Ann's 18 Month Shoot

This was my 3rd session with the beautiful little Ann.  It's incredible how quickly the setting of a session changes within 9 months.  9 months ago Ann was sitting and crawling, this time it was all her mother and I could do to keep her occupied for a just a few seconds to capture a smile or two before she took off.  This gal is just too cute for her own good!  I loved watching her watch her surroundings.  We did this shoot at the Lakeway Greenbelt and as you can see it was a beautiful day complete with lots of joggers and their dogs.  Ann loves dogs and ran to greet each one that walked by.  She is one fearless gal!  I had so much fun chasing her around and watching her have fun!  I love watching this sweet gal grow!

Country Bumpkin Weekend with the Girls

I have yet to post a personal post but this weekend was pretty special to me and I wanted to document the memories.

I have been blessed to have some truly amazing friends in my life.  This group in particular are those lifelong friends that you never let go of.  I've been friends with these 3 ladies since the end of my college days.  We did everything together!  We had a ritual where we would meet up at Trudy's  for a Mexican Martini, an extra bowl of olives, and for their awesome stuffed avocados.  This was our sanctuary place to lean on one another over drinks concerning break ups, make ups, cry fests, promotions, lay offs, celebrations, or just because it's been a bad day and we could all use a drink.  It's funny how our conversations have gone from guys and other daily gossips to how much we pay for insurance and childcare.  Every Thursday was Grey's Anatomy night.  We would take turns hosting our watch party at one another's apartments, cook dinner and wait for the week's dramas of Dr. McDreamy to unfold.  

These are the girls who you can tell your deepest darkest secrets to and who will never judge you and love you for all that you are.  They are the friends who you can spend long months away from but when you're together it's as though time has never passed... the only way you can tell time has passed is by how big their children have grown since you last saw them.

We used to get together on a weekly basis and then I moved out of the country, there were 2 more weddings, babies, serious relationships and life went on at a fast pace.  We try to get together as much as possible but it's never enough.  Kelly's big 30th birthday was approaching and we all received a phone call one night from her husband, Mike, asking if we would like to drive to their country house in Burton on Kelly's birthday to surprise her.  What a great hubby to arrange such a fabulous get together.  So the three of us road tripped it up to Burton and Kelly came running down the steps when she saw us obviously surprised!

Watching Kelly and Jenn's little boys play together and run freely was one of the highlights of my weekend.  They were so cute together!

Watching Hunter's imagination run wild as he gathered sticks and leaves to make us "soup" was quite the experience! 

I also enjoyed watching Kelly's father assume his granfatherly role; chasing after him, a watchful and proud eye always upon Hunter.  Mike kept a nice, warm fire going outside and at one point the fire was dying and the boys needed to gather sticks and wood.  Hunter was amongst the big boys hunting for the biggest sticks he could drag to the wood pile in the bed of "Popo's" truck.

We took Kelly out to a nice birthday dinner and watched Josh devour a bowl of queso.  We're still not sure how much actually made it in his mouth as opposed to his face and hands.  Putting the boys to bed was another fun adventure.  Listening to Hunter sing his ABC's and Josh tell us all the sounds that various animals make made me realize the everyday wonders that go on in househoulds with small children.  Taylor and I clapped, smiled and laughed at just about everything those two boys did.  Robert and I caught a heavy wind of the "Baby Bug" when we watched Hunter one night a few months back. The "Baby Bug" was back in full force that night.  Once the boys were tucked away the girls and I sat around sipping wine and playing games.  Josh woke up at one point and it was bedtime for the rest of us.  I walked in the bedroom to see Jenn lying there with Josh crashed out and snuggled up against her.  She needed to get ready for bed so I swapped places with her so he wouldn't wake up.  The cozy feeling of desperately wanting to hold a child of my own was back!  I snuggled with Josh and the smell of his clean baby hair drugged me!  I couldn't be happier for my two Mommy friends!  They are wonderful, loving, caring mothers who have 2 beautiful boys who were just so much fun to be around!  When you don't have children of your own hanging out with other people's kids can really make or break a trip.... I wouldn't have wanted to spend this weekend without either one of those boys!

The dogs were pretty awesome as well!