Rain, rain, you're okay.

[kv0925]

It's a very gloomy and rainy day here, but I don't mind it at all. I'm at work so it's not ruining any plans, plus we need the rain since it's been sparse for the past month or so. It did necessitate the rescheduling of a photoshoot from this morning to Thanksgiving morning, but that's okay too since that way I don't need to miss any work. Not that it's even work this week--my boss and half the company are on vacation, so it's a very low-stress week to be in the office. The only downsides to today is that I had to go out for lunch in the rain, and I've watched all the Breaking Bad episodes on my tablet. :)

Speaking of Thanksgiving, it's shaping up nicely. We were thinking it would just be us for a quiet family day at home, but the other day my Dad called and said their plans fell through so they'd like to come for a visit. That's great, as we haven't seen him for a while and with our upcoming Virginia trip I wasn't sure if or when we'd be able to get together before Christmas. Then my niece Amanda messaged me on FB to say she was in town this week and wanted to see us and Dad too, so I wrote back to suggest she drop by on Thanksgiving as well since Dad will be over. Haven't seen her in too many years, so I'm really hoping that works out too. Would make for a very nice day.

But we need to at least attempt to clean the house, and that's a daunting prospect. Not that we're complete slobs, but housekeeping tends to fall down a few notches when we're busy, and with the kids we're always busy. :) Hopefully a quick sweep to put away toys and clear counters and tabletops and whatnot will do it. And some vacuuming of pet fur, eww.

We decided to update our video camera this weekend. Heather's family used to make audio and then video variety shows for Christmas when she was a kid, and she wanted to try that with the girls. But our old camera isn't HD, is not great in low light, and uses mini-DV cassettes, which makes transferring the videos to the computer a pain. Plus the microphone always picks up the noise of the tape drive motor, which bugs me. So I went out and got us a Canon VIXIA HF R500, which is all-digital and uses SD cards, so it's nice and quiet with solid battery life. Not sure if the low-light performance is any better yet, but outdoor and even well-lit indoor scenes look great, and the image stabilizer is a nice add too. Looking forward to using it more, especially on our trip!

Speaking of travel, this last trip put me over the top for my Southwest Companion Pass! Whoo-hoo! I named Hermione as my companion for now, and already called to have the Virginia trip re-booked as a companion so I could get back the points I'd booked her with. We figured I'd name her instead of Heather, because whatever trips I take will either be all of us, or me and the older two girls like I did for DC this past spring. In fact, I am sorta thinking I might try to take the girls up to New York City to visit their aunt Stef next month. She's only going to be there for another couple months, and I think Christmastime for our first NYC trip would be amazing. It would probably be a fairly short trip, I'm thinking just a 3- or 4-day weekend, but still--I am thinking yes please even though the very idea of NYC sorta terrifies me. :) I'm hoping to take good advantage of this Companion Pass, though, whether it's for our whole-family vacations or just short trips with the girls. Fun stuff!

Hermione's birthday was this past Saturday--10 years old already. She's a really good kid, I'm quite proud of her. I wish she was a little less timid and sensitive sometimes, but I really can't complain. It was rainy on her birthday so we didn't do much, but the next day we went to Fun Spot, which is sort of like a permanent carnival (without the carnies), and we had a good time. Plus lunch at Sweet Tomatoes, yummy.

I'm still working on my photos from Birmingham last week. It was a good time and a bit of an adventure, so I'm looking forward to finishing those and posting about the trip. In the meantime, I think I'll do a photo post with some other stuff from the past couple weeks. So stay tuned for that!

Okay, back to "work." Heh.

Comments

[invincible.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a fun family holiday!

[cp.livejournal.com]

I hope so! I hope you and Graham have a great Thanksgiving as well. Maybe by this time next year you'll have a little one to include, or at least be expecting one! :)

[pigshitpoet.livejournal.com]

you must be next door. it's been raining like this for two days straight with not a break of sun in sight. dark gloomy, like some dark knight movie..

may the sun that hides behind the clouds warm the cockle of your heart..
; )

[cp.livejournal.com]

Central Florida here, where are you? :) It definitely is gloomy today, and tomorrow looks much the same--but tomorrow will cool off nicely, and Thanksgiving looks gorgeous. Can't wait! :)

[pigshitpoet.livejournal.com]

central vancouver.. canada

you know it is raining when the street lights come on in the middle of the day, reflecting in the puddles of rain on the wet pavement.. surreal actually

my shoes are wet
; )

[girlguitarist.livejournal.com]

Happy birthday to Hermione!

Please update on your video camera again once you use it more :) I still have my mini-DV camera and am down to my last cassette, so I'll have to replace it soon and have no idea what to get. (Plus arrrghh it uses Firewire and we only have an old computer left in the house that has that).

[cp.livejournal.com]

YES I forgot to mention that! Our old one (Canon ZR500, do you have something similar?) only has a Firewire output too, so my wife couldn't use it with her laptop at all, another huge drawback! Since I consider myself a Canon guy, I figured I wouldn't go wrong with Canon, so I really didn't look any further than their current lineup. The VIXIA R500 was the right price (on sale for $199!), had the features I wanted (the higher-end models really only add built-in memory and WiFi, which might be handy but don't justify the extra cost to me), and was rated pretty highly on Amazon, so off I went. I'll remember to give an update and/or share some video once I've used it more!

[re-vised.livejournal.com]

Hah! You sound like me, watching Netflix at work. Shh! Don't tell. ;)

What exactly is a Companion Pass?

Nice that your Thanksgiving suddenly became more of a family get together!

[cp.livejournal.com]

lol, I think it's expected that nothing gets done this week, or the week between Xmas and New Year's. ;)

The companion pass is a thing Southwest Airlines offers. Basically it allows me to specify a person who is able to fly for free wherever I fly until the end of the next calendar year. I named my eldest, since we figure either we'll all be traveling together, or I'll take the older two somewhere like we did with DC this past spring. And might be planning for NYC in a few weeks, if my sister-in-law will still be in town on the dates I'm considering! I hope so, it would be cold but exciting. :)

I know, it will be nice to have some folks over to entertain, and nice to see some family I haven't seen for a while. Looking forward to it!

And Happy Thanksgiving to you! :)

[re-vised.livejournal.com]

Oh, that's a really nice benefit! Makes taking the girls places MUCH easier on the wallet. I think NYC (as crazy as it may be) around Christmas would be a great first experience there. The girls will love it.

Happy Thanksgiving to you, too!

[audamy.livejournal.com]

Aw NYC around Christmas would be great. My first time ever visiting NYC was for my 8th birthday and I loved it. Hopefully you can make it work and the girls will have a great time.

[cp.livejournal.com]

Alas, it is not to be. My wife talked to her sister over the weekend, and she's heading home for Christmas before we could get up for a visit. I'm still hoping to do the trip, but it wouldn't be until after Christmas and maybe not until January sometime, if the weather doesn't look too awful. :)