Rainbow Eye

She saw a rainbow in the hall and was obsessed.  Inspired by a friend who captured a shot like this, I went ahead and grabbed the camera and...

I am baaaaaaccccckkkkk!

I miss this space.  I miss documenting our life.  I miss being able to look back.  I feel guilty that almost two years have gone by without regular documentation.  I am starting a loose 365, which means I am going to try and shoot every day.   So I start with this, an image of our littlest, who has not even ever been included here.  Welcome to the blog sphere, Marlo.

3.3.15 12:45pm

Growing Our Family

Wow.  This was once a place that I came to reflect, to share, to vent... in the past few years I have blogged less and less.  There are many, many reasons for that.  One is that I have a business, two is that I have two kiddos, and three is that I have been nervous about sharing personal info on the internet, especially with my kids growing and starting to have their own personal lives and interactions.  I feel like it is not their choice to have everything shared on the web.  I do love looking back at our blog books and seeing what we were up to and what we were struggling with, it brings great perspective. 
I don't know how much I will blog this year, and I am pretty sure I will make this blog private.  But I took this image of myself growing our third child, and I felt like I wanted to share it here.  Perhaps nobody but me reads this, and that is fine, I don't feel the need for followers anymore, that no longer has any meaning to me.  I just felt the need to write.
Here we are. Preparing for our third natural birth. After much thought, we have decided to birth at home again, circumstances allowing.  We had talked about birthing at a hospital and were going through the motions of that, but in the past month, we realized that really didn't seem right to us.  We aren't here to defend that decision, we know risks etc, it is what we feel is right in our hearts.  We feel so much peace about the decision. 
Here is a self portrait of me and baby at 21 weeks.  Even though this is my third time carrying a baby, it still has me in awe.  I treasure every nudge and movement from within.  Maybe because I know just what we have in store, a child who will no doubt bring us so much joy and fill our hearts to every corner with love and strength. 
Until next time...

Stars Wars Birthday Party | Better Late Than Never

The winner of the worse blogger goes to... me!  I look back on all the blogging I once did and it saddens me that I have fallen so behind on my blogging. Not because I care who is following me, but because this space has been such a wonderful log of our life as a family. In the past few years I have grown my photography business into a full grown successful business but many other things have fallen behind. Next year I plan to back off the business a bit and focus more on the simple things that are important in my life.

Cooper's 6th birthday party was scheduled during one of the warmest sunniest summers we have had in years. But... it rained on his birthday. We had planned to have it outdoors at a splash park and all day I was depressed about the rain. Doug kept saying it would be fine but I was grumpy about it. Well, he was right! It was a blast! The kids even played in the water and we had the whole park to ourselves. It was so much fun, perhaps the best birthday party we have had yet.

Our boy is 6 years old. That means we have been parents for 6 years. Where does the time go? It has been an adventure and a journey.  I have grown in ways I never could have imagined because of Cooper. He is a beautiful, intelligent boy who brings us joy and laughter every day. He is happy and confident and that is all I can ask for.

Here are a few snaps from his party. Better late than never ;)

She is now 3!

I really just can't believe how fast time goes. Every year seems to go faster and faster. Our baby girl is 3! Does that mean she isn't a baby anymore? I guess so. But I like to pretend that she is a baby still, especially when she crawls into bed early in the morning to snuggle and sleep a little more, or when she says "I need you to hold me". But when she says things like "that's impossible!" and gets her little three year old attitude I remember that she is in fact growing up and quick.
Fina is a child you can't resist. Most would agree that you simply fall in love with her when you are around her.
For her birthday she wanted a zoo birthday party. We met her best buds and family at the zoo and went for a carousel ride and had a picnic. Annie made her custom order cupcakes. It was the perfect birthday for our big three year old.
Here are some snap shots from her big day! You can see her official three year old shoot with me HERE. :)