I just don't get it

The sun is rapidly setting as I type this blog post..... at 4pm!!!! Yes you read correctly.... 4pm.

I haven't said it before but I now officially hate Daylight Savings Time. Whose time are they saving? Not mine that is for sure. I would much rather wake up in the dark instead of walking my boys home from school needing a flashlight! Okay so maybe not that bad, but seriously having to turn lights on in my house before 4pm is nuts! If you have a nap in the afternoon prepare yourself for complete disorientation. When we came up here for interviews 5 years ago I was pregnant in the stage of needing lots of extra sleep and remember waking up from an afternoon nap in a strange house and peeked out the window to see what was going on only to see pitch black at dinner time. That was another con about moving further north. I had many cons at the time of those interviews, but I'll save those for another post or two! No cons anymore, except for the lack of light!!

Let's just put aside the whole getting dark early how about the fact that my now normally early rising boys are now awake.... EARLIER!!! 6am Lego building is not the way to start a day that I actually get to sleep in.

The one good thing from this whole thing is that I still get great sunsets out my window - they DO NOT and never will compare to Saskatchewan sunsets, but they are still gooders!!

Enjoy what I get to see out my window.

Little A and S - Family

So I think that I may have taken photos of my future daughter in law (if the Lord allows!!). Little A is soooo sweet and her brother is a busy little boy! My two guys Tysen and Rylen have played with them both a couple of times before and they always have a blast with them! "Hey Mom,.... A was playing hockey with us today - she was a great goalie!!" Yup she is right in there with the boys, I love to see that! Learning how to be around little boys now will definitely give her a heads up or two when she gets older. There will be NO fooling this girl! And I think that if her brother has anything to say about it he'll be chasing down anyone that does mess with her!

It was the coldest day in October when we took these photos - majorly below zero! Our fingers were cold and our noses were red while taking these. I know that they were anticipating the fact that they were going to go for a swim in their hotel swimming pool and then see the Wiggles later in the afternoon that resulted in me running around to catch these. I mean when you've got the promise of a swim and some dancing with the Wiggles who wants some crazy lady with a camera in your face?

I had a great time and look forward to catching a few more of this whole family in the months ahead (it was seriously soooo cold that we couldn't finish!!). Anyways, enjoy them, because I sure enjoyed taking them!

I know that I posted this one earlier, but couldn't resist posting it again, isn't she beautiful? Just imagine how gorgeous my grand babies would be!

Curtis and Andrea - Engagment

Curtis and Andrea make me smile - I got to spend a little time with them the other morning and was happy to see two people that love and respect eachother. The little whispers in the ear, the laughter and the love was shared by both of them.

Curtis was gracious enough to cancel a day of hunting to give us an opportunity to meet. I was wondering where his gun was when we were shooting though as I had heard that there were bears in the area, but I figured that Curtis would have my back and obviously Andrea's! We did joke that it would have made a great shot to have a black bear in the background while they were getting close, but alas no such luck!

I love it when I can spend an hour or two with my couples getting some engagement photos. It gives them an opportunity to see how the photo aspect of their wedding day will go and gives me a chance to get to know them as a couple and most importantly it gives them an excuse to get close, cuddle, hug and kiss an hour away! I have yet to have a guy complain that he has to pull his girl close and hold her tight while I snap away! I'm sure that most of them are wishing that I'd just walk away at times (which I have been known to do!!).

Anyways, I had a good time and since Andrea is a photo buff it was great hearing her suggestions too. I'm excited to be shooting their wedding in two short weeks, a great couple and a new location which I'm pumped about. So look for a post about their wedding in a couple of weeks.

Enjoy nibbling on all the Halloween candy that you don't give away at your door's tonight!

What I'm Lovin

So I wouldn't call myself a bargain hunter by any stretch of the imagination. I look for good deals when I'm shopping and am somewhat restrained with my purchases, unless it's H&M or Jacob at my favorite malls in Calgary. I lived with a closet filling shoe junkie growing up and thankfully didn't have to share a closet with her... my sister Nikki did. Nikki had like maybe 3 pairs of shoes and Jenni, well let's just say Jenni and Imelda Marcos rivalled each other for shoes. Okay maybe slight exaggeration (it's a running joke in our family)but she did have lots!

Well today Jenni would be very very proud of me - I bought shoes! My lovely amazing sister inlaw Sheila called our house last night and in the middle of her visit mentioned to Garth that there was going to be a coupon for 50% off everything at Payless Shoes. Sheila works at Payless and we often stop in and shop when we hit Calgary. So I checked out oprah.com this morning and there I saw the coupon - 50% off everything... IN THE STORE! So I printed it off at the office and called Garth, picked him up and headed out to the mall.

We power shopped and bought all our shoes in about 20 minutes (that's all the time we had before having to pick Ry up from Kindergarten). Anyways...... I still can't rival Imelda or Jenni, but I am the proud new owner of 3 pairs of shoes/boots. Woo Hoo!

So what am I lovin today? I'm lovin that I got a deal. I'm lovin that I got a new pair of winter boots (good timing due to today's dump of snow!). I'm lovin that Garth spent some money too so it wasn't just me (this is important people, I can't just be the spender- he needs to be involved too!). I'm lovin that I got a needed pair of boots, a sensible pair of shoes (check out my feet at my next wedding!) and a pair of sexy boots, yup I said sexy boots, Garth seems to like them!

And because I don't like not having a photo to post I grabbed one of today's purchase..... aren't they great? Thanks Sheila - you're my fave!

The Best of Friends - Just Because

8:00 AM was a very important time in my day while I was growing up. Without fail through grades 4 to 6 I would receive a phone from my best friend Shelley Mann asking me what I was wearing to school that day. One way or the other I was on the phone every morning I went to school. We would commiserate on what the other was wearing and try to figure out how to best coordinate with the other. You see that is just what best friends did. I would then anticipate the door opening around 8:30 and see Shelley come bounding into my kitchen where she would greet my Mom and we'd head out the door, dressed as much alike as we possibly could. After school involved another tradition, we'd walk home from school (I lived a block away from both elementary and high school- it was great!) and hit the kitchen again. When my mom was home for the day we'd grab some of the fresh chocolate chocolate chip cookies and chow down running through our day. Again something that best friends just did.

In grade 7 Kami Bosch ended up at our back door waiting for me to finish getting ready for school. There was no matchy matchy in grade 7 - you just didn't do that, but you made sure that if one was wearing shorts, so was the other one.

In grade 8 Carolyn Stabbler arrived at my door every morning. Now there were those morning phone calls just to make sure we looked okay, but again not matchy matchy - in grade 8 we were WAAAAY too cool to do that. The cookie tradition reappeared in grade 8 because Carolyn lived just down the hill from me and she HAD to go past my house to get to hers.

Grade 9 saw the reappearance of Kami at my back door, no phone calls, lots of cookies and we dressed as individuals (as much as that happens in grade 9!).

The names may have changed over the years of middle school BUT we were still very much involved in eachother's lives. And thanks to facebook we are now catching up on where eachother is at. We don't call eachother, but those woman/girls are a rather large piece of my history. I can look back over those years and laugh when I think some of things we got ourselves involved in. They were great friends and I will cherish those memories greatly.

The three beautiful girls that I had the chance to catch photos of are in the process of making those memories together right now. They've been friends for a while and after spending some time with them I know they'll be friends for years to come. I'm sure that some of their adventures will bring smiles after they've maybe gotten a little gray and added some lines to their faces. Thankfully they asked for some fall photos so they will be able to remember this time of their lives. I hope to get some more photos of them in a few years when they graduate and I'm sure I'll hear about a few more adventures that took place.

Now I'm not too sure if phone calls were made or not about what to wear but I do know somethings were changed because they were dressed too alike by accident! There is a sign of spending enough time together with your girlfriends when you dress alike without planning!

I know that I posted this one earlier last week, but I had to post it again.... it's my favorite of that afternoon. I love love LOVE it! Aren't they geeeeooorgeous?

Ry giving me tears

Okay, so I love to laugh - ask anyone! Well maybe not anyone, but ask someone who knows me - laughing is part of who I am I think. It's been a crazy couple of weeks trying to get edits done and I have found myself short on sleep which makes me a little short in general so yesterday's break was needed!

So,I found myself laughing out loud a couple times yesterday afternoon which caused many sitting around me to stare as they had no idea what I was laughing about, but I'll share with you!

Rylen has been playing hockey for let's see 3 weeks now? Yup 3 whole weeks and my little superstar has actually seen a lot of improvement over that time. Garth is coaching both Ry and Tysen (they're on the same team this year) and so I get a hour of free time two afternoons a week, but they have to be spent at the rink but I've been really enjoying myself. So much in fact that other parent's around me are thinking that there is something wrong with me.

Now my boys make me laugh quite a bit, I'm often giggling and enjoying myself in their company but this was straight from the belly loud bellowing laugh which then caused me to have a grin on my face for about 20 minutes after the fact.

So Ry has been skating for 3 weeks, but he doesn't skate slowly on the ice, in order to maintain balance Rylen has to basically run on the ice. So picture this little 5 year old running on the ice so he doesn't fall. He is SOAKING wet after practice and asks me to touch his hair to testify to it's wetness. During drills yesterday the coaches had them skate lines back and forth and Ry was doing rather well, his running has slowed down but trust me when that kid masters skating nobody is going to keep up with him! Anyways, during the line drill he was doing great, had skated to the blue line and was now turning around to head back to the boards but was going a little too fast to manage a glide-fall stop. Nope my Ry guy plows right into the boards and bounces off onto the ice. Was I concerned for him? Nope, I was laughing - almost choked on my pumpkin spice latte! This laugh didn't cause too much disruption around me as I reined myself in and composed myself rather quickly.

So after lines had been skated they gave Rylen's line some pucks to practice with. It is kind of chaotic with ten 5 years olds trying to skate and stick handle a puck at the same time, but so far no injuries have occured. So Ry who has a decent shot during street/driveway hockey sets himself up for a shot on net. He's lined up for a shot, squares himself to the puck draws his stick back and connects with the puck and it flies across the ice - BUT so did Ry! Imagine this - Shot - Crash - Mom laughing hysterically in the stands. Thankfully he couldn't hear me as I'm sure he'd be rather ticked off at me, but it was funny! I'm laughing as I type this! The parents around me had no clue why I was laughing and why I couldn't stop - I think all the late night edits have been getting to me - but it was funny. I had a smile on my face for quite a while afterwards - and then when I recounted the events to Garth later that evening tears were rolling down my face again.

I was definitely in a place where I needed some laughs and my poor son falling all over the place provided it for me.

Here is a little peek at another shoot that took place in the last 2 weeks - more photos to follow!

Sweet Dreams

"Mommy, can you rub my hair and sing me a song?" is something I hear just about every night when I tuck my boys in for the night. And I am ashamed to say that most nights recently I've said , "no not tonight, Mommy has to edit". I almost said that again tonight and I am SO GLAD that I didn't. I didn't end up singing to them tonight as I was content to just sit between their beds and rub two heads at the same time. How peaceful to just sit quietly, rub their hair and pray for them. I may have busy days right now trying to fit everything in, but what great perspective to sit on the floor in a semi dark bedroom and do nothing for 20 minutes but care for my two not so little boys. How important touch is and even more important is falling asleep knowing that Mommy is right beside me. It was such a pleasant sound to hear two little people falling to sleep, the steady rythmic breathing that comes with slumber. That question won't last forever and I know that in 5 years from now I am going to be BEGGING for it so now things can be set aside. The dishes will wait, the laundry will wait, even the edits will wait, but what will not wait is my two little boys who just want Mommy around to rub their hair.

It wasn't a big thing to sit there, but it meant the world to me tonight.

And because every post is just a little bit better with a photo, here's what is coming up with my edits.