Baby Shower

I love when my friends provide me with great opportunities to practice my photography. Plus I get to (hopefully) provide them with beautiful pictures of these memories for a long time to come. I went to the cutest baby shower a couple weeks ago. The girls that put it on did a great job. I'm not a games kinda girl at showers, but the girls had the perfect blend of adorable baby shower things paired with amazing food and the ability to sit back and enjoy the company of everyone. Kudos ladies! Here are just some of the cutest that happened that afternoon.

Maternity Shoot

During Spring Break I had the opportunity and extreme pleasure of doing a maturity photo shoot for a dear friend of mine. Not only were we able to catch up on life, but I was also able to help document this very important step in her and her husband's lives. Their first child. I can only imagine the excitement and anticipation they must be feeling and I am so happy that I get to witness this new stage in their lives. When you are about 8 months pregnant I am sure it must be hard to feel beautiful. Your body hasn't been your own for awhile now. I'm sure all (okay most) pregnant women hear (and believe) the whole thing about the miracle of life being such an amazing experience, but let's be real, sometimes it has got to suck. Bre is truly a spectacularly beautiful pregnant woman. Radiant. I hope when she looks back at this time she will be able to see what we all see: being pregnant looks good on her and she makes it look easy. Plus I got to use the backdrop that Amy helped me make. :) Enjoy!

RIP Wendell

Life has been so busy recently. Grades and report cards, parent-teacher conferences, the start of my FINAL grad class. SO busy in fact that I haven't been able to report that....Wendell has passed away. Amanda and I came in one Monday about a month and a half ago, I sat at my desk, and gasped. Poor Wendell had finally gone belly up. In reality it was best for him. He had been looking pretty raggid and I was afraid that he was suffering. He had obviously died not long after we left Friday afternoon so he was looking pretty gross. Amanda gagged (which was pretty funny) and we took him off to the bathroom.
We decided not to tell the kids until someone asked where he was. That moment came at snack time. One of our more sensitive kiddos (who just so happens to sit in front of my desk) asked where Wendell was. I didn't want to say "Wendell died." It just sounded too harsh to tell little kids, so I tried to soften the blow by saying that "Wendell passed on." Unfortunately for me no one understood what that meant and I just had to tell them he died anyway. Then they asked where he was and I told them that we gave him a "burial at sea." Amanda and I died laughing, but again no one understood that either so we told them that fish get flushed down the toilet when they die. Long story short...the kiddos were upset (although some were more upset about the fact that I wasn't going to buy a replacement Wendell this year).


Some of the students made me sympathy cards about how sad they were that Wendell had died. Just now, as I sit here typing this, one boy that sits right in front of my desk turned to me and said "Miss L., I wish Wendell was still alive." To which I responded "I know (insert student's name here), me too."
Wendell was probably the most loved fish there ever was. He will be greatly missed. To commemorate his passing Amanda made the following hysterical comic:

The 100th Day of School

Today was the 100th day of school!

For those of you who don't live in the world of first grade, it's a BIG deal. All day is dedicated to the number 100. We have been counting up and looking forward to this day all year. While it is a break from the normal teaching schedule it is not, by any means, an easy day. Well...at least not for us teachers. Breaking from the day-to-day routine means working double time to keep everyone in control and make sure no disasters arise. Luckily for us, it was a smooth-sailing kind of day and truly a blast. The day started out with the kids bringing in 100 objects to glue onto a piece of card stock that has 10 circles on it. This year, my favorite was the kid who brought in 100 pieces of sponges. But they were huge pieces. He had written 100 on all of them and even made one look like SpongeBob SquarePants and one look like Patrick. It was awesome, but there was no way they were going to fit on that piece of paper. So he had to cut a couple into 100 smaller pieces and glue them on. We sent him home with an entire bag of sponges. I'm sure his mother will be thrilled. Haha. As the day progressed we read a couple 100th Day of School books and wrote 100th Day of School poems. I wrote one for Wendell, it goes a little something like this: I wish I had 100 food pellets. I wish I had 100 more days to live. I wish I had 100 first grade friends. But I do not wish I had 100 eyes. For those of you that are not familiar with Wendell, Wendell is our class pet. He's a betta fish and on his last leg as far as life goes. He does not look well and it is a constant topic of conversation in our classroom. Pretty much everyone laughed at that line because unfortunately, it's true. At least my kiddos will be prepared. They "awed" at the first grade friends part, and Wendell doesn't want 100 eyes, he only wants 2. He lost one due to the fish disease called "Pop Eye." I kid you not. The moral of the Wendell story is this: he is just as special as the rest of us and we love him because of it.

ANYWAY, I digress. We did have normal Riggs, Art, and P.E. today, but that's about it. The rest of the day was spent doing special 100th Day of School math, writing, making an extra special 100th Day of School snack, and coloring 100th Day of School glasses. To end the day our principal (who is always such an amazing sport when it comes to doing ridiculous things for our kids) came in dressed like an old 100 year old man. He plays it up big time, even pretending to fall asleep in the middle of a sentence and shuffling his feet as he walks. It was a great way to end the day. We sang songs for him and counted to 100 with him. I can't even begin to explain how much the kids love it and I can't lie...so do we.

Now it's time to head home and take a nap in order to recover some before enjoying my weekend and going out with the girls.

Hooray!

I just got an email saying that three of my pictures made it to the second round of judging in the photo contest! I am so excited! I have to be honest though, I am kind of surprised about the ones that were chosen. I chose all the pictures because I felt they held some kind of "dramatic" impact that could be seen and felt by all and not just by people that had been on the Sierra Leone trip with me. But I definitely have my favorites. Nevertheless, I am excited beyond words and am keeping my fingers crossed for an even more exciting outcome. These are the three that made it into the second round (and the titles I gave them):

Snap Me

Natural Beauty

Is That What I Look Like?

I'm not going to lie, I'm sure the stories I wrote to accompany each picture and explain why it was taken definitely helped. But isn't that the point? When people buy something like this, don't they want to feel something when they look at it? Be stirred to want to do something or just to smile and enjoy? I say yes. And as I look at these pictures now, smiling is definitely what I'm doing. :)

I'll keep you posted!

Photo Contest

So...I entered a couple of photos in a contest I found online. The contest is entitled "People and Portraits" (or something like that) and it is for a book that is also a fundraiser for Save the Children. I emailed in these seven pictures from Sierra Leone. While I love my pictures and think they are book worthy, we'll see what the judges think. Within the week I should find out if any of the pictures made it through to round 2. While submission into round 1 was free, you have to pay if you are chosen for round 2 (why? I'm not really sure.). I don't really have the money to spend on entering photo contests, but if I make it to round 2 then I will gladly pay the fee. Although I realized just now that I never edited the photos. I did editing on the pictures I took of Kyle and Connor and the pictures I took of Lyndie and the twins, but never on the Africa one. I had just downloaded a new editing program so that accounts for a lot of the editing (I was excited), but also when it comes to my Africa pictures I just haven't thought they needed them. The place, the people were just so beautiful that, for me, nothing needs to be done to them. I guess we'll just wait and see.

Starting this weekend I am (hopefully) starting on a new project. I'll keep you updated.

On a different note, life is good. Tiring, but good. School is going well (first graders are so much fun and hysterical) and I couldn't ask for better coworkers. Starting in March I will be starting and finishing my last two chapters of my thesis. I can't wait to be finish! I am done being in school and ready to do nothing but grading little kid work. Oh and living with Rosie is fantastic. It really couldn't be working out any better. And Juno is pretty happy to have a backyard all to himself. :)

Finally...the rest of Kyle and Connor's pictures

Here are the rest of the pictures I took for Kyle of him and his son Connor. There are many more, but this is just a sample of some of the ones I ended up editing. It was a freezing New Years Eve day, but well worth it. We all had a lot of fun. Hope you enjoy!