by Heather
Whitney and I had a great time the other week lugging our boys out to Marin County to visit the professional photographer for our free 8×10. Luckily, we turned the afternoon into a huge adventure and didn’t get too upset that the photos were not worth paying for. We learned what we already suspected: that sometimes Mommy is the best photographer because real photographers can be scary.
Hilary offers us some photo tips to take gorgeous, professional-looking pictures at home:
- Know what you like. Look for baby photographers online. You can look at their sites and pick out photos that you like. We did this a bunch before we began photographing Kai as it helped us decide on what style of photos we liked best.
- Take lots of photos. I easily take 100 photos a week of Kai doing most anything–sometimes in action, sometime just sleeping. It’s helped me narrow down which types of photos I like best.
- Seize good lighting. Bright, cloudy days seem to have the best lighting. I try to avoid using a flash and just get good natural light.
- Find a neutral background. Backgrounds that I have found to work great are nature (flowers, grass, bamboo) and blankets.
- Get close. I enjoy close up photos of Kai’s face best. I try to take lots of these to capture his different expressions.
- Support the baby. Kai is sitting infront of the bamboo. I am sitting in front of him holding him steady with my feet–the ground is concrete and I didn’t want to risk him falling down–and I’m leaning back a bit so I got more distance between us. You can actually see my reflection in his eyes in a few of the shots I took.
- Crop. It’s amazing how much a photo can improve by cropping. Remove a parents hand or go for an interesting shape.
The photo of Kai with the bamboo worked out so well because Hilary knew exactly what photo she wanted before she went out to take it–a close-up of Kai’s face with bamboo in the background set up (to be cropped in a horizontal shape for her site’s banner). Also, the lighting was great that day.
Whitney has some other good ideas for artfully photographing a sleeping baby.
by Whitney
First, I’ll give credit where it’s due:
The author of redcurrent.com gave a clear tutorial for how to make these pants, and the author of tinyhappy displayed inspiring before and after pictures of her tshirts made into pants.
Now, let’s celebrate my success, people. I took this long-sleeved t-shirt belonging to Ryan, and while Julian was asleep, I cut the two required pieces to make pants. About 5 minutes. It’s just a left leg and a right leg. Then, I sewed them together. Now ten minutes have passed. The kid was still sleeping! Then, Heather and Holden came over. Julian woke up, and while the boys wreaked havoc in my bedroom, tossing plastic shovels, cotton balls and Cheerios this way and that, Heather made 75% of a pair of lounge pants for Holden while I coached her and wrangled her baby. Sure, he had to sit in the Pack and Play for a few minutes, but we had a good time. Later that night, I sewed my elastic waist in. The whole project was about 40 minutes. The full tutorial is here.
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by Whitney
Make your partner feel loved by using your baby’s chest as advertising space.
Put an “I love” message on a onesie or bib and take a picture of the baby wearing it. This baby is rocking the straightforward message to daddy. I myself prefer a more subtle tribute to my husband with a projection of his hobbies or interests on the kid. “I (heart) downloading music for free” or “I (heart) burritos”.
I’ve thought of a few ways of achieving this:
Fern and Baby Mack made this great onesie including a little homemade caricature of daddy. Well done!
by Heather
My car is the same one I’ve been driving for almost 11 years. It was always a mom car sedan and is only just living up to its potential now that I have a baby. Frankly, it has room for improvements: it still has a cassette tape hole for playing mix tapes; regular locks that open with keys and no beep-beep; and a teeny trunk that can barely fit my stroller. But I can live with this…
When Holden moved from the bucket car seat to the big boy carseat with no sun visor I couldn’t stand to see the sunshine blinding him in the backseat. We took the advice of Christian (the carseat legend at Rockridge Kids) to have the three rear windows tinted the very next day.
Endorsed by Whitney: Tint On Wheels is run by Andy who comes to your house. If you are jailed by a napping baby, this is a wonderful service.
Endorsed by me and Christian: Window Tinting Plus is on Broadway walking distance to Piedmont shopping district. Wherever you go, don’t pay more than $150.
