I flew back down to southern California for my nephew Aiden’s fifth birthday party. It was a blast – his mom invited about 150 people and most of them showed up! There were so many kids running around, hopped up on tons of sugar (the theme was Candyland – like throwing gasoline on an inferno!). They had a really cool face-painter there, and the kids were all getting their faces done. It was fun to see the differences between the boys and the girls – the boys were all superheroes and didn’t like to smile for the camera, and the girls were all princesses and loved having their pictures taken My wedding season is about to kick into high gear, so this will probably be the last of the “personal” photos for a little while…
 

Even Nana enjoyed the cotton candy:

Family bonding, PS3 style:

And of course, more swimming shots in my brother’s beautiful black-bottomed pool. Out of focus and badly composed, but I love the look on Maya’s face in this one!

I had a great time with my family down in southern California. My sister-in-law planned a fun trip for all of us in Palm Springs. It might seem a bit crazy to head out to the desert in July, but we just spent a lot of time in the pool and our air-conditioned rooms and had a great time. Of course, I took lots of pictures of my adorable niece and nephew. My nephew Aiden is going through an anti-photo stage: I was hoping the underwater camera would hold his interest. It did for a couple of minutes, until he jumped out of the pool and declared “I’m getting out until Uncle Scott stops taking pictures…” Luckily, niece Maya was a much more willing subject, posing for the camera, and making her pretend “shy” face, twirling in her “princess” dress and generally being much more agreeable. And of course, Aiden was more than happy to jump around on the bed like a wild-man while I snapped away…

I’ve been having lots of fun with my new underwater housing for the Canon G9. I went over to Hickey Pool to take some pictures of my friend Bevin, and then took some fun family portraits of Aimee and her family. Aimee and her girls were great – they’re all swimmers (the girls are on the swim team in Dixon) and they had a great time goofing around in the water while I clicked away. I’m looking forward to getting lots of pictures of my niece and nephew in their backyard pool when I visit them at the end of July.