one

So, Josiah turned one year old. My Uncle Carl and Aunt Sarah were out visiting just in time for his actual birthday and party so they came over with my parents for a taco bar lunch and cheesecake . . . and to watch him open presents and schmear cake all over himself. Thankfully he woke up that morning in a pretty good mood:

and kept checking the front door to see if they had arrived yet:

He tried to sneak into some of his presents while we were getting set up for pictures:

Of course his sister helped:

And he spent a little time tied up in one of the ribbons . . . they always like the wrapping better than the toy.

And then the cake! They don't sell smasher cakes here anymore . . . they did for Gennie's 1st birthday but stopped now . . . so I got him a cake slice and it had this ugly pink rosette on it so I asked the bakery lady if she had anything blue instead. She scraped off the rosette and spray painted the blue on it and added the confetti . . . much better!

Then into the bath. He was clean and asleep on my shoulder within 15 minutes. Just goes to show ya . . . give them ENOUGH sugar and it won't keep them up -- it will make them crash! I know he won't have any memory of this day and the fun he had but that's why I take pictures.
Happy Birthday, Bud! Here's to many, many more!

just enough to whet your appetite

So, I didn't plan to have these ready for a few days because I'm actually in Yellowstone as this posts but I couldn't wait to get to work on their wedding portraits! Their wedding was absolutely beautiful . . . a photographer's dream with the yellow and red . . . and it was truly a privilege for me to shoot.

Lots more to come -- stay tuned!

bat boys

So, softball is finished for the season. We came in 3rd . . . out of 4 teams. :) With rain-outs and forfeits it ended up being a long season and everyone . . . including Kev who would play in a hurricane if necessary . . . was ready for it to be over. Couldn't resist a few photos of our bat boys, tho:

sharing the spotlight

So, in order to make sure my little starlet of a daughter doesn't get too envious of the attention that will be plastered on her little brother this birthday weekend, I took her into her new room and did an impromptu photo shoot. Funny thing, she's so obsessed with poses and smiling just right (her words, not mine) she actually looks very stiff and uncomfy in pictures. It took forever for her to loosen up and just have fun. I finally just let her bounce on her bed for a few minutes to get her to giggle and she was much better. . . don't tell her Daddy. :)

legos

So, the boys had their birthday party last night. It was a blast!

They each got lots of loot, but my photos of Ethan opening his presents turned out crazy blurry - I'm sure Val got way better ones of him. Val, Shannon and Jolene made the Lego cake for them and after we had all gotten a piece we stripped them down and let them loose. We're both planning to do the individual cakes for their family parties on their actual birthdays but we couldn't resist the photo op.

They loved it! After they had a nice sugar buzz going we dumped them in the kitchen sink to rinse off for the ride home. (photos coming) The water was a great shade of grass green - I hope it doesn't stain Lu's sink forever. :)

Happy Birthday, guys!

eight

years, that is. We've been married 8 years today. Lots of things have changed and I wouldn't have missed it for the world. Love him more now than I did that day.

I had planned on posting a few photos from our wedding portraits; you know, a kind of "then and now" situation. But since I can't find any of them in the post-moving disaster that is our bedroom you'll have to be happy with these instead. Gennie wanted to go out and play with sidewalk chalk this morning so we loaded up a bunch of stuff for Josiah to play with and parked on the front lawn. After she had been at it for a while I came over to see what she had been drawing.

"It's an anniversary picture, Mommy, so you can celebrate." I love it.

11 months

So, this beautiful . . . ahem, I mean handsome . . . little guy is 11 months old. Actually, his birthday is next Sat so I figured I'd better say something about this last month of infantcy (sp?) before he's not a baby anymore.

What he's up to:
- walking like crazy. No longer interested in crawling much unless he has fallen down 3 times consecutively and decides it's easier to get there by crawling. I'll post photos of the walking later.
- into everything. We don't have the baby locks up yet so I'm constantly closing cupboards and removing him from the trash can, etc.
- loves the steamer basket. He discovered it once when he was unorganizing my pots and pans cupboard and daily goes back to it to pull it out and open it up.
- sleeps really well again. We had a bit of time there that he was up again several times in the night but he's back to sleeping until 10am or so. Thank God.
- eats just about anything but chokes a lot. We're not sure why he's still choking on foods . . . maybe he just hasn't gotten the hang of mashing stuff up yet . . . but we have to be careful what snacks he gets and how many he stuffs in his mouth at a time. He's eating 2 or so jars of the #2 foods at each meal and still loves the rice cereal.
- has mastered the sippy cup. He does better when they have handles on each side but will take just about anything. Grandaddy taught him to drink from the fountain at church . . . drinking fountain, not aesthetic fountain . . . so most Sundays he's drenched before the service . . . Josiah, not my dad . . . but has a great time!

This week we have his joint b'day party with Ethan and his family party both coming up so be ready for tons of photos! Love me the cake-schmeared-from-ear-to-ear birthday photos!