Month: September 2012

Last month, my brother got married.  It was a beautiful, happy day.

If you want to see more photos from the day, here is a slideshow.  Wendi and Rob chose great music for their wedding. The songs were performed by my brother, Joe, and cousin, Michelle, during the ceremony.  I’m putting a few of the songs that were played under the slideshow. You can listen to their music with the slideshow if you have Spotify. (It’s free. You might get an ad.) 

Another niece!  This little girl is just six months older than my baby.  She loves climbing.  She has had her share of falls but she remains fearless.  Earlier this summer, I watched my brother follow her around and keep her safe.

I grew up listening to Lori’s songs. We had tapes of her singing about Joseph’s coat of many colors, the Ten Plagues and the Good Samaritan. When I became at elementary teacher at our church’s school, I sang her songs with my students. Now as a mother, I sing her songs with my kids.

This weekend she and her husband were in town. I took this photo while she was singing one of her songs with the kids in our church nursery.

Lori and her husband wrote and shared their songs while raising nine kids. They shared their songs before you record music on your ipad or check out music on the Internet. They made cassette tapes, we listened and sang the songs with the children in our lives. Their music was something they loved to do and shared with us. They set stories from God’s Word to music and we sang along.

I don’t know how they made space in their busy child raising days to make their music, but I’m so glad they did. My heart was full when I watched my children sing along with her. “The coat was orange, and blue, and green and purple too…”

When Savanna goes out on her pogo stick, she hops and counts:  one, two, three… 

Her goal isn’t to hop forever.  It’s to see how long she can do it and if it’s longer than last time.

…one hundred one…

Eventually she loses her balance.

One hundred sixty-seven.  

Pause.  

One, two, three…

I said last week that I would post a daily photo.  Not a picture from every day of the year, but a picture every day.  I’m counting up until I lose my balance (like simply falling asleep at eight with my baby like I did last night) and fall off… Then I’ll get up and start over.  

I’m calling it the Pogo Project.  

One…

1/31/13 Update:I’ve changed my Pogo Project a little and am counting the number of weekdays in a row that I’ve posting.  I’m taking the weekends off and I’m finding that it’s working better for me.

While the two older girls are in school, the two younger kids and I have a new routine.  Atticus packs us a picnic and we go outside.  On this day, we went to a playground that had a little of everything – swings, slides and even sand.

A neighbor saw him speed by and eventually saw me.  She said, “Can you keep up with him?”  Not really.  But he waits for me.

On a technical note: These photos were all taken with a 5D Mark II and a 35mm 1.4L that I rented (from a local business) to take wedding photos tomorrow.  I usually feel pretty happy with what I have and enjoy it.  But, do I love the rented camera and lens? Yes. Yes. Yes.  It was hard to pick from the many photos I took this afternoon.