me-hee-koe.

so I shot for a couple of days on a movie called 'the girl' last month. it was shooting in mexico, so I got to go to oaxaca city for 5 days (I was missing mgb and magz for real, and wished I spoke more spanish). I learned a lot on this trip, and mostly hope that my performance comes out okay when all is said and done. all photos below were taken with ye old iphone, as I'd neglected to bring my real camera.

view from my balcony

ditto

I tried to capture the claustrophobic nature of the famed markets near the main plaza... I really loved them, though the meat areas were a little nauseating to me:

another strip of markets on the main plaza:

major cathedral, captured on my way to dinner @ a place recommended by the P family. I can't for the life of me remember the name of this place right now.

delicious dinner of local mushroom pasta...

breakfast at zocalo, or the main plaza. I loved people-watching here almost every day.

shooting.

with lead A.Cornish, who knows how to look great. I just know how to look rather pudgy.

with 'the girl'. I can't remember her name, but she was a total doll and liked looking at maggie's pictures on my phone. she also likes angry birds.

with the director and producer. this photo reminds me to be sad that this pair of jeans is currently m.i.a., as is my arcade fire t-shirt.

I did it, I shot a good scene in that movie. at least, I hope it's good. and now I'm going to bed.

m.y.

coping by organizing my phone

there have been a few stories in the news lately that simply slay me if I think about them for very long, awful events that leave behind children without parents, a man without his wife and 4 kids. it's so fragile, this life we live - my chest hurts and I'm shamed to think about how I gamble it by texting in the car or trying to read something while driving.

I'm also chastised when I consider how quick to frustration and short of patience I've been the past few weeks. it's not very pretty, and it's not who I really want to be.

so, to cope with feeling... um... feelings... I clean or try to organize things to, you know, attempt to regain control. my iphone was an easy mark, as I've not updated podcasts/calendars/photos in forever. I've added a new podcast this go-'round - at the suggestion of Ms. R.A. I subscribed to Ecclesia Church's podcast, just to see what that church has got going on. I've not been over there in years, but I used to frequent the coffee shop and I appreciated a lot of their ideals.

before I forget, I really enjoyed my friend K's newest blog post - I was an avid reader up through high school, but especially in elementary and jr. high. I read anything I could get my hands on, and I loved carefully filling out the Weekly Reader order forms and choosing treasures at book fairs. the thoughts K expressed about some of the purposes and goals of children's literature strike me as true and line up with my experience as a young reader. I read all sorts of different kinds of things, and I believe that by doing so I was able learn to distinguish that it wasn't all the same - various ideals carried different 'weight' based on my worldview and I was able to work that out by being exposed to large themes and different genres, whether it was Golden Books or Sweet Pickles or Nancy Drew or Judy Blume or a wonderful book about Joseph and his coat of many colors that I read at YaYa's until it fell apart.

I don't remember politics ever being connected to what I read or thought, or even being much on my radar (except for 'voting' for Jimmy Carter in the second grade). I would say I was raised to be a faithful Christian, but that my parents still allowed us to experience the world in a way that allowed us to think and wrestle with it, and I'm really grateful for that. in an increasingly-standardized and fearful/distrustful society, I want to help our girl learn how to navigate the world thoughtfully and compassionately, and I think the stories she hears are a good place to start.

this is a bit of a tangent, but in a recent late-night conversation with my brother, I said that I believe kids today are likely to have a super-different view of the world than even my generation, as the internet and such makes the global community so accessible... it's becoming easier and easier to view most people of different countries as being fellow humans, same as us, that we can banter with on discussion boards and do business with instead of viewing them as national allies or enemies. I don't know what that will mean, I just believe it to probably be true.

here are an assortment of photos rescued from the iphone. ones from mexico, grandad's funeral, etc. will come another time. oh, while you peruse these photos imagine this darling face screaming and unconsolable at 12:30 last night, arms flailing and little body twisting in frustration. she's better today, sweet and still a little clingy. every so often, she finds her favorite blanket and presses it to her face, biting the yarn hard and trying to take the edge off. teething is a hardcore, serious business.

helping with laundry

first story-time!

exhausted from playing with the calculator

I came home one day to find a picnic in progress

watching the end of Elmo's World with momo

my hair, before.

and after. :)

I'm still getting used to it... I keep thinking I just have my hair pulled up in back. It's never been this short before, but I really like it.

happy Saturday!

L

I post photos.

I can't even begin to try to describe the past few weeks. so let's just look at pictures I collected on my camera during that time.

first up, we went to M's friend's wedding over at U of H. here's our fun, pretty, and VOCAL girl:

this dress was my mother's day gift - it's totally fly, for real.

documentation of that first big bruise, compliments of the coffee table. and there's Goodnight Moon, which is still a favorite. she likes to show you where the kitties are.

after my Mexico trip, after work, after the trip to Hico and Grandad's funeral, after the trip home and more work, and after throwing my house together in the blink of an eye, we had Magz' first birthday party. it was a total success - we were so glad to see family and friends, and I really wish I'd had it in me to take more photos. I'm grateful to my brother for snapping a few shots, even though the light coming in from the skylight makes Maggie look like a glowing radioactive cherub:

I rather like the slight blurriness of the photos. it looks a little bit like it felt to me, like we we'd just stepped off the Tilt-A-Whirl and were trying to get our bearings:

this is not clean eating. :)

in a real pool for the first time. we should all have a floatie like this.

with daddy and momo.

100% adorable.

with yaya. fyi, when we went up to the metroplex last Wednesday we sort of stopped giving her bottles. I took some, just in case, but we never broke them out. so it's sippy cups and whole milk all the way for this one-year-old:

I wanted to chronicle the fact that one of her favorite toys around here was this cheap Office Max calculator:

riding yaya's wheels at the reunion in Ft. Worth last weekend:

pretty mo.

unabashedly eating berries. she does not care.

studying cousin K with marmee.

considering a meltdown.

i love my daddy.

and this was today, after I'd read for 5 hrs and hit the church for a meeting. Magz & I ran out to do some errands and give mgb a break, and when we got home I got to sit and enjoy this while I caught up on a stack of dvr'd episodes of 19 Kids and Counting. don't judge.

I think I'm starting to breathe deeply again.

guess what's not in this post? any photos from Mexico, because they're all on my phone. so I'll have to blog again, I guess.

:)

mgb makes good hummus from total scratch. and I love it when he makes us cold wedge salad in the summertime and cuts up bell pepper instead of tomato.

I could not have accomplished the birthday party/housecleaning effort without lindabell's help. really, I couldn't have.

grandad's funeral was wonderful. my brother said the best things.

in the last few weeks, I've let myself off the hook for trying to be awesome at everything all the time, but I'm really ready to start eating well again. and I miss working out.

I am, apparently, a reading machine. oh, and if you're a teacher you may encounter the training programs I'm doing now... why don't you go ahead and start imagining how you can transition your classroom to a multi-media, online format. don't worry, your organization's LMS should be a great help, and you can shoot for gradual blended learning if the online component freaks you out. but buck up, soldier - the technology is here to stay, people are already drawn to it, and it can add a lot of options to your class to help different kinds of learners, so make friends with the computer and let it help us turn out critical thinkers who're actively participating in their educations. *sorry, I've read a lot of these things the past few days.*

I can't wait to have my hair chopped off.

our baby is toddling.

I'm blessed beyond my understanding.

-m.y.