The Most Wonderful Time of the Year
Yes. We’re a little bit nutty about the Johnny Appleseed Festival. Nutty in that we planned our wedding for the same weekend because they ALWAYS have beautiful weather for the festival. Nutty because we will NOT schedule anything else for the weekend it’s here. Nutty because we build up our expectations, get excited, talk it up for weeks prior. And for all that hype in the King family, honestly, the Johnny Appleseed Festival does not disappoint! This weekend is the festival so today Betsy and I took Miles, and I think it’s safe to saw we all loved it. See for yourself:
I think Miles makes a great narrator! This was a really fun bit to put together, by the way. I’ve always had a thing for putting sound to pictures just like this. It’s like NPR, but with photos. For some reason just having ambient audio helps tell the story in a way straight video doesn’t quite do. And now that I can very easily record voice memos on my iPhone, you’ll probably be seeing more to come. Think of it as an audio photograph. Kind of a fitting thing to put to my wife awesome photography, don’t you think?
Thanks for watching. If you live in the big FW, BTW, and you haven’t been to the festival in a while, you should go tomorrow. And if you do, look for us. Even though we went today, we’re craving another fix before the most wonderful time of year is gone once again.
Much Metta,
John
P.S. – Want to see my wife’s take on the festival? She’s blogging about to right now, too. See, told you were were nutty about it!
4 Years Ago Today…
Today is Betsy and my 4 year anniversary! To celebrate, I thought I’d start with a photo:
In honor of our relationship, I have a little story to share. Before Betsy, I was really good at being single. in fact, the longest relationship I had ever been in prior to Betsy was 4 months, and that was my freshman year of college. That’s not to say I didn’t want to be in a long term relationship, in fact quite the opposite. I just didn’t stick around for very long if you weren’t “The One.” So I lived my happy little life dumping and being dumped, and in general just learning how to be good at being single. Oh, and endlessly pining for, you know… “The One.”
Anyway, long story short too late, (as Betsy would say…) as Betsy and I neared our “4 month dating anniversary”, I genuinely started to get nervous. I’d never made it past this point. And I knew that if Betsy and I were to break up, she’d have to do the dumping, because for me, I’d found “The One.” I just knew I had. Much to my delight, she didn’t dump me after 4 months. In fact, she hasn’t dumped me yet!
So why did I pick these pictures? Because no matter what tomfoolery may be erupting around me, sitting across from my sweet Betsy at the table is my happy place. It was on our first “date” at Casa. It was on our honeymoon. It was this morning. And I hope that it will be for a lifetime to come.
Happy Anniversary, Betsy! Thanks for being my “One!”
Cinema Center
Tonight Betsy and I (thanks to Grandam Smith for Miles sitting…) went out with some of our friends. The evening was a perfect evening because we got to visit a new little local restaurant called Calhoun Street Soups, Salads & Spirits and enjoy a meal with some new friends. Then we went to the Cinema Center to catch a movie called Lars and the Real Girl.
First, if you live in Fort Wayne and haven’t been to see a movie at the Cinema Center, I’d highly recommend it. Being a not for profit film society, you may not be able to catch the latest release of Spiderman but you’re bound to see something that touches you in some way. Lars was no exception. The movie take you on a gentile ride, beautifully paced from beginning to end. The story follows Lars and his Real Doll, and does so with the utmost respect, humor, and sincere honesty. I don’t want to talk about the plot at all because I think knowing very little about the story line allows the movie to guide you in just the right way and I wouldn’t want to take that away. Just see the movie. Oh, and check out the music. If anyone is listening, that’s the kind of movie I want to write for. Or at least one kind of movie I’d like to write for… (I can’t be too picky!)
Speaking of music, I’ve been writing like mad. I’m very excited about posting some more here, but it’s not ready yet. Soon.
Much Metta,
John
Happy Halloween!
When we dressed Miles up to take him on his first trick-or-treating adventure, I had no idea it would be such a treat for me!
Miles is, of course, much too young to even care about costumes or candy or going out, so when Boss Lady and I decided to dress him up in his little bear outfit and she and I in bee costumes, I felt a little silly, honestly. My hesitancy was exacerbated by a comment we heard today about how parents of babies go trick-or-treating just for the candy for themselves. Since I’d been gorging myself on Snickers and Three Musketeers for about a week now, I knew that wasn’t my motivation. We just wanted to take Miles out and enjoy this unique holiday.
So off we went, into the beautiful dusk evening, bear, bee and all. We decided we were going to go to all the neighbors we’d gotten to know in our year and a half here and just say hello and show off this adorable little honey bear.
The first thing I noticed was the distinctly open friendly feeling in our little corner of the planet. It was like a big friendly block party. You could head kids voices down every street, people’s doors were open, lights were on. Despite halloween’s love of all things dark and scary, the mood here was all giggles.
The other part of the evening that touched me was that every house we stopped at was a pleasure all in its own. Each doorbell ring ushered in another conversation with the very people we share a street, mailbox, or even a backyard with. Even though I don’t know any of our neighbors very well, I know them just a bit better after tonight, and this place feels just a bit more like home. We’re very blessed to be surrounded by so many wonderful people, and I’m excited about getting to know them better.
Happy Halloween, neighbors!
John
P.S.
Ok, I admit, I dressed up a bit too, so Boss Lady wasn’t alone in the bee department. How embarrassing I met some of my neighbors for the first time wearing this, but I am what I am… And yes, those are antennae.
Here’s the whole family:
SMiles
2 things for today, both baby related.
First is Betsy and I are learning about what it is to be a parent. I’m going to start off by saying the King family had a really great day. There was a lot of time spent with Miles. We walked the whole family in this beautiful weather a couple times. I even had time to vacuum the house. But being a new parent isn’t without it’s challenges.
The day was pretty Miles-centric. There really wasn’t much time where he wasn’t being held, fed, changed, burped, cleaned up or loved on by either Betsy or myself. That was definitely the focus of the day. Come about 5:30 this evening, after tending to Miles all day, we’d been trying to get out of the house for about 2 hours to grocery shop. He had just eaten and been burped, and I’ll be if that child didn’t just burst into a fitful wail complete with tears, as if to say, of all things, “I’M NOT HAPPY!”
Not happy? What? We’ve catered to your every need ALL DAY LONG. How could this be? Ungrateful? Disrespectful? Just plain rude? No, just a baby, doing what babies do. In retrospect, probably lower gas, but at the time Betsy and I both looked at each other in disbelief at our squalling baby boy. And so it is with being a parent, I suspect. We did, by the way, eventually make it to the store, and some how squeezed dinner and not an insignificant amount of snuggling into the evening.
The second thing for tonight is what really makes this being-a-parent thing all worth while. It can be summed up in one simple picture.
Ladies and gentleman. Miles has learned how to smile!
Betsy caught this new and still somewhat rare moment this morning as I was holding him and reading the paper. They are starting to come more frequently and it just makes everything SO worth it. He’s even been kind enough to give me a face full of them the last couple mornings around 4:30am when I go to change his diaper. SO precious!
Anyway, enough doting. Check back tomorrow night, and I’ll have a new version of my TCM clip up. Until then, love to you all!
Much Metta,
John
Things as of late
Hey.
Long day. It’s been busy getting ready for baby. I feel like I have a million projects that have to get done before he comes so each evening is spent working through my to-do list. The latest project is re-finishing a beautiful custom bookshelf that Andy designed and built. After months of…. work (translation: procrastination) I’ve finally set this Sunday as my drop dead date to get them done. Yesterday I did the final sand and today I started the third and final coat of polyurethane. It feels good to finally be close.
I bring this project up because I’m learning about setting goals. I mean really starting to experience it. (I hope my boss isn’t reading this!) I’ve had a couple of personal projects now that I finally mapped out and gave myself a goal to reach, and much to my surprise I actually reached the goal, even when I wasn’t sure if the goal was realistic. It’s turned into a great motivator.
Oh! I almost forgot. I’ve got something new to share! Brady Sark has finished the percussion to my marching band opener! I’ve even made a page to showcase the show. Check it out!
As some of you know, I’m really getting in to photography and when something catches my eye, I like to take a picture of it. So the other day after our morning pug walk, we noticed some rather strangely tall ice crystals on my car. Some of these were over an inch high. Check it out:
Look at the lenght of these ice crystals!
A Fuzzy Antenna
Ok. Three more photos. First, I couldn’t sleep one night, so I thought I’d take a couple pictures of the moon. See?
The Moon
And last but not lest, as many of you know, Whisper has a habit of picking up the nearest toy and bringing it to you when you first come into the house. One afternoon she got a hold of what we affectionately call a “beeber” (which is a stuffed animal attached to a little blanket.) The result? Cuteness overload. See for yourself:
Welcome home!
Who could resist this face!!
Ok, that’s enough for now. Thanks for following along!
Much Metta, John
Smith Family Christmas
We just hosted our first Christmas with Betsy’s family and we had a blast! The food turned out great and we had so much fun just celebrating our family together. Even our first turkey turned out just fine.
We are all truely blessed.
Smith Family Christmas – Page 1
Merry Christmas!
John
Bluewater by Betsy
It’s Sunday afternoon and my perfect husband, John, is busy cleaning bathrooms (I told you he was perfect!) so I decided to sneak onto his blog and post an update. Here’s the latest:
Last week we took some photos of John for his professional use and had MUCH to much fun snapping away. Here’s a sampeling of my photography skills and of John’s “photogenic-ness.”
Of course, while we had the camera out, we had to snap some belly pics as well. I’ve been feeling pretty good but I”m definitly feeling all of the things that go along with the third trimester. People definitly know I’m pregnant now when I’m out and about, which is actually pretty new. This is a nice size to be but I’m pretty scared of how much bigger I’m going to get! So these photos were taken around week 27 of my pregnancy.
So our nursery is almost finished with just the closet shelves to finish painting and to hang. We also need to prep and paint the closet doors as well. However, the painting I did of the 20 by 20 inch canvas for the nursery wall is complete. We painted an accent square on the wall to “frame” it. We still need to hang the three wall hangings (canvases covered in fabric) on the wall as well.
We also had a beautiful shower thrown by my mother and sister last weekend so I photographed some of the baby items we received.
We got our mobile too, but it clashes too much with our nursery to put it up just yet. : )
One of John’s co-workers found these little slippers with a King on them! How sweet! (I’m sure they will stay on a toddlers feet for about 3 seconds…)
Last, but not least, we recieved a Bumgenius cloth diaper we had ordered online in the mail on Friday. We have done a bunch of research on cloth diapers and we think we really like these diapers called Bumgenius. They are adjustable so they fit babies from 8 lbs. up to 35 lbs. and from what we have read are really easy to put on and work really well. We tried out the diaper with some water, and it seemed to be ok, but otherwise, I guess we’ll figure it out this winter when Baby King breaks it in. ; ) So far we are happy with our educated, yet unexperienced opinion and have created an online registery for cloth diaper stuff at www.cottonbabies.com. If you have a baby at home or might someday, you should check out the website. It’s amazing the advances they have made in cloth diapers just in the last few years.
Here’s how they work:
Here’s a Bumgenius diaper in it’s smallest size.
You open it up, load it with an insert (or remove the insert to clean) and there ya go.
Here’s a Bumgenius diaper at it’s largest setting.
This past weekend John and I went to Indy for the Band of America Competition. It was my first band show experience and it was really cool to finally get to see more of John’s world.
John’s done cleaning, so I better go!
~Betsy
Painting technique
We’ve had so many people as for our painting technique that I thought I’d share in another entry to satisfy all you curious readers!
The secret to getting pristine lines is in one simple step. After you’ve taped your trim, for example, and before you paint your wall, take a brush and paint the color under the tape along your tape edge. That’s it!
Still confused? What makes taped edges jagged is paint leaking under the tape. In our case it would have been green leaking under the tape onto our white trim. So we ran a strip of white along the edge of the tape before painting green. That way the white leaks under the tape (Which you can’t see because it’s the same color as the trim) and creates a seal so the green can’t. Paint your green walls as you normally would, pull the tape and you’ve got beautiful, clean lines!
So that’s the secret. Go forth and spread the word. And no more jagged tape lines from you!
Thanks for following along!
Much Metta, John