a room, and thankfully they were able to use dermabond instead of stitches.  45 minutes after arriving, we were on our merry way.  Camryn did really great.  She was happy and smiling until they wrapped her in a sheet like a burrito so they could clean and close the gash, but even then she only cried for a minute or two.

Of course I took pictures…well, only before and after.  I refrained from whipping out the camera while they were actually working on her.

Connor is still home sick today.  We’re not really sure what he’s got…he’s had a lot of snot and been coughing for about 6 weeks, and then he started running a fever on Sunday night.   We’ve been doing a sinus wash on him for the past 2 weeks trying to clear everything up, but it’s still there.  I took him to the doctor yesterday afternoon and he’s starting on some antibiotics and they did a swab of his nose to see what’s growing in there.  Poor kid.  He feels really miserable.

So that was my Monday.  Definitely not what I had in mind (especially since Monday’s are the day when all 3 are in school and I typically have nothing planned!)  Let’s just hope today is calmer, although with all 3 home, it’s anything but calm around here!

We went to my friend Laura’s house on Monday. The kids were all playing outside and the moms were all busy talking inside. It was a pretty typical playgroup time. Suddenly Noah, Logan’s bff, came running inside with a very exciting message. “Logan is riding my bike without any training wheels!”

Sure enough, Logan was riding a bike without any training wheels just like he had been doing it his entire life! I was way impressed. Luckily I was able to take a video of it with my handy iPhone. Sidenote-i had no idea how much I would love being able to take video on my phone! I love that feature!

So here he is, riding a bike without training wheels for the first time ever.

Logan Rides a Bike from Megan Thurman on Vimeo.

Getting Connor an alarm clock changed our mornings around here.  Before he had an alarm clock, it was like waking a sleeping bear every.single.morning.  But now, he sets his alarm (for 6:30, which is actually a compromise.  He wants to wake up earlier so he can have more time to play, and I want him to get as much beauty rest as possible.  So 6:30 is our compromise.)  By 6:35, he’s out of bed and in my room, waking me up.  I love that I count on my 7 year old to get me out of bed in the mornings!  He gets himself dressed while I pry my eyes open and stumble out of bed.  We meet in the kitchen by 6:45 so I can make him breakfast which usually consists of getting a granola bar out of the pantry, but every once in awhile he wants oatmeal or eggs so he can “run faster in p.e.”  After breakfast, he finishes up his morning routine, and I make his lunch if it’s a sack lunch kind of day.  He only likes to buy when they are having chicken nuggets or popcorn chicken (Tuesday), cheeseburgers (Thursday), or corn dogs (every other Wednesday).  He has this personal goal of being ready by 7:00 every morning, and he’s usually pretty close.  Once he’s ready, he gets to play.  He almost always goes back to his room and works on whatever project he’s got going on…coloring, drawing, practicing his cursive, writing a story, or building legos.  He loves to work at his desk!  At precisely 7:28–everything about Connor is precise–we start heading to the bus stop.  He still gives me hugs and kisses every morning before he boards the bus, and waves at me from his window until I am out of sight.  I love it.

Most morning, when I get back to the house, Logan and Camryn are still sleeping, and Derek is just leaving for work.  I enjoy a few minutes of complete peace and quiet with  my cup of coffee.  And when I say a few minutes, I mean a few.  Camryn is usually squawking within 5 or 10 minutes.  When I go into her room, she grins at me real big, but then says “dada?  dada?  dada?” over and over and over again.  I get the feeling that she’s always a little bummed out that she just gets mama and dada is already gone to work.  She gets over it eventually and starts handing me the things from her crib one by one: a baby, another baby, a third baby, her blanket, her bear, her glow worm, and finally, she reaches her arms to me and I scoop her up.  Some mornings, she just wants to be held for a few minutes.  Sometimes she goes right into her chair for breakfast.  If Logan wakes up before her (which is rare), she wants to be with him.

And finally, Logan wakes up, usually sometime between 8:00 and 8:15.  This is one of my favorite moments of my entire day.  He sneaks out of his room, tiptoes to find me, and peeks at me from around a corner.  Once he catches my eye, his face breaks into the huge Logan grin that I love so much and he runs into my arms for a morning hug and cuddle.  It’s short lived, I’m sure less than a minute, but I love it so much.  He’s my morning tv watcher and after our bear hug, he spends the next 30 minutes or so vegged out on the couch.  It’s the stillest part of his day because once he gets going, he does not stop!

I really love our morning routine.  I’m sure it will change once the summer comes, and then it won’t ever be just like it is right now.  I treasure the simplicity of them and the fact that, for the most part, they are not a frantic part of our day.  Now dinnertime and bedtime?  That’s a whole different ballgame.  But our mornings are a peaceful and slow.  I love them.

I’ve been writing this post in my head for awhile and kept meaning to take pictures of our mornings, but I give up on that idea.  But this is the grin I get from Logan every morning when he sees me.  Love it!

I’ve been busy working on my photo website!

I’m really, really excited about this new venture.  As I drive around town, I’m constantly looking out the window for photo locations.  When the kids are outside playing, I notice the light and take pictures in my head.  I look at different photo blogs, photo message boards, and pretty much any spare moment I’ve had over the past month has been taken up with photography in one form or another.

I’d love for you to check out my photo site! I feel like I’m still very much a beginner with so much to learn, but I’m excited about what God has in store for me with this.  It’s the first “job” or “career” thing I’ve ever been excited about.

I’m offering all my blog reader and Facebook friends 50% off while I build my portfolio and gain experience.  Please let me know if you’re interested in scheduling a session!  I’d love to take photos of your family.