i’m a pretty emotional person by nature. it’s what i do. i cry. i don’t do it nearly as much as i use to because for whatever reason when you get older you become more inhibited about how you feel and the emotions you show. so i try to stifle it alot. i don’t necessarily cry alot when i’m actually sad. i usually cry more out of compassoin. when i witness great triumpth or devastation around me. as i sit and reflect upon the last 24 hours…emotions have ran high.

i came home last night from a meeting in austin and as i sat at the dinner table i had this moment. people talk about “moments” alot. like their day is just littered with them. but in reality, my life is busy hectic and i’m sorry to say i don’t have alot of “moments”.  that’s my fault alone because i don’t take the time many times to sit back and actually witness the moments that are m life. for whatever reason last night was different.

i was sitting at the table. watching mark cook dinner since he made it home before me. he’s had a horrible week or so at work and the stress has been monumental. yet, here he was pulling together some grilled cheese sandwhiches for the kids and trying to juggle it all while i was out trying to live a dream.  it’s hard sometimes. to feel ok that your spouse has to take over sometimes when you are called to be somewhere for work. and you feel bad because ….it’s work you enjoy. that fulfills you and that you feel called to do. that’s just crazy. but it’s true. i never use to feel that guilty if i had to work at a job i hated. that was just life. but it’s hard when you CHOOSE to do the work you do and it takes time away from the family.

totally different point all together.

so dinner. grilled cheese. good stuff.

hudson is beaming because his class is in charge of the morning announcements. he has a “part”. he leads his entire school in the Texas Pledge. he’s stoked! he’s even practicing his smile.

brooklyn is on cloud 9 because she got to trade backpacks for the day with a girl in her class. and it’s a highschool musical backpack. i’m feeling the other girl got the short end of the stick when she got brooklyn’s dirty worn out plain jane pink target backback. such is life.

parker is happy as a clam gnawing on some apple jacks and bits of grilled cheese.

after dinner i played connect 4 with the kids and then it was bath time. this was the beginning of the moment.

i sat there in the bathroom floor watching parker. he had a cup. just a cup. and it was as if you had granted him every desire of his heart. he was giddy as he tried to fill the cup with water and then pour it out. he held it up to his face, and would yell into it and then smile at the echo of his own voice.

i sat there and thought, wow. this is a moment. the stars are aligned and life is good. right now. this is pure happiness. awesome.

so why the title “tears in the morning”

i was getting my daily dose of fox & friends this a.m. and i saw this story. i sat there and before i knew it i was crying. not the ugly cry. just these silent little tears. i was literally sick.  and i thought, while my 5 year old kindergarden son was standing in front of his school leading the Texas Pledge another little boy across the country was standing in front of his class while his classmates voted him out….at the teacher’s direction! people, this is heartbreaking. i am so disheartened over this. i can not even wrap my mind around such an atrocity taking place in a school system. not only is this little boy stood in front of his class and ridiculed and humiliated….the other children, his classmates have now been taught that it’s ok to treat another human being this way. what are we teaching our children? and then we want to stand back and be surprised that our kids are taking guns to school and hurting each other the way they do? it’s awful. it’s just so incredibly sad.

so today, my life is still beautiful. i still have my moment. but events like this remind me that it’s so easy to get caught up in our own little suburban bliss that we quickly forget what happens in every crevice of our community. 

 i pray that justice comes to those who are responsible for this and the other tragedies that plague our schools and our children.

i’m pulling myself out of a cloud of lysol for a quick post. 

what started out as a great week last week…going back to the 19th….ended up as the beginning of an 8 day full out attack on my family. 

mark’s birthday was last monday. i was rather proud of myself for having gifts wrapped and ready by saturday. pat on the back for me. monday the spurs were playing so we had plans to have dinner at some friends to celebrate and then watch the game over there.  mark came home a little early from work, we did presents and started packing up to head out. as we were walking out the door brooklyn begins to vomit….EVERYWHERE.

change of plans.

mark headed to our friends’ w/ the boys to celebrate alone and i got brooklyn squared away in a shower and jammies and began the task that every mother loves …. vomit cleanup. i’ll spare you the ugly details however, I will say in the midst of it I broke my mop and then had to get on my hands and knees and scrub the floors by hand. always a great time.

i spent the next 6 hours holding brooklyn’s hair back and catching glimpses of the game from the bathroom. brooklyn felt awful and was crying at one point, apologizing for missing daddy’s birthday and vomitting on the floor.  i felt so awful for her. i reassured her we would celebrate with daddy the next night when she was feeling better.

and she was. and we did. i cooked some killer steaks and shrimp and we enjoyed tuesday evening ….sans vomit. and she headed back to school on wednesday.

wednesday evening hudson began complaining that his throat hurt. like any good mother i took a look, told him it was irritated by a popcorn kernal and called it a day. that night he woke up screaming and writhing in pain. his throat looked awful. upon our trip to the dr. on thursday we were told his tonsils were so swollen he would have to get a shot of penicillin because they didn’t think he’d even be able to swallow the antibiotics orally. ugh! it was a nightmare. i bribed him with a new xbox 360 game but even that didn’t help. i sat there and watched him lay pathetically on the table spitting in the trashcan because it hurt too much for him to swallow.  another great day. he missed school thursday and friday.

saturday we had plans to go w/ friends to the Blanco State Park. We spent the morning packing our picnic lunch and loading half of Parker’s belongings into the car. you never know what a 14 month old might need at the river. everyone was feeling great. happy. healthy. enjoying the day. it was a perfect day. parker was so well behaved at the river. i was so nervous about taking him but he did super. the kids loved it. we had a great time.

sunday.

i get up early to do an engagment session. knock it out. get home and we decided to take the older two kids to the witte museum. we made arrangements for a sitter for parker and got ready to head out. 30 minutes before the sitter was going to be here. parker started vomitting.

change of plans.

mark takes the older two out to the witte and i stayed home cleaning up baby vomit. which by the way isn’t nearly as bad as 7 year old vomit. oh, and in between i watched when a man loves a woman and cried uncontrollably.

it was a great day.

memorial day!

woohoo! we’re all happy and healthy again.

we decide to bbq with some friends. things are going along perfectly. (you know where this is going don’t you?)

mark was next on the list. our dinner was cut a little short and mark headed to bed early to sleep it off.

and finally…..i woke up this a.m. around 5:30….and I was next. exactly how i wanted to start my week. mark got the kids up and off to school and parker headed to the neighbors. i spent the next 7 hours waiting for it to be over and praying costco sold Lysol in bulk.

it’s done and over. i hope and pray this misses hudson. he’s the last on the list. but i’m hoping w/ that shot of penicillin he had for strep it might help him out a bit. we shall see. it’s a quick little virus. only lasting around 6 hours or so. i guess that’s the silver lining?

so now i hope to begin my week tomorrow. vomit free. and high on Lysol.

do you remember what it was like? to be a senior in highschool. to have your entire world right in the palm of your hand. that feeling of sweet exhileration that you would soon begin making your own way. that your life would finally be YOURS to live. the choices you would make would and could be your own. i can remember the entire summer before i left for mizzou. i remember being so incredibly excited just to buy my own mini-fridge. i couldn’t wait to room with amy (i would totally link her but the girl doesn’t even have a facebook account) would be rooming together at Lathrop hall.  we bought matching bedding and her dad built us these rockin’ lofts. it was incredible. the entire summer we sat around contemplating life at college.

tonight we honored 11 amazing highschool seniors at church.  it was a great night. i was in charge of the night with the help and guidance of some other amazing women and youth.  as i sat in the back of the sanctuary listening to one of our senior girls talking about making choices and where their lives were heading i found myself praying for each one of them and hoping they really realized what lies ahead for them. it’s an overwhelming feeling when you sit back and watch these young kids ready themselves for the world. when you can see the joy in their eyes. the excitement. the trepidation. it just became a really awesome feeling to know that they were as prepared as they could be. they’ve been loved and nurtured by family, by friends and by their church family and they will head out in just a few short months ready to make the choices that will define who they are with each passing day.

it was a great night. i was honored to be a small part of it and feel blessed that i’ve known each of these young men & women.

so i only slept until 11. it’s terribly sad when you have to force yourself out of slumber because your body aches. i’m getting so old. it’s rather depressing really.

i’m kinda bummed today because mark wanted to go out to Blanco State Park which I was all for. Then I realized I haven’t went to pick up his bday present yet. Today is the only day I have to do it since tomorrow I’m busy with the grad banquet tomorrow at church and tonight we have dinner plans with some friends.  The kids wanted to go so he took the older two out with him and P. Diddy and I are going to go roam the streets of S.A. in hopes of finding the perfect gift.  When I told him what I had to do he said, “don’t buy me anything big.” which he tells me every year. His ultimate gift would be if i replaced the plasma tv that i caught on fire at thanksgiving but…hey, he said he didn’t want anything big. so perhaps a chia cow or something??

I know Mother’s day was last weekend. I’m never on time. I don’t post happy birthday’s until a week later. i don’t post about special occassions until they are just a faint memory. It’s not that i don’t remember, it’s simply that I’m usually too busy celebrating to stop and post.

ahhh, so mother’s day was pretty darn fantastic around these parts. i usually don’t want much of anything other than to sleep the day away. which honestly, i’m fortunate enough to get to do most weekends anyway. mark always gets up w/ the kids on saturdays so i can sleep. he knows i’m a night owl and he’s usually got a good 3-4 hours more sleep each night than i do. he likes to be up in the morning…..i’d rather sleep until sunset. what can ya do. but the difference is that on a typical weekend i feel incredibly guilty about sleeping in. so i force myself out of bed by 10…ok, 11. on events like mother’s day….ahh, yea. that’s a totally different story. i can at least sleep in and not feel guilty about it AT ALL. so that is the best gift ever.

but i didn’t get to sleep in. i postponed my marathon of sleep day until tomorrow. so we got up at the regular time which lately seems to be far too early to even imagine with parker. the kids were so excited to give me my gifts. hudson actually wanted to give me my gifts on friday as soon as he got home from school with them. i had to bribe the child w/ candy to make him put his hand decorated paper bag away until sunday. i lloooove getting the handmade gifts from them. brooklyn is quite the little artist so i’m always impressed at her creations. and hudson was totally proud of his “interview” that he did. you know the one’s where the teacher asks them some random questions about mom/dad/grandma/grandpa. i love these. this year he was pretty accurate with his answers. i especially love when he said i was 6′ tall and 100lbs. love that dude!

i proudly displayed my new gifts of love for all the world to see which they loved.

After the opening of the artwork they bolted upstairs and told me i was under no circumstances to venture up there until i was beckoned. (as if i’m going to hike the stairs for no apparent reason…don’t worry kids, i’m sitting down here on the couch, eating a giant bowl of lucky charms and wondering when i can go back to sleep)

after, oh a good 30-45 minutes mark and i were finally told we could see the unveiling of this “special project” i was asked to close my eyes and go upstairs where they had been hard at work.

this is a map of the upstairs. each room was designated for a special “event” or “theme” in Hudson’s room there was face painting.

i resisted the urge to scold them for having paint and dirty paintbrushes in his room and instead asked what i could get painted on my face. i was directed to the “sign” which shows all the images they were able to paint for us.

is that not the cutest thing you’ve ever seen? hudson came up w/ “you’re a hot mama” which i thought went well with his 6′ 100lb comment in his interview. brooklyn was in charge of the other images since she is the “artist of the family” as she so fondly refers to herself. mark was first for face painting.

he’ll be thrilled that i’m sharing this image on the www since he’s really not that keen on the fact that i share so much personal info online anyway, but since no one grabbed the camera and offered to get a photo of me with “you’re a hot mama” painted across my face i had to use this one.

after face painting was the “treatment” room. they led us (notice i keep saying “us” …isn’t father’s day in june???) into the theater room where they each gave us massages. i’m talking all out people. i KNEW i had kids for a reason.

after our killer massages it was time for some physical activity and we had to hit the obstacle course.

mark conviently opted out at this point.

i had to weave in and out of the piles of dirty laundry and stuffed animals. then i had to pick up the jump rope and jump rope 20 x. so like the super hot and agile mama that i am i rocked the obstacle course. they were completely impressed with my jump roping skillzzz.

the guest room was converted into a “arts & craft” room where i had to go and draw my own picture to give to them. i was pretty winded after the obstacle course so i forgot the camera at this point. but once again i impressed them w / my mad coloring skillz.

after arts and crafts i was told there was one more room. it was brooklyn’s room, aka, the present room. however, we had to wait until they got presents to put in there. i thought this was the point where they’d rummage through their toy boxes searching for that perfect gift. but daddy said they actually did have gifts for me but they weren’t ready yet.

they came downstairs a bit later to present me with my gifts. hudson had gotten me a gift card to i’tunes and brooklyn a giftcard to starbucks. apparently parker couldn’t decide where he wanted to get me a giftcard from so he opted out this year. mark then gave me a very impressively sweet card. he usually waits until the last minute to get any gifts or cards for any occassion so i usually end up w/ a spanish card from the gas station. i’m never sure if they are funny or sappy cards but this year it was in english! and it was sappy and oozing sweetness. then…the gift.

Mark has a looooong history of really unique gifts. i’m sure he wouldn’t care that i share that with the entire www because if you’ve spent any amount of time with us you already know this. i’m certain i’ve even blogged about it before at some point over the years. past gifts have included chia guy , a gourmet popcorn maker, an ice tea maker, a chocolate factory , a blow dryer and a scale (this was a pair). In his defense he has gotten me some incredible sweet gifts as well….like my tennis bracelet, my engagement ring, my leather jacket, my cedar chest, a bouquet of iris’ after my grandmother passed away because he knew they were her favorite flowers, a surprise trip to las vegas & LA, and numerous james avery pieces.

my point her….the green bags. brooklyn warned me profusely about this gift. “mom, i don’t really know if you’re going to like dad’s gift” “mom, i don’t know. oh, gosh…i just don’t know” so the green bags were very tounge in cheek. and brooklyn was relieved when he gave me my real present which was a trip for the two of us to a bed & breakfast for a weekend. good job dude!

later that day our neighbors came over and all the men grilled steaks for us and cooked dinner and then cleaned the entire kitchen for us too. it was sweet. the kids were fantastic and it was totally laid back and just nice to be hanging out and surrounded by so many people that i loved. awesome.

so here’s to all of you who have anything to celebrate. mother’s day or any day. i hope you enjoyed your day. i feel humbled and blessed….and that is the best gift ever.

i’m lovin’ me some pink today.

be sure to check out the store and all the awesome things that are going on over there. i love the templates and actions in the store. holly & andie are uber talented. i’ve gotten so much stuff from the store i’ve had to show some serious self restraint lately! monthly themes and contests and forums…..ahhh, it’s a photographer’s dream! good stuff over there. check it out. big thanks to andie for showin’ me some pink love.

you might remember Lindsay’s sister Tara.

Tara was my rockstar bride from March. She was the first of two weddings for this family.

Now it’s Lindsay’s turn! She & Logan will be exchanging vows on June 6th. Isn’t it nuts that June is now right around the corner?

And while the two gorgeous blondes share some obvious similarities (that’s Lindsay on the left)

They are so polar opposite it’s amazing.

Tara was pretty “hey, cool…I’m getting married. i should probably get a dress” kinda gal.

Lindsay had her engagement photos picked out and had emailed me her order within 6 hours of their debut. And I finished editing those babies at like 2am! by the time I woke up at 8am and checked my email she had already viewed her images and picked out her favorites to be printed. now there’s a girl that’s on top of things.

i shot she & logan’s e-session at the botanical gardens and i was so excited that there was finally some color peeking out after a long winter. they came ready to have fun and full of ideas! always a nice change of pace when your clients give you a little direction and have ideas of their own. i love that.

here are a couple of my faves from their session.

We did her bridal session last week and she rocked it. i wish i could share but some things must remain a secret before the wedding!

Congrats Lindsay & Logan! I can’t

 My feet are aching and my back is killing me. I hosted bunco tonight at my house and had to cook for 16 people. So tired. But it was fun and there’s a ton of food left thank goodness cuz I love leftover greek food. 

I don’t have the energy to find anything clever and witty to blog about so  I’m sharing a tag. Anne sent this to me in email form but I thought I’d just post it here instead. I know I’m a rule breaker. Scandalous.

had a crazy 2 days here. spent 13 hours in a car driving across texas, oklahoma and missouri yesterday. i rode back to st. louis with my mom (she decided to move back home ) and then i had to fly out at 6:45 this morning. so after a long day of driving we stopped in my hometown to grab a maid-rite and then headed out. mom and i laughed because we had skipped lunch dilerberately so we could be extra hungry for dinner. we got in around 8:30 and we were starving. as we were sitting there we realized we were not talking at all. we were so focused on devouring our food. we thought the locals probably thought we were nuts.  we left maid rite and headed to st. louis. we got about 20 miles from our hotel when we had a flat tire. so at 10:30 at night we were strandad on the side of I-44. we were actually pretty calm. i called *55 (it really works!) and the highway patrol  came to our rescue in about 30 minutes, which in retrospect seems really fast but not so much when you are tired, full and hanging out on the shoulder of a major US highway and can feel the entire car move as the semi’s fly by.

after about a 2 hour delay we finally got checked into the hotel around 12:45. got to bed around 1:30 and then back up at 4:30a.m. to get to the airport by 5:45.

yea, i’m pretty much exhausted. i’m doing nothing more than finishing up some editing on a bridal session and then….nighty night.

must sleep…now.

One month ago today I got the divine pleasure to shoot a traditional Persian wedding. Full of tradition, custom and a lot of family and friends, Mina & Pegah’s wedding day was nothing short of amazing.  As if there is anywhere in Austin I wouldn’t fall in love with, the Renaissance Hotel is a top notch venue and I was stoked to be there.

Jana came along as my 2nd shooter and thank goodness.  There was so much to take in and I didn’t want to miss a thing. We started off with a few detail shots.

Then we hit the bride’s hotel room where there was plenty of fun to take in.  Mina was lookin’ hot in her Juicy track suit complete with her new title.

Pegah had sent her a this gorgeous arrangement of flowers earlier in the day that Jana got a gorgeous shot of.

and the sweetest card came along with it.

i know! it’s ok ladies, let’s not let our envy get the best of us. just because some of us get husband’s who idea of a romantic gift is a chia head doesn’t mean they’re a lost cause….ok, now i’m just talking to myself.

mina wasn’t quite ready to get into her dress and i made the guys promise to be in the lobby by 5 sharp so we headed down to meet them and when i rounded the corner in the lobby this is what i saw.

they were all lined up perfectly trying to get a quick snapshot in before i got there. i loved it and was totally impressed the Pegah was able to get the entire group of guys together and ready for me.

i spent some time with the guys and made it quick and painless for them. here’s one of my favorite shots of pegah.

yes, i know…..now you’re really jealous.

We got the call from Mina that she was ready to get into her dress so we headed back up to the room to get some great shots of her getting ready.

aren’t those earrings hot? one of her friends made those for her!

there ceremony was so unique. they spent alot of time preparing for it and it showed in the details.

this was as they were announced husband and wife….pure joy!

group shots were awesome. the wedding party was huge and they were definately a fun group! totally whipping out ideas and we did our best to incorporate them all. we had all of maybe 30 minutes but i could’ve easily shot for 2 hours!

this was one of my favorite group shots. we had these perfect rocks to stagger on outside. i was praying now one would fall flat on their face….and of course, they all climbed trees like pros.

stunning bride & groom. they made my job….completely effortless.

Thank you Mina & Pegah for an amazing day! I am honored to have been able to be a small part of it!

Happy one month anniversary!