How to go down the giant slide: by River.

Climb the steps carefully; you don't want to fall.

 Make sure you have a good grip before you sit down!

Put your legs out straight. This is going to be fun!

Um, maybe lay your whole body down. It's kind of high...

Oh no, you've let go. Now you have to go all the way down.

 Ride down in terror for two seconds.

Yay! Lets do it again!

Flower girl

This drawing is called, "Flower Girl".
After the drawing of Joshua, I was tired of pencils and wanted to work with a different medium. So it is drawn with markers on 11x14 size paper. The picture is based on a couple of photos I took of River last fall; I made her hair longer to better reflect how she looks now.
This took a long time, mostly because I kept delaying drawing the figure because I was afraid of messing it up! My favorite parts are in the flowers, which turned out pretty great. The big flower that draws all the attention does have some issues, but I think it's overshadowed by the fun shapes and designs around it.


On the figure of the girl, I have some issues I don't like. For instance, I wish I'd chosen a different color to do the darkest shadows on her face; it seemed good at first, but it doesn't' quite blend with the other face colors very well. I think I need a wider variety of skin tones, but that's beside the point.
 I also really don't like her right arm (on the left side of the drawing). In the photo reference it was completely cut off, and I wish I'd have found a good reference of an arm instead of just drawing it freehand. Part of the problem is that I decided to make the arm wider after I'd already started coloring it, so there's a weird line that I can't get rid of through the center. Oh well.

Here are some work in progress photos. It's always interesting to see how the different lighting or the camera changes the color of the picture. I really tried to make it look accurate in the final finished photo; not so  much on these ones.

Originaly, I wasn't going to have any black outlining, because I wanted it to look more like a painting. But in the end, some elements needed to be more defined, and the pen really helped with that, most particularly on the flowers that cross in front of the overalls.

All in all, I really think it turned out well. What do you think?

Cutest 17-month-old in the world

So, River got this cute summer outfit (or two or three). And I thought this one in particular would be perfect for her eighteen month old pictures. But then I couldn't wait, and one thing led to another, and now I have these lovely pictures of the cutest 17-month-old named River that lives in my house. Now the only dilemma I have is deciding what to hang on the wall, because they're all so cute!
Which do you like? (You can click on them to see them bigger.)

The one good close-up. Aww.

I think I like the ones in this group the best.

 In these she's not smiling at the camera, but she's still aDORable. Especially in the angry one on the top left.

 None of these next ones are that great for display- too much background stuff in them - but she was funny. I was trying to get her to hold the clover but she kept throwing it in the grass. The two on the right are the only two where she had them in her hands.

Finally,  I love the bottom two where she was showing me her teeth. And her pose in the top one is sweet.

By the way, do you like the bench Joseph made? We have two of them.

River in the kitchen

Here is a new drawing I just finished of River in the kitchen! I took the picture several months ago, and something about the scene really appealed to me. The combination of colors, the baby's smiling face, or maybe just my favorite curtains mixed with the baby. That's right, you've seen these curtains before.

You might recognize them from this drawing from around 2011,

 Or maybe from the lefthand side of this fun drawing in 2013,

or this one done later that same year.

It's true, my favorite bedroom curtains are now my favorite kitchen curtains. But what else can you do if the kitchen is already painted yellow and blue when you move in, right?

Anyway, it's a cute backdrop for a cute baby, even with the dirty (yet pretty) dishes in between.

What I like about it: the colors, the style, the curtain pattern, the dishes in front of her face. What I don't like: the layout of the dishes behind her, and the angle of the tiles.

sisters

This picture measures 11x14, and was drawn with Prismacolor pencil on toned paper. The colors seem slightly off from the real drawing; my camera has a hard time with yellows I guess. I thought this was a fun picture of River and Elora; I focused in on River because her expression was so cute.

What do you think?

Beautiful Baby

Here are River's first birthday pictures!  I much prefer taking pictures outside, with interesting scenery and much better light, but winter doesn't lend itself well to such photos so we opted for the inside  this time around. I went with white background instead of black (I have sheets of both colors) because I figured it would help with the lighting, which wasn't that bright.
After I started editing the pictures, we decided to try one with all the words just like we did for Eli's first birthday. It kind of looks like a magazine cover, but it's fun to be able to see at a glance all the fun things she's doing when she turns one.

I took a few horizontal pictures, just so we had'em. I like the one where she's checking out her new shoes, and the one on the top right with the smile. So cute.


















We got some good pictures, and River was pretty happy for most of them. It helped to have Daddy and Elora making her laugh, and a fun ornament to play with. I almost chose the bottom right picture here for our big one, it's so cute and you can see her teeth.

As I was editing, I tried several different effects on the pictures, like the shading around the edges as you see below, or different textures, etc.. But I decided I liked the plain white just fine. The bottom one here is the same picture as the one with the words. I posed her feet that way so they weren't sticking out awkwardly, they stayed that way for a few of the photos.



































 I got rid of a lot of pictures where she was making a whiny face, but I decided to keep at least one, because it is so funny. This is her fake crying face:























But truly, this is her real birthday face:

Happy birthday, River! Feel free to click on the pictures to see them bigger.

6months baby

Six months is one of my favorite baby ages. It's when they suddenly can do everything.

 





















They roll around the floor, they're starting to sit by themselves, and they babble all the time. I remember when I took Elora's six month pictures, they were the first pictures of her that I was really excited about: she was so cute!

I do regret now that I never bought her hair bows and didn't dress her in a bunch of cute dresses for her photos. Luckily, I have another girl to make up for this travesty...mwaahahaha. We have a bunch of beautiful clover and alfalfa growing around our area this year, more than I've ever seen. I've been waiting for River to be able to sit up so I could get some pictures before it all gets cut down!

The other night, we were able to go out at the perfect time of day and take pictures of River, with Elora helping so she didn't fall down. At least not more than six or seven times. It's going to be impossible to pick favorites, but it's a good problem to have! Please click to see the photos bigger.

We were able to capture quite a few expressions:

A.























I laugh every time I see the surprised face at the top left, and the "talking" face at the top right. I adore the fingers in the mouth, and she is so pretty at the bottom right! I can't decide if I want one of these, or one of the smiling ones in group B. She's so happy!

B.

I love all these smiles. In the top right she's like, "Hey Girlfriend!"

There are lots of fun photos of her enjoying the flowers and being thoughtful...

C.

D.  left or right?


































 And others with some cool sun flares as well. I love those. In "E" I like the bottom right best, she looks like a doll.

E.























Whichever pictures we end up hanging, there's no doubt she's one cute girl!

F.

Wouldn't you agree?
G.

Jan and Feb

I went to look at all my pictures to see what happened in January and February, and yeah, most of the pictures are of the baby. But she is getting cuter by the day! Especially now that she can smile sometimes.

3 wks old

oven mitt clothes. And one sock

Blessing day

4 or 5 wks

There was also Valentines day, but the only picture I have is of the box Elora made to bring to school for her class valentines.

 





















Also, Elora loves to hold the baby a lot. It's actually quite helpful sometimes, and River loves being held by her sister!























In February we got a second bunk-bed, so Eli could be in the same room with the other kids (he sneaks in there at night anyway) and so the third room could be freed up for the baby when she's ready. Eli was so excited to be a big kid! However, the other kids aren't so excited at how loudly Eli snores.
























Finally, there was a nice baby shower for us and another family with a new baby at Joseph's school. Elora's teacher, M. Little Sky made this pretty baby quilt for us! She even let Elora help sew some of it to make it more personal. How pretty.