don't mind me, i just created a photography blog.

so... i have decided to create a little blog where i can post about anything & everything photography... it will mostly be where i post the pictures i take for other people.. but if i figure out how to do something really cool with my camera, or some really neat editing trick or something like that, i may post it there too. we'll just have to wait and see...

so, without further ado, introducing my little photography blog!

i posted abby's session on there, and the one i did on friday with shelly and her kids!


check it out if you want! i'll be adding more photos to it soon!

Babies and Birthdays

Phew! This weekend was pretty packed... I didn't even have time to get on the computer at all! Well, I'm sure I had time at some point, but that's the time that I feel that cooking dinner and watching a movie with my B is more appealing (we watched 30 Days of Night and I actually stayed awake the whole time! It was a little more gruesome than I expected). And since that's how I chose to prioritize this weekend, I'm now up to my eyeballs in photos that need editing, e-mails that need returned, a million facebook notifications, etc. And I just looked at my calendar for the next couple of weeks and it is BUSY! But with mostly fun stuff.

Speaking of photos... if you've been following along with my 365 day photo project, I have not updated the website in forever! I don't find it difficult to take a picture every day, but uploading them is a different story! Lately it seems they have only been making it to my flickr photo set.. you can check them out here! I'll get the website up-to-date soon, hopefully!

Anywho... on Friday I went to take pictures of Shelly's kids. We went to a cute little park down by the river that I didn't even know existed. It was a wonderful little place for a photo shoot, except for all of the mosquitoes!

Can I tell you how hard it is to get a good picture of three kids 3 and under? At first I was afraid that all the photos would turn out like this one:


Ian was not having anything to do with having his picture taken! He wasn't scared of me because he'd let me hold him, and he wasn't scared of my camera, he would just scream his little head off anytime we sat him down somewhere. He finally warmed up though and we got a couple decent pictures.

We spent Saturday afternoon partyin' it up, 7 year old boy style.






The wind kept blowing out the candles so we had to move the cake inside.




What party is complete without a pinata and Hulk hands?! I'm taking notes for my 24th birthday bash coming up in a couple weeks... Holy cow... am I really going to be 24?!

I spent Sunday afternoon at a party of the baby shower variety in honor of Josh's sister, Mandy.


It was pink overload, perfect for her little girl due in August!



There was delicious punch, that I could have drank all of, compliments of Josh's momma who gave me her "secret" punch recipe... but not her secret cheesecake brownies recipe, which I still haven't gotten to taste! Hopefully she brings some for my birthday... I hear they are delectable!



We played games...




...and after the very appetizing poopy diaper game, we ate some delicious cake!


...and then Mandy opened all of her gifts... she got so much stuff! (there's a whole table of stuff not pictured!)


I don't think baby Avery will be missing a thing when she enters the world! Can't wait to meet her!!

Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend!!!

summer, life, & dogs

Monday was the first day of summer.

It was also the day my mom called me around 6 o'clock while she was still at work and said she had a really bad headache. A really really bad one. At first she just said she wasn't sure if she should drive herself home and then I casually suggested the Emergency Room (because my mom doesn't go to doctors, let alone ever want to go to a hospital) and Yeah. Yeah, I think that might be a good idea, she said. I knew it was a pretty serious headache then.

Her blood pressure had been high for the past week (that we know of, maybe/probably longer) and although her family doctor had given her some medicine to lower it, it had done nothing. Once we arrived at the ER and they took her blood pressure (210/125... normal is 120/80), they rushed us right back.

Long story short, we were only there for 3 hours, which I thought was good for an emergency room, and they gave her some medicine to temporarily lower her blood pressure to ease her headache.

We followed up with a cardiologist on Tuesday. He gave her some new medicine that seems to be working wonders and now we are just waiting for the results of her blood work to hopefully determine the cause of the high blood pressure. It's kind of a mystery considering she is pretty young, it doesn't run in our family, and she is relatively healthy. Hopefully they can tell us something soon!

Thank you for all of your thoughts, prayers, and e-mails! I know it's just a small thing to send a quick text or e-mail that says We're praying for you or Let me know if there's anything I can do.... I mean after all isn't that kind of what you're "supposed" to say? But I can't tell you how many times my phone would beep while we were at that hospital... with calls, texts, e-mails, and twitter notifications. And if nothing else, it just let me know that we were loved and thought of. And I really, really appreciate it so, thank you.

Also, I really love my mom. And I don't know what I'd do without her. I also love her attitude.

When we got home from the ER, she said You know what one of the worst things about today was? I was thinking something along the lines of that we had to go to the emergency room and that her blood pressure had put her in the "at risk for a stroke" range... but no.

I lost a whole field of carrots on my Farmville! I don't even want to go look at them, I just know they are gone!

She sure does love her Farmville. hahaha :)

.........

Meanwhile, back at the homestead, Josh tried to have a photo shoot with the boys, but clearly they were in no mood for pictures!


I just love this picture and I think it's my new favorite of the dogs. Tobey is just sticking his tongue out at the camera and Kosmo is all I don't want to do photos right now.

Ok, this one makes me laugh too...


Tobey looks like a little drill sergeant and Kosmo is standing up all straight... Sir, yes Sir! ... and he's missing his ears! Love it!

So, here's to summer! Seems like it's going to be a hot one!!

Papa's Day

Sometimes looking at pictures of my dad makes me want to kick and scream and have one of those really good cries where you just sob and your whole body shakes uncontrollably... because I miss him. I miss him so much. And then sometimes it simply makes me smile because I remember the good times we had together, I remember his laugh, his jokes, his advice, his hugs, his smell.

I can't believe it will be 10 years this December.

Ten years is a long time not to celebrate Father's Day... so this year I changed that! We celebrated Papa's Day, because goshdarnit Josh is a good papa to the Kosmo and Kosmo wanted to let him know how much he appreciates it!



So we baked him his favorite cake. A carrot cake in the shape of a dog bone (because dog bones are Kosmo's favorite).


And Kosmo even picked out the perfect Father's Day card. (The inside says It's in the yard.)

Happy Papa's Day, Josh! We hope you enjoyed your carrot cake!!!

xoxo

ten.

yesterday was mine and josh's 10th monthiversary!
we didn't do anything extraordinarily exciting...
just had some taco pizza from papa murphy's (delicious!), went for a walk (a short 5 minute one because it was hot and we're sallies) and watched some tv (persons unknown...i'm intrigued but not totally sold yet).
okay, so basically it was just like every other day.
except every other day isn't our whatever-monthiversary, so that called for a special silly family photo shoot!

happy 10th monthiversary, joshie poo! ;-)

warning: picture overload

Today I did an impromptu photo shoot with Abi (the sweet little girl I nanny for). It's been awhile since I've photographed babies and I have a couple of possible photo shoots in the works, so I thought it couldn't hurt to practice. Plus I didn't think Abi's mom would mind having some more pictures of her precious baby.

Warning: there may be a lot because I think she's just so darn cute and couldn't decide which ones to post!












So sweet!

The Brutal Barnyard Dash

I was nervous about yesterday's 10k. I hadn't run at all this week, let alone 6 miles at once in a long time. I am pretty sure the farthest I'd run (until yesterday) since the half marathon (which was at the end of April... OMG) was about 4 miles. Plus, after signing up for the race, I heard it was a doozy as far as hills go. And we all know how I feel about hills. Oh, and did I mention it was about 76 degrees and HUMID as all get out at the start of the race and the chance for rain was like 110%?!

So I put on my favorite motivational running shirt and gave myself a little pep talk.


You CAN do it, I told myself. It may totally suck, but only for an hour. You won't die. Pass out, maybe, but not DIE. It's okay to walk and it's okay to not PR. Just get out there and do it and be thankful for the ability to run.

And so we went Huber's. It's such a fun place. That, and the fact that I wanted to keep up my one-race-per-month trend going & have a "big" goal after the half marathon, were the main reasons I signed myself up for the voluntary torture race.

My mom accompanied me like a good little #1 fan. Josh was busy dabbling in his new hobby (photography, for those of you that haven't been around here lately) as a "2nd shooter" for a wedding. It sounds so fancy and professional and cool. So this was my first race that he hasn't been to. Kind of weird. Missed my coach :(

At the start of the race I realized there were NOT very many runners (I heard there were only about 1/4 as many runners as usual.) I could see the start of the runners ahead of me and the end of the runners when I looked behind me, which in my head meant that my chances of coming in last seemed pretty good. Oh dear, my worst fear may finally come true.

So off we went. There were hills immediately into the course and ALL throughout the course. It wasn't like the half marathon or the 10 miler where the hills only lasted for a couple miles and then it was flat again, or the Grand Prix races where there were only a couple rolling hills. This course was brutal!

Less than 2 miles in I actually wondered if I could even finish. I almost wanted to turn around and just go back, but by that point I would have run 4 miles anyway, so what's another 2.25, right?

Then it started raining. The rain really makes no difference to me, although I suppose it might if it had rained for longer than 5 minutes. Either way it was enough to make my shirt soaking wet which wasn't too fun and my socks got a little wet which caused an uncomfortable blister on one of my toes that I got to deal with for the remainder of the race. Oh, and after it stopped raining, the humidity.... oh the humidity!

But I kept trucking along.

The rest of the course is pretty much a blur. I remember walking up hills, being really hot, and watching Gertie slowly count down the miles. At one point the 3 mile walking group met up with our course so I thought, maybe I'll just walk the rest of the course and no one will even know! But then about a mile later their course went off in a different direction because they only had a mile left and we still had 2.25... I was pretty tempted to just take the walking course back. I'd already run 4 miles anyway, I would have been pleased with finishing out just 5 ;-)


Somehow I finally crossed the finish line... in 1:09:32 according to Gertie. And I didn't come in last!!! :-D

I suppose my time wasn't so bad. My previous (and only other) 10k time was 1:05... so 4 minutes slower, given the conditions, isn't too horrible right?


We stuck around for a little bit waiting on door prizes. I was hoping to win one of their $50 checks, but no such luck.


I did get to meet fellow runners and twitter friends @mudd4goals (who DID win one of the $50 prizes!) and @MikeCampbellCFO though! So that was pretty cool. I always think it's neat how something like Twitter/blogging can introduce you to people you'd otherwise probably never meet.

So overall, it was a fun but killer race. I probably would have enjoyed the course more if I was a little more prepared and if it wasn't so dang humid! I really need to get used to running in this heat!

I'm on the lookout for a July race. There's a 4 mile "off road" race the day after my birthday... could be the winner, although it sounds a little dangerous?!

Stats:

Barnyard Dash 10k
June 12, 2010

Distance: 6.25 miles

Time: 1:09:32

it's almost here..

i remember summertime being magical when i was a little kid.

my favorite summertime memories: road trips with my mom to see my favoritest cousin. she was like the sister i never had. we'd go swimming late at night, catch lightning bugs and build forts. one time we had a jumping competition and begged our moms to be the judges, and although they probably didn't want to, they did. i remember when my dad built me the coolest swing set on the block and surprised me with it one afternoon when i got home from school because he wanted me to have a fun summer. i remember going to get ice cream and walking around the neighborhood barefoot and cookouts with neighbors and riding my bike around the block until it was dark. i remember when we'd set off fireworks with our neighbors to celebrate the 4th of july but also to celebrate my birthday (which is 5 days later). i remember playing with sidewalk chalk and bubbles and swimming until we were little prunes and going on family trips to the beach.

summer = magic.

but somewhere along the way growing up, summertime lost its magic.

it turned into lazy days at home, taking summer classes, and just another birthday. like last year when my best friend lived with me for the whole summer and we had a whole lot of really awesome things planned. we were going to go to DC, go white water rafting, go to the lake for the 4th of july, have a fun birthday bash for my 23rd, and go to holiday world. among other things.

but..

we never made it to DC or white water rafting. the 4th was rainy and i was sick on my birthday. we made it to holiday world but even that got ruined.

not that it was horrible, it just wasn't what we had planned. plus i met josh so that pretty much cancels out all the bad stuff anyway and makes it my favorite summer ever :)

but this year i am determined to make it a good summer. even if that just means periodically having cookouts with our neighbors like we did last weekend...




i think it's going to be a pretty great summer :)