Better Than The Pros

Okay... perhaps that's a bold statement but it is what my mother-in-law said about these pictures. Yes yes, I'm finally posting some of the pictures we took of our nephew.

I decided to only edit a handful of them (the ones I liked the most) and sent the rest over to my sister and brother-in-law to look at so they can decide which ones they'd like edited. Thank you Maria for this wonderful idea. I would have spent a bajillion years editing all of the pictures.

Anywho... here ya go:




This one is my FAVORITE.





I hate to say this, but I saw some of their "pro" pics and I do think that some of these are much much better. (I'm patting myself on the back now)

Squirmy Little Bugger

As I mentioned yesterday, taking pictures of babies is f'n difficult. Babies don't get the concept of holding still, looking at the camera and they poop.

Saturday, The Mr and I went over to his co-worker's house to snap some photos of their 2 week old son. I was super peeved that he offered this because we have zero experience with babies and taking their pictures.

Anywho - I don't need to go into why I was pissed because I already blogged about it. Sooooo... we took pictures of my nephew-in-law Friday and thought, "Well that was easy, tomorrow won't be so bad."

Yeah... so not true.

I have to say that the hour we spent at co-worker's house may have been one of the most uncomfortable times of my life. They didn't know what to do, we didn't know what to tell them to do nor were we comfortable giving real direction. I was sweating a lot (seriously - what's up with me and sweating so much lately? I feel like I'm going through withdrawal or something).

We were just snapping away (we both had our own camera) and probably took about 550 pictures in total. We snapped photos of the parents interacting with their baby and while some of the photos turned out okay, a lot of them were blurry because they kept moving! Shouldn't adults know better? I was too polite to tell them to STOP MOVING. It is so much easier to tell your friends to do something or stop doing something.

When we uploaded all of the pictures at home, we immediately were able to reduce the pics down to 330 because of all the blurriness. Between the parents rocking their baby, or the baby just squirming around - it was tough to get a good clear shot. Although I kind of enjoyed the pics where the baby looked like he had a misshaped hands from moving around so much. It made the photo interesting and a little freakshow-esque... but I imagine a parent doesn't want pictures like that of their own child.

Our goal is to deliver roughly 50 pictures to them but this is turning out to be a bigger pain in my ass than I expected because we need to go through and pick the 50 best, edit them, upload them to an online album AND burn them to a cd. Did I mention we are doing this for free?

Taking an hour to snap photos isn't a big deal, really... except for the immense amount of pressure to deliver Annie Lebowitz type photos but the real effort comes AFTER taking pictures. Sorting, editing, OY! We are never voluntarily doing this again.

So, here are 2 samples of some decent pics we managed to capture:



Unfortunately, we promised we'd deliver the pictures asap so it looks like this weekend is going to be shot for us.

Have I mentioned we're not doing this ever again?

I feel like I'm in Good Fellas...
You want us to take pictures for you?
Fuck you, pay me.
You want us to edit pictures for you?
Fuck you, pay me.
You want us to upload AND burn them to a cd?
Fuck you, pay me.

Aunt? Auntie? Aunt-in-Law?

The Mr's sister had her baby on Wednesday. Strangely, everyone thought I'd hate the kid but I don't. I just don't want a baby right now. I think babies are cute, albeit a little weird, and I don't possess that gene that makes me want to hold everyone's baby. I think THAT'S weird. If its a baby I'm connected to (a close friend's baby, family, etc), I'm all for it though. Just don't ask me to babysit.

Anywho - we went to visit SIL on Friday. We also saw this as an opportunity to get a few practice shots of a baby in before our big debut the next day. Plus - we wanted to take pictures for SIL and BIL. So check him out:


How cute is he? Seriously - so cute. And taking pictures of a newborn is pretty easy considering they don't move much. The only issue we discovered was that its difficult to balance their skin tone. I guess that's why so many baby pictures are in black & white?

Little Nathan was very cooperative although he hated the flash. Everytime it went off, he's slowly shut his eyes for a few seconds (like he was hungover). So cute. And watching BIL interact with Nathan was super cute too. I've always viewed BIL to be a big kid so to watch him coo over his baby was seriously precious.

Have you thrown up yet? Seriously - who am I?! I even told The Mr that I wanted a baby when we left... and I'm pretty sure his testicles ascended up into his body.

Now - my only issue is that I don't necessarily feel like an Aunt. I'm not trying to sound like a jerk but I'm not a blood relation to the kid. Using the term nephew-in-law seems more appropriate to me. Even so, SIL and BIL kept calling me Aunt Twink or Auntie Twink and it just felt unnatural. Maybe because Aunt sound so old and Auntie sounds like an old chinese woman (think The Joy Luck Club).

I thought it would be cool to have Nathan refer to me in the Korean translation for Aunt: Emo (or Imo... I don't actually know how to spell it). But even that sounds old! And they were butchering it by calling me Emu. I don't think I want to be considered an ostrich-like bird.

However, according to Yahoo Answers - the proper phrase given my relation is:
If she married your Uncle on your Mom's side (older or younger) she is your Way-Seung-Mo.

Now, if they had trouble with Emo, I'm pretty sure that wouldn't make it.

So there's another Korean term used when referring to an older but young woman. I don't know how to spell it (Angie, help me!) but its pronounced: Uhn-ni. Again - if the whities can't say "Emo", this won't make it either.

So what do you think? Just stick with Aunt? Ryan pointed out that it might be strange to make a total white kid call me something Korean.

Also - for those of you married ladies, when your in-laws have kids... do you feel slightly disconnected? My thought is that I'd cease to be the kid's Aunt if we got divorced, right? I know not everyone agreed with me and Gerard pointed out that I was jerk for thinking this way. Maybe it would be different if The Mr was closer to his sister.

Regardless, I'm going to try to be the "fun Aunt" by buying the kid lots of candy and loud toys.

We're Not Pros!

First - I'd like to say that I survived my presentation. I received a few kudos for a job well done but if you ask me, it was awful.

I was sweating profusely.

I was rambling.

I was making bad jokes.

And I managed to eat up 30 of our 40 minutes leaving my partner to scramble to fit in his material quickly.

But I survived!

Now onto the weekend. I'm a little peeved with The Mr. right now. As I've mentioned previously - we're photo enthusiasts. I would never claim to be good or anywhere near a professional level (like Maria and Kelly!). We love taking pictures and always offer to do so for our friends.

Why? Because they're our friends. Its a win-win situation. We're hanging out with our pals, we're getting practice with our cameras and photo editing software, our friends are getting free pictures and ITS FOR FUN.

So The Mr. offered up our "services" to a co-worker of his who recently just had a baby. And she's been hounding us about when we're going to do it because they have to send out announcements and they really want the pictures. She even asked to see a portfolio! Ack! I'm freaking out because:

(1) We've never taken pictures of babies.
(2) We don't even play with babies.
(3) This isn't actually for fun...
(4) This is a NICE thing we're doing and yet we're getting all sorts of pressure from her about doing it.
(5) When The Mr. asked her what she was looking for in terms of pictures, she sent a link to Anne Geddes!

I am SO not thrilled about this.

Sake Bombs!

First - like the new header? I was pleasantly surprised to receive it via e-mail from Myriam over the weekend. Seriously - the whole making a header just baffles me and no matter how much I tinker in Photoshop... I just can't figure the shit out. So, thanks Myriam!

Now onto the rest of my weekend.

Saturday was The Mr's sister's baby shower. I was dreading it but not for reasons one would assume. I just hate baby showers. I don't give a crap if you're my best friend - I DON'T LIKE BABY SHOWERS. As a non-parent and a person who doesn't wish to have children anytime in the near future (and I'm still questioning if I want it in the distant future) - I just don't care to sit through other people's stories about labor, their doctors, great products for babies, etc. etc.

I was also dreading it because this was my first shower as a married chick and that means...

When are you going to have a baby?

When did this become an appropriate question to ask someone? Furthermore - when did this become an appropriate question to ask someone you just met? It was one thing that my mother-in-law was jokingly trying to get me to hold a baby (someone brought their 3-week old daughter) or make comments about making grandbabies because that's expected of a parent. She wants her son to make some offspring. My own mother harasses me weekly about babies and when I say I don't want them anytime soon, she moans, "I'm not getting any younger!" And yes, she says SHE'S not getting any younger as in she wants to see some before she's dead. She's says that to me A LOT and wonders why I don't want to call her daily.

Anywho - I think every guest at this shower was a parent. One woman, a mother of 2, that had her first at 24 and that I JUST MET engaged me in this conversation:

Stranger: So you don't have kids yet?
Me: Nooooooooo... and its not happening anytime soon.
Stranger: How old are you?
Me: 27.
Stranger: Oh yeah, that'll change real quick.

I then spewed vomit on her shirt and pooped in my pants. I was shocked that she was so disgusted because that's what babies do... and that's why I don't want them. That'll learn her for saying such nonsense.

But really - why is this an acceptable thing to say to someone? I could be f'n infertile or something. Assholes.

That night was Megan's big bday celebration. I hadn't gone out in a month so I thought it would be fantastic to order myself a bottle of warm sake at dinner, challenge Zach to a sake bomb (I kicked his ass) and then drink more and more all through the night. Is it possible to be hungover 2 days later? God, I'm lame.

And I'd like to add that the whole no-smoking things in bars is MAGIC. People wondered why I was so dressed up Saturday night and I pointed out that I would have dressed up like that more often but didn't want to reek like Virginia Slims, puke and Pabst Blue Ribbon because I try to get several days worth of wear out of my dry-clean only clothing. I can handle the puke and PBR... but smoke takes forever to air out.