davejenbarnes
Korben is having a hard time. His team is very very poorly coached. Hopefully the YMCA will get involved with that this next week as there have been complaints and only 4 of them have been showing up to games.
Lowell is doing great. He loves it! He has a great coach that you can tell loves kids.
I still don’t know what either team chose as their mascot. I’ll try to find out at their next game, on the 28th.
EOS 30D :: 85mm f/1.2 :: Processed with VSCO film
Here is a peek at our weekend.
iPhone 4 & iPhone 4S :: Instagram
He’s at Grandma’s house right now. We miss him here at home, but we smile, knowing how happy he is to be spending time with Grandma and Grandpa without either of his brothers with him. He was so giddy to leave us. *sniff*
Here, he has drawn a super mario level out for us on the chalkboard wall in our garage. Notice the stick people going through the path.
EOS3 :: 50mm f/1.4 :: Portra 400, desaturated
We layed low (laid low?) for Christmas Break this time and stayed home for the most part. On Christmas Eve, we drove up to my mom and dad’s house and came back on Monday, the day after Christmas. Our New Years was just an “everyday” kind of day and I have to say, it was awesome staying put. We got the house back in order and culled through a LOT of outgrown clothes and baby toys, relaxed, played on our iDevices to our heart’s content, and stayed in our pajamas the whole livelong day. Downtime is awesome.
I also got to know my EOS3 pretty well and, coupled with a 5dMk2 as insurance, shot the opening of the presents with off camera lighting. I am quite pleased at the results and I had fun getting all of these pictures on film. Literally. (These are all film scans, btw)
The last day of the break, we headed downtown and let the boys go absolutely crazy at the playground at Zilker Park.
EOS3 :: 24mm 1.4L :: 85mm 1.2L :: 50mm 1.4 :: Portra 400 :: PRO 400H
Walgreens scans (seriously)
Remember when God said “Not Yet” to a prayer of mine? The first week of January, He changed His answer. I didn’t think it was the right time — I had to work a wedding that same day and it would mean leaving the house at 8:30 AM without getting home until after 11… it was just busy and hectic and … God said “Go!” so I did. I was scared. I was excited. Everything went off without a hitch. Well, one hitch. My film body has focusing issues. Everything can’t be perfect I suppose. Not until we get to heaven.
And the best blessing of it all was meeting someone just as crazy and backwards and twitter-pated and addicted as I am.
If you’re still wondering what the heck I am talking about, visit my biz blog!
The day started with a party of sorts. Korben opened his presents from his brothers, then we headed to Krispy Kreme. I didn’t take the camera into Krispy Kreme. Or maybe I did, but I certainly didn’t take any pictures with it. Oh well. From there, we headed to bowling at Mel’s in Georgetown. Where Korben wiped out the competition. Completely. They didn’t get to play a whole game because the entire bowling alley was reserved (Bowling with Santa or somesuch) about 30 minutes after we got there, but they were nice enough (wanted our money enough) to let us bowl until the event started.
After a generally easy afternoon, we were joined for cake and presents by my parents and ended the night building knex toys. He had a blast, I’m sure, and he loves telling everyone he’s “Tfweee yees owld!”
Canon 5D Mark II :: 24mm f1.4L :: 50mm f/1.4 :: Processed with VSCO film
grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr…..
I seem to have misplaced my CF card reader somewhere between here and Kempner (it’s probably up there, as I’ve searched this entire house and it is not in this house), so DSLR Christmas pictures are going to be quite late. I’ll run to the store tonight to buy a new reader (and then we’ll locate the old one the next day, as this is the order of things). I’ve tried connecting my two DSLRs to the iMac to no avail. There is absolutely no recognition from the computer to the cameras. Good thing I don’t shoot tethered!
In other news, I’ll hopefully have my film scans back from Christmas this week! Cross your fingers that those turn out!
UPDATE: I FOUND IT! Woo! I’ll start getting pics offloaded when we get home!
Today was a blast! I had to run downtown to drop off all of Doberenz Photography’s video gear that I had at my house and David thought it would be fun to go as a family, so we did! After meeting Allen at Umlauf sculpture gardens, we headed over to the Zilker Playground and let the boys go crazy for two hours. Keeping track of three boys in a sea of kids is a full-time job.
We took a rear-end-numbing train ride and had a blast. The boys acted like they’d never seen a train or a playground before. They certainly hadn’t seen a train that goes right smack through the middle OF the playground. They even got up on the “bridge” and waved at the train going under. It was absolutely crowded and James claimed it was the most fun Sunday, ever.
After the playground and train ride, when the light was fading fast, we loaded up the van and headed over to Hula Hut for dinner. It was so nice to actually go out for dinner, on a whim, where we wanted to go (in other words, not limited by the gift cards we have in our stash), order a XX (Jen; Dave doesn’t drink beer) and eat really, really good food. The boys fell asleep on the drive home and Dave and I held hands, enjoying the silence. It was the perfect ride home.
What a fun Sunday! Now for the pics!
iPhone 4s :: Instagram
In lieu of a Christmas Card (seriously, there was no time to get one done with the trip to Chicago falling two weeks before Christmas), we did a Happy New Year card. Hopefully you’ve all gotten yours by now! It was my biggest mail-out to date at 90 cards. Whew! Facebook has really connected us to a lot of y’all!
As is becoming tradition for our family, the day after Korben’s birthday (that would be December 22nd), David headed to Lowe’s and picked up our $5 tree. I know it’s waiting to the last minute to decorate but you just can’t beat FIVE. BUCKS. y’all! I mean, those trees are $40 just two days before the Korbster’s birthday. Worth the wait. Definitely.
Least coordinated tree, ever. But we love it.
Christmas in Kempner
Aaaaaand… we didn’t have very many matching light strands since we’re in the beginning stages of switching over to LED strands, so… this is our little tree out front. So sad. So funny.
Santa brought the cat a shelf. How thoughtful.
360 – the decorated cedars… I was sitting in traffic and had to snap a quick shot of them. They were all so shiny!
And a busy last Friday of the year… I had a model shoot at the Capitol (on film, literally) with another EOS 3 shooter followed by a wedding out at the Barr Mansion (I got there super early and read a chapter in the book I’m working on.)
And Korben… hanging… out… I want to pinch his tummy!
And Korben… out… in the car rider line to get James, after James got in the car. I also snapped this one with the film body, hence the light meter stats. I keep track of my settings this way.
2011 wasn’t a very blog-tastic year here on davejenbarnes.com, I’ll admit. We really have gotten busy with the boys as they get bigger and bigger (they just don’t stop growing, do they?) and more active! I’m going through my facebook stream (love that Timeline!) and supplementing all the pictures and videos from there in this post. I thought I should do a recap of our year since we actually got around to sending out a ton of cards this year (albeit late)! So if you’re here from the New Year’s Card, welcome! We are praying that 2012 is less dramatic than 2011 was, and with more rain!
In January, I travelled to San Antonio for Imaging USA, the Professional Photographers of America’s annual Convention. While there, I took (and passed on my first try!) the Certified Professional Photographer’s exam, won $250 in wedding editing, and a huge metal mural worth over $350, wholesale. The exam was a huge thing for me, though I’ve been dragging my feet completing the image submission as they’ve changed the requirements on us and I just haven’t kept up with the new changes. I still have two? one? more year(s) though so I’m not out yet.
We started the year with James and Lowell in the YMCA’s Indoor Soccer program where Lowell learned some monumentally important social skillz, James burned off some energy, and Korben confirmed what we’d long thought about him — he thinks he can do what his older brothers can do! It was tough keeping Korben out of the soccer area, but thanks to the YMCA’s childcare (thank you mom!) he wasn’t too much of a distraction. I have no idea how the teams did; it was just super cute seeing the four and five year olds running around. We kinda coasted through the rest of the school year as a family. David works a LOT of weekends in the Spring with all the festivals and clinicians and pre-UIL contests and the like. The boys are looking forward to indoor soccer again like you would NOT believe and Korben is so ready for the 3 year old league!
In February, Lowell turned 4 and I finally got around to making a slideshow of his birthday pictures (like, from his actual birthday).
A college friend and Tau Beta sister of mine married in March and shot her bridals at Baylor in January as well as their wedding.
They were blessed with a little girl a few weeks ago and she is the most precious thing I have seen with two of the biggest doggie brothers to protect and love on her that you could ever imagine. As far as the business, I had some sessions here and there, and another wedding in June, but it was a very tough summer so I didn’t pursue filling my schedule with sessions every spare moment. When things get tough at home, you really need to take time out to take care of yourself, though I did shoot another friend’s wedding in June and had theirs edited before my big trip…
At the very end of May, I cracked a tooth. It was a molar on top, waaay in the back, on the left side of my face. My jaw (or so I thought) had been giving me problems for years and it turned out that my last molar up there was decayed. That ended up in a root canal at the beginning of June. Upon doing the root canal, the endodontist discovered that the cavity was too deep in the tooth to do a simple build-up and crown, so I ended up going BACK for oral surgery in late July to expose more of the root (ouch). My gums took twice as long to heal as they thought it would take, so I was in a temporary crown for over three months.
In the meantime, mom and I took off for 10 days for my first trip to Hawaii. Let me tell you all: I have a TON of images that I am SO far behind in editing from this year… 1300 alone from the Hawaii trip. It was mainly a family-meeting trip, so we visited family, put flowers on graves, ate at the best local places, attended (and I even danced) my first Bon Dance in Honolulu, walked on Punaluu black sand beach, discovered the loveliest bed and breakfast just outside of Hilo, flew in a helicopter over the Puu Oo volcano (COOLEST THING EVER!), and enjoyed a luau. Maybe in 2012, I will do a recap in pictures. Aloha and happy 4th of July!
I still need to get about $200 in developing done from Hawaii… oy!
While we were in Hawaii, my right upper rearmost molar started giving me problems. Duh-duh-DUH! Enter root canal #2 AND the oral surgery I’d mentioned above. When all was said and done, I had nearly $6K of dental work done over three months. That is not my idea of fun, y’all. Not at all.
In the midst of dental-hell and David’s surgery, we celebrated James’ 6th birthday with our first ever trip to Sea World where James got to feed the dolphins. His favorite animal ever, dolphins. He was one happy kid.
July and August brought us four fires within 2 blocks of our house. The first one burned down 15 mobile homes and the last one destroyed 300 acres and 11 neighborhood homes. We were in evacuation mode for most of August. Fires are so scary. When I look at these pictures, I can still smell the smoke and see the ash landing in our yard from them. I never want to be this close to a wildfire ever again.
Aaaaaaand the new school year started. Life settled down. I started shooting video with Doberenz Photography.
And James started 1st grade. He’s doing really really well. I am surprised at how simultaneously smart AND stubborn he is. A big motivation for him to finish his homework (yes, he has homework this year!) is Lego Robotics at the YMCA in the afternoons on Tuesdays. He has to finish his homework before we leave for Lego Robotics and Tuesdays are the days he does his homework without arguing. Thank you, Grandma & Grandpa for Lego Robotics!
We wrapped up the year with a trip to Chicago for some of David’s saxophone students to perform at Midwest Band and Orchestra Convention. It was a whirlwind trip and you can see those pictures below. David and I started our marriage in Evanston, IL, just to the north of Chicago, and we will always be in love with Chicago. In our old age, when we are the Grandpa and Grandma, we’d like to retire up there. Maybe someday David will audition for the CSO and he will get to fulfill his lifelong dream of playing in the Symphony.
Christmas was wonderful and we are enjoying the last few days of 2011 before bursting into 2012, full steam ahead!
OH! How could I forget! Korben turned three. I’ll end with him — blowing out his candles!
