Wow!

I am so excited. My little business has taken off better than I even could have imagined. My shoot with Miss Idaho and Miss Teen Idaho yesterday went great! I got to try my first maternity pictures today and have another maternity shoot later that I am really excited about. I tackled my first family shoots last weekend and was thrilled the the results. I LOVE to see mom's faces when they see a picture of their kids that really catches their personality. My indoor photography isn't perfect yet but I'm getting there! I have been booked for my first wedding and been asked to make business cards that a wedding planner wants to include in her packages. Wow! AND I am loving every minute of it. It hard to juggle homework, housework, kid work, scout work, and photography but I'm re-vamping my schedule (plus who really needs to do housework anyway, right?) I have been so happy Paxton's been OK with letting a few things slide and I love him for it. He has been so supportive of my craziness! Here are few of my favorite less traditional pics.

Swan Falls

On Sunday it was so warm and sunny we decided to go for a family walk down at Swan Falls. Of course by the time we were ready it was no longer sunny. It was a little chilly but the kids still had fun getting out of the house. When we stopped at this look out point I remembered why I liked naming my new little buisness after this spot. Even in January it's beautiful.



I don't know what it is about boys that makes them want to throw rocks (I have to edit Jake for a few more months):

Learning to skip rocks:

Sweet Baby:

More boys throwing rocks:




For more pics I have taken:
www.swanfallsphotography.blogspot.com

New Equipment

My indoor studio equipment arrived last Saturday. I thought I had my camera somewhat figured out by then. Indoor photography is a whole new ball game though. It kicked my butt. I was only getting one picture out of ten that was infocus and good. Finally after several hundred shots and paying Shaylee 25 cents for each 15 min shooting session, I finally have it figures out. Mostly... I had to get an external flash (that cost more than most cameras, gasp!) and another lense for portrait photography but I LOVE them both. I think something has snapped inside of me. I am thinking photography and cameras 90% of my waking hours. Angles, lighting, backgrounds, cute kids, F-stops, sunshine, colors. It is an exciting new world to me and I can't seem to get enough of it. I keep expecting to burn out a bit and need a break but instead it is getting worse as my pictures get better. Paxton has been amazing about my distracted, happy state as I babble about things that mean very little to him, like apature and depth-of-field. My kids have been amazing, patiently posing/grimacing for the camera while I get my settings figured out and my lighting set. I'm such a happy girl!!!


PS I finally got all the kinks worked out of my studio set up. These are a tiny big fuzzy since I don't have a remote and have to hit the timer and then jump in front of the camera but I am happy with the results. And are the touched up? Ablsolutely!

Paradise

This is a journal entry from my little sister who has just finished radiation and her third surgery for a cancerous brain tumor. Having been through a life-changing crisis I understand what she is getting at and think she expresses it beautifully. My sister is my hero and I admire her strength and courage.

I’m sitting at my kitchen table (currently placed at the bottom of our stairs a midst a lot of boxes and suitcases), listening to Caleb sing “I’d like to make myself believe That planet Earth turns slowly” from his bedroom. It comes from the song “Fireflies” by Owl City, which has been getting some airtime on our car radio of late. I think that line of the song must be the only one he can remember right now, as he sings it over and over and over again at the top of his lungs. Each time it gets a little louder and a little more off-key. While I should probably be getting concerned about him waking his brother, I just listen. Right now I don’t think I’d trade that sweet, slightly brass-sounding voice for anything. It’s amazing how the experience of having cancer can change one’s perspective. As someone who has known and worked with many people who’ve gone through it, I know my experience is not unique in that respect. Still, it’s interesting that things that used to be annoying to me—like loud, off-key singing that threatens to waken a teething baby—is now, literally, sweet music to my ears.

It’s like that country song by Phil Vassar, called “Just Another Day in Paradise.” (That I prefer a country song is maybe another indicator that I am not who I used to be… :) We don’t have a printer hooked up in our house yet, so I’ll just summarize the gist of it. Vassar starts off describing a house with kids screaming, phones ringing, overdue bills, sour milk, and a broken washing machine. It reminds one of those mornings when so many things are not working in harmony that it would be comical if it didn't also seem so maddeningly routine. The interesting part of the song comes next, though, as Vassar not only refuses to delve into self pity, but heaps praises on the experienced inconveniences. He sings,

Well, it’s O.K. It’s so nice
It’s just another day in paradise
Well, there’s no place that
I’d rather be
Well, it’s two hearts
And one dream
I wouldn’t trade it for anything
And I ask the Lord every night
For just another day in paradise.

I got teary-eyed listening to those lyrics when Brook was driving me back from my last day of radiation a little over a week ago. I felt overwhelmed as I put my hand on Brook’s (my husband)knee and said, “That’s all I want. A lot more of those days.” I realized that all the so-called “inconveniences” of family life had, during the two months of radiation and chemo, become the moments I wanted to keep more than anything else. And as I contemplated the wide range of survival for people with my type of brain tumor (from less than one to over thirty years), I found myself yearning for the “exceptionally long” side of survival—with forty, sixty, or more years to go. Not so that I could find some way to save the world from injustice or because I thought I could have some monumental achievement that could get me recognition, wealth, beauty, or fame. It was so that the things that had once perhaps seemed like aggravating interruptions to “me” time or the moments of “happily ever after” solitude had suddenly become infinitely precious to me.

There's a quote by Gordon B. Hinckley’s I read a while back, part of which says:

“Life is like an old-time rail journey . . . delays, side-tracks, smoke, dust, cinders, and jolts, interspersed only occasionally by beautiful vistas and thrilling bursts of speed. The trick is to thank the Lord for letting you have the ride.”

When I first read that quote years ago, I thought it was nice, but I felt that his words, like Paul’s in 2 Corinthians 12, were perhaps too idealistic, advising us to “glory” in infirmities or experiences that any reasonable person would find discouraging. I thought I was to find joy in the trials of life because they remind me of my own “nothingness” and because they helped me to more greatly appreciate the easier, more peaceful moments when they came.

Since cancer has made me ponder more seriously on my life and on mortality in general, I think I see things a little differently. I still don’t know that I can ever echo Paul’s pronouncement of glorying in my infirmities. Trials like cancer are not things I relish experiencing. And yet, I am grateful that I’ve learned how to better differentiate between which things are trials and which are undervalued blessings. Experiencing life as a cancer patient and reflecting on Vassar’s song about what paradise is, I have rethought Hinckley’s quote and realized that many of the delays, much of the dust, and many of the serious jolts in life’s journey are not just significant because they make the “beautiful vistas” and “thrilling bursts of speed” more appreciable, but because they are what make our journeys. They are the foundations for building our most significant relationships and experiences, and, if properly appreciated, can give us the life-changing, treasured memories we can ponder on during those brief times of solitude that may crop up on occasion.

I hate cancer. It terrifies me to think of it sometimes, and it seems this last year has been one of the longest, hardest ones of my life. And yet, because of it I think of my family and am overwhelmed with gratitude for the role I get to play in what many people would term the mundane tasks of housekeeping and childrearing. I am grateful for the sweet, off-key songs by Caleb. I am grateful when I’m allowed an interrupted night’s sleep to care for my teething baby. I am grateful for the confusing, complicated patterns of communication between Brook and me as we try to plan for a future that bears many uncertainties. I am grateful that I’ve experienced the closeness that comes from the sweet giving of friends and family as I’ve been forced to surrender some aspects of my independence. I’m grateful for these and many other experiences, for they remind me that I am alive. That my life has purpose. They remind me that I still have opportunities to build experiences and relationships that can soften character, that can sweeten memories, and that can provide eternal joy. And it is because of these experiences that I pray every night for many more days when I’ll get to hear my kids screaming, phones ringing, and washing machines breaking down as my experience with cancer has taught me that those truly are my sounds of paradise.

Quote of the week

Paxton (to me): You do have plenty of initive, what you sometimes lack is finish-iative.

Paxton (to me): Hold on babe, you are caboose-ing. You have to give me the whole train of though and not just the very end or it doesn't make sense.

This guys knows me entirely way too well... But that is a good thing!

Also, I have made a blog for my photography pictures! I am having so much fun with this it hardly seems like work.

www.swanfallsphotography.blogspot.com

Addicted

This is healthy right?

Woo Hoo!!

I have been used to running my own little tutoring buisness but with three (almost four) kids in school now my time after school is limited. I have been looking at finding something else to do to earn a little extra money but didn't find anything that I was excited about until I got my beautiful new camera. I am hopelessly addicted. I don't think there has been one day since I got it that I haven't been taking pictures, experimenting with the camera or editing. So, I have decided to make my hobby a little side business (Swan Falls Photography, I just barely thought of that!) that atleast pays for it's self. I am so excited that I could barely sleep last night after I bought some indoor backdrops and lighting yesterday. Thanks to my other photography friends for letting me pick your brains and steal your kids (my kids run when I pull out my camera now!) Wish me luck!!!!

4

As the baby of the family I admit Avery gets spoiled a bit. But it is so hard to resist. I wish she could be 4 forever. (But then again I said that when she was three.)


Just after New Years we stopped to see Colin. We usually go three times a year, Christmas, Memorial Day and Colin's birthday. I think that is just about right for us. We were lucky to have Paxton's mom and dad, brother and sister-in-law and his grandma there with us. It helps to have family but it about broke my heart to watch Paxton's Dad wrap his arm around Paxton while they both cried. I don't think time can heal all wounds but it does make them more managable somehow. Besides, if it hadn't been for Colin, we wouldn't have Jacob now.

My five beautiful babies.

Murphy's Stinking Law

So, after a nice weekend with the in-laws we decided it was time to drive home. As we were leaving Avery started to say her stomach hurt. Being Mom I grabbed a large tin can just in case we needed it on our 2 hour ride home. By the time we got home, 3hours later FIVE of us were throwing up. We had to stop 10 times to clean out the can and to find bathrooms to clean up in. Not to mention the time I went to go clean out the can and slipped and fell sending flying throw up all over (but that luckily did not land on me!). After we got home I parked myself in the bathroom and figured if I could take care of myself, Paxton could take care of the kids. I came down in the middle of the night to find Paxton asleep on the floor, with all the kids camped around him in the living room. There were bowls and tissues and blankets all over. He took such good care of all of us and was a total trooper (although I think for the first time ever, he was happy to go back to work today).

I got to play photographer over the weekend and took some good pics. Here are a few of the newest members of the family, Charlotte, Abby and Ashley!