Two-year-old's silhouette

Continuing a tradition we started last year, I made a silhouette of Eliza at age two. I think it's the best one I've done yet. I'm really happy with how her hair and eyelashes turned out.

For comparison, here's her previous two silhouettes:

How much she's changed in the past year is clear even in her silhouette. She's definitely a kid now, no longer a baby!

For anyone who cares about the nerdy details...

All three of these silhouettes were done with the GNU Image Manipulation Program (a free, open-source Photoshop clone). I started in each case with a profile photograph of Eliza against a high-contrast background (this year I got smart and had her pose in front of a white sheet of posterboard), then used a combination of the polygonal lasso selection tool, the pen tool, and image threshold/levels filters to create the silhouette. Of these three, threshold and levels is the fastest technique (but the least realistic as a silhouette, as it tends to make blurry or overly rough edges), the polygonal lasso tool produces good results very quickly but is hard to fine-tune afterwards, and the pen tool is more time-consuming but infinitely adjustable. (The pen tool is how I did Heather's veil in our wedding silhouette - couldn't have done that any other way.) My approach for this latest silhouette was to use the polygonal lasso tool for her face and the outline of her head, then use the pen tool for her hair since that required the most fiddling to get right. I think it was a very successful approach!

Two years past

Thinking about our babies today. Wondering what Oliver and Charlotte would be like today and wishing Eliza had her siblings around her. Can't believe it's been 2 years today since getting to hold Oliver for the first and last time.

Sending up lots of love to both Oliver and Charlotte today. It would mean a lot to us if you could send up some love and hugs today as well. 

 Love you forever sweet babies!  xx

Eliza's Second Year

Eliza turned two years old yesterday! (It was a weird - but good - feeling, waking up this morning as the father of a two-year-old!) Here's a video slideshow of the last year:



After last year's debacle, I was determined to start early and use a different program from last year, so this time instead of Picasa or Windows Movie Maker, I used iMovie '09. While still not a perfect program by any means, it was a lot easier and less frustrating than the other programs, and we're very happy with the resulting video.

(Previously: Eliza's First Year)

Steps

Wow such a long time since the last post! This is a good one though... Eliza took her first steps in her walker last Tuesday during physical therapy!!! It was completely amazing to watch her figure it out. She was concentrating ever so hard to get her legs going the right direction. I definitely had the biggest smile on my face!

Please take a look at our oh-so-happy moment!

We love Eliza's PT! Unfortunately she is moving far away soon so we won't be able to see her anymore and we are so sad! Thanks for helping us make such great progress the last 7 months!