Another annual trip to the Calgary Zoo turned out terrific! The weather was beautiful and the animals were all out basking in the sun, including us!

Brandon was really into checking out all the animals. He was amazed and would need to be reminded to keep moving as there were still lots of animals to visit.

Owen on the other hand could not sit still and was being a total ham, except for when you turned the camera on him.

Owen and Brandon thought the view was super cool from atop Uncle Derek and Daddy’s shoulders.

After a ride on the carousel Dude and Trouble needed some Ice Cream!

Yeah! Mom to the rescue with some of the best soft serve ice cream this side of the elephants

The trouble with ice cream is that it is very messy, but so delicious!

Dude! Where did my ice cream go?

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Self Portrait Sunday has been negleted for a while but with good reason. Have have made it a priority lately to look after myself a little better. Eating balanced meals that are appropriate in portion and getting a little more exercise have been the main focus so I have not spent anytime working on self portraits. I have lost about 30 pounds to date and I think that it is really noticeable in my face. The other day we were out for a photo walk at the University of Alberta and while we were in one of the buildings there was some pretty nice window light coming in. Since I did not have a subject I turned the camera on myself, and it is a little challenging holding a DSLR in your hand while trying to take a photo of yourslef. Lets just say framing is pretty limited… Anyway after seeing the photos of myself I thought that it would be cool to dig through some old photos and find one of the chubbier me. I liked this photo because it was simple and something that I could recreate pretty easy as it was simply a test of some new Pocket Wizards with my 580 EX II flash. So here is a before and after (after about 3 months) taking better care of myself. I know the expresions are pretty lame so I also included the photos from the University with some sillier faces Hope you enjoy!

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Last year we took the boys to see Thomas the Tank Engine at Heritage Park in Calgary. Since they enjoyed it so much we decided to take them again this year. While the day looked beautiful with a bright blue sky

It was actually quite windy and cold.

Once we were on the actual train though the boys perked up and were excited to watch all the sights go by, and catch a glimpse of Thomas puffing smoke as he chugged around Heritage Park.

After the train ride we headed for the activity tents and first up was the Temporary Tattoo parlor. Brandon waited so patiently and Owen took off to play with the trains.

The boys remembered the ice cream from last year and wanted to stop again this year.

Unfortunately, or fortunately due to the frigid temperature, they were closed so we could not get any ice cream.

Luckily the candy store was open and we were able to stop in and pick up some…

Popcorn? With all that candy at their disposal yes the boys picked popcorn. I think popcorn is one of their favourites!

Poor Brandon, the wind had blown over his popcorn bag and some spilled out onto the bench. He was so upset he started to cry.

One thing that Owen did wait patiently for was Thomas to steam on by.

They had people manning the train crossings to that you could not accidently get trampled by the train. They would tell people that they had to wait until the train went by and it was safe to cross while they waved flags on long sticks. Owen and Brandon have since started this practice while Angela and I are getting reading in the morning. They block off the section that joins the bathroom and bedroom and wave toilet plungers instead of flags while telling you that you need to wait until it is safe. Too cute!

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A few weeks ago while visiting Aunty Claudette, Owen challenged Brandon to a duel!

Without hesitation Brandon accepted the challenge and the battle began. Owen came out swinging strong…

but soon stumbled and the tide turned in Brandon’s favor.

In the end Owen was victorious over Brandon

and set his sights on his next victim…

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Today Owen turns 4 years old, Happy Birthday Owen! We were planning on doing a photoshoot of Owen to mark his 4th birthday but things took an unexpected yet pleasent 4 year old detour. Owen is a firecracker of activity and you will rarely catch him sitting still for long. This can make for a challenging shoot to be sure but it is always entertaining. Here he is showing me how to jump rope. Not quite what I had in mind for the shoot but when dealing with a 4 year old you sort of have to roll with the punches. I thought why not get him to hold a camera too, maybe he would sit a little longer and I could get something in focus.

Right off the bat he noticed that there was no battery or lens and he needed them to be able to take picture you know. So I ran off and grabbed a battery and lens so that he could actually use the camera, and I have to say I think he is a natural! Almost instinctively he knew what to do and snapped a few frames and then checked the back of the camera to see the results of his first few frames. Chimping ain’t easy you know.

Obviously he liked the feeling as his face lit up with exceitement! Maybe Owen could rep for Canon, how cute would that be. A little 4 year old prodigy in their ads.

This was the resulting shot, not bad hey. Of course I put the camera on aperture priority mode at 1.4 and cranked the ISO to 3200 so the grainy image is not his fault, just a by product of shooting with no light.

After he smiles big, he puts the camera back up to his eye to take a few more frames… yeah now were talking!

We are now trading frames shooting each other working and it donned on me that this is probably the first photos I have of me in action. I have to say it is not pretty, I think I need to improve on my style when shooting

I also happened to notice Owen’s preference for shooting using the left eye in the viewfinder. At first he put his right eye to the viewfinder but then immediately switched to the left and stuck with it everytime he shot. The lucky kid will get to put Joe McNally’s Da Grip to use!

So the photoshoot is now abandoned, well the session of Owen anyway, but Owen has just started his own session. We wandered the whole house looking for subjects. I was taking pictures of Owen taking pictures so we have a few here of my perspective of Owen and then his resluting shot. Pretty cool hey!

Their play kitchen.

Some garden gnomes that were waiting to be release into the garden of korsan.

Himself in the mirror. I guess it is not just his dad who takes pictures of himself

Then Owen switched gears and turned his attention to some details shots of his toys.

After checking off self portraits and detail shots, I think Owen wanted to show his versatility and do some portrait work.

First up was Kosmo

Then Grandma H

and Grandpa H

Brother Brandon

and last but certainly not least Mom

Happy 4th birthday Owen! We are so proud of the little man that you have become and daddy is looking forward to a little help on my next shoot!

For full details of what our Owen has been up to this past year check out Angelas blog at Korsan Crew

Editors Note: aside from adding a blog watermark the images from Owen’s camera have not been processed in any way.

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A few days ago we took the boys out back to plant some sweet peas that our friends next door gave us. They were so excited to get to head into the garden. Once everyone was ready to “work” it quickly looked like it was going to turn into a “city job”, you know the kind were there are 3 workers and 1 shovel!

After some careful supervision and instruction we were ready to get our hands dirty.

First up was Brandon. Just need to get the seeds into the hole and then fill it up with dirt, pretty simple right…

Whoa, all this manual labour is making me a little light headed, I better sit down and take a break before I…

After Brandon had his posterior planted he was done with um planting so Owen took over. Mom helped a little and then set him free to keep planting on his own.

Owen really enjoyed working with the seeds and soil. It was extra cool because this week they got to plant seeds at daycare and have their own plants growing right in the room. Owen wanted to bring it home today but we told him it had to stay a little longer. He cried and was pretty sad because he was so proud of his plant that he created…

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The boys got coloured bubbles for Easter and I was lucky enough be to home with them for the day! It was beautiful outside so we headed out to the driveway for some bubble mayhem. Right off the bat it was obvious that it was going to be a messy affair.

I figured that before things got too out of hand that we should switch to the bubble machine.

They thought it was so cool to try to step on a gazillion colored bubbles.

Looks like the sharks are swimming closer!

Closer, closer, closer, almost touching, STOP! So the inevitable happened, the bubble machine and it’s colored ooze were knocked over… At this point I thought it might be a good idea to put the camera down and help them get cleaned up before mom got home.

The driveway was covered, their clothes were covered, their shoes were covered. We hopped into the bath and got cleaned up and put on some new clothes. Luckily the bubbles were washable otherwise I might have needed to go into hiding, or the witness protection thingy.

Before and after, see the shoes are as good as new now!

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