Dream-come-true Dress

Jasmine has a dress she calls her "dream-come-true" dress. She is adorable in it, and she knows it. Unfortunately, it means she's always wearing the same thing in her pictures. My sisters noticed on Saturday that she was wearing the same thing she'd worn the time before. It does get washed...but the whole time it's in there, she's asking if it's time to change the load so she can have it back.

I decided it was time to scrap that. I'm sure Josh's Grandma will be pretty pleased to see this, since she's the one that bought the dress! (she bought one for Bekah, too, but Bekah is okay doing a bit more rotating of clothes!)

Cheating

I posted this picture on my Photo-a-day blog too, but I wanted to show you here, too, since I know more people read this blog.

Here is Bekah before we went to see my parents on Saturday. She stood still long enough for me to put these braids in her hair, and they made her look absolutely gorgeous (not that she isn't the rest of the time....)

Who Needs Roller Coasters?

With all the insanity surrounding my camera problems, I feel like life has been a roller coaster. Add in pregnancy hormones, which are much more apparent this time around, and it's made for an interesting ride.

I don't remember how much I've written and am too lazy to go back and look. ;)

My camera had a quirk from the day I got it (I say "quirk" only because it resolved itself, not because it was easy to deal with at the time). If I used the Depth of Field Preview button (which I only used to see what it did, since my D40 didn't have one), the pictures were extremely dark after that. I reset everything, and a couple hours later the pictures worked again.

It happened again a month or so later, when I changed lenses (yes, I change them that infrequently!). And again right before Christmas, for no reason whatsoever.

Knowing we were headed to Disney World in the end of January, I decided it was time to get it in to the shop right after Christmas.

I got it back yesterday. Everything was covered under warranty, and I was esctatic.

Until I saw this morning that my warranty was only good for 3 months (because it's refurbished and not new)...and realized that meant it was expiring before our trip.
Being very curious by nature, I decided to try the Depth of Field Preview button once more, just to see if it really was fixed.

And was heartbroken to find out that it wasn't. Not only was it not fixed, it now wouldn't accept my rebooting.

I wrote to Nikon again this morning and said "HELP!!!" and told them about the warranty concerns and our vacation. I heard back when I got home from the chiropractor: it's still covered since they didn't fix it last time, and they can't promise anything, but they'll try to get it back to me before our trip.

So they have 6 days (two of those days being WEEKEND) to get it fixed and back to me. Otherwise, I'll have to use our point-and-shoot, which was a constant frustration last time I tried to use it. So I may put Josh in charge of photos for at least some of our trip, if my camera isn't back in time.

I could use your prayers in the situation...I feel silly asking that you pray about a camera, but God says that anything that concerns us is big enough to come to him about. Praying that they get it quickly, find the real problem and can fix it right away, and that it's back in my hands again by Thursday.

Edit: It seems to be working again for now. It's touchy, but I think it should do okay for the next 2 weeks, and then I'll send it in as soon as we get home. (I haven't gotten an email back from Nikon yet so can't send it until at least Monday. I don't think there's any way it would possibly make it back by Thursday!!!) So pray that it keeps doing okay and getting the pictures for now, and hopefully we'll have good pictures to show off in a few weeks :)

The end of an era

We have decided that our website, joshandcharlene.com, has outlived its usefulness. We won't be renewing the domain.

It's sad, but it's time. I haven't updated it since shortly after we moved here. If I have anything new to say, I write about it here. When we started that site, I had no idea how much easier a blog would be (really, I didn't know what a blog was at that point!)


In other news, Jasmine and I made a project together. I got my hair trimmed a couple weeks ago, and she came and took pictures of the process. Since I had done that during her haircut, she thought this was a very cool idea. The pictures came out kinda drunk-on-the-run, but it's fun to see things from her perspective.









I put the pictures on the computer, and the next day she chose papers and frames she wanted for her box. She decided which pictures went in which frames, and I put it all together. After Josh printed it, I cut it out and let her glue the seam. A minute later, she was holding her very own popcorn box! (no, we haven't put popcorn in it yet).

We couldn't let her have ALL the fun, so we made one for Bekah, too. She chose her papers and frames, but they're pictures I took at the Strong Museum of Play the weekend before. They are both so proud!

Jasmine's Blocks

I wonder who she's taking after???

Jasmine, Bekah and I started making a big tower of their Legos and Mega Bloks. I had to leave to make lunch, but Jasmine kept working on it.

A few minutes later, she came running in, saying "I need to take a picture. Where's my camera?" I told her it was in her room, so off she went.

She told me she got "a good picture." Here's what she took (with her camera):

Albums for the girls

I made both girls CD albums this week. They were SO much fun to make, and the girls are thrilled :)

Jasmine's:








And Bekah's: