Caught Red-Handed

I don't have a lot of pictures of Jane looking at the camera and smiling. My main goal is to surprise her and capture a candid moment. But sometimes Jane turns the tables on me, and I'm the one surprised. You remember from my last post the picture of Jane eating the dirty snow? It's kind of like that. Daddy is too engrossed in taking the pictures, that he doesn't stop to think about what Jane is doing. Here's Jane throwing gravel at the back of the Civic:I snapped off way too many shots before I thought, "Maybe she shouldn't throw gravel at our car. And at point-blank range, no less." And the solution was so easy, too:Jane was all too happy to throw the gravel at the garbage can instead. What would it matter, since she closes her eyes at the moment of impact anyway? Truth be told, she ended up throwing gravel at her own face:

I used to think Jane was smarter than the average bear.

Here's one Ella's going to hate my guts for:How did Jane end up with a Diet Mountain Dew in her hand?

Let me give you some background on Marcella Jespersen. Ella is what one might call a Buzz Agent, that is, she is an agent of buzz. That means an organization sends her various products to try out and then she is supposed to share or buzz about them with others. She tries to be a good buzzer, but sometimes the buzzing is a little heavy-handed. That's why you may have had a conversation with her where you were wondering if somebody was shooting a commercial and you were in the middle of it. She starts to sound like she's selling Amway or something. You're thinking, "We were talking about my upcoming vacation. Why is Ella telling me I should try this automatic shower cleaner? Man, she's really pushing this shower cleaner hard. What is her deal? Why would I want to dangle a giant contraption from my shower head?" She doesn't always like to buzz, but she loves getting the free stuff to try, and she's too honest to not do the actual buzzing part. That's a long aside, but it's the reason why the Diet Mountain Dew ended up in the fridge.

The Buzz Agency sent their number one Agent two cans of Diet Mountain Dew. Ella cracked one open like a good agent of buzz, drank a little and left it in the fridge. Later, I was running around chasing Jane with my camera and my flash, and she said she was hungry and she wanted me to open the fridge. I did, and just kept snapping away. Before I realized it, Jane was sucking down this diet soda with aspartame and who knows what else. I thought it was a cute picture. I thought it was worth the chemicals inside my little girl. Ella didn't. She said, "That's not going on the blog." But she's taking a nap right now.

Here's an interesting one:It seems I caught Jane peeing her pants. I snapped off three photos before I realized something was amiss. I thought to myself, "Why the ruddy countenance, the odd expression?" The poor girl. Look at her face, a mixture of shame, self-loathing, and discomfort. What finally clued me into what was going on was when Jane said, "Go pee pee." She doesn't have her past tense down yet. It was all on the chair. All of it. For all intents and purposes, she might as well have not been wearing underwear.

On a related note, I took a picture of Jane farting:As I was taking pictures, she was moving around, acting crazy, and I was about to give up. All of a sudden, she paused, and an expression of concentration and anticipation washed across her face. I was like, don't move. I snapped off as many shots as I could, all the while wondering why she was so relaxed. Then came the fart. Suddenly she was back to acting crazy and moving around.

My penchant for taking pictures of activities I should be preventing (farting excepted) extends beyond Jane. Last week we watched Sharon's kids. Apparently, George is not supposed to do flips onto the couch:Oh well.

Sometimes Daddy gets his comeuppance. Jane was successfully riding a tricycle for the first time, and I made Ella help her while I took all the pics. After a while, I realized my pregnant wife should get a break, so I handed the camera to Ella, and here's her first shot with it ever:Believe it or not, that's actually a photograph of Daddy throwing his back out. No joke. I hit the lawn and rolled over in pain. I'm sure I won't learn my lesson.