December 3rd

My DDP for today

12 "Days" to Better Photographs--Day 1 Aperture

Today's lesson was on Aperture and the F-Stop function of my camera.

Here's what I did, notice the background focus changes.

Fear of Change

If you know my son, the following story likely won't surprise you.

My son is a very obedient, kind hearted, compassionate young boy.  He loves friends, and cares about who is around him.  He also HATES change in routine.

He was selected as the boy representative for his class as the student who represented best the Pillars of Character.  We were asked not to tell him and keep it a surprise (uh-oh) from him.

We snuck into the school after dropping him off and sat waiting for him to come in.  He didn't know why he was leaving his class, but went along with it.  Even being very happy.

He Then looked around, saw all the parents (100 or so) and realized that me may have to go up in front of all of them!  Very scary for him...see?

When he realized he didn't have to go in front, he was fine.  He even snapped some shots with his favorite girls and me!

December 2nd

Tonight we went Christmas Caroling, taking gifts around the city to donors in our area.  The kids loved the caroling and as one said, "I loved it, I bet we have not been caroled to in a decade!"  I love my job.

December 1st

Today's DDP has two photos, one for Rachelle and one for me.

K3 had a play date this morning.  The little boy LOVES to kiss her when she comes over, and as you can see, she loves it too.  Her first boyfriend at 13 months, oh boy.

I get night coughs about twice each year (I can't figure out the catalyst nor have I found something that stops it).  I have them now. Rachelle is a light sleeper.  The combination of the two pushes me downstairs to the couch for my night's slumber.  Here's the benefit, I get to wake up next to the Christmas tree!

A few thoughts

OK, I'm going to do a few things that I'd like to share with the few that read,  maybe even pick up a few followers along the way.

I've struggled a bit with blogging (as evidenced by my streaky blogging habits) but actually really enjoy it and it's somewhat therapeutic doing it.  I've thought that I don't have enough to share, or good enough stuff or something like that, but that flies in the face of what I try to teach the people in my life (we are each uniquely and wonderfully made), so I'm challenging myself to a few things for this month.

• We have a very nice camera that I don't use nearly enough of it's functions.  I have two goals for December
• I'm turing the Two Peas in a Bucket 12 Weeks to Better Photos Course into my personal 12 Days of Christmas to Better Photos Course and will complete prior to Christmas Day
• I'm going to participate in the December Photo Project (or DPP as the cool bloggers call it) and post a new photo every day for the month.  I hope that this both gets me taking more photos as well has forming a better habit of blogging regularly.
• I've thought that we should have a cool name for our Blog (Currently The Bakers-nice but lame name) like our friends Pilgrims At Oak Ridge, Starbucks and Salvation, or Meant to Live.  We don't quite deserve one yet.  Assuming I complete both of the above tasks, I will allow myself to try and be creative

I also hope to throw in a smattering of the things that are bouncing around in my nugget. 

Mindpower...

I've been thinking a lot lately about the power of the mind.

You see, I broke my leg and back in February they put in 2 plates and 14 screws.  I've recently started working out more to find that there is still a lot of pain in my shin, right at the top of one of the plates.  After a couple of conversations, I was convinced that the swelling I was seeing was a screw backing out.  It began to hurt more, I was able to do less and found myself limping again, which I had not done in some time.  I called the surgeon to schedule a follow up visit, assuming the worst.

After expressing my concerns and some xrays (which I am a pro at now) I found out that it was indeed...nothing. There was absolutely nothing wrong with my leg, in fact the surgeon said that my leg looked great and that he was so impressed with the healing that he wanted to take the hardware out at 10 months instead of the anticipated 12 months. 

He then told me to "Go bang on it, run, jump and play".  Since then I have upped my running, jumping and playing a bit with almost no pain.  When I was told I was fine, I started feeling and acting like it!

That got me thinking about my walk with Christ.  How often am I told by the world that I'm not good enough, that I don't have the will power or that I am too much of a sinner?  How often do I tell myself stuff like that?  I think too much we spend time trying hard not to sin.  I spent time trying hard not to hurt my leg.  BUT I was already fine.

Too often I think I live like I am still a captive to sin in my life, but the blood shed on the cross covered that sin already.  When I began a relationship with Christ, Jesus told me that I was fine, in fact I'm more than fine, John 10:10 tells me I can go run, jump and play with the freedom that he has given me! 

I don't need to "try harder" to stop sinning, I need to live more freely so that the power of the Spirit can stop my sin for me!

Now to figure out how to convince myself of that continuously.