100 Days - Sat, Feb 14th

30 sec at f 3.5, 18mm, ISO 320

Finally captured the super awesome light display from her mobile.  She and daddy watch the mobile lights every morning. And no no no do we ever leave her unattended on the changing table (oops).

100 Days - Friday, Feb 13th

1/2 sec at f 3.2, 50mm, ISO 320

The whole family (gotta love the camera timer). Harper giving the cute eyes to the camera. These days she is more into looking around than eating in the morning.

100 Days - Thursday Feb 12th

1/15 sec at f 3.5, 18mm, ISO 500

Playing in the bedroom before we really get a start on the day. Look at those super strong legs!

100 Days - Wednesday Feb 11th

1/50 sec at f 1.8, 50 mm, ISO 500

She is enjoying her car seat more and more (thank god).

100 Days - Tuesday Feb 10th

1/20 at f 1.8, 50mm, ISO 500

Harper completely bored with eating. Or she might be completely bored with my Steven Tyler look.

100 Days - Monday Feb 9th

1/8 sec at f 3.5, 50 mm, ISO 500

Dinner time with Harper in her big girl chair.

100 Days - Sunday Feb 8th

Feb 8th: f 5.6, 18mm, ISO 200 (Diana posting here and I have no idea what these numbers mean so I hope I am documenting them correctly).

Diana, Harper, Lisa and baby Nina at the First Colony Marina. Beautiful sunset. Beautiful babies. You can't see in the photo but Harper's outfit said "Let's Play" and had little space invaders on it.

Rick and My Three Marriages

So, this posting is for posterity.

Rick and I have wedded each other three times. Yep, three times. The first was in 1999 when we became domestic partners for insurance reasons. When Rollingstone.com was taken over by emusic, which was based in San Francisco CA, we became legal domestic partners. When I took my job with RTP, in Vail CO, it was contingent on them giving insurance to my "partner". This caused confusion for RTP who thought their first technical female hire was a lesbian, but they still hired me and Rick had insurance (thank goodness as ski mountains are injury manufacturing plants).

So, that is number one.

Then there was our "real" wedding. Our ceremony on Vail Pass with family, friends, a fancy dress, and Moe's Original BBQ (oh my god my mouth is watering just thinking about it). This ceremony was on July 3rd 2004. Well, about a month after this ceremony we went to the Avon, CO DMV which is where marriage licenses are submitted. We gave them our signed form, and they were suposed to file it.

That was number two.

We forgot all about this license.

Rick got a job in Virginia. Since I kept McSpadden as my last name his new company, Colonial Williamsburg, requested to see our marriage license before they extended insurance to me. I went to the Avon, CO DMV and requested a copy of our license. They couldn't find it. They requested a copy for the county seat, Eagle, CO. THEY couldn't find it. So, now we needed to get married again since Colorado lost our marriage license.

Except, Rick was living in Virginia and I was in Colorado finishing work and selling our house. So, I had to get the form that I call "How-To-Marry-An-Overseas-Soldier-Or-Prison-Inmate-Form". I got it notarized, Rick got it notarized and then I submitted another marriage license and we finally got our certificate. This was in 2007. Sometime in March.

My third husband is the best.

100 Days of Harper - February 7, 2009

1/40, f3.5, ISO 400, 50mm lens.  This is Harper's pose after being told that turning at an angle to the camera is slimming.  Also notice the pointed toes to bring out the definition in her calves.

100 Days of Harper - February 6, 2009

1/5o, f1.8, ISO 500, 50mm lens.  Harper in stylish hoodie being held by her new baby-sitter Maggie.

100 Days of Harper - February 5, 2009

1/60, f1.8, ISO 500, 50mm lens.  It's interesting how in some of the pictures she looks like she's gotten so much bigger, but in some pictures she still looks pretty tiny.

100 Days of Harper - February 5, 2009

1/25, f1.4, 50mm lens.  We get really nice light in the morning in our room, partly because of the light green paint on the walls, and partly because the light comes in through the trees.  Anyway, makes it easy to make good looking people look good!

100 Days of Harper - February 3, 2009

1/5, f1.4, 50mm lens.

100 Days of Harper - February 2, 2009

1/60, f5.6, 50mm lens.

100 Days of Harper - February 1, 2009

1/8, f4.0, 18-70mm at 18mm.  Note that she's starting to get hair.  This is her first every carrot feeding!  She has now eaten 4 things in her life: breast milk, formula, rice cereal, and carrots.

100 Days of Harper - January 31, 2009

1/25, f2.5, 50mm lens, ISO 800.

100 Days of Harper - January 30, 2009

1/30, f2.2, 50mm lens, ISO 500.  Honestly, I'm going to have to come up with something pretty special to top this one.  Those are her first ever shoes, by the way.

100 Days of Harper - January 29, 2009

30s, f5.0, ISO 1600, 50mm lens.  As you can see, this photo is pretty lame.  We had a crazy day, and at 10pm (2.5 hours after Harper went to bed, I realized I didn't have a photo of her.  So, carefully balancing my drive to keep the project alive, with the risk of the Wrath Of Mom if I were to wake Harper.  So I carefully setup the tripod in the hallway, set the camera for the longest exposure possible (30 seconds), opened the shutter in the hall, carefully opened the door, counting to 27 in my head, pointed the camera at the crib, waited as long as possible, then backed out before the shutter closed.  The shutter opening and closing are a little noisy, which is why I didn't want to do them in the room.  This particular image just barely beat out the other one I took with the same process.  The other one is completely black.  This has just a hit of color in the upper left!

Trying to fall in love with my dog again

Oh Osa. Sweet sweet Osa.

I write this post knowing that many of the readers are devoted animal lovers and I need your help. I do really love our dog Osa. She came to us 5 weeks old after the owner of her mother threatened to drown a sack containing her and her siblings unless the humane society picked them up (in Colorado the human society charges a fee per dog they take off your hands to cover the cost of spaying or neutering.). She was so tiny. She ate out of a ramekin. We saw her through a urinary tract infection, spaying, several doses of hydrogen peroxide due to chocolate binges, and spider bites requiring benedryll. She devotedly ran miles and miles with me through the Rocky Mountains, even when her paws were tired. She wiggles and sqeaks with joy whenever we come home. She has never liked being hugged, or snuggled, just scratched under her collar. She is often aloof, which just makes me want to hug her more.

Well, since Harper was born I have found my beautiful, sweet dog exhausting. She barks and wakes Harper up. She barks when company comes. She requires walking when I would rather play with Harper. She has mostly just seemed like work. I wasn't expecting this feeling when I was pregnant. Osa and I have been family for 7 and a half years, I wasn't expecting to ever think of her as a task on my list. I am trying to get over this feeling.

She injured herself last week. Somehow, I think jumping through our new dog door, she lost a quarter sized piece of skin off her rear left knee. It took me almost half a day to notice her limping and I felt awful. I have been trying to redeem myself in her eyes since. It seems horrible that her injury made me realize how little I have played with her in the last 5 months. But I now resolve to reestablish my relationship with my dog. Hold me to it.