Happy Koninginnedag (Queen's Day)!!

Today is Koninginnedag!
We took this photo a little bit early (back in Oct 2009 when his orange onesie still fit). Ryan will be celebrating Koninginnedag by selling his old toys on the street :-)

Happy 10 Month Birthday!

Birthday photos plus a few more from the past couple of days....

Dancing?

We filmed this 2.5 weeks ago. He hates sleeping in his crib, but he loves to dance in it....

Here are a few photos of Ryan in his crib today....

Baby Steps

For the last week or so, we've seen Ryan trying to walk without the support of furniture. Last night we encouraged this development by enticing him with a couple of his favorite things: bottles and cellphones.

No, he's not going after the beer. He likes every type of bottle.
Yes, he really does like Michael Jackson. Especially the earlier, "Off The Wall" years.

Holga

About 2 weeks ago, Brooke and I each got a Holga 120N camera. It's an inexpensive, plastic, medium format film, "toy" camera that takes fuzzy old-fashioned-looking photos. And despite its German sounding name, according to the manual, "Holga" is derived from the Cantonese term "ho gwong" which means "very bright".

We each shot one roll of film...and of the 28 total shots taken, only 6 were worth keeping. Since neither one of us has used a completely manual camera in over 10 years, the most common mistake we made was forgetting to wind the film and ending up with double exposures. We don't have a photo or film scanner, so I just took digital shots of the prints. Here are a few of our favorites....

I don't think I'll be giving up my digital SLR anytime soon, but the little Holgas are a lot of fun...and I just bought another 4 rolls of film.

Our weekend

Hanging out with A/C and the twins...




It was our turn to host a wine tasting event. We provided all the ingredients and our guests made their own Vietnamese spring rolls. It was messy, but a lot of fun.

The wine varietal was Riesling. We've done Riesling before, but it was in Feb 2009, back when Brooke was pregnant. Although it wasn't planned, we had one repeat from our previous Riesling event: a Chateau Ste Michelle. Both times the Chateau Ste Michelle (~$7) beat out the much pricier competition....




Other miscellaneous photos from the weekend...

Portraits

We had some friends take photos of us around SB on Easter weekend (Thanks S&J)

Cruising

For the past 2 months, Ryan has been pulling himself up to standing....and finally this weekend a light went off in his head and he figured out how to get around while standing. Also, he can now stand unassisted for up to 30 seconds.....

Mommy's Touch

Even though I give a lot of input into the pictures we post on the blog, Van gets final say on most of the photo editing. This is fine with me because he is the one who takes most of the photos and the one who gets them uploaded onto the site. Van likes photos to look pretty much like they did straight out of camera, with a few tweaks to contrast or the occasional removal of drool from around Ryan's mouth.
I, on the other hand, am a Photoshop addict. I love to drastically change photos, increase the contrast dramatically, add vignetting, etc., all that cheesy wedding photography moody-type stuff. Normally, my photo edits don't make it on the blog. They become the wallpaper on my computer desktop for only me to enjoy. Today, I decided to put some of my edits up. The first, is one of the shots I took during his birthday shoot and the second one is one of Van's photos. Compare my edits to Van's in the birthday post below....

Okay, so my changes may be a bit cheesy and over-the-top, but that's what mommies are for!

-Brooke

Happy 9 Month Birthday!

Ryan enjoys jumping off the couch....