The beginning of wisdom…

Knowledge is the understanding that a tomato is a fruit.

Wisdom is the understanding that you don’t put tomatoes’ in fruit salads.

I’d like to think if I were given 1 wish, I’d pick wisdom.

I’d love tons of cash too.

Or just even financial security.

Health for my kids…

To be skinny…

Happiness?

Solomon, when given the option…

…chose wisdom.

What is the difference between wisdom and knowledge?

Knowledge is having the information.

Wisdom is knowing what to do with that information and when and how to apply it.

Well…according to ME it is. That’s my definition.

Solomon chose wisdom. And because God was so impressed with his choice of wisdom, He gave Solomon everything else: health, wealth, and power.

As long as Solomon followed God, he prospered.

Sweet ride.

He had everything a man could want…

…and somehow, like so many Christians out there, we fall away.

We become too busy to read our Bible everday.

Guilty.

We get distracted by so many other things: tv, hobbies, friends, work, etc.

Guilty.

We enjoy sleeping in on Sunday morning so we find every excuse NOT to go.

Guilty.

Things get tough, and we blame God.

Guilty.

I’m trying so hard to do the right thing, but I still find myself falling behind in things and having to catch up or ask forgiveness in my prayer time. Lord, I’m so sorry…I got distracted, I got busy, blah blah blah…

I’ve made it to the MIDDLE of my Bible though! I’ve been reading the Bible through in a year, and I’ve made it HALFWAY! I’ve still missed and had to go back and make up some days, but I’m still truckin’ along. I’m trying.

Solomon’s wisdom was based on his obedience and his following God. And for awhile, he did fantastically! And he prospered, along with the city.

However, he grew old, and distracted, probably self-absorbed, and lazy. Somehow he forgot the “fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” and the presence of the Lord left him.

Is there any more tragic sentence?

Totally preventable, right?

We’re all guilty of it, so how do we stop it?

1.) know God is God. The first. The last. The beginning. The end.

2.) know God loves us. He came to Solomon twice to redirect him, and Solomon did not heed those warnings. God warns us all the time. If we are wise enough to spot those warnings, we will redirect ourselves and get back on track.

3.) Stay in God’s word. I cannot stress this enough, and I say this with experience. Stay in it. It is powerful.

4.) Make time. MAKE.THE.TIME. Sneak it in the morning, stay up late, turn the tv off while the kids are sleeping, put your Bible in the bathroom so you’ll pick it up, keep scriptures close at hand….do SOMETHING. Just MAKE THE TIME.

We feel safe, we get complacent, we fall away. 

For Solomon, it cost him the presence of God.  Don’t do it.  Stay active.  Stay diligent.  Stay strong.

copyrighted image.

Family photo

This is the OTHER silhouette photo I wanted to use for iHeartfaces. This is our family portrait….

…wait….

….except I’m not in it….

heh.

copyrighted photo, so don't steal it. Or I'll beat you up. Not really. But I will use my angry eyebrows at you and you will feel very guilty. Really. Angry eyebrows.

But look at that Baby Girl with her little tiny Baby Girl arms in the air!

Stop and admire. I’ll wait.

Now, dry your eyes and blow your nose.

Yes, Baby Girl is 3 now. Working on 3 and half. Hush.

And my little bitty confession here…

THIS is the original jumping picture:

Beware the angry eyebrows and do not steal this photo.

Sky. Not the same. You caught that too? Not as dramatic. Not as yummy. So I worked a little photoshop magic (searched YouTube for a tutorial, or something, don’t hate), and cut and paste the kids jumping from the ABOVE photo, into a portion of the sky from the photo of the “family”, yeah, the one I’m not in. Whatever.

And came up with this one:

I took BOTH photos, so it’s not like I cheated or anything…

Hey, it’s midnight, the boys are spending the night with friends and I’m waiting for a certain BABY GIRL to go to sleep. Darn late nap. Grr.

Standing up…

I’ve been trying to figure out a way to somehow put in words the desire God has placed in my heart. I’ve lived a “safe” life. I’m saved, I go to church faithfully. I work wherever they need me. If the doors were open, we were always there.

And that sums it up.

But in the last couple of years, I have felt God leading me OUT of my comfort zone and into something new. At first, I thought I heard “MISSIONS” and stuck my fingers in my ears…probably did the whole “I-can’t-hear-You, I-can’t-hear-You” too.

But it got louder, and it got stronger. And the harder God was calling me, and the more I drew near to God, the more I understood. At least in part….I heard “Missions Photography” and said “HUH?” Never heard of it, have no idea what You are talking about….but I’m listening. (at least I’m listening now…)

And the closest thing I could find to express what my heart has been SCREAMING was this video, it’s only 3 minutes, but it will change your life:

That is one of my biggest fears….to get to Heaven and hear, “uhh…that’s it? You held on pretty tight there….you didn’t fall OFF…but you didn’t DO anything!” (Like God is going to talk like I do LOL)

So this is where I begin to let loose of my death grip on my life, and start standing up. There may be a flip or two, or maybe just a little bit of walking around, but I’m UP! And if I fall…..if I stumble and completely bite it, I’ve got some pretty big Arms to fall into.

Right now, my first trip (of what I hope to be many), will be to Mexico in July.

I am a photographer and am taking prints and adding verses (or quotes).

8×10 print: $20 shipped: $27
8×10 framed print: $35 (sorry, I cannot ship framed prints at this time)

11×14 print: $25 shipped: $35
11×14 framed print: $45

I can order larger if anyone is interested. I will be adding more as I complete them.

Right now, these are the ones I have available:

Guitar Psalms

I am working on these prints:

Feel free to email me or hit the “donate” button on my blog page to order. Please be specific.

100% of the proceeds goes straight to the Mission trips.

Fix it Friday #15

I totally fell in love with this little girl this morning! She is simply DIVINE!

Here is the original:

And here are my fixes:

Just pretty basic fix; layer, soft light (reduced), any blemishes, and levels. Vertical crop

#1

#2, did more in depth editing, smoothing of her face reduced to 40%, eye pop (I don’t remember if I did it in the first one or not, if I did, I reduced it to 35-40% too)

# 3, did a Pioneer Woman action from her free action sets (COLORIZED). Not my favorite, just wanted to try it.

#4, Went vintage on this one just for fun. Then adjusted levels.

#5, This one I went back to the original, and used a Seventies action on it, just because it’s one of my favorites. Cropped in closer to her face. I really like this one! And I LOVE the closer crop! But then again, I’m all about that FACE and those EYES!

#6 Black and white using gradient map, adjusted in levels and curves. And kept the same close crop.

Thank you Angie and Amy for letting us do this! I think we build our editing skills when we do this. And I’m all about learning and getting better. Now to learn how Teresa did hers…I always love how she adds the borders and textures and I’m ignorant in those.

Anyway! Thanks to the Owner of this gorgeous little girl for letting us “play” with her!

All mine

So THIS is why I was so busy over the weekend.

(….well Mike did the MAJORITY of it, I was shooting a little wedding Saturday night.)

Apparently Cindy-Lou Who is all grown up…

They were FUN and sweet and it was the FASTEST wedding in the history of weddings. No really, someone actually timed it: 2 and a half minutes…seriously.

But I STILL don’t shoot weddings. So don’t ask. Or beg. I’ll just tell you to find another photographer. I’m not equipped to do something on such a GRAND scale. I’m serious…..NOT playing around.

And I got suckered into them TWICE now. Sigh. I’m weak.

But, while I was shooting this little tiny wedding with the sweet family with the long reception, my dear, handsome husband was doing THIS:

Oh and little drops here and there:

You see that? Yes, that would be PAINT on my bamboo plant. LOL

Oh and if you’ll look, there’s paint on my toaster too. But he painted, so I’m happy.

The OTHER casualty was a brand new Gymboree outfit. Sniff. No, I won’t cry. I won’t do it….it’s JUST clothes….really. Even though it said Little Sister on it with adorable little butterflies. I won’t cry.

At least he painted the kitchen.

And my bamboo plant.

And the new Gymboree outfit.

And my toaster.

But OH HOW NICE it is!!!

To have my own stuff put up in our own home that we put our stamp on…

…it just almost makes me cry. Usually we move our things into another person’s home and somehow it stays their home with our stuff in it. But finally, we are able to really put our mark in it…and we’re NOT moving out! LOL

See the bench along the wall? All leather and yummy? We are lining that wall with them instead of chairs. Plenty of seating! And the gorgeous solid cherry dining room table I inherited from my Grandmother, all polished and sparkly….

…and the roses Mike gave me last September, dried and beautiful…

The picture of Mike’s Grandpa as a young man, just seemed to fit perfect…

…and of course, Chandler’s painting of the road that leads home…

It’s nice knowing it’s all mine. Not the wallpaper from the family before. Not the paint that a previous owner thought was a nice color. It’s all mine.

It’s like I teach my Sunday School girl: it’s better when it’s yours. I know, what an odd thing to say, but listen for a second…

We grow up with our parents and learn their ways, their beliefs, and for a little while, we live on their faith.

But we cannot get to Heaven on our parents faith. It doesn’t work that way. We all have to have our own.

Which means, we have to open our Bibles on our own, and read it for ourselves. We have to have our relationship with Christ apart from our parents. It has to be our own.

They can be our foundation, but they cannot be our faith. It’s important for us to have that all to ourselves.

I figured that out early on after getting married and moving out of my parents’ house. I have to find my own way.

I have to make it mine.

And now, thanks to my darling honey, my house is finally becoming that too…

All mine.

That darling son…

I think it’s hard sometimes to be the middle child.

The older one goes through everything first, grows bigger, hits the older grades first.

While the youngest is the LAST, the last time to be this age, the last one to do this, the last one….there will be no more….

And the middle….well…..the middle can be a challenge.

There are challenges to parenting all of our children, but sometimes the middle one seems to get left out. When it comes time for new clothes, the older child has outgrown his….try his on.

So as a Mom, I’m always looking for those little ways to make Chandler feel special.

He is a darling son…

He doesn’t mind being alone, he’ll go off by himself to entertain himself.

He has those eyes that melt your heart…

And after he rough-houses with his brother and conks his head on the bottom of the pool, he lets me take pictures of the biggest bump on the head in the WORLD…

And he has one of the best senses-of-humors…

And he made me breakfast for Mother’s day…

So of course, I’m going to go out of my way to make sure that HE feels special.

Last Thursday while he was school, I took one of my nice frames and framed his painting he did at school. They were studying famous artists and well-known art styles. He could tell you what artist this was for, but I forgot. Wasn’t the point…

The point was, seeing his face light up when he came home from school and saw that something he did, something he was particularly proud of, and something entirely HIS, was displayed gloriously in the house for all to see.

It may not be all the karate trophies like Austin, or pink and frilly and GIRL, like Brooklyn, but it was his.

And right in that moment, the look on his face, showed it all.

He is Chandler. He is the middle child.

And he is something very, very special.

iHeartfaces week 20-silhouette

I am totally in love with iHeartfaces…it’s just fun! And I am AMAZED at how much they put out there for us to learn! Thanks Amy & Angie!

This week, is my kiddos…getting all 3 of them to cooperate and do what I asked all at the same time….I deserve a medal I think.

A big one.

Even the 3 year old got those feet off the ground! LOL

Gosh, I love those kids…

Now head over to iHeartfaces and check out the other unbelievable silhouettes!

Iron Chef-blogstyle

This is the last recipe of this months Iron Chef-blogstyle put on by Heidi. I actually did this recipe LAST week, but haven’t had time to blog it. (The reason WHY will be in the NEXT post I blog.)

Texas-style Mustard Potato Salad

*NOTE: You must like the mustard to enjoy this potato salad.*

Ingredients

4-8 large russet potatoes
6-10 boiled eggs
sweet relish (you can use dill-if you like it better)
mustard
mayo or miracle whip
salt, pepper, garlic salt, season salt or paprika

Directions (some are hers, some are mine…..with a healthy dose of humor and photos):

Dice the darn potatoes. (I still hate dicing…probably even MORE now that I’ve done so much of it these last 2 weeks. )

Again, I detest peeling too, so I didn’t. Recipe didn’t say one way or the other, and of course, I’ll take the lazy way out.

To save time I never seem to have, I boiled the potatoes and the eggs at the same time.

Boil and bubble, toil and trouble….

Wait….nevermind….

But SPEAKING of bubbles, that reminds me! We interrupt this Iron Chef-blogstyle post to bring you a commercial break:

I have discovered this cleaner and LOVE it! I seriously HEART this stuff! It actually encourages me to CLEAN because I LOVE the smell of it! It actually calms me. And with 8 kids running around the house at any given time, I need that. Mr. Clean with Febreze Lavendar and Comfort…..one of my favorite things right now.*

OK, back to the blog:

After you boil the potatoes and the eggs, you need to rinse them in COLD water, like so:

Sprinkle a generous about of salt and pepper, about half that amount of garlic and seasoned salt.

OK, watch this….

Oh look….the Potato Washer is back! She bailed on me at the beginning of this recipe…..anyway….did you catch what I did in that photo? I added a full TEASPOON of garlic powder in there!

I KNOW!! Oh MY! That was bad….really really bad….

Right after this photo was taken, I noticed my HORRID mistake and had to rinse the potatoes again.

heh. This is why I hate cooking….

So add the seasonings again because I’m a dork and did it WRONG.

Then you add the mayo:

Try to convince the Potato Washer that it’s MAYO, NOT ice cream…

No, SERIOUSLY…that’s not ice cream…

She listens like her dad….wish I’d gotten a picture of her face after she tasted it and realized Mom was right….

Shell the eggs….or de-shell….just PEEL maybe? Whatever, take the crap off the outside of the egg, and mash the eggs:

Lose 1/4 of the eggs to the Potato Washer. Nice….

Then you generously squirt mustard until the color becomes radio-active.

Cover and place in refrigerator for as long as possible. Over night is best, but I tend to not be ahead of the game and sometimes only get 1 hour.

I served it with Shake-n-Bake chicken tenders and corn.

Yes, that is a MIGHTY lot of yellow there….even down to my Grandmother’s GORGEOUS yellow dishes I inherited. Hush, it was supposed to be steamed BROCCOLI to go with it, but I forgot and served the broccoli to the daycare kids with their lunch since obviously we couldn’t have corn. So the end result is a lot of yellow.

Whatever.

I made Potato Salad for the FIRST time in my LIFE! Seriously!

Now, I am not a fan of potato salad. I know, sad, huh? Now PASTA salad I’d be ALL over…..however, how would it look for an Iron Chef recipe that is supposed to consist of POTATOES, be made with pasta instead?

So the recipe didn’t get high marks from ME only because I don’t like potato salad. However, my dear, darling Husband really liked it and my teenage son LOVED it! Seriously, licked the bowl.

I wish I was kidding.

And I was given strict orders to make it again. So, I guess the recipe is good!

But I still can’t tell you the winner yet….

*I was paid ZERO dollars to endorse this product. Wish they did. Or at least send me lots of coupons to keep using it instead of the Store Brand stuff I usually buy.

Fix it Friday

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So uhhh….yeah…..guess what I discovered this week?

Did you know you can download the BIGGER files from Flickr?

{Please say no….please say no…..please say no…….}

You didn’t EITHER?? Well….then we BOTH learned something this week!

{totally embarrassed smile}

heh.

I’m an idiot.

OK, for those that live under a rock with me, up above the photo on flickr, is a magnifying glass. If you click on it, you are given the option to download the BIGGEST file uploaded.

heh. Who knew…..(don’t answer that….)

Here is the original photo for “fixing”:

(yeah, the BIG file )

Fix #1

I didn’t want to, but I thought I’d give it a try and learn how to take the undereye circles off. I’ve never done it before, but I may need to do it eventually. I cloned some healthy skin from another area and patched it over, and because I wasn’t real happy with how it turned out, I smoothed the skin a little over my patch job to help smooth things out a bit. Then reduced that to 50% so she doesn’t look like a porcelain doll.

I’m learning.

I did a Boost action on it and reduced it to 75%. Reduced the noise and sharpened a bit using 80/1/0. Cropped to 5×7 size.

Fix #2

Ran the Seventies action on it just for fun. I don’t think I sharpened this one though.

Fix #3

I had a hard time with a close crop with this one. I really wanted a nice close shot of her gorgeous face, but with the ponies, it was hard to figure out where or how. So I hope this crop works.

I converted to black and white and then I prefer the undertones of brown instead of gray or blue, so I changed to sepia then reduced down to 20% so it was an undertone.

Fix #4

This was an afterthought. I just burned the edges to bring attention to the face. It was just to try it out and see what I thought.

href=”http://momof3darlings.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/3552072263_48c6483e07_b-copy4.jpg”>

Thanks to the owner of the gorgeous girl for letting us “play” with your daughter! And thank you to Amy and Angie for doing this every Friday! We learn a lot from seeing others do it and share their work, but to actually participate and work with a photo to see what works and what doesn’t is really nice for the EXPERIENCE! I always want to learn more and do better!

I use Adobe Photoshop CS2.

True Story Tuesday

I don’t know if I can top Rachel’s pee story….I don’t think ANYTHING can top that story…..

….but I suffer from Foot-in-Mouth disease. The more you know, the better you’ll understand.

But one thing I do not EVER EVER EVER do is ask a woman if she is pregnant or how far along she is. I do not EVER do that. I’m a Big Girl myself, and I know, this is something you don’t ever do.

But, I suffer from Foot-in-Mouth disease…

We had a new young lady in Sunday School a few weeks ago and I introduce myself to her, ask her name, her age, ya know…..making small talk. And I notice that this girl is READY TO POP at any time. I know for certain she is pregnant so I didn’t feel weird asking her. And ya know, WOMAN’S INTUITION and all….I didn’t want her to feel awkward being in a Youth department and the elephant in the room of her pregnancy. I wanted to be the nice Sunday School teacher to put her at ease.

So I ask:

Idiot: So, when are you due?

New Girl: I’m not pregnant.

Idiot: (in my head) CRAP!! CRAP CRAP CRAP! TAKE IT BACK! TAKE IT BACK! THINK QUICK!!) But what actually comes out of my mouth is totally unintelligible.

New Girl: I just had a baby though.

Idiot: (Oh thank GOD! Please say YESTERDAY or something….) Oh! When did you have the baby? (PLEASE say yesterday or last week so I don’t feel COMPLETELY stupid…)

New Girl: August.

Hanging head in shame….I just simply can’t believe I broke the Cardinal Rule. You do NOT ask that question. I don’t care if the baby is visibally bungy-ing by it’s umbilical cord….you do NOT ever ask that question.

And I’m sure she’ll never ever be back again. Sorry, Jeff, you can fire me if you need to….. I just get so NERVOUS talking to new people! I panicked.

Click on the True Story Tuesday button up top and read along!

I’m so ashamed….