Family Self Portrait

When Erin was here last week she did a maternity photo session of me in all my big belly glory. Keep an eye on her business blog for those shots. . . I'm super excited to see them, myself. While I know she got some great shots, I will confess that I was slightly disappointed that we didn't get any family or big brother & belly shots. It wasn't for lack of effort. The 2-year-old camera-shy/cranky antics, the 15-month old who needed attention, and the lack of good light just conspired against us.

After seeing a few belly shot in her portfolio, I had an idea of the shot I wanted in my head and realized I'd just have to try to capture it myself since the next time she sees me my baby won't be in my belly anymore! Wow. . . what a challenge! At first, I thought, it won't be too hard. . . just get the camera set up and use the self-timer. Then, the reality of the situation set in when I tried to get Hayden to look this way and put your hand here and oh, now hold that for the next 3-4 seconds and okay, Rich, run over and push the shutter button. This is a disaster, I thought, giving up after self-timing about 6 shots.

But, I was pleasantly surprised when I downloaded the photos and saw what we captured. . .

Not exactly the image I had pictured in my mind, but it does make me smile!

Rich even snapped a few frames. If only I could have convinced Hayden to read one of the several big brother books he has. . . then it would almost be a perfect shot. I still love it, though, just me and my boys, all snuggled up and doing one of our favorite things!

This is love. . .

Carpet Skiing

Please excuse the quality of the photos. . . it was (obviously) dark inside the house and I couldn't decide between using my built-in flash and getting harsh photos or going flash-less and getting blurry photos. So, I did a little of both. And at least I captured the moment. . .

So, you saw Hayden's first day on skis a few weeks ago. He had fun, but we haven't had a chance to make it back up to the mountain since. Not to fear, however, Hayden has his very own pair of skis. And they're cross-country skis--the best kind! The only problem is that he hasn't been interested in actually trying them on since we bought them at the second hand store at the beginning of ski season. Until now.

After we (Rich and I) had spent the day cross-country skiing, with Hayden riding along in the Chariot, I guess he decided it would be fun to give it a whirl himself. We didn't mind that he wasn't actually on snow. . . we just want him to get comfortable on skis and have fun while he's doing it!

A lap around the kitchen and he was happy. So were we!

We finally got some much-needed snow here this afternoon (about 4" on our back porch!) so maybe we'll actually get him out on the fluffy white stuff this weekend!

Fat Tuesday

You don't often see this in the Shertzer household:

But then again, Fat Tuesday only rolls around once a year. In fact, I think the last time there was a pot of frying oil on the stove was Fat Tuesday about 3 years ago. Since it had been so long, and since pregnancy brings on strong cravings, I was game when Rich suggested we make some fastnachts. They are the traditional Pennsylvania treat made to celebrate this last day of indulgence before Lent.

I've got to admit, there's nothing quite as yummy as warm, sugared donuts right off of your stove!

I think Baby enjoyed them as much as Momma (yes, that's powdered sugar on my belly!), cause he was kicking like crazy right after I devoured several!

I have my gestational diabetes test on Friday. . . I don't think I have it, but let's hope this didn't put me over the edge!

A Sweet Surprise

When I transferred my photos from Erin's weekend visit to my computer, I was giddy to find a few particular snapshots on my memory card. While hanging out on the couch one morning, she picked up my camera to play around with my zoom lens and started snapping away.

She drew out Hayden's smiles in the way that only she can (she truly is a gifted photographer, connecting with her subjects in a meaningful way to elicit beautiful, amazing images).

I was even treated to a few mother-son photos!

Thanks, dear friend, for the sweet little surprise!

Weekend Visitors

We were thrilled to have Erin and Ephraim here for a visit over the last few days! Unfortunately, I took them to the airport early this morning and we're already missing our dear friends. We had the cameras out in force, though, and Erin will be surprised to see this post when she gets back home this afternoon (this sort of promptness is very un-Shertzer-like).

Hayden was just as excited about the visit as I was. Rich loaded an extra carseat into the Odyssey last Sunday and every time we went somewhere all week Hayden declared, "Ephraim's seat!" and couldn't wait to have a buddy in the backseat with him!

He also was very happy to see dear Miss Erin again, especially when she indulged him in his favorite activity. . .

(that big bad wolf is pretty scary!)

The visit was a little more challenging than we were expecting, though, because it turns out Hayden was only excited about Ephraim in theory. He didn't realize that he'd be sharing his toys for the weekend with his little buddy. Hayden was also quick to realize that he was older than Ephraim and he pulled rank on him, snatching just about every object that Ephraim picked up. After enduring this type of toy-snatching for the last 15 months, he recently figured out how to defend himself by frantically waving his arms. Within a few hours, anytime Hayden came within a 2 feet radius of the boy, his arms would start flailing. I'm chuckling about it all now (after the fact), but constantly repeating the mantra "you need to share Hayden, pick out something Ephraim can play with. . ." we were all happier when the boys decided to play in separate corners! And after seeing this relatively new side of Hayden (he actually shares much better with the kids his own age that come over to play), I'm a bit concerned about the arrival of little brother!

We did have fun checking out all the fun stuff Bozeman has to offer. Our first stop was the Children's Museum of Bozeman. Ephraim quickly learned why Hayden and I go there weekly.

Even on neutral turf, Hayden felt entitled to help himself to whatever Ephraim was playing with.

Luckily, there was enough to distract and entertain them both!

We also had the pleasure of meeting up with fellow Bozemanite, photographer, and (up until that day) "computer friend," Kelly. She "met" Erin years ago on-line through their photography and then Erin hooked us up before we moved to Bozeman.

After letting the boys play for a while longer, we had lunch at a Main Street cafe (table for 6, with 3 high chairs) and did some window shopping.

It was a fun outing and with three photographers (2 real photographers and me, the "hobbyist") we did manage to get a self-timed photo with all of us!

To be completely fair, the boys did have some closely supervised, nice moments of sharing. The workbench had enough hardware to keep them both happy!

And at the Museum of the Rockies (another of our outings), the treehouse exhibit was fun to explore both together. . .

. . . and independently.

All-in-all it was a fun visit. We had a good mix of watching the boys play together nicely, supervising toy battles and enforcing friendly sharing, relaxing during kid nap time, fun trips to some of our favorite Bozeman spots, and lots of playing with cameras.

The only downside of the weekend was failing to get a good photo of Erin and I together and failing to get a photo of the boys in their matching "I want to be a Montana cowboy" shirts. The former was due to an oversight, the latter was due to uncooperative subjects. Oh well, maybe during our next visit!

Thanks, Erin and Ephraim, for braving the airplane flights and cold weather (although it really was sunny, beautiful, and mild the entire time. . . but 40's are still chilly for southerners!)! We love you guys and miss you already!

At last. . .

. . . a family ski outing under gorgeous blue skies! One of the things that drew us to Bozeman was cross-country skiing. The community really supports it and even has an organization that grooms five areas around town for skiing (in city parks, on city trails, and on a local golf course). There's also a cross country "resort" about 20 minutes from town and there's another, world-class nordic resort 45 minutes from town. Not to mention the miles and miles of trails where you can blaze your own path within a 10 mile radius from our house.

As we were unpacking in August, we were already dreaming of the first snows, expecting to be on our skis 4-5 days a week from November through April (and maybe even into May) in conditions like this:

But things haven't quite lived up to our expectations. . .

First, I'm pregnant. I've been fortunate to be able to stay fairly active thus far, but it's still a fraction of what I was doing before I had a baby in my belly. Downhill skiing has been completely off limits and I can't cross country ski for nearly as long or on nearly the hilly terrain that I'd like.

Second, the weather patterns haven't been very normal for the last 3 months. We got mounds and mounds of the white stuff in December, which had us giddy. But we also had over 2 weeks of sub-zero temperatures (and those were the highs). I like the cold, but that's just too cold to be active. Stepping outside to get the newspaper in -10 degree weather sent me into a fit of coughing. . . there's no way I could ski! January rolled around, the sun came out and the temperatures warmed back up, but they got a little too warm. . . into the 40's (which was 10+ degrees higher than normal). And in the entire month, we had merely a dusting of snow. The beautiful city ski trails struggled to hold onto snow and started getting icy.

February, however, seems to be our month! Check out these beautiful scenes at Bohart Ranch over the weekend. Bonus #1: they had a few inches of new snow overnight. Bonus #2: it was a "bonus day," their once-a-month half-price trail pass day!

Rich was all smiles, Hayden was all smiles ("more more woooooooo!" as he and Rich raced down the trails), and I was all smiles!

And look, proof that I really was skiing. . . the pregnant lady in action:

This, dear Bozeman, is what we've been waiting for. . . here's to (at least) 6 more weeks of this kind of winter! (Mother Nature: if you could please oblige us this weekend in particular as we show off our beloved hometown to our dear Alabama friends!)