Word for 2010 & Photos

Posted on January 1, 2010

Last year I was inspired to come up with a word to jump start my year. A word to focus on throughout the year. Link to last years post. I chose strength as my word for last year and boy was it ever fitting. It was perfect for me as I was met with certain situations and I felt it was a good overall word to help inspire me throughout the year. Between becoming a mom of two, being alone in a foreign country during Davids deployment, being away from my family during times I really would have loved to be there for support. Strength was something I definetely had to tap into at times.  I wanted to also choose a word for this year and after much thought I’ve come up with: nurture.

Description:
Nurture: noun, the process of caring for  and encouraging the growth of something or someone.

I want to continue on the nurturing path I’ve already started with my family – I want to keep nurturing my children in spirit, mind and body, to help build them into quality, loving little people. I want to nurture my marriage and make it a priority to spend time with David one on one. I want to nurture my new home and help turn it into a home (I’m so completely pumped about decorating!!!!). I want to nurture my business as I move to a new area. And finally I want to nurture myself, I’ve gone a very long time not really caring for myself as much as I’d like, but I want to change that. So that’s it…my word for 2010 is nurture.

And in closing here are my Top 9 Personal Photos throughout 2009. Some of them I took, some I didn’t, but they are all special to me for one reason or another.

January 2009 – First Family Picture
My sweet Mama took this of us. It’s our first family image and one that is proudly displayed in my living room. I love this picture for so many reasons, but the main reason is it was the first time our family of four was documented. I so love my little family.

January 2009 – Claire Elizabeth
A close up of our new little baby girl. I wanted her so badly and faced something that was a great fear of my own – delivery in a foreign hospital – which ended up being an amazing experience, but none the less, it was something I feared and I’d put having another baby off because of that fear. Once she was here and the delivery process was all over I was so, so thankful. Thankful for the precious gift of life and thankful that I had another perfect baby girl to get to love and adore.

February 2009 – Sisters
I so badly wanted to give Kate the gift of a sibling and to see them interact with each other blesses me beyond measure. I just LOVE watching them love each other. I’m so grateful they have each other.

March 2009 – Holding Hands
More sisterly love here. This photo will be framed and displayed in our new home because everytime I look at it I’m filled with happiness.

April 2009 – Family Photos
Taken by Dream Street Photography
My wonderful friend Susanne took these photos for us. David was about to leave for a deployment and I wanted some family pictures to show to Kate while he was gone to help keep our family unit fresh in her mind. I love these so much!!!! These will also be displayed in our new home (remember I’m excited about decorating? I can’t WAIT to decorate with photos!)

August 2009  - Sissies
This might be my favorite photo of the ENTIRE YEAR. Oh my gosh I love it. I love how you can tell Kate is helping show Claire all about flowers (Kate is a great little teacher). I remember her saying things like, “These are flowers Claire, they are yellow” and followed up closely by “NO!!! Don’t EAT flowers” (said in Kate’s best frantic tone). I love these girls so much.

August 2009 – Katherine Grace
My sweet little Kate. She grew so much throughout the year (becoming a big sister does that to a girl). She completed so many important milestones – potty training, school, learning to write her name, becoming a more mature, obedient little girl. She is a blessing to us and we love her so very much. I love this picture of her because it shows off her big beautiful brown eyes and she really looks like herself here. So often when I bring the camera out she shows off her goofy face (and I do love it too!), but this face is her – really her.

October 2009 – My man and me
Photo taken by Valerie Raybon
This picture is sooooo us. HAAA! I adore it! David’s expression is priceless. I think it’s so very important to get pictures of just David and I together sometimes. It’s so easy to fall into the habit of only taking pictures that include our children, but it’s important to document us as a couple sometimes too.

December 2009 – Christmas Eve
A big part of our family routine is reading before bed. We always make it a point to read The Night Before Christmas each Christmas Eve night and this year we got to include Claire in our family tradition. Sure it was a little hectic since Claire doesn’t really have a concept of sitting and looking at the pictures yet, but it was still fun. I just set my camera on a self timer and take a ton of pictures of us interacting as a family. This was my favorite shot out of the night. I love that we’re all in our jammies piled up in Kate’s bed, I love the girls interacting with each other, David and I enjoying them. Great family stuff.

Hope all of you had a wonderful New Years! HAPPY 2010!!!

My Girls

Posted on August 10, 2009

I love my sweet little girls so much. As Claire is now getting older and mobile and able to get into big sisters stuff it really is so heartwarming to see her so patient and gentle with Claire. Sure I’m not ignorant enough to think there won’t be some little disagreements here and there, but I’m just so thankful for the great start they have. They are already wonderful playmates for each other. So thankful for them!

Claire and Me

Posted on August 2, 2009

I’m proud to say I think my 3 year old already has some totally rad photography talent. Check out this photo she took of Claire & me. Awesome composition, perfect expressions captured, love the back lighting, my gosh the kid has talent. Oh and she didn’t take it with a regular point and shoot, she took it with my heavy DSLR. I’m crazy proud AND I’m super excited to actually be IN a photo!!! It’s pretty rare these days!

Today

Posted on June 27, 2009

With David being deployed I find myself wishing the time away. Being in a constant count-down mode of just wanting each day to go by quickly so he can be back with us. I spend alot of my days complaining to myself at how challenging it can be for me to get both girls down for the night. Being tired of how lonely I feel after they are in bed and it gets dark out and I have no one to chat with. Tired of not having anyone to cook for who will praise me and tell me how great it is (Yes, Kate does compliment me on my mean PB&J and grilled cheese sandwiches and while I appreciate that, it’s just not the same! LOL!). Really resenting having all the bug squishing duties and remembering when to take the trash out. I really love my husband and while I’m completely capable of keeping the home fires burning without him, life is sure so much sweeter and easier and more joyful when I have my best friend to experience everything with. But today as I was cleaning Claire up after Kate assisted with feeding her some delicious pureed baby food goodness I realized how she wasn’t eating solids when David left. She wasn’t rolling. She wasn’t as alert. She was 2 months younger than she is now. Then I look over at Kate and see her inspecting her beautiful piece of glittery artwork from preschool. She wasn’t in preschool when David left. She wasn’t using the word mischievous, wasn’t potty trained, didn’t own a pair of fabulous pink plastic dress up heels and didn’t know that Beatrix Potter books existed. We didn’t have picnics at the park next door, we hadn’t discovered Odwalla juice & didn’t rock out to the song Jungle Drum by Emiliana Torrini. My girls are growing and drastically changing and the real tragedy is that not only is David missing it, but I’m missing it too. So starting today I’m going to stop wishing the time away until he’s home. Starting today I’m going just enjoy the moment – the moments where a perfect slobbery little hand reaches up to touch my face, the moments where my three year old honestly beats me in playing memory and yes, even enjoy the moments when it gets hairy and crazy cause while it’s hard, at least I get to be with them, cause David isn’t, and I know he’d love to be present for a hissy fit or a diaper blow out cause that would mean he’s here with us.

Here is a small collection of this weeks photos. Of me enjoying them and their preciousness. Of me simple enjoying today…no matter what.

Daddy’s Day

Posted on June 20, 2009

I take LOTS of photos. I usually have at least 100 personal images to dig through each week, but sometimes more. I work my best to immediately go through and delete the ones with closed eyes, bad expression, etc., label the keepers for reference and do a little editing to them, but sometimes I just upload the images to my computer, get distracted and (gasp) forget to look at them!! This is UNACCEPTABLE! I need to seriously strive to put the same time and attentiveness with my personal images as I do my client’s images, but alas…there aren’t endless hours in the day!

Since David is currently deployed I wanted to give him something personalized and special for Fathers Day from his two little girls. So I decided to create a book for him. So I began digging through all our personal images and I found so many pictures that I just ADORE and I’d completely forgotten about! I loved going through our family pictures and remembering the moment, it was so special! Here are a hand full of  a few of the layouts in his Daddy’s Day book. I know he’s loving flipping through this while he’s away! Some of the images I chose were pretty and others were just natural not at all perfect. But I loved them all for different reasons!

This first one is a great example of printing something that isn’t technically perfect. The two images on the right aren’t perfect at all…Kate was actually kicking my legs as I took it and I know in the top one especially I was losing my balance as I shot it (which is one of the reasons why Claire’s head isn’t even in the frame at all!) And the second image on the right Kate is a blurry mess. But you know what? It reminded me of our LIFE, Kate always moving. Claire hanging being chill and hanging in her Bumbo, Daddy on the floor playing with them, that’s life!! Bad composition, blur and all.

These are special to me because this is our last Spring here in Germany and the last chance we had for images in the yellow flowers. They are gone now and man I miss them! Glad Daddy was home JUST in time for me to capture these before he left.

These are images I COMPLETELY forgot about!! How sad is that??? Glad I dug through and found them!

More natural shots of my precious girls.

So here is my challenge to you – take LOTS of personal pictures. Don’t forget what you’ve captured (HAAA!), and print them in a way where they are easy to enjoy – for your walls or in a book that is out and easy for you to flip through and enjoy. It really does make me sad how so many great photos are stuck on hard drives and not enjoyed. So while digital photography is AMAZING and computers are even more nifty…nothing really compares to having those precious photos in hand…nothing like it.

Happy Daddy’s Day everyone!!! Now go out and print a picture of the #1 Daddy in your life…your own Dad or your kiddo’s Dad…and while you are at it print a picture of you, and your kids, and your pets, and your home and…well you get the picture (pun intended) – just PRINT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Best Friends

Posted on June 9, 2009

I have three siblings. I love them all so much. Some of my greatest memories of childhood were with my siblings. I love having that special bond with them. Knowing what makes them tick. Knowing what makes them laugh. Knowing endless inside jokes that only we understand. I love them so much! Which is why seeing my girls enjoying each other it brings me such great joy. Even though Claire is only 4 months old, their relationship is blossoming. Claire finds Kate completely fascinating and will turn her head to wherever she hears her big sissy. Love seeing them share a smile or a giggle. Love watching Kate eagerly share things with Claire and explain to her what characters are in a book, what colors her toys are. The first time our girls met I introduced Kate to Claire by saying, “Kate, meet your sissy, your new best friend” because friends may come and go, but sisters they are forever.   

Winter in June

Posted on June 6, 2009

The weather here has been pretty lousy lately. Cold, rainy, dreary – very January-like. I can’t help but wonder if Germany got the memo that it’s JUNE!!! I was browsing through some images I took when we had some lovely Spring-like weather back in April and came across some landscape images I took when all the beautiful yellow flowers were bloomed out. The yellow flowers are all gone now…and then this chilly weather too…ugh! COME ON SUMMER!!!

Warm Fuzzies

Posted on May 31, 2009

I’d say one of the best feelings in the world is feeling appreciated. There is nothing like the warm fuzzy feeling when someone appreciates something you’ve worked hard on. It’s GREAT!!!

Jenny (my friend and client) thanked me by sending me FOOD. Wow…appreciation PLUS food? Is there any better combo??? We’d discussed before how I’m a fan of Hickory Farms summer sausage and cheese and she remembered and sent me THIS! Talk about making me feel so loved and appreciated. I immediately chowed down on the cheese and summer sausage with just as smidge of their incredible sweet hot mustard…YUM! Kate immediately devoured all the strawberry candies.

Thank you Jenny! You totally made my day!

First Post {My Family}

Posted on May 24, 2009

Hello and welcome to my new blogsite! I wanted the benefits of a blog and the benefits of a website so now I have all of that lumped into one. YAY!!! I wanted to highlight something especially special to me as the first official post here at my new blog and decided I wanted to show off my little family. My good friend Susanne of Dream Street Photography captured these for us. I LOVE THEM!!! Susanne did an amazing job capturing the REAL us – Kate running around, David sneaking smooches, us laughing and just being us – beautifully unrehearsed and natural. Thank you Susanne!! I’m forever thankful for these priceless family images of us

It’s hard to pick an ultimate favorite, but I think this just might be it. LOVE how Kate has her eyes shut as she accepts a kiss from Daddy, so sweet! And props to Susanne for this rock star pose. Love how we are separated, but still together…just cool stuff.

Sweet Kate! Love the hands on her hips…adds an extra bit of attitude to the shot don’t you think?

Now I ADORE this one cause it shows the real us…David and I just sitting back watching Kate run, run, run. Also love how it captures Claire in her most loved pass time – hand chewing.

These just make my heart swell with happiness. Love my family. Love the greenery. Sigh…I just love, love, love these images.

 

Cool outfit with totally rad shoes – Check. Ability to ignore the Germans staring at you making out in public – Check.  Totally in love with each other – double check!

And finally this one. Gosh I will cherish this image forever. For starters my sweet hubby is the one who talked us into stopping the car and capturing this, it was towards the end of the shoot and the kiddos really needed to get home, but at the last minute we stopped to take in this amazing backdrop. SOOO glad we listened to him. I loved this picture the second I saw it, but now that he’s left for his deployment I love it even more. I’ve got an amazing man, glad I have some images of not only us with our beautiful family, but also with just the two of us.

Thank you again Susanne!!!

Here Granny, are ya happy? :)

Posted on April 14, 2009

My wonderful, amazing, creative, beautiful (and every other positive and lovely adjective you can think of) mother, who Kate and Claire know as Granny has been more than just lightly suggesting I create a post with her grandgirls.  

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