Photos from Sarah

Since Sarah has been obsessed with taking pictures on my camera for the last several months, my parents decided to get her her own camera for Christmas.  They ended up getting her a very inexpensive (read: cheapest possible) regular digital camera because all the cameras designed just for kids got terrible reviews and seemed to break really easily (ironically).  Anyway, she's taken about 150 photos on it so far, and here are some highlights:

 This is just the beginning of unflattering photos that will be taken of me, I am sure.

 The Christmas tree at Grammie and Grampy's.

 Grammie and Grampy talking in the kitchen.

 Grammy. :)

 One of many, many selfies.

 We are cuter than this in real life, promise.

 Upside down, half-face selfie.

 Mommy and Daddy's bedroom mirror selfie.

 Grampy. :)

 The TV.

 The dog in Sarah's [impeccably clean] room.

 Selfie. Obviously.

 Our living room, on a rare neat-ish day.

 The dog.

What our living room more commonly looks like when Sarah gets in one of her building moods.

Cod-orado

 David, Sarah and I drove to Colorado in August to meet up with my parents and Becky, Josh and 3-month-old Everett for a family vacation.  This is third or fourth time we have done some sort of family vacation in Colorado in the summer, and those trips always prove to be amazing.  Amazing.  Sarah was excited for weeks about our trip to "Codorado" (as she calls it, and thus it will forever be called in our household). And how could you not be?  Gorgeous weather.  Mountains.  The most amazing fresh air. Mountain Streams.  Codorado is the best!!

 This trip was made extra special because it was our first vacation with Baby Everett.  And the first time David, Sarah and I got to meet this special little guy.  He is amazingly cute and aware and fun, and Josh and Becky are already incredible parents to him.

 Mountain Streams. The. Best.

 Views like this are simply good for the soul.

 Some highlights of our vacation include a bike ride David, Josh, Sarah, my dad and I did from Avon, where we were staying, to the nearby town of Edwards.  Sarah LOVED riding in the little bike pod behind David. I wish I had taken more pictures, but you will just have to trust me that it was really, really fun.  Though some of my family members (Becky, Josh, David) are more athletically inclined than others (me), we always try to do some sort of bike ride on these summer trips to Colorado, and we all manage to enjoy them.

 Sarah's highlight was hitting the hotel pool every day.  Funny story:  this did nearly get she, David and I killed.  On the last afternoon we were there, Sarah wanted to go to the pool even though it was overcast and just slightly rainy.  Since we knew it was the last chance, David and I agreed to take her despite the inclement weather.  WRONG.  We got down to the pool, and even though there was barely a hint of rain and just kind of whitish cloudiness, I thought to myself, "Is this safe? Surely this is not dangerous, right?"  Well, about five minutes later when all three of us are IN THE WATER, out of nowhere comes the loudest crash of thunder and brightest flash from the closest lightening strike I have ever experienced.  We think it may have hit the hotel right next to ours.  In any case, it somehow set ALL the fire alarms in our hotel off at the same time (super creepy)!  We jumped out of the water, of course, but had to stay outside while the fire department came and checked out our hotel to make sure the lightening hadn't set any actual fires.  Basically, we were just really, really lucky that it didn't hit closer to the pool.  The rest of the day the hair stood up on the back of my neck.  In fact, it is standing up on my neck right now as I write this.

Family Portrait, August 2013.

The other highlight of the trip was a big family reunion dinner we hosted for our larger, extended family who live in Colorado.  Nearly all of my aunts, uncles and cousins who live nearby came out to the mountains to visit while we were there, and somehow I got no photos of that evening.  Josh and Becky "catered" the big meal for about 25 of us, including kiddos.  It was really a great evening.  That is the other thing I love about Colorado--my Colorado roots and family. I am a "Texoradan," if you will.  A proud Texoradan. :)

Sarah's Photography

Another thing Sarah is really into these days is photography. By that, I mean stealing my camera (occasionally I give her permission, but mostly her photos are taken clandestinely) and snapping photos of whatever interests her.  Still, she is surprisingly good!  Here is a sampling:

 The kitchen, from Sarah-height.

 Taking Mommy by surprise.  Please ignore the mess.  In all these photos.

 Daddy after a run.

 The dog.  One of her favorite subjects.  I adore this photo!!

 The dog's back end.  Hmmm.

 Self portrait #1.

Self-portrait #2.

I love her budding interest in taking pictures!  Maybe someday she can be like our friends the Montague's 14 year old daughter Ruthie, who is an AMAZING photographer!  Check out her website:  http://www.photosbyruthie.net/

Stuff Sarah is into

Someone recently encouraged me to start paying attention and looking for patterns in the things that Sarah does if given freedom to do what she likes to discover her interests and natural abilities.  I have discovered she really likes building things.  Like paths out of books:

And building her "World Famous Dog Traps":

Maybe someday she will be an architect or an engineer?

A St. Louis 4th!

I finally talked David into going downtown to celebrate 4th of July and watch the fireworks under the Arch this year.  Supposedly, between 300,000 and 500,000 people attend this each year--whaa???  When we told people we were going to brave the crowds this year, many gave us wary looks.  There are like 10 other fireworks celebrations around the St. Louis area, including a small one just a couple of miles away from our house.  But I really wanted to do the "big" one at least once!  And this year the weather was great--highs were just in the 80's yesterday.  I figured it was the perfect year to do it.

We went downtown around 5 and figured we would get dinner from some of the food vendors that were set up around the arch.  We were able to get food for dinner before the lines got insanely long--David went back later to try to get us some funnel cakes, but heard the wait was over an hour!  But then we did have a long while to sit on the lawn waiting for it to get dark and the fireworks to begin.

 So we took some photos. :)  Next year we will bring a frisbee and other stuff to keep Sarah (and ourselves) entertained during the wait. The advantage to arriving early is we did find a nice spot sitting on a hill to watch the show from (later, ALL the green space you see around us was filled up with people).

 And, please ignore David's expression in these photos.  Those of you in the Dean family know that the Dean boys have made a life-long commitment to being wierd in photos.  He was having a good time and does indeed like his family, I promise!!

 Another thing adding to our fun on the 4th--our Chinese friend Yang Fan (English name--Peter) was with us!  He just got a job teaching 2nd grade at a Mandarin language immersion Elementary school here in St. Louis and will be living with our family for a while.  We are so excited to have him!  He has been in the States for 2.5 years getting his M. Ed. at Michigan State.  He said the crowds he saw downtown last night were more people than he had seen in whole time in the U.S. up to that point combined. :)

While we waited, they did have a concert going on.  Trace Adkins.  I like a couple of his songs; David--not so much.  We probably would have enjoyed the wait more if there was a concert of someone we actually enjoyed.  Personally, I think I prefer a live orchestra playing patriotic music even to a pop concert.

In any case, once the fireworks began, they were definitely amazing!!  I wish I had gotten some photos of the  crowds (insane!) and the fireworks show.  But you can go here: Fair St. Louis photos to see more pictures of those things!

We also left a little before the end of the show so we could get on the road before the traffic became unbearable.  We got home without getting stuck in the crowds, but both David and I said it really was kind of a bummer we didn't just sit and enjoy the whole thing--after all, the part we missed was the finale!  I did see it on video here this morning: STL fireworks video

Anyway, it was a fun time and we were glad we did it.  The crowds were seriously, seriously insane though.  I think we will try it again in the future, coming early again and then trying to park someplace where we can hopefully stay till the very end and still not get stuck in traffic for hours afterward!

Retro-Blogging: The Holidays Part 1

Soooo, what's a girl to do when she gets behind on blogging for a couple months? Retro-blog, of course! So here are some of my favorite photos from Thanksgiving and Christmas. :)

We had 2 of David's Chinese law school classmates over for Thanksgiving. It was a blast!  Andrea, on the left, couldn't get over my album of Tang Dynasty glamour shots. :)

The spread.  Pretty yummy.  I think the corn casserole was the biggest hit with our Chinese friends.

Sarah and I made a gingerbread house.  Wondering why it looks so good?  Because you are looking at the side I decorated.  Sarah struggled with having the self control not to just eat the icing and decorations before they made it onto the house!

Making gingerbread cookies.  Funny story: we took a bunch of these over to our neighbor's house.  A few house later Sarah and I came down with a stomach bug.  I was convinced we had just delivered holiday vomit inducing cookies to my dear neighbor!  Thankfully I asked her later and they were miraculously spared the virus!

Sarah's official Christmas portrait.

After her portrait photo session, Sarah wanted to try taking some photos herself.  She took this one of an ornament on the tree--pretty impressive, I'd say!!

Recently

Well, I haven't blogged in about a month, so . . . I figured its time for a little photo drop of sorts. :)

CHEEEEEESE!!!!!

Sarah was a bumblebee for Halloween this year--totally her idea! We asked her what she wanted to be, she said, "Bumblebee!" We thought, "Random, but potentially cute." And my mom found the costume!

 

Sarah gives herself a makeover, part 1.

 

The "queens" at Burger King (we like their two whoppers for $5 deal after church on Sundays).

 

Sarah getting her first "real" haircut from an actual stylist--my friend Melanie at her house.

 

And, Sarah's self-makeover, part 2.  Two days after Sarah's first real haircut, she cuts off 1/3 of her bangs at the root.  Nice move!!