Life In Motion Photography

1. I will be in San Antonio this coming Sunday if you or anyone you know is interested in a session in the area!  Email me at lstradtner@mac.com for details.

2. The last few weeks have been crazy for us.  We were in Dallas weekend before last.  It was the first time our family has traveled together, overnight, in several years.  The last time we traveled further than a day trip with duder was over 2 years ago and that trip caused him to regress.  It scared us when the demyelination returned and we had to do a lot of healing.  Well, a lot of healing has happened in the last few years and the time finally, finally, came to try again.  We hit the road to Dallas and Legoland and stayed 2 nights.  Jude did amazingly well.  It went great!  Traveling with 6 people in one car is challenging though, whew!  And 6 people in a hotel room, cooking dinner for us last minute as we discovered the salad bar at whole foods wasn’t organic.  One little burner we plugged in, hacking in to a tomato with a plastic butter knife, that’s the stuff memories are made of!  But we did it and fun was had by all.  It was so fun for all of us to go and experience something “normal” families do.  We’ve come a long way in the almost 3 years since his vaccine injury…..a very long way.  Oh!  And it was May the 4th (Be With You) Star Wars day at Legoland.  Nerd holiday heaven!!!

3.  I took the good camera on our trip and took a ton of photos at Legoland….but have zero extra time to edit personal photos.  So, a few from my instagram it is….

4.  This.  I mean, seriously.

5.  My mother’s day was AWESOME.  The best one in years!  First of all, my mom was here for a visit.  We had a relaxing day, I received wonderful cards, homemade ones from the little kids and Jason made dinner for us.  And, if you are a long time reader around here you might remember that my husband and I have an ongoing battle over trees.  Every year I ask for a tree to plant in our yard for Mother’s Day.  Every year he promises one and well, it just never happens.  That is because part of the gift is that I get to decide where to plan the tree since we can *never* agree.  Then there was the year a tree mysteriously appeared right where Jason had been wanting to plant it…on the other side of our fence, out of nowhere.  I KNEW he planted that damn tree, I KNEW IT.  But….I couldn’t prove it.  At least until he confessed during our photo shoot with Bonnie Berry last year.  Quite a few mother’s days have passed and I’ve never gotten a tree, so I didn’t have high hopes, but this year, he came through and in a big way!  I got not 1 but 2 very tall big trees and he paid to have them planted!  I am so excited!  And I get to pick where they are planted!  Yes!

6. Jonah is so fun right now.  I am loving this age.  He waves and fake laughs.  He gives big open mouthed kisses upon request.  He hates having his diaper changed and getting strapped in the carseat.  He loves the Mei Tai Babyhawk.  He loves rolling from one end of the living room to the other.  He’s sitting up so well and for longer periods and while he isn’t crawling yet, manages to get where he wants to go.

7. Adobe caused quite an uproar last week when announcing that we will now be charged a monthly fee in order to use the Creative Cloud (Photoshop, Lightroom, etc.)  I’m not happy at all about renting software, it actually infuriates me that they have taken this route and it really sticks it to the small business owners out there.  $50 per month to use editing software, when I’ve already purchased an expensive  license for use is just unreal to me.  If you agree please consider signing this petition.

8.  Have you seen this photography project by Jaime Moore?  I love it.  Definitely worth a click over.

9. I finally went and got a haircut.  It’s been a long time, almost a year maybe?  My hair was getting way too long and unmanageable but I’ve really tried to avoid the whole new mom haircut I always regret.  So, I went in, asked for 3 inches.  7.5 (?!?!?!?!) inches later I left in tears.  Gah!  Bad haircuts are the worst and I miss my long hair.  When you only get one haircut a year it’s supposed to be a good one.

10. The Non-GMO Project contacted me last month and asked if my kids would like to kick off their challenge for the month of April and Earth Day.  I jumped at that chance and we had each of the kids choose their own challenge and follow through.  Taryn’s was to teach her homeschool enrichment class about GMOs.  I helped her put together a presentation and she did an AWESOME job.  It was a big deal for her and she feels so much pride over it.  She passed out buttons, stickers and brochures to 50 kids!  You can check out the kids pictures for their submissions to the challenge here, here and here.