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Team Up Thursday ~Calm~

Amy: This kid is full throttle all the time!  But when the sand box is open, he goes into his own little world.  He is calm :)

Me: She is in that tween stage..energetic, giggly, fiery, dramatic...up and down. When she gets outside, just at sunset, she stares at the colors and becomes calm.

 ( Although I see her everyday, I am always shocked to see how much she looks like me when I see her in a photo...everything, down to her body type...scary)

Phenomenal Woman

A huge white pick-up truck pulled up in front of my house. Out stepped a beautiful blond woman.  With her, she brought presents for me...it's not a special occasion, she is just ALWAYS thoughtful like that.  She brought colorful arrangement of flowers (picked from her garden) and gorgeous eggs in pastel colors (from her chickens).  Then she pulls out the pear burner, which is basically a butane torch on steroids!  We were going to use it to torch the hell out of my vegetable garden organically control the weeds in my vegetable garden.   I mean, what kind of woman shows up at your house with flowers, home-grown eggs, and a torch...a phenomenal woman.

Becky does not know this, but she is one of my favorite people. I love how fearless she is. I love that she breaks all the sterotypes you think of when you picture one type of woman or another.  Instead of limiting herself to a stereotype, she seamlessly blends all the amazing parts of herself together.

Here is a little game (I love games).  I am going to list types of women and you are going to picture that type of woman in your head.  Ready to play?

crafty

girly-girl

seamstress

gardener

farmer

hunter

stylish

carpenter

generous

football mom

There are so many more things, I could list, but this post would get too long.  Now if you roll all these up into one person, you get my friend Becky.  But she does not fit any of the stereotypes...she is not like one of these things or the other...she is just Becky. This woman can kill a deer, make sausage out of the meat, and then go inside and embroider and angel ornament for a sick friend and deliver it with a jar of homemade jelly...all while looking beautiful in mascara and lipstick.  All true.

You would think, that with all of these skills and knowledge and talents, she would be smug...not.at.all.  She is the first one to share if you have questions and the first one to ask for advice if she needs it. I know that when she reads this, she will blush and then deny how great she is.  This is not false humility either...she really does not get how awesome she is.

Becky, you inspire me daily with all you do and make me want to learn and try things I think I cannot do....and to buy a pear burner:)

Look at how awesomely we torched the weeds.  This was seriously the most fun I have had in a garden:

Team Up Thursday ~Bubbles~

Lol...I just have to laugh.  Ours match perfectly this week:

Amy's is on top:

Fish, Frogs, Fireflies

This weekend I took my 3 kids on a Boy Scout camping trip. My husband happened to be out of town, so I took them by myself. I'm sure a lot of moms do this, but I was a little apprehensive. I am so glad I did it and can't wait to do it again. Here are some of my favorite moments:

watching them run around and scream with the other kids. watching my 'shy boy' yelling and doing 'boy stuff' totally uninhibited. cheering my girl on as she caught a fish. my girl being the only one to catch a fish out of all those boys. cuddling them in front of a campfire. spending 3 days outdoors. snuggling like a row of sardines in a tent. talking and talking until we fell asleep. listening to them tell me things I never knew was in their heads. waking them up in the middle of the night so they could hear grunting bucks and howling coyotes. seeing shooting stars. catching fireflies. catching a frog for them. hearing them laugh as the frog peed on me. hearing them scream as the frog hopped out of my hands onto them. listening to them tell their friends what a cool mom I am...sniff. hearing the words 'mom, can we do this again soon?". coming home and having them say"oh.tv. we didn't even miss tv". giving them my camera and letting them shoot like crazy.

Here is what they got:

They had fun with the camera...so much fun that they used up all of the battery power by the middle of day 2 :(

I really can't wait to take them again.

The Stygar Wedding

A few weeks ago, the kids and I flew up to Michigan so we could witness the wedding of my brother and his beautiful bride. Although the day started out rainy, it ended perfectly. I have to say that I was very nervous about photographing this wedding because 1) I do not think that I am a great wedding photographer, and 2) it was for my brother a future sister...I just wanted the photos to be awesome.

I have divided the photos into 3 groups and today you get to see the "Pre-Wedding/ Portrait" group.  The bride and groom planned and designed this weddiing from start to finish and I am in love with how beautifully it turned out. If their current careers don't turn out, I think they may have a future in wedding planning!

L & D, thank you so much for asking me to be such a huge part of this special day and for trusting me. Love you both!

How cool is he with these shoes???

 

This one is one of my favorites: