2010 Portraits

Being photographers, we take A LOT of pictures of our children. One thing we don’t take too often are portraits. It was time to get them done and I had been musing “the look” in my mind for months. I knew what I wanted them to wear and where we would take them. Of course, we were running late so I had to do Madeleine’s hair in the car and I couldn’t find her dress shoe that morning. Flip flops worked fine, though.

  They are such perfect kids!!! Although, Madeleine is currently uninterested in looking at the camera and smiling. Every time we try, she puts her head down and frowns. Oh, well. We got some really cute ones anyway.      

Nate is just a stud!! He loves posing for us and loves it even more if we let him goof off so he gets funny pictures of himself. He is just so handsome.

 

Together, they make the perfect brother/sister pair. We love you both!!! And thanks for putting up with us always snapping away at you. We just love capturing your personalities and you’ll thank us when you’re older :)

   

 

Now for some fun, playful, unplanned shots.

If these bazillion pictures aren’t enough, family can see even more here.

Valley of Fire – the Landscapes

Way back in March our family went on a camping trip to the Valley of Fire in Nevada (you can read about the trip here).

We stopped at Cove Fort on the way to Valley of Fire. It was nice and sunny and snow had fallen only the day prior to our visit. The result was quite breathtaking.

In this post we’ll share some of the stunning landscape of the park.  The image below was made just before dusk.  The mountains were completely shaded and the sky was still full of light in comparison.  The wind was very, very strong at the time which probably gave the clouds a stretchy quality.  :)

The next image shows the expansive and sweeping space so akin to our western national parks. 

The rocks of the Valley of Fire sometimes seem to climb out of that expanse as shown by the panoramic image below made near sunrise.  See it large here or full size here.

It is really fun to try and find shapes in the various rock forms. The rocks in the image below look like E.T.

This last image is one of my favorites because of the visible “mixing” of the rock layers.  Amazing!

If you’d like to see the rest of the images and several videos we made check out the gallery.

Jungle Jim’s Playland

Last week while carpet was being installed I took the kids to Jungle Jim’s Playland with my sister and her kids. It’s a little old (I went there when I was a kid) and small (only a few rides) but still a blast for little ones.

I forgot my camera but my sister got these two shots on her phone.

 

 

Yesterday morning I woke up to Madeleine standing at the top of the stairs crying frantically. From what I could understand it sounded like she had a dream that we all went to Jungle Jim’s and left her home alone. She was super sad!!!

They’ve been asking to go back and luckily we’ll be returning for a cousin’s birthday party next week.

Tidbits on a Tuesday

 

Things have been pretty busy around here. Here are some tidbits of information.

The house is coming along. It took almost 3 weeks to get the tile in but it looks so great. The painting is half done, we get carpet on Friday, and Saturday will be spent cleaning the outside of the house and planting flowers. Then we’ll be ready to officially put our house on the market. We so excited and nervous at the same time.

I’ve only looked online so far for houses. I keep going back and forth between newer and older homes. They each have advantages and disadvantages. Newer = Less remodeling/decorating, young children as neighbors for the kids, and possibly a nicer neighborhood. But also “cookie cutter” neighborhood, houses are close together, unfinished basements, and small yards with virtually no landscaping. Older = just the opposite of those things.

We’ve been pretty busy with our photography. In our queue to be blogged are: Valley of Fire landscapes, Smith & Edward’s junk yard, my niece’s bridals and wedding, a high school senior session, some missionaries, and portraits we took of Bishop Carolyn Tanner Irish, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Utah for Utah Business Magazine.

We watched “Bright Star” a couple of weeks ago and it was so good. It is Jane Austen-esque and oh, so romantic. It is only rated PG so it really is romantic, not lusty like so-called romantic comedies.

And here are some random family pictures from February, March, and April.

Rob’s mom’s birthday party:

  Miscellany:

Easter:

Wanna Come?

We’ve decided to go camping for three days/two nights over Memorial Day weekend. Does anyone want to join us??

This is our itinerary:

Visit the Bonneville Salt Flats

2 nights camping in Great Basin National Park

Lehman Caves

Visit Little Sahara sand dunes

Visit Eureka ghost town

Doesn’t that sound fun? Let us know if you wanna come!

Bowling Buddies

I’d been trying to think of something fun for Nate to do regularly over the summer to help fill the VAST amounts of time. Everything costs a fortune and we may be moving anyway, so I was a little discouraged. But then my friend, Kelli, emailed me a link to sign up for FREE bowling!! PERFECT!! If you’re interested in signing up your kids, go to KidsBowlFree.

We went this morning with our kids and had a really good time. The place was empty, the kids had a blast, and it’s always a sanity-saver to hang out with a friend.

I hadn’t taken any pictures for a while so I thought it’d be a fun thing to photograph…and it was. But it’s really hard to take pictures of little kids bowling. Obviously.

What every girl does in a bowling alley…it’s completely normal…

    

Madeleine looked so cute in her little bowling shoes!

After Madeleine got bored she wandered into the arcade and I followed towing Kelli’s baby. It was fun to have a new subject to subject to my flash. Family can see more here.

Here’s a sneak peak at the arcade shots I took. I’ve always thought arcades were creepy and this proves it. To see more, click over to our photography blog.