My Babies...

...are ONE & THREE this month! I couldn't be more in love with them.


I took their pictures yesterday and we had so much fun. Jude was a crack up... a total toddler! These days I feel good if I can even get him to look in my direction when I have a camera in my hands. :) I don't have time to write the post I want to right now about my Jude-e-booty and my Chica-monkey, so it will have to wait until tonight. Have a wonderful day!

Drawn from the Water

Tonight before bed I checked my google reader and my friend Erica had blogged about this little 4 min video. I love her heart, so I knew I'd most likely like the video, and I took a moment to watch it before I shut down for the night. And here I sat at my computer in my dining room and my eyes began to well with tears. So I went to the video's website and read more about the orphanage and was really impressed. What a wonderful thing they are doing! I wanted to share and help get the word out about it. It hit close to my heart, especially having little ones of my own.

Craving Growth

Josh and I spent a couple days at the beach with good friends...

...and it was wonderful. It was needed. Jude and Selah got to spend two nights with Grandma (this was a first for all of us!) and I definitely missed them, but also found it to be really rejuvenating.

I had an amazing morning curled up in the reading nook reading Crazy Love, overlooking the ocean. Amazing. This book was recommended by a dear friend of mine and I'm so glad I picked it up at Borders the other night. It has brought me to tears a couple times. I'm loving it! (If you go to the Crazy Love website click on videos and watch The Awe Factor of God)

Later that day we enjoyed a walk on the beach. Here's a photo of Ivan and Josh in the Sylvia Beach Hotel. We took a few minutes to walk through it too. I didn't take my camera with me, but thankful Hayley had her camera. After cleaning its lens it took great shots! :) I had to tease her about it.


I've been living in my head a bit these days, which is why my blogging has slowed down a bit.

I'm definitely finding myself at a place with my photography where I'm wanting to stretch myself to grow to the next level! I feel like I've been steadily climbing the past two or three years, but now I'm at this spot where I'm having some frustrations... I want to be better. I'm craving inspiration. I have these ideas in my head of what I want future shoots to look like... all in good time. :)

I hope you all had a wonderful Easter celebrating the resurrection of Jesus!

Sisters

I grew up with brothers, so I don't know what it's like to have a sister, but I can tell it's pretty special. Although, I'll share my secret, that being the only girl growing up in our family had it's upsides too. :)

Seeing these four girls together I can tell they have something so sweet. They really love each other and I know they'll grow up extra close with one another because they're all only a year apart. Isn't that awesome? I'm sure mom and dad are giving so much right now... time, energy, sleep... but what a gift of friendship these sisters will have for life! And with two parents who clearly adore them.

Wendy, thanks for allowing me to capture this little window in your girl's lives!

Our Backyard

I emailed these photos to our family showing them our new backyard. They are serious snap shots that aren't very pretty so I never intended to post them, but I just had to brag on my husband a bit. So I'm going to post them.

Josh is seriously the most amazing husband and such a fantastic daddy!

We moved into our house 3 1/2 years ago and opted out of them pouring a back patio (which they credited us money instead) because we wanted to put in a beautiful slate patio. Well... we got busy (found out we were pregnant with Jude the day we moved in) and quickly the backyard was given the nick name "jungle". :)

Well, two weeks ago Josh decided it was time to put in a backyard. So last week he worked each night after work and he put in a sprinkler system, then he leveled the ground with the help of a co-worker (thank you Dan!) and then he put in the lawn. We love it! The kids have a place to run and crawl and I love playing with them back there. Thank you Josh. You blessed my momma heart! I {heart} you, Baby! :)

Some weekends should have weekends :)

Phew! I feel like I've been running at full speed for about 4 days straight and if I sit too long I may just lean my head toward the arm of the chair and fall asleep. Josh and I packed a lot into our weekend! But it was wonderful! If it weren't so beautiful and sunny outside I'd be tempted to just recover all week holed away in my house in my sweats with the blinds closed. :)

We had a wonderful birthday weekend for the kids & celebrating birthdays with family down in Corvallis! I just love every moment I get to spend with our families. We enjoyed an evening with friends and a service at our church's new building. We put a lawn in our backyard (only 3 1/2 years after buying our house). And I photographed 4 beautiful little girls - all sisters. Thank you to everyone who gave us a helping hand this weekend! We're blessed with such fabulous friends and family.

I've barely even had a chance to look at their photos yet, but seeing this shot of this little cutie's smile made me smile today. I'll have more photos to share soon.

Published!

Yesterday was a fun day. Josh picked me up a copy of this months PDX Magazine - Portland's Where to Go What to Do Magazine. Chloe (sister-in-law) & Monica's catering business, Eat Your Heart Out, was written about in the "Planning a Particulary P-town Wedding" section, and one of my photos was used. (The bottom photo is mine. Sorry, I just took quick snap shots of the pages) If you look really closely under my picture it says, Photo by Bethanyf.com. :)

(I just found out this weekend that the cake photo on this page was taken by my friend Melanie. You can see her great site here!)

And here's another photo I took used in their advertisement


To view the magazine online click here
Here's what it looks like if you see it around town.


We're celebrating the kid's birthdays this weekend with family! Jude is turning 3 and Selah is turning 1! I can't believe it. I'll be sure to post a couple photos of their sweet faces.

Have a wonderful weekend!