7 Quick Takes – My Toddler is 2! My Camera is New

Putting this Quick Takes up in a hurry… All the pictures are with the new camera.

1. It has become clear that I am being called to detach from my camera and photos. The thing is I’m not ready. For now God and I have to agree to disagree.

2. My camera got broken and had to be sent away (somewhat a fault of my own because it fell off a sadly unreliable tripod ). My camera had to be sent away right before my son’s birthday last year as well. This year too, I was not impressed to say the least (see #1). I did try to put my trust in God, but in the end He closed all the doors and I had to open a window.

Because I could not be without a working slr (and now also because it wasn’t under warranty and I’d be spending money one way or another) I bought a new one. I went for a Nikon this time and it is a better camera over all (and it was also cheaper ). It takes SD cards instead of compact flash which is good, SD cards are much more affordable. I bought a single card that has more space than my other 2 cards combined for about $30. It is easy to switch to manual focus (something I never figured out with my old one) which should help me take close up shots when the auto focus won’t. The pictures seem to be coming out brighter at least how they appear on the camera, but I’m not sure how I feel. Sometimes they look better and sometimes they look like the color is too saturated. And the focus points to line up what you want as the subject are different too. There are more of them, my old camera had 3 and I’ve seen about 7 on this one, spaced kind of oddly. In auto mode I think it decides what it wants as the subject, and highlights a few points on it… It’s usually pretty quick but it has made a few pictures a little more tricky than they would have been with my old camera.

3. Last night my husband came home and proudly announced that he and his friend are going to sell their paintball stuff and take up snorkling/scuba diving… This came out of nowhere and I’m not quite sure what to think only:

-He won’t be shooting other people for fun anymore.

That’s a definite bonus. There won’t be big guns in the house so our kids are less likely to take it up as a sport themselves… win win (but I didn’t mention this part to him!). It sounds fun, if they can actually see anything interesting in the murky water then I will probably give it a try too… It’s the sort of thing I’ve always waned to do… Maybe some day when our kids are long gone a trip to the great barrier reef would be something we could both really enjoy.

4. My little boy is 2! Gah! Strangely enough there seemed to have matured quite bit overnight as on his birthday he was suddenly having long conversations over the play phone, understanding and even talking more.

5. The play kitchen has been very well received. He didn’t get it until that evening but we had a good play session then, and 2 good sessions yesterday, one in the morning and one in the evening. It’s in a different room from the rest of his toys, so hopefully that will also help keep his interest up.

6. My toddler can recognize Jesus in his little kid bible. He can also say ‘Jesus’ and it is so cute! We’ve been reading one story a night out of it since Sunday. Time to expand his concept of Jesus beyond the pages of the little book…

7. Today is my son’s birthday party. Cake and jello and presents and lots of friends and family coming, I’m really excited. Best of all, the weather is decent this year (last year it rained) so we can have the party outside