Mulligan...

Generally, I don't find myself being one to use golf terms... but... 

Last weekend, NOT the best weekend.  Not that anyone died, or went bankrupt, or anything... maybe something INSIDE them died, and maybe someone went EMOTIONALLY bankrupt...  again...  NOT the best weekend.  

And even though the disturbing and upsetting events didn't necessarily happen to ME or Choni, they affected (infected) our family unit just the same. ... Because we care dammit!

Choni's got some upsetting news about his friend...that made him blah.

We went for a visit with my mother-in-law on saturday and basically dropped Thing 1 off with her to spend the night...and then Sunday was a blah day... the kind of day where you have a list of things to do...and there's 5 day things to do...and all 5 of those things don't go either A)The way they were supposed to B)The way you atleast hoped they would C)Didn't go at ALL.

Bummer...

But it wasn't my list it was my mom's, but I was there as one thing after another did NOT get checked off on a day that was already sucking for her.  

Bummer...

Big.Fat.Bummer.

So, Monday, we awoke, getting ready for the first after the time change, which also leaves everyone in a state of blah.  The morning became dark again.  That does not help my family of four get jazzed for the mornings...  We were late getting up and getting out of the house... the next day we were less late...the next day we were on time, this morning, we were early.  Yay us.  It only took us 4 days to get this down...

But Monday when we got up, and the maddening tornado of "Move! I'm late!" started...and in between the lines we knew... we knew our weekend pretty much sucked... it did... it sucked... I wanted a do-over... I think we deserve it. The way things have been on a bit of an upswing for us and we've doing our due diligence as good adults and grown ups and members of society...  we deserve a good weekend... a weekend full of good, positive, awesome vibes... 

Not to put the pressure on , but we will get what we want!!  Ha-haaa!

The plans for this weekend are starting to come together into something that one way or another, we will get things checked off our list, kids will be happy and we will go to sleep exhausted and fulfilled...one way or another.

That being said: a little catch up-

Thing 1 does not require a parent/teacher conference for the spring (as usual) and I am happy about that!  Thing 2 is talking her gibberish that gets more understandable each day.  She says SO many things, yet it is total gibberish... A few words are clear as day.  You can tell she wants to learn the words so badly and wants to communicate... One day, just like her sister, she'll be three years old, and Daddy and I will be on the cusp of a nervous breakdown from people telling us "She should be talking by now, my *insert toddler relative here* is just talking up a clear, concise, articulate storm of diction!" and then BOOM!  Fully blown conversations will erupt over night.  We're not worried, it's fine.

Thing 1 goes to an after school program and when she gets there, she is assigned a "teacher" and a "class room".  It's held at her school, so there's no transporting needed and she's already in a place she is familiar.  The staff is brought it in just for the after school program and if something happens with your child, these people will pull aside to talk to you.  That's never happened to me yet, and I always see the staff talking to the parents and telling them that their kid got a warning, or is on a second warning, or that they have had enough warnings that they will be considering dropping them from the program... always negative... never positive.  When I walked up to the room to get her the other day, a woman in a blue shirt rushed out the door to meet me and asked if I was Thing 1's mom... 

ME:  Uhm... yeah?

Miss B: OH Great! I'm Miss Brandy!  I just LOVE having her in my class.  She's a good reader.  I mean, she reads VERY well..?  **because it was almost a question...

ME:  Yes, she really does. She reads all the time.  I've read to her since she was very little and I read a lot, so she sees me do it and wants to be like Mommy, you know.

Miss B:  She puts inflection and voices into the reading out loud that we do in class, it just amazes me.  I just love her, she's so sweet!

ME: Yes, she really is.

Miss B: Well, it was GREAT to meet you finally!  I hear so many good things from her about her mom and dad and little sister!

ME: **Trying NOT to hide the shock and awe* Good to meet you, too, thanks!

See what I mean?  Things trod along just fine, and then a weekend of extreme less than mediocrity comes and bites us in the ass...and this after I spent a FULL week in bed with some such YUCKINESS i care NOT to ever repeat in my life and then another week of getting over that while trying to function at work and catch up...this week is REALLY the catch up week... 

I got my lens in the mail and all my fun purchases I made with the tax return...not able to enjoy it at all for about a week due to illness...it's like someone getting something you can't have, but you know you can in a few days or a week, but you STILL can't have it right now and that just sucks... First world problems right?  I know... sad but true... My new lens rocks!!  It's a Tamron, my lil cuz says it's the Civic of lenses... sweetness.  And I hate to admit how much of a different it really makes.  Cause it does...and I hate that because it makes something so expensive so necessary.

Daddy is looking at lighting and backgrounds systems that we can both use.  Funny how this is never how we intended to end up...a still and video photographer living under one roof**smiley face**

Ok, well that's enough from this end...  I just felt like we had SUCH A BLAH WEEKEND!!  MULLIGAN!!!!!

Hold Me Closer, Tiny Dancer...

I have no idea what to do with this...

She's doing exactly what you think she is doing...

Plié...using Noni's end table as a Barre...

I got a girlie girl supreme...  Tutus and dresses and barrettes that cover her entire head like a crown are my life for the FIRST time in my whole life.  Thing 1 was not this way.  She patronized her grandmother with the fufu dresses, the gloves, the ruffle socks, the ribbons in the hair with every color in them coordinating with her exact ensemble...

But YOU had to do it... YOU had to ask her if she wanted it, if she wanted to wear the fufu... and usually she said no..It became one of those things where she would say, "But that's what I wear at grandma's, that's not for home."

Damn...

That doesn't mean, though, that this Tomboy doesn't have a few tricks up her sleeves... I have a way that we can have our cake and eat it too... Thing 2 likes frilly dresses and grabs them with gusto to get dressed in the morning...Like this...

Oy vey...how was I supposed to leave this today?  It's not easy, I tell ya.

I can't believe I actually found a cute little ruffly tutu legging combo thing in the clearance rack at Target for $6...  HAD to get that for my girlie girl... Thing 1... well, she's 8 1/2 going on 30... so she's fine with her Kindle books. 

My baby is not a baby, I have a toddler.  NO matter how we slice it, she's a big girl now...  She has her specificities with things, she's not much for words, but that doesn't mean she's not paying attention to everything you're doing at any given time.  Because SHE IS!  I have slowly started the move from silicone sippy cups to hard plastic sippy and with everything else so far she is making the change like a trooper...maybe I"M not the one ready for her to leave the crib behind, but I love the replacement crib I got her and she loves it, too.  There are some things that will need to go on in the not too distant future as far as making a large bedroom fit for two girls of such different ages... but not right this very second.  I'm enjoying this stage, drinking in the last drink before I quit cold turkey in the morning, so to speak.

Last baby, and we're done... No mas bebes... and it's sad.  It is, even the mister said it was sad...but then he gets all logical on me and rational about how there are so many firsts we have to look forward to and that's what she be focusing on...damn him... and his perfectly reasonable logic.

We are still toting a stroller everywhere, because I would rather push a stroller than pull a toddler.  She gets plenty of running around time in the backyard these days.  Especially with this bullshit, crazy ass weather... I'm already considering bathing suits for these two.

We'll be dusting off and pulling out the ol' potty trainer soon too...but I think we'll wait a little while longer before that trauma begins... Not gonna lie... I'll probably bawl my eyes out when I pull the last diaper out of the diaper box...  good thing those bad boys are so absorbent...

And On The 13th Day...

Good Monday... Good Morning... however you prefer... I prefer whichever way works the best!

We have had quite a beginning of the year...And all in good ways!  One of my cousins on my dad's side, which is a very small side, they're the Rhode Island of families, recently moved two towns away from me if you're counting from my house.  SAME town if you're counting from work.  Yay!!  I get to see her more!  She  moved in with her mum, my Pop's little sister, and I might get to see her more too.  She's a Hermit Crab.  Not just a Hermit, a Hermit CRAB...  She's rad and we love her, but she can be a bit of a crabapple.  4 years in the same town as my work and I have yet to see her due to that fact.  Saw her twice, once at a wedding in Pismo Beach of all places and once at my baby shower for Thing 2.  That was a surprise!!!  It was the best surprise of the day, really.  She took Pop's death really hard and she's one of those people that doesn't want to be reminded of the negative, even if it means staying away from the negative's children.  Hopefully a trend to be changing in the not too distant future... I'm leaning towards Saturday! 

I am still rolling with the changes, REO Speedwagon style, as to having a child born in January...  Atleast it's at the polar end of Christmas and New Years, but still...January.  I have decided to make it less stress and I am now not including the month of January in my yearly budget.  January is a free for all...The "year" will start with my January 31st check, not with my December 31st check as previous years sans Thing 2.  Once I decided on that, my whole outlook on this month was A-Number 1-100%-OK.  Yay!  Nothing extravagant for her bday this year.  Just an intimate family party with some cake, some pizza.  You know, health food.  I'm excited though just the same because it means we have managed to keep the tiny human safe and sound for two whole years.  It's as much a celebration of the day of her birth as it is of every day since... I am a proud mama of this little one and of our family as a whole!  Yay us!

We got our W-2's at work today...You know what that means...the tax man waits for no one...  I get to start my orange tri-cut folder of 2013 tax info.  My tax lady loves me for this, by the way... she LOVES me for this.  I have two more W-2's, the mortgage company info for the house, the bank statement year ends and my 401k stuff to throw in and we're getting our taxes done! YAY!  I know, shut up, I like YAY... it works for me right now. 

I have the taxes all tangled up already and I'm fine with the outcome so far.  I am VERY fine with the fact that the lens that was suggested to me by my lil cuz is coming down in price as we speak.  I love the Amazon Wish List, it's one of my favourite things.  Then there's the whole Flash debacle.  I have been putting off getting a flash for my DSLR since I bought my very FIRST one.  I have a flash for a SLR, and I LOVE it... nothing special, but it's fancy enough for me.  I am not a true dyed in the wool photog, though... so I am not comfortable using the 35mm that was once my gpa's anymore...So it's time to walk away from the past and make the push into the new millennia...14 years after it started, but still...shut up.  I am DYING to get the lens and flash because now that the prices have dropped SO significantly I feel super justified in the purchases.  Then there's the struts for our civic, still need to do that...  we are getting our new phones, and now there is a new deal through TMobile that I am wondering if we should check out.  Getting these phones is going to be just as if not more harrowing than getting our house.  But that's how I roll and that is one of the reasons my hunny loves me!

Wednesday I have taken a personal day to stay within the vicinity of my home and await the arrival of my Pop's elder sister to come into town from several states away with my Uncle and their RV... I LOVE that I get to see them too!  I have gotten to see her a lot I'd say... for someone that lives STATES away.  I LOVE seeing the side of the family that completes my puzzle.  That's what Choners says.  He kinda gets where I fit in with Ma's family...but when we're around Pop's family it's like a game show buzzer going off in his head and it's lovely.

Another reason for us to write off January as a loss, other than Thing 2's bday, this year my favorite bookstore in town is closing it's doors.  They couldn't brave the slow paced sMall that they reside in and have to make a decision.  I have been a patron of the store since day one and will miss them so.  They had GREAT discounts when there were discounts, and it's even better with 75% off the lowest price.  I got THREE bags of books for $24.  And there's something in there for ALL of us!  It was so bittersweet...  So many empty stores in our sMall.  Atleast during Halloween they put one of those atrocious Costume City things in there and it beefs up the traffic something wonderful... I loved how artificially busy it was Saturday with the closing sale. People came out of the woodwork.  Aaahh, small towns...

We still don't know what we're doing for the Big 10...  and we also made another financial decision.  To cancel our New York trip next year so I can get LASIK... I am just about Legally Blind and I am a candidate and Ma works in Optometry and can get me a deal...but with the things we have going on this year, I would really like to get my eyes done next year.  I almost bit the bullet and did it this year, but it would cut too heavily into our, lets say, profit margin...Still not sure how to incorporate photos into the blog to make it interesting... so I'm considering that heavily and hopefully that will improve with the new upgrades to ol' Betsy.  Other than that, everything's good.  Rolling along at work... I need to get in for a trim, keeping the short 'do... 

First Pic...

Having fun with the 'do...

These are my wascally wabbits...

 

And one of them will be two :*(

 

 

Two days....

Two Years!!!

 

and always with the squishy face!!

♪Oh The Weather Outside Is Weather...♪

I have been crafting up a storm and the man has been baking cookies fresh for Thing 1's lunches... peanut butter oatmeal. Yum!  Cookies make the house warm and it smells like the holidays already!  Generally I am ALL about making room for Thanksgiving so it doesn't feel like the redheaded stepchild of the holiday season, but this year man, it just seems like we need the OOMPH into Christmas.  Luckily for me, I have never had decorations for Thanksgiving and the stores decided to lump Halloween and Thanksgiving together this year.  Amazingly enough, I now have Thanksgiving décor due to the storewide "fall" clearances that did the lumping together! Haha!

 Ma and her man are doing well...we like him.  He might be around for Thanksgiving... hope so... he's fun.  It's going to be a small Thanksgiving this year, much like Christmas.  I'm just glad I finished shopping already.  I get to sit back and enjoy now.  Generally, what we do is take the Friday after Thanksgiving to decorate like so many people I'm sure do.  This year, I'm jumping the gun...and get this...at the request of Choners...he is usually VERY adamant about giving Turkey Day it's due.  Well, this year, he wants his cake and he's going to eat it too... Next Monday, whether the big one goes to day care or not, we are doing our Christmas décor.  It's something to pass the time and we might have Knott's plans on Saturday... but until that is certain I don't want to make any plans in stone.  So I say, the general idea will be to get out the Christmas awesomeness for Monday... and if Thing 1 goes, she will come home to a winter wonderland in the house :)  Also, I am planning on lights outside this year! Shhh, don't tell Mister... 

This weekend is family weekend, we're gonna see a lot of his family :)  I say his family, but they're really OUR family...It's funny, I just wanted to specify WHICH side of the family, mine or his...  I could say The Brown side...  But really, that doesn't help... us Irish have been known to have the fever.  So both sides are relatively brown.. hehehe...

Tuesday is Christmas pictures... I have been saying, I want to make more image heavy posts, but I haven't yet.  I think because I don't plan them THAT far ahead... so it's hard to do.  Also, I love my camera.  I love it SO much I'm afraid to leave the house with it...  I know.. shut up...  I got a filter for it to protect the lens so perhaps I would feel better about letting it bang around my back pack...  wrapped in a scarf...  and maybe a sweater.

Next years tax return already has a portion dedicated to my new lens.  My cousin Ace is in "the business" and he helped me out HUGE on shopping around for my next lens purchase... And the more Choni is working on his film project the more I think he will probably want to use the Nikon for projects...  A new lens wouldn't hurt!  Ace said that my camera body and specs are great, I should be getting great results when I put the new lens on ...next year...

I am LOVING the weather...cold. I love cold.  Snuggles, soup, hot cocoa, coffee NOT for my morning commute... aaaahhhh... Blankets on the couches... I LOVE blankets...  kid snuggles...  and when the decorations go up...the soft warm glow of the tree...  oh yeah... that's the stuff....

Today is my last work day of November and I start my staycation... Thing 1 asked if I had any time off that overlapped HER time off...so I made some... cause sometimes, you just have to.  I hope this allergy/cold thing goes away... Maybe with a little help from my friends Alka Seltzer and Nyquil... 

Too bad there's not a way to make people leave comments... I want comments...

Justified...

jus·ti·fy

 [ jústi f ]   

1. make something seem reasonable: to serve as an acceptable reason or excuse for something
2. give somebody reason: to give somebody an acceptable reason for taking a particular action
3. explain something: to give a reason or explanation why something was done

I was just talking to my boss...and realized I used this word about a bazillion times... 

Why did I do that?  Oh... I don't know... Maybe because I bought another Nikon...  and an instant film camera...with money that I wasn't really counting on being there after I strapped my family to a budget rocket headed for our future savings goal. 

We have already had most of our FUN after I put the savings money in savings.  That money is "gone" now and not to be returned to...and then there's the NEW savings I set up...the 401k.  Which doesn't exist.  That's what I tell myself so I don't feel like I'm getting screwed out of money. 

I had a nice long talk with my CPA and she and I decided that maybe after NEXT year, I will raise my deductions so I can have more money with each check.  I don't like using the IRS as a savings account.  I make sure that my state deductions are just enough so that I don't owe... because FUCK JERRY BROWN AND CALIFORNIA STATE TAX BULLSHIT ... that's why... Moving on...

I justify everyday the decisions I make because I want them to make sense not just to me but to the rest of my little family unit and maybe a few people outside of it.  I justify that I get my hair done every 6 weeks, I justify getting our cars maintenanced often as they need it because it will save me money in the long run and they're both paid off... I justify NOT having credit card debt because I bought my house and utilities now report to credit bureaus so THERE"S my credit bitches... I had to justify my marriage to a person need not speak his name, I had to justify the move I made after high school, I justify it all...I justified not touching my deductions yet because I want a trip to New York...and then I will change it.  It amazes me every time my boss lady tells me what my Gross Income is... and I laugh and I think of the person out there that might actually get to take all that home...cause that's not me.  I don't get to do that.  But I do get to cover my whole family on all kinds of awesome insurance plans and I do get to have a retirement fund and I do have the FSA Section 125...until next year that is.

Our payroll company is rad, the people are awesome, I do NOT like how they roll with the section 125.  All of a sudden, and I mean as of last year, I have nothing but problems trying to get them to take my claims.  I have re-sent so many claims it is ridiculous.  Basically ending in threatening them with coming down there (all the way to upstate NY) and shaking my fist in their faces and spitting all over their keyboards on their desks with their kitties and puppies and nephews and nieces...  I just had to do it again.  They are trying to deny me my claim for my glasses because I really need the anti glare coating on my lenses.  I already pay out of pocket for the lenses and now I want money back that is already mine from this reimbursement fund.  Eff them, I could use that extra money in check and I am going to take it next year!  No more Section 125 for me!  I want to take my family on a vacation back east to Up State New York, so I want one more big tax return, and unless something awful happens to our house... it's ON!!!!  Owning a home does that to you.  It's another compartment of the brain that I didn't know I had and it's open all the time.  Sitting there with the adding machine everytime a drain doesn't drain properly or a light flickers or a bug shows up out of nowhere making me wonder if I have an infestation on my hands or maybe it's just a hot day and hot days bring the bugs in the house sometimes...

If it doesn't happen next year,  then I am going to take ANOTHER year to do it... but once I get my trip back east, we are taking our deductions up so I can get more money on my check... 

I tell you all that I guess to tell you this...

Growing up, I remember my mom and dad fighting about money a lot...  And I wouldn't change it for the world because I think it made me a more fiscally responsible person.  I really do.  And I think it's great that I found my awesome hubby who comes from humble means.  We don't fight about money, we don't even discuss it heatedly.  It's always a calm, cool, collected conversation that begins well, ends well, and boom... onto the next topic.  So when I went to sell my current camera to purchase the new one, he asked me why?  And not just "why?" but Why?! WHY?!? JESUS WHY?!?!?!  and I thought that was odd.  He has tighter wallet strings than me!  He has a velcro wallet that works TOO well because he wants to be discouraged to open it ever.  I thought it was weird to question me on it.  I explained it was because I was just too responsible to do otherwise...  And the reason I decided to get this new camera is because I really think it will be the end all be all camera for me for a really LOOOOOONG ass time.  I already love it, have used it and played with it and "That's Amore"...  I really thought he was joking.  I really should have been a lawyer...

When I decided I wanted the instant camera so I could better fill the pages in Mary's baby book like I did for Harley's with the JoyCam Polaroids, I didn't want him thinking I would get a gadget for gadget's sake...so I justified it.  And when I got it and used it and started to fill the pages immediately with these perfectly sized little photos, he got it, it clicked and we moved on.  Not that he NEEDED it justified to him, but I did it anyway just to make sure...and when I said I was trying to justify the purchase of the new Nikon with the Tax money ( mind you I still have plenty to throw into savings and even maybe go to Universal Studios with the family and I don't mean the kind of trip where everyone eats out of the same box of popcorn all day and the ticket stub is your souvenir) he got kinda taken aback like, "Why do you feel the need to justify it to me?"...well I don't... not really... I guess it's just PTSD from the money fighting that my mom and dad did... the money fighting my mom did with her second husband, the money fighting my sister did with HER second husband (now ex)...

Well folks, I did it, I justified the purchase...and welcome the newest member of the family :)

Ain't she purdy?  She will be the star of our New York trip that WE ARE TAKING!!  When... I dunno... but...  Wanna know how I justified it?? hehehe...

...I KNEW IT!!!!....

Blogger chick that I love so much for all the reasons we are so drastically different just as much as we are alike on so many things finally did it...she blogged about her pictures she takes for her blog.  I knew it was going to come one day because she was so heavily into film photography at one point and now it's the expression of the photos along with the words that move her blog...  I love that reading her blog sometimes is more like "reading" ...  more like osmosis if you will... 

I was sitting here thinking that it must be something awesome...awesome-ER than my camera...my meesely little Nikon 3100 that I got in red cause I could dammit...  and then I see the filters on the pictures and before I had Instagram I was completely in AWE by the filters on these photos and the moments she captured...  And then the blog hits and she talks about ALL of it!  I can't believe myself and how fast I soaked it all up like a slurpee in August...  **SLURP** done gone and all comprehended and accounted for. 

I KNEW IT...  I just did...  I knew that she used her damn iPhone...  top of the line awesome sauce iPhone that fits everywhere...  and I knew it.  I knew it because of the sheer amount of accessability demanded from the pictures she took... I just knew.  And now I know, next year when I get my new phone, I am getting either an iPhone or a badass camera phone... but probably...iPhone...  I am still getting my point n shoot Nikon Coolpix P520 ( in red because I can) to take the place of my DSLR which we WILL in fact be keeping because a) we are getting $$ back from the IRS and b) Choni can use it in his ventures.  Also I was only really selling so I could justify the purchase for my name is Ebeneza Scrooge, you may know my great great great grand uncle...

Fantastic news as that is, I am going to want something point and shootable that takes great pictures and then I'm going to want something that takes great video and then I'm going to want something with a great zoom feature and it just all pointed to P250...Also getting a Fuji instax mini.  I have been putting that purchase off since the goddamned thing came to the market and I'm doing it now... and it comes in yellow...  But someday very soon, it will be just me and my iPhone...taking the video and pictures that mold and shape our lives.  Because it's not about the tools you use on the photos but the passion with which you take them... disagree all you want... I'll just mock you...  heehee.

I Should Have Listened to My Dad and Become A Lawyer....

...or a mediator.. that would have been good too...

My Pop was a smart cookie...and I knew that even as a kid.  I knew that if I wanted him to see my way on something, I was going to have to step up my game.  And I did a pretty damn good job of it, too!  I could easily argue my way into a new Barbie, some matchbox cars or a couple of Archie comics from the impulse aisle of the Lucky's ...

Just when I started to think maybe I wasn't that good at it, I met my fabulous hubby.  He became witness to these moments of my arguing my way out of a paperbag (some people can't do that) and was once again self aware of my power of Justification.  The Ends Justify The Means...  probably would be the name of a semi-auto biography about my life :) 

Today I am justifying why I need a new lens for my Nikon, of which there are many.  But just now I was checking out a blog I love!!  The chick takes awesome pics with her iPhone...bare with me here...  I don't have one of THOSE and I don't have the $$ to buy a new one cash outside of the available upgrade for my cell plan that comes up NEXT year...  So I'm thinking, since we are due a good sum on our taxes, I would like to get a 55-300mm lens for my Nikon.

I didn't realize it until I read the blog as to WHY... 

I open my followed blogs and the first thing I see is an adorable and obviously instagrammed pic of a cute 18 mo old girl in her messy room.  Obviously Blogger Chick was standing above her child. Said child is happy and not screaming.

  Immediately my mind goes here:  Hey, that's a really cute picture and how come I don't have more pictures like that because i don't have an iPhone would it matter if I did have one I don't think it would because everytime I have my phone out Marysu wants to grab it and eat it and then I let her because I'm a sucker and then she gnaws it and then I have to take it and then she gets mad and then I have to dissuade her intentions away from my phone and then I don't get the cute picture I wanted so why don't I just pull out the Nikon because if you pull out the Nikon stupid ass then the baby will want that too and you won't get the good picture you wanted you will get a series of much too close up pictures because she will be on your ass like a fat kid on a cupcake and you shouldn't say stuff like that because your husband used to be a fat kid but thats okay because everyone of your boyfriends in middle school was a fat kid and hey didn't one of them give you a necklace for your birthday where the hell is that did it survive any of the moves why didn't you check and make sure that it made it okay it probably got lost with one of the tubs that had your matchbox cars in and now you have a spare room full of cars because your former fat kid husband makes an effort to put a new matchbox car in your stocking at xmas every year...

... I go from why don't I have a Nikon lens that I can zoom and take snaps from across the room to "There are way too many matchbox cars in my spare room"...

I'd like to avoid these head space convos... and I need to take snaps from across the room so I can Ninja-Photo my kids...

Therefore: I need a new lens...

CLEARLY, I chose the wrong profession...

...and speaking of photos.. think I should integrate more photos in this thing? Is it too boring without something to look at?