Can you believe it is already Tuesday again??  Yeah, me either!

So the challenge for September 7th in the INMT meme is Animals in Funny Places.  We could either find this inside or out.

Do you know how hard it was to find an animal in an odd place?  Yeah, pretty hard but here it is……..

A cow on a billboard! Haha?

This blog challenge is brought to you from Kristin.  Please head over to her site to get weekly challenges that are suppose to be posted every Saturday, but as you can see, I was totally late this week.  Sorry, K!

Anyways, this week the theme is A Picture Worth A Thousand Words. (which means I do no talking) So here you go:

It’s with a bittersweet taste in my mouth, and a certain heaviness in my heart that I type this post.

Just yesterday it feels like I was pregnant with my sweet baby, Ariana. In the blink of an eye she was rolling, smiling, crawling, even cooing.

The next moment she was standing, walking on her own, giggling. How soon following she started saying “dada” then “mama” and then “uh-oh.” Now she says “bite,” “budder” (brother), “GO!,” “Tink eww,” (thank you) and so much more!!

Now, she can almost run, and really tries her hardest to jump. She dances, sings (which is more of a hum), and has her own personality.  She even drinks from a grown-up cup sometimes!

Falling at about the 70th percentile for both her height and weight, I imagine she will be tall and lean. This, no doubt, has been the

genes on her father’s side of the pool. As a matter of fact, most of her physical features have come from her father, aside from her deep blue eyes which are a very dominant trait on my side of the family.  Oh yes, and the size of her head is for sure inherited from me, since she is in the 95th percentile there.

What I’m trying to get at is that my daughter…. my baby…… is growing up.  She is a toddler.  As

overwhelming as all of this is for a Mommy like me, it also opens new doors and opportunities.  She can run and giggle and play with her big brother, who adores her so much.

They are pretty much amazing together.

I hate that she isn’t a baby anymore, but I love and adore the toddler she has become!

This McDonalds play structure was, I kid you not, in someone’s backyard!!  I am truly and utterly JEALOUS!!!!!!  Yes, I do want one for my very own!

You can find more WW at 5 Minutes for Mom, My Organized Chaos, Mrs. Cox Slice of Heaven, and WW home !!

My baby had to have 5 (yes FIVE) shots on Monday.  One on each arm, one on her left leg, and two on her right.

Yet, she seems unfazed, doesn’t she?

You can find more WW at 5 Minutes for Mom, J. Leigh Designz, Mrs. Cox Slice of Heaven, and WW home !!

This is one of my “formal” attempts at trying silhouette photography. 

Thoughts?  Opinions?  Tips?  Anything helps!  I think silhouette photographs are spectacular and really want to sharpen my skills.

I don’t claim to be a photographer, in any sense of the term.  As a matter of fact, I consider myself extremely amateur when it comes to photography.

Mostly, I teach myself about photography and the camera that I use.  When I was a Sophomore in high school I did take a photography class, which is where my love and passion for the hobby began.  Using a Pentax K-1000, the 3 month class taught me a lot of what I know.

Since then, I have owned a number of digital Point & Shoot cameras, which can do no justice with pictures, and frustrated me more than anything else.

Recently, I was able to buy a digital SLR (single-lens reflex) camera and it was THE BEST INVESTMENT EVER!!!  My Pentax K-x is my new baby, my love, and my reason for this post.

Having to teach myself photography all over again (after all, it has been many years since I was a Sophomore), this camera really has all the options.

I’ll be completely honest with you…… I use my Pentax in “auto” mode 99% of the time as I haven’t had a large amount of time to use it in manual.  However, I am taking an oath now to work on my manual photography more when the sun decides to come out and play.  I need to teach myself what this Pentax is all about and push it to its limits!