Return of the Black Hat

As was teased in the Too Silly Video, and much to the chagrin of my siblings (I am sure), Behold, the Black Hat Returns.

Lilly also managed to figure out how I make the camera click during this photoshoot, and proceeded to fire off several shots. *Sniff*, I'm so proud, even if they were all out of focus.

Final set from the Park

Swingin

From that "one day in the park" series...

"I have not felt this wieghtless in months" -Aunt Lindsay, 8.5 months pregnant (ish)

Too Silly

Watch it now before audio gets disabled!

Baby Babble

Dear Lilly,

I don't know if we will ever tire of trying to learn your language, but I love the way you are trying to learn ours. Here are a few of our favorite words that you have mastered and/or put your own spin on.

goo (good)
buh (book)
sss (this)
doggies
ducky
daddy
ight (light)
dance
mommy (which also means monkey...are you trying to tell me something?)
batch (bath)
peeze (please)
gra (grapes)
buh-fi (butterfly)
Je-su (Jesus)
mo (more)
baby
ball
sh (fish)

and so many more I can't keep up.


We love you

Semester Final

Grades were posted.  Thanks to my abysmal math class grade I got a 3.4 something or other.  This brought my total GPA down to a 3.8 even.  Thankfully I had a bunch of other classes that kept my GPA afloat.  Classes that, no offense to those who love math, I will actually use in my career.  (Nathan says higher math exists to give jobs to mathematicians.)

So I came here today to post my Photoshop final.  I had to do something outside my normal realm of skill, so here we go.  I went online and found a random photo of the British natural history museum, and following the theme of my last big Photoshop class project I proceeded to play around with it.

Here is the original:

Note:  I cannot find the source for the original.  If by some odd chance you who took this picture are actually reading this, no malice is intended in the use of your image, and as a student I do have a legal right to use images for projects that are not for profit.

First thing to do was to remove everyone from the building, fix some of the digital image artifacts, and play with the color.  If you look, you will notice that almost every part of the building that  is obscured by someone is visible somewhere else.  So it was just a matter of cutting and pasting the pertinent parts, the distorting till they line up with the underlying area.Some areas i knew would not be visible in the final image, so I did not bother fixing those spots.

The end result is right here:

Keeping with this semesters uncharacteristic post apocalyptic theme, I vented some of anger towards math onto the canvas using some alternate sources like the ones shown below:

 I also found that sometimes you just have to paint in features.  So I grabbed the Photoshop brush manipulation dialog and Got all Bob Ross on it. I first added some dirt, and then I painted a  Happy Little Waterfall.

Then I added some happy Little Ivy and some Happy Little Plants.

Some final color manipulation, and voila:

One post apocalyptic Scene suitable for framing.

Cousins

More from that day in the Park.  Here are Lilly and her cousins playing on the playground.

Bad things come in...

How many?  I dunno.

I don't know what the deal is, but we have had quite the year.  Remember my posts about our car?

No? 

Recap:  The car was overheating, but only when it was cold outside. Below 30 cold.  Then the transmission started having shifting problems, then the blinkers quit working, then the wheel bearings started humming.  Anyway, the day that I accelerated to get onto the freeway and the speedometer stopped at 35 while the RPMs came within 1/8 inch of redlining we new we had to make a decision.  So we traded in the Oldsmobile Intrigue:

Woebegone the White, in his early days of fading glory

And Purchased a Chevy Malibu:

"No, we are not naming it Barbie." -Brian

Can I say, I love this car?  I say it, because if you look the car is sitting on a recently poured driveway, and if we had known last fall that we were getting a new sewer line, we probably would not have purchased this car.

But as history affirms, we took a big hit in December with the failure of the Main Drain on This Old House.

Where have you gone, Bob Villa?

A Nation turns its lonely eyes to you.

Well, after the new sewer was in and before the above mentioned driveway, Paige's Saturn, whom she had lovingly named "Mr. Darcy" (And I named my home computer Pemberley.  I tell you we were made for each other. . .)

Photo Unavailable

"Mr. Darcy" started having battery/issues.  Then the one of her coworkers positively id'ed an odd sound as Mr. Darcy's CV Joint failing.  Then the radiator split in two and started gushing antifreeze all over the engine compartment every time the engine revved.

Well, Rob from R&D excavation expressed some interest in the car, so a dump truck full of topsoil and  a fist full of dollars later, Mr. Darcy headed off to the demolition derby:

Photo Still Unavailable.
Shame, Really.

So Maybe we would have bought the Chevy anyway.

A couple of weeks ago, we had a really NASTY windstorm.  So nasty that the neighbors knocked on our door to tell us we were spreading shingles all over the neighborhood.  Sure enough, they were everywhere, and Paige and I spent an hour or so gathering shingles from all over the place.

Oh, then last week our big freezer in the garage gave out on us.  We hope things look up from this point forward.

Deffinately James

We had a follow up visit on The pregnancy yesterday, and it is definitely James. we also have some new ultrasounds, check them out:

The legacy continues

The night is dark and quiet. Most of the world is sleeping...except us restless Olsons. I love (ahem...is the sarcasm turned up?) having to wake up multiple times a night to move positions or empty my bladder. Actually, since the option is not having kids, I don't mind so much. I am only whining. Brian has those inexplicable times when his brain will not shut off or he is just restless.

Last night was one of those nights...with an unexpected bonus. As Brian was coming up the stairs in the wee hours of the night, we both heard a "eh" and "wdna blma" from Lilly's room. That is her usual way to say "Hey guys, I'm up. Come get me."

Brian, being the good dad that he is, detoured to check on her. I sat in bed marveling at her ability to be wide awake and ready to go at 1 in the morning...and trying to figure out how either of us would be able to function later in the day.

What he found: Lilly, sound asleep.

Talking, in her sleep.

So asleep that he could not get her to accept a paci through her tightly closed lips.


Just like her mama. I am so proud!

Here's Lilly

What do you get when you buy lots of expensive toys for your children?

They don't play with the toy, just the box in came in...right? I mean that is the excuse Brian and I are using to justify being cheap with buying things for Lilly.

On the other hand, using things that are not designed as children's toys seem to be a success.

Like this dog house that Mom and Dad Olson gave to Lilly.

She loves it. It is good for games of hide and seek, arrange to toys, peek-a-boo, find the ball, etc.

HEEEEEEERRRRRRREEEEEEE's LILLY!!!!

One Day in the Park

I have a problem:  A couple of weeks ago, we had a spontaneous extended family picnic on account of unusually warm weather.  I brought my camera, and here's the problem bit, I can't narrow the pictures down.  There are a couple hundred, and I just can't get it down to a manageable number for a single post.  So, here are the first of the pictures of a day in the park.

 

Expect more photos in more posts later, and may my Sibs know that they are not all about Lilly.

Grandpas make good slidin' buddies.

Too busy for pictures, crazy paparazzi.

This is not the same as jail, right? 'Cause this is fun.