Seaweed and Seashells

Everything is perfect while babies dig in the sand and quesadillas are what's for dinner. Never mind the quesadillas - that's actually every night. Regardless, the days can't possibly get any better.

She is Stunning

This is my favorite photo from the shoot

Becca is kind and confident and funny. That is what I see in this photo.

It had been sunny all week, so when it was cloudy the day of the Anderson's shoot I was bummed out...until I pulled up and saw her fiery red hair against the grey clouds. Then I thought, "Hallelujah for clouds! This weather is perfect!" This photoshoot was everything I want every photoshoot to be: relaxed, real life, full of laughter and love and more laughter and more love. I'll take all the families who don't feel like they are "good in front of the camera" because they aren't working for a perfect picture. Tom,  Becca, and Dean walked, played, laughed, chatted, sat, snacked, and relaxed, and I was having so much fun observing them I [accidentally] took more than 600 photos of them.

I have been studying a lot about creativity. It's not a talent that comes easily to me, but it's a talent I want, so I am reading, listening, and practicing everything creativity related. In one podcast I listened to the interviewer asked Sting to define creativity. Sting said it was the ability to take risks. The interviewer also talked about one study that was done on musicians who perform for hours, and everything they play is improv. Those conducting the study wanted to know what happens in our brains the moment creativity happens. While they don't know much about when or how that moment occurs, what they did find - in this one study - was that while creativity is taking place, our prefrontal cortex (the part of our brain associated with consequences) turns off, in a sense. In other words, if we want to be creative, we have to be able to take a risk, and not worry about what happens if, or when, we fail. 

I have set a goal to practice creativity everyday. I want to take pictures that make me giddy-happy. The relaxed attitude throughout this shoot made it easy for me to take on that challenge, and I love the photos that came of it.

Light Perfection

When Nicole says, "Look at that light out there!" we drop everything and chase it! These babies were all ready for books and bed, and then we took them back outside to play in the raining blooms. If only we would have snapped the picture of the two littles back in the pool, in their pajamas, after the shoot was over . . .

Endless Beach Days

Tyler and I sometimes pop the question, "If you could move anywhere, where would you go?" After listing the same "must haves" in the place we want to raise our family, we always come back to: "Seattle. Where else would we go?!"

It's interesting to think that there is not a time or place in the future we are waiting for. We are content - more than content - we are happy where we are right now! While I do look forward to the liberation that will come when there is no more studying, or exams, there is nothing I would change about our lives. We love everything about this place that is home, and it only gets better with time.

Apple Blossom Festival Weekend

Summer is here. Hopefully. Fingers Crossed. And we can't get enough. 

Memories of my summers as a child are some of my favorite memories of all time. I can still taste the humongous carrot cake slathered in cream cheese frosting Mema would buy from Costco every year for my birthday - she knew they were my favorite. Bacca would sit poolside as all of the grandkids swam for hours and hours. We would hold our breath underwater and he would count. When we popped up he would shout out how long we held our breath, "8!" "4!" "12!" Little did we know he wasn't counting at all - just making up numbers! I knew I held my breath for longer than some of those 4's..... BBQs and cousins and parties and late nights and slumber parties on the living room floor and King's games...Life could not have possibly been any better than any of that, and now to watch it unfold through my babies' eyes is almost too much happy for me to contain.

Mother's Day weekend spent in Wenatchee was a much needed break from city life. Tears come to my eyes now as I remember Cindy, Nicole's mom, tearing up the stairs SO excited to see her own grandbaby. She had been out on an errand that could not wait and was sad to be gone when her family had arrived. I was in the house when she came home and heard her fly through the door, watched her leap up the flight of stairs, in a rush to get out the back door fast enough to her family. I hugged her and asked how I could help, but she said, "Oh, I have a car full of groceries that can wait; let's go see these babies first!" Life was put on pause - she had babies to see! I am full to overflowing with love and gratitude for my own parents, and equally for Tyler's parents, because I know they would, and do, sacrifice everything for our own happiness, no matter the amount of sleepless nights and busy schedules. Thank you, Cyndi, for welcoming us so lovingly into your home and taking care of us as my own mother and mother-in-law would have--even as a mother I still long for the rejuvenation that comes from being mothered.

These photos are what I want every summer to be: freedom, laughter, pool toys, naked babies, yummy food, smells of the grill, dessert, happy, family, friends.

Sitting in a backyard while the babies play in a pool are the memories of my childhood, and some of my favorite memories of all time. Then, nothing compared to Mema and Bacca's house all summer long, and now, to watch the girls bask in the freedom that is summer fills this mama with a joy that is infinitely times sweeter than honey.