Avery and Spencer

On Friday afternoon, I did my first official photo shoot. The subjects were Avery and Spencer. They suffered the heat with me as we roamed around the park in my neighborhood. I won't lie...they made me work for it, but it was worth it (at least in my opinion). Merri and Tim...here are a couple of the photos of your beautiful children.

This is Avery. She wasn't feeling the whole picture taking thing at all, but she humored me.

Here is her younger brother, Spencer. He has the most amazing eyes. I promise that I did not do anything to enhance these eyes (cross my heart).
Thank you, Spencer and Avery, for being patient with me when there was a whole park just waiting for you.

Anniversary

On this day two years ago, Mike and I became husband and wife. This past year has been an intense one for us. We bought a house, got a dog, and went to more funerals than weddings. Through it all, we had each other and that is what made the year exciting, memorable and bearable all at the same time.

Dear Husband...Thank you for loving me through it all. You are my best friend, true love and soul mate.

The picture above was taken by the lovely and talented Megan Hammond.

Picnic

My department picnic was on Friday. I took the opportunity to practice taking candid photos of children. Luckily, there were quite a few available subjects.

This is Anna. She wasn't going to give up a photo very easily. I had to catch her as she peeked around her father's leg.

This little one had a lot of fun with the frosting end of a cupcake.

This is Jackson - a very photogenic young gentleman.

Go pigeons?

Mike and I went for a walk tonight and lo and behold, we saw a trailer solely dedicated to the purpose of transporting the Omaha Racing Pigeon team. Who knew Omaha had its very own team of racing pigeons?! I've chosen to ignore the fact that the trailer was rather dilapidated and didn't look like it had been used in several years.

Good practice

For the first time, we gave Lola a bath at home. As a result we learned that Lola does not like baths. We had to do it though. Her fur was very long and she was having some issues...with pooing. Long fur plus poo issues equals a dog with a stinky butt. After her bath, I proceeded to clip the fur around her hiney to remove the offending remnants of poo.

Amidst all of this, I kept hearing the phrase "Oh! A puppy! That is good practice for having a baby!" and I was silently cursing every person that has uttered that phrase to me since Lola joined our family.

First off, who said anything about having a baby (apparently everyone can hear my biological clock ticking except for me). Second, puppies and babies are so not even close to the same thing.

Let me elaborate...

1. Babies wear diapers. Moreover, babies are immobile for a fair portion of the first year of their lives. Puppies do not wear diapers. Puppies are mobile. When a puppy needs to relieve itself, it does so, wherever it pleases.
2. Puppies have teeth - sharp ones. And, they assume that everything within their reach was put there for their chewing enjoyment. This includes human flesh.
3. Puppies can jump. While you are laying on the couch, enjoying the Food Network and feeling quite pleased with yourself that you have found a non-human chew toy that seems to be occupying your puppy, you are suddenly attacked by a flying ball of fur. Amazingly, the ball of fur always...always...manages to land directly on your face. As a result, you now huddle in fear when anything with your peripheral vision makes a sudden movement.

But, there are similarities...

1. Both babies have puppies have the cutest, roundest tummies that just beg to be rubbed and tickled.
2. Both know how to love unconditionally.
3. Both amaze you as they learn new things about their world.
4. Both necessitate setting up multiple baby gates resulting in bruised shins and knees (we have three).

Finally, if Lola were to become too much for us, we could find her a new home and no one would judge us for it. Well, some might, but at least we wouldn't be thrown in jail. Luckily, we love our little flesh-chewing, face-landing, bath-hating little ball of fur.

Shooting blind

As I was doing my daily viewing of my favorite blogs, I stumbled upon a post by photographer Melissa Rawlings in which she talked about "shooting blind" so I decided to try it out. Instead of looking through my camera, I put it on auto-focus, aimed it in the general direction of something and took the picture. These images are the result of my little experiment.

Odd

If you want your neighbors to think you are odd, take off your shoes in the middle of your driveway and then lay down on the cement and take a picture of them. These are my sparkly shoes. They make me smile. The neighbors are just jealous they do not have sparkly shoes.
I rented a lens from rentglass.com. It is a 50mm/f1.4. I tested it out on some flowers in our yard. The shallow depth of field is very nice. The hard part is getting used to the fact that it is a prime. That means I have to move instead of letting the lens do the work.

In search of peace

Do not stand at my grave and weep;
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn's rain.
When you awaken in morning's hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft starshine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry;
I am not there. I did not die.

-Unknown Native American Author

I captured the flower images this weekend and then tonight, I saw the butterfly. It was perched on the leaf of a tree in our backyard, right by the house. I've seen several butterflies of late, but this one seemed special - like maybe it was a message from grandma, telling me that she is happy and beautiful and at peace. Maybe she is trying to send me and my mom and all of us some of her peace - peace we are all trying, and struggling, to find.

Twins

The two little cuties are the twin daughters of one of my good friends. Franny has made a blog appearance before, but this is Elliot's debut.

This is Elliot. She is the lover. Doesn't she just have the sweetest face?

This is Franny - aka Yoga Fran. She is in her downward dog pose. She absolutely loved the camera.

New life

Will Bethylyn joined our family yesterday afternoon. She weighed 7 lbs. 8 oz. and was 19 inches long. It is very nice to have some happiness grace our family right now. Miss Willow, we are very glad you are here.

The new parents - my brother, Aaron and his girlfriend, Kayla

Willow Bethylyn
Tiny little baby toes
My brother doing his part in giving Willow her first bath