Oh, April. You were challenging. Between birthday parties, engagement sessions, banquets, graduations, retirements, skill saw accidents, exploding studio lights (really), yearbook photos, and just general insanity at work during the busiest month the school has seen since I started working here, I was feeling a bit, well, like this chicken:
Stretched thin, for sure. But graduation is behind us, and I can finally look ahead to some of the fun things coming up with anticipation instead of stress. (Chicago, look out, I’m coming back! And I’m bringing Josh with me!)
Saturday, as the tornado sirens blared (from FOUR in the morning until TWO the next morning, AWESOME), we celebrated with my dad his nearly 28 years of service to the police department. And as we watched the news and saw the families affected by the flood waters rising all around our community, I was once again reminded how lucky we are. Lucky that none of us had any flood/tornado damage. That my dad put his life on the line for so many years on the department and was never seriously injured. Lucky to have a job that I love, even when it gets crazy busy.
When things pile up and get overwhelming, it is sometimes hard to remember life is good. But how can it not be when you have a buddy to play Christmas-Chicken-Tug-of-War?
(these shots were taken in my impossibly dark living room, at night, under terrible light. I was just playing around to see what kind of results I would get from the H2 ISO setting. Result: kinda noisy, but not really that bad.)
Posted in Holly, Personal
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Tell me a lab ear flopped over the bed isn’t the cutest thing you’ve seen this morning.
A couple days ago I got a phone call from my mom containing several words that made my heart stand still. “Skill saw,” “Accident,” “Ambulance,” “David.” I sat frozen at my desk, waiting for information as my mom followed an ambulance carrying my stepdad to the hospital.
Thankfully, he is going to be fine. Thankfully, my mom is a nurse and happened to be home when my stepdad cut a gash through his thigh. Thankfully, she did a good job tying a tourniquet and he didn’t lose much blood. Thankfully, David kept his cool and knew to put pressure on and hold together the wound when the safety feature on his skill saw failed. Thankfully, that skill saw is now in the dumpster.
Moments like this remind you to take time and be thankful for the ones you care about.
Josh, Holly, and I headed over to their house that night and were relieved to see that everyone was in good spirits. As we drove home and I watched Holly enjoy the fresh air, I reflected on how thankful I am that my Saturday morning breakfast buddy will be good as new after taking some time to heal and recuperate. I am thankful that he has a built-in nurse, my mom, to check in on him. I am thankful that my brother stepped up to the plate and ran around picking up prescriptions and taking care of the chickens.
(did I mention they have chickens? Justin: How do you get all the chickens to go in the coop? David: I usually shake some feed to get their attention. Justin: Ohhh. David: Why, how did you do it? Justin: Uh…I used the water hose.)
I am thankful for all of my awesome family members. I am also thankful that I have a husband who makes me laugh when I am stressed, and a dog who likes to let her lips flap in the breeze.
Posted in Holly, Personal
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One more sneak peek from Chad & Emily’s session. Full post to come!
Josh helped me practice with some new equipment this afternoon:
As you can see, he is very dedicated to the cause:
But actually, I snuck one shot in that I love:
I might have to frame that one.
Dogs. They are always ready to teach us something unexpected. For example:
1. Butts apparently make excellent chin-rests.
2. Droolies happen. (ew.)
3. Sometimes, you will spend your Saturday morning cleaning poop out of the carpet, despite the fact that your dog has been housetrained for 7 years. (though apparently, not don’t-step-in-your-own-poop-and-track-it-through-every-room-in-the-house-and-then-jump-on-the-bed-trained.)
As awful and gag-inducing as my morning of de-poopifying the house was, it motivated us to do some serious spring cleaning, and ahhhh. Let me just say how refreshing it is to finally see the carpet in our spare bedroom again. We got rid of a LOT of crap. So, uh, thanks, Holly?
Don’t get her wrong, though. Holly is 95% awesome and only 5% gross. See?
HI THERE! My name is Holly. I have just met you, and I love you.
What do you mean I have something on my nose???
It’s gone, right??? Tell me it’s gone!
Whew!
Remember Jack?
I was excited to come out and shoot with my friends and their adorable kid for the third time. This year’s shoot was quite a workout- the kid moves FAST!
Jack’s dad is a minister, so it was lots of fun to take some shots at the church where he most definitely feels at home:
I was thrilled that we managed to get yet another version of the sweet mother/son shot we got the last two times:
Posted in Families, Kids
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This isn’t Holly, it’s my brother’s new dog, Charlie! Isn’t he pretty?
Holly might be miffed that I am featuring another black lab here. (Okay, who am I kidding? She could not care less.) Still, here’s one of Holly for the road:
Time to relax, right?
I still need to go through all of our winter getaway photos, but I am so excited about getting out and shooting this weekend, I doubt I will pay my vacation snaps any attention. I guess they can wait a little longer, for the sake of quashing cabin fever right?
This is here for no other reason than I came across it while skimming through our vacation photos, and it cracked me up. During one of our snow days last month, I was using up the last of the exposures on our waterproof disposable camera and got this shot of our fire-breathing lab. Ha! So glad it’s not cold enough to see our breath anymore!
