Summer Day at Uncle Monty's

My Aunt Beth and Uncle Monty have a wonderful swimming pool in Tumwater. These two people are very special to me. Being my Mom's youngest brother, he was around ALL the time when we were younger. In fact, my first memory comes from their wedding...I was only 2 and 1/2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I don't remember the whole day; my brain isn't that big:). But I do remember tugging on my Aunt's dress and asking her to get me mints off the table because I couldn't reach them. Through out the years we have shared MANY more fun memories. I mean, these were my 'cool' aunt and uncle!! They were young and I thought they were the coolest...probably because they are:).

Here is Uncle Monty...enjoying the hot day...(side note: I totes think he looks like my Grandpa...more so than ANY of his siblings). Scotty and his girlfriend, Tallia (I hope I spelled that right, she told me a few times that day, but that was a couple weeks ago:)).

Big Boy Roy!!!!!!!!!!! Love this little guy. He is such a boy:). However, as Sophia said, "His eye lashes are a little bit princess." Such a beautiful boy.

Daddy and Son...this kid LOVES his Dad. Always wants to follow him around...too cute.

My Uncle's new dog....soooooooo sweet and cute!!!

This next one cracks me up! She is like, "Get over here now!! Take a picture with me and look cute!! Act like you love me!!!"

"Okay, now I am ready for the picture. Don't I look cute and sweet!?!?!"

These two pictures crack me up...the sequence is perfect:).

I love that she is playing with these Fisher Price toys. These are my Aunt Beth's toys from when she was little. I remember playing with them when I was a little girl and now Sophia gets to play with them. Fisher Price Little People (the original ones, not the big ones they have now) does it get any better than that?!?

I am deep in some type of convo...who knows what was so important

...And to end the long day...Griff's cute little shoes. He was beat and just left the shoes in the entry way.

Thank you Aunt Beth and Uncle Monty for always being such great support for all of us and for letting us play with your toy (the pool). Aunt Beth, you taught me how to swim for real...not just doggie paddle, and to dive. You are a great teacher and a blessing to have...glad I get to show me the skills you tauhgt me in your pool:). A pool is a great excuse to hang out on a hot day. I love you both and love that we keep making great memories:).

Oh, the lazy, hazy, crazy dayz of summer....they are great...

Pictures that make me smile

Ok, so the following pictures are in a really weird order...I had to get them from my sisters camera so my uploading was very scattered. The pictures start from the end of the night and then work their way to the beginning...more or less:).

The night before Kora's bachelorette party, we had the mansion already rented so we took advantage of it to have a family night. It was so friggin fun!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was the first time in awhile that all of us were together....equals a good time:). These are just some of the pictures that make me smile.

Seriously, this was one of the last pictures of the night. Obviously, my husband and I were demonstrating how those crazy kids dance today...or something like that...

Love this guy...

I LOVE THIS PICTURE!! Every time I look at it I laugh. Kyle and Joe are just being brothers and lovin' on each other...and then those two other boys just really want to be in the pic and be brothers too!!!

Even though I was FREEZING, they made me take off my hood so that I wouldn't look like the unibomber in every picture:).

This just makes me smile every time!!!

Why are my sisters grabbing my boob?!?!?!?!

I don't know what is going on here....maybe Kim is hungry?????

I love how hard we all are laughing!!!

LOVE this picture...total framer. I need to get one of these printed for my parents...all of their babies:).

See, I told you the uploading was crazy...this picture is from the beginning of the night. I love Richie's cute little smile.
These may be the best of all. These three were sitting on the couch chatting and I was across the room. I started laughing because they were all sitting sooooo close without even realizing it. I had to grab the camera and snap some shots...this is what they came up with when they realized I was taking pics...

It was such a fun night!! I knew it was good when Richie crawled into bed late that night and said, "Ris, I had so much fun tonight!" Statements like that rarely come out of his mouth, so I knew it wasn't just me loving time with the fam:).

I love you guys and thank you for being so fabulous!!!!!

Colin 2011

Colin is a Senior at Capital High School. I had the pleasure of taking his Senior Pictures a couple weeks ago. His parents have a beautiful backyard area, so I was able to meet him there and get all the pictures done in one location. Colin was great to work with. Very easy going!! Like most of the boys that I shoot, he was ready to be done posing for pictures after just over an hour, so he made my job easy:). However, in that short time I was able to get sooooo many wonderful pictures. It was hard for me to pick my favorites to share with you all!!

Colin is on the Capital basketball team so we got a few pictures with his warm up shirt and the basketball...they turned out to be some of my favorites!!!

I LOVED his dog, Shadow. He was such a sweet little guy...we had to get him in a couple pictures!

This one may be my FAVORITE from the whole day. Only for the reason that when I showed it to him he said that was the picture that looked the most like him. Whenever I do a shoot, I try to tell people to wear something they feel comfortable and themselves in so that they look back on the pictures and remember what they were like in high school. He said he always wears hoodies and this one is his favorite...I think the pictures show that he was the most comfortable in this outfit:).

Kora's Bachelorette Party

A couple weekends ago we had a bachelorette party to mark the end of Kora's single life. We ended up staying at the Olympia Mansion, which is right on the water off of Eastbay Drive (for all you Olympians who know where that is). It was beautiful. We could not rent the house for just one night, so the first night my family was able to hang out and have some fun together before all the women showed up the next day. Both nights were so memorable and fun. I think that Kora was able to enjoy herself and relax with family and friends. (If you want to see more about the first night with family, see the blog "Eat, Drink, and Be Merry" linked on the side of my blog.)

Here is the bride waiting for her friends to arrive. We had high hopes of getting the day started at high noon, however, the family fun the night before took its toll on some of us an we were not quick to jump out of bed the next morning. Abigail made her first appearance at a bachelorette party. We like to start them young:). My Mom was with us for most of the day, but after gifts were opened her and Abby headed home and left the girls to play at the mansion.

Kora with her Maitren (sp???) of Honor.

Sitting out front...the view was AMAZING!

Now that is A LOT of bling!! My family likes to "play ring" with each others rings...Kora decided to "play ring" with everyone's ring at one time.

This was the first time that Kimberly has brought her "A" game since before she was pregnant. At one point, when she was being typical drunk Kim, I had to tell her how much I have missed her this past year and a half:). I think this picture proves that it was time for everyone to go to bed...oh wait, Wendy might already be sleeping:).

Eating breakfast the next morning before we all said goodbye.

It was such an amazing weekend!!!!!!!!!! Thank you to everyone who attended.

The beautiful Dakotah...

Amazing...this whole shoot was amazing. I have had Dakotah in class since she was a Sophomore. I have loved to watch her grow into an "almost" adult. She is so different today than she was the first day I met her. I cannot believe that she is a Senior and will be graduating this year. I will miss having her in class.

Beware...there are a lot of pictures to follow...only for the reason that so many of them were amazing, it was hard to choose witch pictures I wanted to display. I hope you all enjoy:).

I had so much fun with this shoot!!! Thanks Dakotah, you were great!!!

Anyone who knows of a 2011 Senior that wants to get inexpensive pictures done before the yearbook cutoff, which is usually early October, let me know...I can squeeze them in:)!