Terran Goes Out - First Edition!

We've been a little sick around here, and due to my current lack of imagination, it's been difficult to find time to do a quality update, so I was just not doing them at all. It's been brought to my attention that I should just get the damn photos up and try to be funny later. 

I couldn't agree more.

Typically, Terran starts his day by waking us up.
Like a boss.
Sometimes with a camera flash.

Sometimes our favorite apartment maintenance guy hangs
 out downstairs. A toddler with a camera totally
rocks in his book, aparently. 

It was Pajama Day at "Going Bonkers"

Uncle Paul and Aunt 'Reli joined us this trip! It was
fortunate, too. Paul was the only one with enough energy
 to keep up with our little  photographer :P

Terran's first Self-Portrait!
After our excursion to GB, we went for ice cream, of course!

And we walked around the "Shops at Legacy," letting
Terran take photos anywhere he wanted.

Walking.

Tony-Daddy had a headache.

Back at the apartment, we were a little worn out - fun is hard!

The next day, we did discover that apparently Terran takes his camera to bed sometimes.

Even when he's tucked in...

...he's still taking pictures...

...as hes trying to sleep.

Thought apparently sometimes it wakes him back up...

I guess he wanders around a bit..

...and we get more foot pictures.

He's pretty much a visionary.

Terran Got His Camera!

Huzzah! The spiffy-yet-affordable camera for Terran s here!

He also got a haircut!

It's pretty minimalist, really just "push button, take picture." I was kind of hoping it had an active viewfinder LCD, but I'm not gonna complain because it was $10. Terran has already gotten used to the good 'ol fashioned look-through-the-damned-hole viewfinder, though.

We've had some success with "check your fingers!" but
his first couple of shots looked like this.

He was thrilled. Absolutely overjoyed. This is especially wonderful as I could not describe how Terran was acting this morning before his camera's arrival other than "polite nightmare." Tony had jury duty, so I took the wee lad out for some mommy-son-McDonalds-for-breakfast time. Poke'mon is the toy right now, so its kind of a big deal.

"Terran, please eat your pancake." to which he replied  "NOTHANKYOU!!!!!"  repeatedly, at the top of his lungs. Those who know him have seen this, along with the hand gesture that accompanies it.

Case in point.

So, anyways - super excited about camera, right? So what's the first thing he does?

He documents the suffering of a dog yet to be walked.

Makes Tony-Daddy look a little creepy.

Takes pictures of feet.

"I LOVE ANKLES!" "What?"

But definitely, my favorite part was when he, as intended, starting walking around taking pictures of everything he thought was pretty cool right then.

Baby's first GTI

Proprietary took-it-in-the-mirror "MySpace" shot

We ended up with a lot of pictures of this blanket.
He ended up taking it to his naptime.

Goofy!

More "Dog in Captivity" studies.

T-Shirt close up, which would have been even neater 
without flash. Oh well, I guess we'll get into 
lighting when he's four.

And of course, more feet.

But I think this is picture of the week:

Freedom is delicious

All in all, I think it was a pretty successful first 20 minutes with his new camera. This is going to be awesomesauce.

Just to get us started...

On a very late June morning in 2011, Terran woke up my houseguests by wandering into the living room and asking for a cookie. This is pretty typical for any 3 year old, especially if said cookies are already on the table and said child had already been munching on them for the past 10 minutes before anybody woke up. Frankly, I was surprised he asked. Even used “please.” I came into the living room to the rather impressive sight of my son playing with my guest’s Android tablet PC. “We thought Angry Birds might distract him from the cookies,” they said. “He just got three stars.”
I was pretty impressed by this point, watching my young son using multitouch features to zoom in and out on his little birdies-vs-piggies battlezone, articulating usage of those little dashing yellow birds, and getting a better feel for physics than I had in high school. He then hit the “home” button, I thought by accident. “Oh no! Let me put that back on the Birds for you,” and I reached for the tablet. “Nope!” he replied, and kept the screen out of reach. He then activated the camera. I thought this was a further accident, until he lifted the G-Slate to eye-level and said “SAY CHEESE!” taking a picture of our friend Paul.

Do what now?!

We were a little floored and figured he just understood because he saw the picture of the camera. I’m a photographer, so he’s been seeing/ being photographed by cameras since he was in infancy. I mean, this kid can’t even read yet.

He also found the flash.

Then he saw the icon to change to the forward-facing camera and switched to it. He then leaned back and began to take “Facebook-Style” photos of himself with everyone. 

Some turned out better than others.

Despite the quality, we are all pretty impressed by this point, and I was inspired with what I felt was a pretty neat idea.

Not my best picture, but I can't blame him.

I wondered what the world looked like to my three-year-old. 

UNCLE PAUL YOUR FEET ARE AWESOME
THEY ARE SO MUCH CLOSER TO ME THAN YOUR FACE

It’s widely accepted that most children at his age have a deeper understanding of their surroundings than they display, or speak of. Most times this is for a lack of being able to show us, or explain what they see, or feel. Communication is a learned skill, which many of us take for granted these days. Terran is incredibly observant, and frequently points things out to me that I didn't even see, or think about.

There's Zombie food on this T-Shirt!

So what if I gave him a cheap, user-friendly digital camera? What if I saved some of these pictures to give to him when he’s older? “This is what you were thinking about when you were three. This is what was important to you as you developed your ability to communicate with the rest of the world.”
I found a camera on Amazon for 20$ including shipping, and I had a 10$ gift card. No skin off my nose, that’s cheap for ANY toy for Terran. And for a piece of insight into my child’s developing mind, that’s priceless to me.

Pretty Aunt 'Relli

This is the product. We’ll see how this turns out.

Eye see you!