Are you eyeballing him? Believe me, this is one hombre you do not want to mess with.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in manual exposure mode. Aperture f/1.8, shutter 1/60 sec, ISO 1600. Post-processing in Aperture 3: auto WB, picked from the white on his vest; curve to bring up exposure, dodged over his face; burned the background; desaturated yellows; added heavy vignetting.

Thoughts for improvement: I tried to get rid of the heavy shadow that runs across his nose and cheek, but couldn't do it in a way that looked natural. That's one thing I'd change. I ultimately opted to keep this one in color, but there were a few B&W versions I tried that weren't bad, so that is another option. And, of course, I wish the picture had a bit less digital noise--I kind of like the texture, but would prefer a bit less.

After we finished trick-or-treating, Jason got his first taste of Halloween candy. I'm not quite sure, but I think he liked it.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40, Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 lens, and Nikon SB-400 flash, in manual exposure mode, automatic (eTTL) flash mode. Aperture f/2.8, shutter 1/250 sec, ISO 400, flash tilt 90 degrees, flash exposure compensation -1 EV. Post-processing in Aperture 3: auto WB, picked from the white of his vest; cropped to vertical; cloned out some spots on his face; curve to increase brightness and contrast; burned background; applied light skin smoothing over his cheeks and forehead.

Thoughts for improvement: Really, this isn't a very good photo, artistically speaking. The composition is boring, the background is cluttered and the framing is pretty poor. There should be a little more room above his head and his arms really shouldn't be cut off. It's pretty much just a snapshot, albeit a relatively well-lit snapshot. The expression is priceless, though.

We took Jason trick-or-treating for the first time this year, with some friends and their kids. Neither of us were sure how it would go, whether he'd have fun or whether he'd fall apart quickly. The previous times we'd put him in his costume, he started taking it off again within minutes, so we didn't expect much. Turns out, he loved it. After the first couple of houses he was pulling us along down the street, running up to each door and shouting "Trick or treat!" before he even got up the driveway. By the time we were halfway around the block his pumpkin bucket was too heavy for him to carry, but he still kept going. What's more, he kept his costume on the whole time. It was a lot of fun.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in manual exposure mode. Aperture f/1.8, shutter 1/125, ISO 1600. Post-processing in Aperture 3: cropped and rotated; daylight WB preset; curve for contrast, tone, and highlight recovery; burned the background.

Thoughts for improvement: I'd be interested to see what this would look like on a camera with better high-ISO performance and a higher resolution. (Though, if I'd taken a step forward I could have saved some pixels and not had to crop.) I'd also like to see what it would look like with sharper focus. Still, the grainy look from the high-ISO noise and the softness give it a kind of retro look, which I tried to enhance with the white balance and tone. I think it works relatively well. The only thing that kind of bugs me is the way that the bucket is out of focus, which is due to the wide-open aperture. If I had a camera with better low-light performance, I might have been able to get this at f/2.8 or maybe even f/4, which would have kept the whole subject in focus.

Jason, like most kids his age, goes nuts for stickers. What I'm not sure is quite as common is the fact that as soon as he gets his hands on some, he starts sticking them all over his body. As you can see, he particularly likes to put them on his belly. And then show them to everybody.

Technical information: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in aperture priority exposure mode (matrix metering). Aperture f/2.8, shutter 1/250 (+0 EV), ISO 800. Post-processing in Aperture 3: a little bit of straightening and a curve to bring up exposure and contrast.

Thoughts for improvement: I honestly can't think of anything. I love this shot.

We went to a wedding this weekend, and after we got all dressed up, Juliette wanted to take some pictures. We did some standard portraits of each other and a few that I took at arm's length of the two of us. This was the last one, by which point we'd devolved into pure silliness.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in aperture priority exposure mode (matrix metering). Aperture f/1.8, shutter 1/640 sec (+0 EV), ISO 800. Post-processing in Aperture 3: curve for contrast, desaturated reds and yellows, slight overall desaturation.

Thoughts for improvement: It's hard, of course, to get framing just right when you're holding a camera at arm's length. This turned out very cute, but I still would have liked to get more of Juliette's face in the shot. I do like the texture in my jacket lapel and the color and rumple of my shirt, though, so in order to get all that and more of Juliette's face, I would probably have to have longer arms.

Seeing as we were there for the Brick-or-Treat event, we brought Jason's Halloween costume with us to Legoland. We got there in the morning, though, and the event didn't start until the late afternoon, so for most of the day he just wore his street clothes. When it was time to change into his costume, Jason was pretty excited, and as we headed back into the park to find the event, he proudly displayed his boots and vest as he marched along.

That lasted all of five minutes before he started kicking the boots off and pulling at his collar. Hopefully he'll make it a little longer when it's time for some actual trick-or-treating.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in manual exposure mode. Aperture f/1.8, shutter 1/500 sec, ISO 400. Post-processing in Aperture 3: Curve to set black point and add contrast and color pop; cropped a bit off the top and left side.

Thoughts for improvement: There's a bit of lens distortion I probably should have cleaned up, and it also may need a little straightening. Other than that I'm pretty happy with it.

Me: "Do you like Ms. Manijeh? Is she your friend?" [Ms. Manijeh is one of the teachers at his day care.]

Jason: "Um yeah." [This is his new thing, putting "um" in front of his answers. I don't know what's up with that.]

Me: "That's good. What about Eva, is she your friend?"

Jason: "Um yeah."

Me: "And is Tescia your friend?"

Jason: "Um yeah."

Me: "Is Kayleigh your friend?"

Jason: "Um no."

Me: "No?"

Jason: "Ale my friend."

Me: "Ale's your friend? Well that's nice."

Jason: "And Kayleigh."

Me: "Wait, Kayleigh is your friend?"

Jason: "Everybody my friend, daddy!"

Me: "That's true. Everybody is your friend, Jason."

Jason: "And Jason my friend, and Mommy my friend, and Daddy my friend. And Cooper my friend."

Me: [smiling] "That's right, we are all your friends."

Jason: "I love you!"

Me: "Awww, thank you! I love you too!"

Jason: "I love you, daddy!"

Me: "Awww... That is so sweet. I'm going to kiss you now!"

Jason: "No, don't kiss me!"

We put Jason in a toddlers' soccer class over the summer and he hated it. He didn't want to run or even get out of our arms, and when it was his turn to kick the ball he'd almost invariably burst into tears. I don't know what's changed between now and then, though, because when he saw some of the other kids at Sunday's birthday party chasing the ball around, he couldn't get enough.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 55-200mm VR DX lens, in aperture priority exposure mode, center-weighted average metering. Focal length 200mm, aperture f/5.6, shutter 1/125 sec, ISO 200. Post-processing in Aperture 3: Auto WB adjustment, picked from a white part of the design on his shirt; curve to reduce exposure, bring up blacks, and add contrast.

Thoughts for improvement: I like the way the grass looks with the narrow depth of field, but this would probably have been better at f/8 or maybe even f/11. I was shooting wide open mainly to keep a fast shutter speed and avoid motion blur, but here I managed to miss the focus just a bit--you can see that the front of the ball is soft, and due to his stance, his right leg is a bit further away from the camera than his left, and is therefore also slightly out of focus. Stopping down to f/8 would have given me a lot more leeway with focus depth and probably still would have had shallow enough depth of field to separate him from the background.

Jason likes to run but he has a tendency to trip over his own feet, so we've tried to get him to run only when he's on a soft surface, like grass. He forgets a lot, though, so we still have a fair number of scrapes and bruises to kiss. Fortunately, the only times he fell down at his friend's birthday party on Sunday, he was on some nice, springy grass. He was up chasing after a soccer ball just a few seconds after this photo.

Technical info: Shot with a Nikon D40 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX lens, in manual exposure mode, center-weighted average metering. Aperture f/4, shutter 1/125 sec, ISO 200. Post-processing in Aperture 3: straightened horizon; auto WB, picked from the white of his eye, strong curve to bring down the exposure, bring up black point, and add contrast, mild dodge over his eyes.

Thoughts for improvement: A lot of the shots I got in the later part of the party were overexposed, which I did on purpose to try to get some more pop. Unfortunately, I overdid it a bit, which did some weird things to the color when I brought the exposure back down in post-processing. You can see a red tint to his hair that isn't really there, and the grass is a bit electric. I do like the texture of the grass, though, both the in-focus and bokeh, and I like the look on his face. Compositionally, the only thing I'd change is to not have the gazebo right behind his head.

"I want that diaper."

I've just put him down onto his changing table after his bath. As every night, we flossed and brushed his teeth, then he washed his hands. Immediately after drying them, he ran--still naked--into his room and behind the rocking chair, to sing to himself and play with the strings that tie the seat cushion to the frame. I followed behind, pausing to move his stepstool back against the wall and turn off the bathroom light, then fished him out from behind the chair and set him on the table.

He's pointing at the picture of Elmo on the front of the diaper that's hanging over the edge of the shelf above him. "I want to wear it."

"You want that one?" I ask, and he nods. "But Jason," I say, "that's not a night-time diaper. We only wear those ones during the day." I don't know why I say "we," but he doesn't notice.

"I want it," he insists.

"I know, buddy, but we don't always get what we want." I pull out an overnight diaper and put it on him, then slide on his pajama pants. "Jason, I'm going to tell you something," I say. "Sometimes we want things, but we don't get them." I pull his pajama top over his head and hold the bottom open for him to put his arms in. "And sometimes we have to do things we don't want to do. It's frustrating, I know, but that's just how it is sometimes."

I pick him up. "But, I'll tell you what: it's worth it to wait because then when you do get..."

He throws his arms around me and puts his head on my shoulder. "Awww," I say, smiling. "Are you giving me a hug? That's so nice. I love hugs from Jason. Those are my favorite kind of hug." He leans back and looks at me, in that way that he does that seems like he's searching my face.

I continue. "Jason, when you wait to get the things you want..."

He cuts me off with a kiss. I take the hint. "OK. Night night, buddy," I say.

"Night night!" he replies as I hand him to his mother. She and I both chuckle--turns out, sometimes you don't have to wait to get what you want.