Taking Technology For All It’s Worth

Two and a half months now. It’s hard to keep up a blog when there is so much going on! Plus, I didn’t want to post up 15 posts about getting poo’ed on. Toilet humor only goes so far.

I have however had a recent realization. Technology. It has made having a kid a million times easier… On my family. We take it for granted so much. It’s just a necessary part of our lives nowadays. As I write this I am sitting in bed on a Sunday morning. I just finished uploading photos of my daughter to Facebook and emailing photos to my dad who still doesn’t understand why the internet has a book of faces.

Technology.

Back in even just the 90’s, if you wanted to show family members photos of your trip to the zoo, it meant loading film into the camera, shooting, dropping the film off at a developer, paying for prints, loading up an envelope and mailing them off only to have them get there a good two weeks after the event.

Now I can stand there and video call my family and they can practically walk through the zoo with us while still being 2,000+ miles away. I can take a photo on my phone, edit it and upload it to Any number of social media sites simultaneously all in a matter of 30 seconds for the whole world to see. Instantly.

I say again… Technology.

It amazes me. I was the last generation to know what it meant to write a letter over a text. To have to load a roll of film and not know what the photo you just took looked like until probably 2-4 days after you took it. To consider only having a voice on the other end of a phone something special. No video chatting, picture texting, fancy-dancy iEverything devices.

It is 2013. While the Jetsons might be disappointed in our progress, I’m amazed by the things we can do.

My daughter is going to grow up in a world that has evolved so quickly over just the last 15 years… It’s sort of a scary thought. Where will we be when she is old enough to want an iPhone 23gsXL? Where will the normal age for getting a cell phone be within society? As it stands now, it seems like every 8-year-old has a cell phone. Maybe I should get her one now. She doesn’t need to know how to talk… Who uses a cell phone to call people? Pssh.

Anywho. Just wanted to throw up some thoughts I had on this Sunday morning and top it off with a few photos. As for all of us, we are doing well. Amelia is getting big quick; hard to believe it’s been almost three months since she was born. Well, time for another cup of coffee and a shower. Stay close, more coming sometime soon…

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The Beginning of My Mobile Blogging…

So, a week to go until the ol’ bun is ready to come out of the oven.

Funny story. I am blogging from my phone. Right. Now. Oh technology! WordPress, my blogging medium, FINALLY redesigned their iPhone app, it used to stink reallllll bad. However, now I can actually blog, with photos, and effectively create posts on the go. Bet that’ll be real helpful come time to be a super dad.

So, with any luck the posts will be a) much more often and b) probably way shorter now. Thumb typing makes for naturally shorter paragraphs.

Anywho, just thought I’d proudly show off how on the cusp of technology I am…. Blogging straight from my iPhone… Look out Thomas Einstein…. I’m on the edge of science. Well, it’s Halloween weekend round here, so back to the pumpkins and costumes! Photo included is Marie’s daughter, Alyssa, gettin her Halloween costume put on….

Stay close to the blog, baby’s comin’ soon!!!

Bump Photos, Baby Movements and Moments to Remember . . .

Baby bump photos.

Let me explain to you how much nagging it takes to get a photographer to take his own baby bump photos. My mother, who does have a very valid point, has been pestering for me to take baby bump photos since the moment she found out that we were, in fact, having a baby.

“Is she showing yet? Get the baby bump photos. Oh I am so excited, have you done the photos yet? You NEED to do the photos, Matthew, time is going to fly by and you are going to miss it and you’ll never be able to get it back… It’s going to be too late really soon…”

Every. Single. Phone call.

She had a very valid point indeed though. My little girl isn’t even born and I am already almost missing moments. How is this happening? Two days ago we found out we were pregnant, now she’s 23 weeks along…

So, I took time out to get my baby bump photos.

   As a one-man photo band, I have learned that when prepping to do stationery formal portraits, I am my own best lighting model. Thanks, timer function.

   It’s also important to have a qualified lighting technician to help. In this case, Fletch, one of our two labradoodles, would have to suffice…

So, after getting the light set up (yes, for you photo nerds out there… ONE light. Keep it simple… It looks just fine!) and figuring out how the reflector would need to be placed to fill the camera right side of her face in (ah, alright photo nerds, one light AND a reflector. . . you got me…) and waking Marie up from her evening before bed nap, we took us some baby bump photos. Good thing we did it when we did, in the last few days she has blown up! Her belly is getting bigger literally every day. It’s amazing to watch happen.

   In the final dog photo, we thought it only fair to Dexter to let him be in the photo. He has pretty much become Marie’s dog. Side note, labradoodles… really great dogs.

    Aside from posting my glamour shots and photos of my lovely ladies, however, I wanted to talk within my blog which is supposed to be all about documenting stuff and whatnot, about these moments.

   Moments are what make up our lives. They are the only things that can and do create a memory. You don’t have memories about every meal, trip to the grocery store or casual outing to the local Wal-mart.You have memories about events and happenings throughout your life. Good or bad, a moment is what writes your path through life. Already, before my daughter is even born into this world, we are experiencing these moments. Watching Marie’s belly grow and knowing that my little girl is in there getting bigger by the day gets me all choky and teary. It’s also made me download every song I could find relating to fathers and daughters. It’s my drive to work playlist now…

These photos are the first set of photos saying “Here is my daughter; better get ready world, ‘cause it’s about to be on.”

For the first time since this pregnancy began I got the chance last night while laying next to Marie to really feel her movement. Before now, there has been the occasional ‘I think that was a kick’ or ‘Yeah, I kinda felt something I think…’ Marie was already passed out asleep, and as I laid down and assumed the hand on the belly and ‘goodnight talk’ I give to my little girl, I felt her kick. Then again, and again and again again again. I laid there in the dark feeling her do somersaults and perfecting her cartwheels already. Elbow dropping mommy’s spine. . . . nice, kiddo.

That little section of time, however, will live in my mind for the rest of my life. I laid there talking to my little girl, feeling her practicing for the 2028 gymnastic uneven bar Olympics’ team, getting to really FEEL my daughter’s life for the first time.

It’s the start of a rapid path that has no brakes. The further you get, I would imagine the steeper the path seems and the faster it flies by. But for now I’ll do what I can to enjoy every kick and movement, every random pregnancy craving that takes me to Wal-Mart at ten at night, and every moment that will help to create the memories that will soon be my daughter’s first years of life. Much, much more coming. . . stay close.

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