traditions

Our family has a few fun traditions...Bobby and I like to keep our individual family traditions going, and have worked hard to add our own into the mix, too.  One of our very favorite ones started sort of by accident.  The summer after we got married (May, 2003) we went to the beach with Bobby's family.  In Garden City, SC.  There is an old arcade that has a photobooth.....a real, black and white, 4 pictures in a row, photobooth.  We had our pictures made as a fun memory, without a second thought!

Fast forward to 2007, we were able to go to Garden City again....this time with an 8 month old Macie Quinn in tow!  Her first beach trip will always be one of my favorite memories!  Since we were staying in the same place, we thought it would be fun to have our pictures taken in the photobooth again.....that's when our favorite family tradition was born!

We have been blessed to go back 3 more times since then.  Our next trip was the summer that Emery Pearl (2010) was born...she was just a tiny 12 weeks old in her debut photostrip!  Macie was so into this shoot, too! 

The following summer, we had a fun and hilarious 4 year old, Macie and a very sleepy 1 year old, Emery!

This summer, both girls really got into it!  We had some super silly and funny faces!  Macie is 5 and a half (that "and a half" is important!) and Emery is 2!

These photo strips stay on our refrigerator, in a spot that I can look and smile at them several times a day.  I love being able to look back at our family, and at how it's grown from two very young newly weds to a photobooth full of my most favorite silly faces ever.

In an even sweeter "accidental" addition to this tradition, the summer that Emery was born, my brother in law proposed to my sister in "our" photobooth.  I know that Lindsey and Brandon treasure those two strips of photos as much as we do ours!

What are some traditions that your family keeps?  Which are the most important to you?

Color!

Yesterday, during school, we talked about colors and the beauty that God has given us in Creation.  Macie and I looked at some black and white pictures compared to some color ones and talked about what it would be like if life really looked like the black and white pictures.  I asked her if she would like it if all of her clothes were grey, and if you know her at all, you know that her answer was an emphatic "NO!"  hahaha!

We did a neat little experiment that I had seen on Pinterest, next....I thought it would be a perfect thing to go along with our color talks!  I put some baking soda in a casserole dish and filled some little dishes with vinegar and food coloring.  The girls had a great time choosing, mixing, and dripping colors into the dish......and were super excited about the fizzing that came along with it!

The girls were a little under the weather yesterday (super tired from Macie's dance recital the night before and Macie had a little fever) so this was a perfect, low key (relatively low mess) experiment for the day.  Somehow, though, all of my droppers were gone, so we improvised.  I think I'll try and round up a couple, so that the next time we do something like this, it'll be a little easier for them. 

We're planning to get outside today and enjoy the beautiful world that God has blessed us with....I think I'll have Macie do a little color collecting, just to reinforce our talking about it.  Thankfully, it's going to be a gorgeous day to do it!

worth a thousand words...

We have been blessed since Emery's birth to know a wonderful local photographer, Davina Fear.  We hooked up with her through the birth center, and her desire to branch into birth photography.  We were initially a little unsure when Lisa (our midwife) approached us about this opportunity.  Bobby and I view birth as a very intimate moment, and want it to be as private and as focused on us and our baby as possible.  We just didn't know how to feel about inviting someone we didn't know to come in and not just be there, but photograph the event.  After some prayer and talking, we decided to do it!  It was honestly the best decision ever.  Prior to meeting Davina, I had no experience with professional photographers.....she is just wonderful, and I've got the bug for sure!  I just can't look at photos the same way after I've seen just what they can be!

Davina blended perfectly into our birth experience, and captured little tiny moments that would have been forgotten and lost forever.  She allowed Bobby and I to be totally focused on us, and not have to worry about whether or not we were getting enough pictures.  She was such an important part of my birth experience, yet I hardly remember her being there at all!

After Emery was born, Davina came to our home to do a little family session with all of us together, since Macie wasn't at Emery's birth.  Those images are so special to me.  I look at them, and not only see how my tiny baby has changed, but just how grown up my big girl became in just the changing of one day.  Macie settled right into her new role as big sister.  After spending just one night (a big one!) with us, I felt like Davina was just another member of the family!

This past fall we had another opportunity to work with Davina, for a road trip shoot.  She and I put our heads together and worked on that shoot for weeks!  Circumstances kept delaying it, but oh, was it worth the wait!  Finding the perfect car and weather were challenges, but the day that we ended up doing the shoot couldn't have been better.  All of the little elements that we worked on came together perfectly and couldn't have been more "us"! 

She recently added more of the pictures from that shoot to her facebook page, and I just can't stop looking at them!  She has an amazing talent for freezing real life in one photo.  There is just something so different about them......not a posed photo that doesn't show anyone's personalities, but a split second glimpse of what her subject is really like.  The smiles, laughs, and affection are all real, not coached or forced. 

If you've never had the opportunity to have someone like Davina spend time with your family and take pictures, I'd encourage you to do so.  There is just nothing like looking at your family through the eyes (and lense!) of a talented photographer!  Thank you Davina, for being a friend, surrogate family member, and for providing us the opportunity to work with you!

You can see some of our sessions on her blog here, here, and here.

Welcome to the world!

On June 17, 2010 our family was blessed with it's newest member! Emery Pearl was born into the water at 11:36pm.