In Other Words

Crash...

Wow, wow, wow...what a month it's been.   Business is booming, kids started sports classes, my husband is busy with a new position at work, life is BUSY.   I've had more shoots this month alone then I think I did all of last summer...it's crazy.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining.  I'm having a blast doing what I do, but combined with my husbands new role at work and added responsibilities it's been a bit of an adjustment for us both.

The weight of all that's been going on this past month hit me like a ton of bricks last night at about 5pm.  I was making dinner talking to my husband and with every word my voice just kept fading.  By the end of our conversation my voice was completely gone.  I have NO voice...NOTHING.  Now, this isn't out of the ordinary for me.  My voice is usually the first thing to go when I'm tired and stressed.  When I was working as a teacher I lost my voice every single year during the first week of school without fail.  Then I'd lose it again during the last week of school.  Stress is not good for my voice.

Unfortunately, this bout of laryngitis comes at a VERY bad time.  See...I have a high profile photo shoot tomorrow.  Yep, go figure eh?  This is something I have been anticipating for over a month.  It's something I never thought I'd have an opportunity to do, yet here I have a nationally known client on the books for tomorrow and I have NOOOOOO voice.  Needless to say I'm in a bit of a panic.  Luckily, I'm not sick...not even a little sniffle.  It's just that I can't talk louder than a whisper.

Thankfully my uber-talented-soon-to-be-famous-opera-singer brother-in-law, Sam, e-mailed me with some helpful voice restoration tips.  I thought I'd share them all with you in the event that you ever find yourself voiceless the day before a big event. 

• Drink A LOT of water.
• Humidify- hot steam, shower, etc..
• Do NOT whisper
• Use Robitussin (or another decongestant)
• No antihistimines
• No asprin
• Don't gargle
• Avoid alcohol and caffeine (sorry...can't give up my tea)

If you have any good voice vibes to send my way I sure would take them right about now!!!!!

10,000 Clicks

10,000 clicks...is it really possible that I've pushed the shutter button that many times on my camera?  I guess so!  I reached that milestone while shooting this series of little Noah.  It seems fitting as Noah was one of my very first test subjects.

Back when I was starting to experiment with photography I used to hound all of my friends to let me practice on their kids.  Looking back I'm mortified by the results of those sessions.  Oh, the horror!

Poor little Noah took the brunt of the experimenting as he and my oldest son were born within days of each other.  His mom, Heather, and I spent a lot of time together over the first year which means she has a lot of pictures (a lot of really bad pictures) of Noah's first year!  Ha!!

It's been 4 years now and I love it when Heather calls and asks me to come to take pictures of her kids.  It's quite an honor considering the product I delivered to her in that first year.  Thank goodness she is a true friend...one who has encouraged me from the very beginning, one who believed in me, and most importantly one who was thankfully able to see the potential through some really horrible pictures way back when.

It seems fitting that I reached 10,000 clicks on my new camera during Noah's shoot.  It gives me a point of reference in my photographic journey.  It will be interesting to see where the next 10,000 clicks take me!

Oh where, oh where is spring?

A few weeks ago I started to get a bit of spring fever.  The kids were outside playing nearly everyday...I was starting to poke around in the flower beds...the sun was shining.  Where, oh where has the sunshine gone? 

Last night I had a speaking engagement at the University.  Fun, right?  WRONG!  I had to park quite a distance from the building and I forgot what it's like to walk cold distances in frozen tundra.  Ugh!  I arrived half frozen and  thought for sure my teeth were broken from the constant chattering during my walk.  Then when I woke up this morning...more snow!  That's right...it's S N O W I N G in April!  Oh, the joy of living up north.

I'll just have to be patient and wait for Mr. Sunshine to make another appearance.  Until then, I'll need to get creative with indoor activities.  Most everything in they toy room is old and boring.  It might be time to pull out the crafts.  So much for my clean house.  I imagine there will be glue, paint, glitter, chalk, crusty play-doh, and many other random craft objects scattered about the house by the end of the week.  Oh well.  Perhaps my kids will enjoy the warm weather even more when (if) it ever comes!!

 

April showers bring...

April showers bring May organization??!!  I guess so!  The past 4 days have been nothing but rain here.  Cold, rainy, dreary weather...yuck.  The nice thing about it is that it has forced me into an organizational mindset. 

It started last Thursday when the kids and I were playing in the toyroom.  My son was playing with a toy and it was missing a piece.  And so it began.  I started in one bin and worked my way through them all, then the closet, then the bookshelf, then the craft cupboard.  When I was done in the toyroom I went to work in the bedrooms...bye-bye old clothes.  4 garbage bags worth of clothes are sitting before me waiting to be tagged for a garage sale!  And those 4 bags are only from MY closet!!!!! 

I mean to tell you this place is ORGANIZED.  I know where every piece to every toy is in our house.  There are no unmatched socks waiting patiently in our drawers for their mate.  All the pens are tucked safely in a little box in what used to be the "junk drawer".  Magazines are all sorted by topic and are resting comfortably in their baskets.

Life is good.  Now...I wonder how long this will last?!

On a sidenote:  With all the rainy weather my poor kids have been cooped up for days.   Thank goodness for Hullaballoo !!   If you have pre-school aged tots running around you might consider buying this and tucking it away for a rainy day!  So fun!!

Only in the Northwoods...

I love mid-west living...really, I do.  It's just that at this time of year the weather is so unpredictable.  One never quite knows what to expect in March and April.

Take for example two shoots from the past week.  The top image was taken last Sunday..just a little over one week ago.  It was so cold that day that I actually got a little bit of frostbite on my hand!  (When will I learn to wear gloves?!!)  This couple was so cute and so in love...we actually had a lot of fun despite the cold weather.  It just took me FOREVER to warm up from that session.  I think I actually slept in two shirts, flannel pants and wool socks that night!

Yesterday I had a shoot with this beautiful young lady and it was a tropical 81 degrees!!  The shoot lasted about 4 hours and by the end I was a sweaty mess.  I came home last night and wanted nothing but to sit on the front porch eating popsicles!

What a difference a week can make, eh?!  I was so excited about the balmy weather yesterday that I pulled out all the summer wear this morning (short sleeve shirts, shorts, sandals, etc...).  My excitement came to a screeching halt when I heard the weather forcast...highs this weekend=40 degrees.  Ugh!  I guess I won't pack the winter coats just yet.

Happy Tuesday! 

Good friends...

Good friends...what would we do without them?!  As you all know the last few weeks have been tough for me.  Last week I was feeling emotionally drained and a bit overwhelmed as I worked my tail off to get caught up from being gone.  By Friday I was feeling exhausted and in need of a major break. 

Saturday morning I started my weekend cleaning routine when the phone rang.  My friend Jenny was calling to ask if I could join her for a day of scrapbooking.  Oh, how I wanted to go.  I got on the horn with babysitters but I knew it was going to be a long shot finding someone available on such short notice.  After 3 or 4 unsuccessfull calls, I gave up.  I called Jenny back to tell her that it wouldn't work, but to try me again next time.  I was almost in tears because a day of scrapbooking seemed to be exactly what I needed. 

About an hour later, Jenny called back and told me to load up my supplies and meet her at the scrapbooking store.    She called one of her students who was willing to come out and watch the kids for the day.  I couldn't believe it!  The sitter showed up and the kids fell in love with her in the first 5-minutes.  So much so that not one tear was shed as I was walking out the door.

I stopped for a coffee on the way to the scrapbook store and totally enjoyed being spontaneous...what a treat!  Jenny and I had a great time scrapbooking and chatting.  The hours flew by, but I enjoyed every second.  What a blessing it is to have good friends...friends that know exactly how and when to help. 

Thank you Jenny!

(O.k..so you'll need to excuse the HORRIBLE image quality here!  I don't own a scanner and photographing 12x12 pieces of paper is no easy task. Ha!)

 

A tribute...

I've been away from my blog AGAIN.  But, this time for good reason.  My dear grandmother passed away last Saturday.  Needless to say it's been a sad time here.  Two funerals in less than a week...kinda' hard on the heart. 

We journeyed safely to Kansas (a whopping 16-hour drive) for my Grandma's funeral.  Although it was a haul, I am so happy we were able to go.  Reminiscing with my family about Grandma and all that she was to each of us...it was a little piece of comfort for my aching heart.

How I loved listening to the stories of my Grandma loading the neighborhood kids in her car and driving them to the outdoor pool.  Or sharing one of my favorite memories of playing Skip-Bo for hours with Grandma.  (This is the Grandma who was NOT afraid to beat her grandkids at a game of cards...she was always in it to win!) 

What I remember most about my dear Grandma though is her baking ability.  Boy could she cook and she loved sharing her passion for food with me.  Whenever she came to visit there was always at least a full day of cooking activities planned.  Sometimes we made pies, other times cookies, but my all-time favorite was lefse making days.  Oh, how I loved making lefse (o.k...so I enjoyed eating it more than baking, but it was fun regardless!). 

On the way home I got to thinking about how much I love baking.  I bet a huge part of that comes from Grandma.  I'm so glad she took the time to teach me the fine art of baking.  It's something I can pass along to my children...one generation to the next.

It also made me think that it's about time I launch my recipe blog.  It's something I've wanted to do for many moons....I just couldn't find the time.   Well, there's no better time than now, eh?!

So..be sure to visit my new recipe blog: In Other Words: The Yummy Stuff

Thanks! 

Boyhood...

It's official.  My son has completed the rite of passage into boyhood.   If you'll take just a moment and look at the images I posted above I have no doubt you'll know which method he used to journey into this phase known as boyhood. 

That's right, my friends, a Lite Brite peg up the nose.

My husband and I were in the kitchen cleaning up our dinner mess when we heard our oldest son crying (scratch that)...SCREAMING up in his bedroom. We ran up the stairs practically tripping over one another to find him with his hand covering his nose.  He was in such a panic I didn't know if he fell, knocked out a tooth, I had NO idea.  My husband took one look at the scene, turned to me as says with total confidence "He has a Lite Brite stuck in his nose.". 

Now, you must understand.  I was raised in a home with mostly girls.  My mom, my older sister, myself, and my poor dad.  Inserting foreign objects in noses was virtually unheard of in my house growing up.  My husband on the other hand...he grew up in a home with 5 boys (no, that is not a typo).  My husband is the oldest of FIVE boys.  Is it any wonder that when he stumbled into our son's room he was able to analyze, process, and diagnose the problem within seconds.

This is EXACTLY the type of thing I imagined back when I was pregnant and learned we were having a boy.  I even remember driving home from the ultrasound and asking my husband if he wanted to take dibs on what object the ER doc would be pulling out of his nose someday.  His guess was a pea, my guess a rock.  O.k...so we were both wrong.  It was a Lite Brite peg! 

It seems fitting that this happened just days before his 4th birthday.  I take it as a sign that he is venturing into boyhood.  If this is the beginning, goodness knows I'll be ready for a vacation when he leaves for college.

Cheers!

That little voice...

You know that little voice you hear when you're making dinner,  getting ready in the morning, driving in the car, etc...  You know that voice, right?   Sometimes it alerts us to danger, sometimes it provides us with a creative vision, and sometimes it urges us to act on something.  I hope I'm not the only one who has that voice.  Oprah has mentioned "the voice" before so I'm assuming I'm not alone!

Anyway, I'm here today to tell you to listen to your inner voice.  I know I've been away from my blog a bit in the past week or two.  I've been busy putting all my grandeous plans I made around the Holidays into action.  Who knows if I even have any readers left?!  (Maybe I'm talking to myself.)  At any rate, if ever you have taken anything away from reading my blog let it be this:  LISTEN TO THAT VOICE.  It's there for a reason.

Wednesday afternoon I was out running errands kid-free (a rarity for me).   On the way home I was enjoying a bit of peace and quiet with MY music playing in the background.  A nice change of pace from the books on cd or kid music that usually plays when there are kids in the car.  So, I'm sitting at a stop light when that little voice pops into my head.  "You should call Katie." , the voice said.  Hmmmm... the voice goes onto say things like;  "Wow, Katie is coming up on her 21st birthday...has it really been that long since she graduated.", "I wonder if all of her hair is grown back.", "I wonder if she still has a lot of phantom pains from losing her leg.", "I bet she would like a gift certificate to a movie rental store...oh, how that girl loves movies.".  It was at least a 10-minute train of random thoughts about my dear friend, Katie. 

Katie was a former high school student of mine.  I had her in my 10th grade American History class.  The beginning of her Junior year she was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer.  Due to the side effects from the rigorous treatment she was unable to attend school on a regular basis.  I took on the role of homebound teaching Katie.  During her junior and senior year we worked like mad to complete her course work.  Of course that meant notes and lectures in the company of a nurse administering meds. Or the constant buzz of the port dripping that weeks treatment into her body while she plugged away at a paper or a test.  It also meant her mom holding and rocking my brand new baby who was just a few weeks old so I could help Katie fill in the answers as she was too tired to write.

Together we worked to accomplish her goal of graduating with her classmates.  She and I were a determined duo...nothing would stop us...not even chemo!  I'm proud to say that we did it!!  Katie graduated with her class.  Quite an accomplishment especially under those circumstances.

Well...it's been 3 years since she graduated.  In the past three-years Katie's cancer was under control, came back, had a leg bone taken out and replaced with a state of the art "rod" (katie called it her "Cadillac Leg"), cancer under control, came back, had her leg amputated, suffered extreme phantom pains, continued treatment to rid her body of cancer...   In other words, in the past three years Katie put up quite a fight.

Over the past three years I have thought of Katie often.  I checked her Caring Bridge site for updates every now and again.  I also recieved updates from a mutual friend of her family.  Although I didn't stay in close contact with Katie after she graduated I still felt such a strong connection to her. 

On Wednesday, there was that voice.  I'm almost positive it was the longest stretch of time that voice has ever gone on in my head.  By the time I got home I was determined to call her...we needed to catch up.  When I walked in the door I was quickly swept up in  birthday party preparations.  There was a cake to bake, dinner to prepare, gifts to wrap.  Maybe I could call tomorrow.  The next morning we made our regular Thursday morning trip to the library.  Then of course the kids decide to nap opposite one another so there is no quiet time for a phone call.  That's ok...I'll call just as soon as the kids go down.  I go and tuck my oldest son into bed and phone starts ringing.  I can hear a voice on the answering machine..."Hi Jamie, this is Mrs. Fellows calling with an update on Katie...."

My heart dropped.  I knew.  I was too late.  I knew without question why she was calling.  There wasn't a doubt in my mind.  Sure enough.  Katie passed away at 4:15 pm on Thursday afternoon.  She passed in the comfort of her home surrounded by her closest friends and family. 

So this, my friends, is a gentle reminder to listen to that little voice.  Act on it.  DO what it is telling you to do before it's too late. 

Non-toxic...

 

Thank goodness for non-toxic art supplies!  My poor little guy wants so desperately to be like his older brother...always wanting in on the activities.  The other day I thought I'd let him have a try.  Afterall, how bad could it get?! 

About two minutes into our art project my oldest son says, "MommyI'vegottagopottyreallybadhurryhurry".  I quickly usher him into the bathroom forgetting that I left my baby sitting at the table with a half a bottle of paint, a paintbrush, and an insaciable appetite...not a good combination.

I rushed back to the table only to see my budding artist devouring a tasty mix of green tempera paint.  Now one would think I would rush to get soap and a washcloth...WRONG.  I run over and grab my camera and start snapping away.  Ha!  It must be the die hard "scrapper" in me. 

I think it's moments like this when I really appreciate the world of photography.  When I was growing up my mom kept a seperate album for both me and my sister.  They were filled with the standard "first day of school" pictures and the dreaded "class pictures", but there were a few candid shots tucked in too.  These were my favorite and I LOVED hearing the stories behind them.  I can see myself sitting down one day explaining to my sweet little boy why his mommy let him eat green paint early one January morning!