His Image

After several months of researching cameras, studying, and taking LOTS of pictures, I have officially started a photography business! I am really excited and cannot wait to see what God does through this venture I feel Him leading me in.
Photography has been a love of mine for a long time, taking several classes in high school and in recent years has turned into more of a passion, especially as I've had children. I love it when I capture a moment or expression that I don't ever want to forget and, because of a photograph, won't ever have to. I started to think about doing this for others and got really excited about the possibility of turning something I love so much into a business. Stepping back from Silpada allowed me to sell some jewelry samples and be able to invest in a nice camera.
I would love it if you would check out my website. I am offering introductory pricing as I gain experience and build my portfolio. Pictures can be seen in the galleries, as well as under slideshows. If you do not have a photographer, I would be honored to take your children or family's pictures. My style is very laid back, capturing children playing and just being themselves.
www.hisimageportraits.com

owen 10/07

Corn Maze and Pumpkin Patch

Our annual trip to the corn maze and pumpkin patch was last weekend and we had a beautiful day. We didn't make it through the whole corn maze as the kids were getting a little motion sick bumpin along in their strollers but we did get some pretty good family pictures, which has not happened since June in Hilton Head. Beth, Jenn, Andy and Lilly Medley joined us as well, and we all had a good time. The pumpkin patch is my favorite place to take pictures for some reason. I filled my 2gb card - 272 pictures in less than an hour :)

Carving pumpkins

The kids had a lot of fun drawing faces and carving them, although Kai and I were the only ones who enjoyed the messy seeds. That's my favorite part :) Matt showed his skill after they went to bed with a "Go Colts" and horseshoe on the last pumpkin. Unfortunately, I didn't take a picture I'm realizing right now. Maybe later :)

little gymnast

Princess dancers

This sessions ballet dance was "Princesses on Parade" - very fitting for these girlies who like to wear their princess outfits everyday. This was Macy and Emma's first time joining Makenna at YMCA dance and they all three had a great time. At the end of every class they do a spotlight dance and each girl dances by herself across the gym, does a curtsy to the teacher, and gives her a hug. It's so sweet. This picture was with Miss Shelly, Miss Kelly's helper.

precious

They are seriously so sweet with eachother- 85% of the time. :) Makenna frequently says "you're the best sister" and hugs Macy and they tell eachother how pretty they look and "good job" if they've done something. I just pray they stay this close and sweet forever!

yummy

Kai is doing well. It has been a tough two weeks for him and I but in the last couple days he has finally started to be happy for the most part during the day and willing to come out of my arms and play. He is still upset a lot at night and not sleeping great, but I'm sure that will get better soon as well. The hardest thing for him now is that he wants to eat crackers and apples and all the good things he's used to eating by himself. He gets so mad and shows his little temper. I'm sure he is getting sick of pudding, jello, yogurt, and applesauce. These pictures were from the other night when Matt and I wanted to eat, without holding him, so we put him in the highchair and gave him a jello and pudding and let him have fun. I'm pretty sure he only ate a bite or two and just played the rest of the time. We didn't care because we both got to eat with two hands and he went straight to the tub. :) His follow-up appointment is Wed so we will find out how it is healing and how much more jello and soft foods he has to look forward too.

feeling better

Last night was MUCH better! Kai actually slept from 6:30 last night to 7:15 this morning. He was groaning a couple times in bed during the night but never woke up. Today he has still obviously been in pain but his medicine seems to be taking care of it a little better. He played a little and was happy at times. He still wanted to be held most of the time and slept a good part of the day. Tomorrow will be even better for him I'm sure. Thank you all for your prayers and your sweet & encouraging comments on the blog. We are so blessed to have so many supportive friends and family!!
A special thanks to my wonderful friend Marisa who I realized I forgot to mention in my earlier post. She stayed with me at the hospital Mon. night so that Matt could get some sleep before being on call and my mom could go home since she had been at the hospital since 5am (my grandpa was admitted to the same hospital for a cat bite infection at that time) Marisa only slept a little and even though Kai would only go to her for my quick trips to the bathroom, she provided great moral support and conversation while we sat awake with him. Love you!

update on Kai

Well the plan we had about Kai and I drifting to sleep for the night in his crib did not go quite according to plan unfortunately. Shortly after we got in bed, we discovered his IV was out. :( The nurse had to talk to the doctors and figure out whether it needed to be replaced and one of the ways to avoid it was to see if he would drink enough fluids on his own. So the next hour or so was spent trying to get him to take sips of several different drinks. He would try but then cry when he had to swallow. So sad. They decided to wait on restarting the IV and give him oral pain medication which didn't go very well either. He just couldn't ever get very comfortable and would fall asleep and wake up 5 minutes later almost all night. Part of it too was that he is having itching as a side effect of the medicine so that was making him rub all over his face all the time and get upset. That on top of the fact that he had a fever made for a long night and about 15 minutes of sleep for me and in and out of sleep all night for him. Thankfully early this morning the nurse got more desperate with the doctor and she found out there is oral Morphine which helped get on top of the pain - definitely would have appreciated that piece of information several hours earlier:) After a second dose of Benadryl for the itching and finally some restful sleep for him helped a lot. He woke up and took a fair amount of water, started to look happier and had a little pudding. They discharged us around noon and he has continued to have periods of being happy and eating a little for a couple hours after the medicine and then two hours of not so happy as it wears off. He has been asleep for awhile now so hopefully the medicine will do better tonight! We would appreciate your continued prayers as he heals and goes through the frustrations of not using his arms, having difficulty crawling and not being able to feed himself or eat a lot of his favorite foods. Rough on a 14 month old! Going to bed now to hopefully sleep for awhile!

The long road to recovery

Here's our big boy, waiting so patiently in his recliner with the remote. Note the cute salmon colored hospital outfit he is sporting, also about 3 times to big. He did pretty well considering he hadn 't eaten in 7 hours. Our favorite part of the morning was when we were in the waiting room with him and animal planet was on the tv. He stopped to watch it and said wfff, wfff and we noticed a dog was on the tv. Such a smart little boy, and now with a complete palate, he will be able to pronounce woof, woof.

This is the first shot of him with Kelly after the surgery. It was very sad. He moaned and groaned for a while, but was consoled after being in mommy's arms. It's hard to tell much was done, except for the little bit of blood on the side of his mouth.

Kai spent most of the day in and out of sleep, from a long day of surgery and from the pain medication. His body also decided to spring a fever on him, which didn't help things. We were blessed to have great nurses that stayed on top of his pain medications and fever.

Life is always better with a mommy to snuggle. Kelly decided she could fit in Kai's hospital crib so that hopefully both could get some sleep tonight. Macy and Makenna also came up to see their little brother and offer lots of love and kisses. Thank you all for your prayers today and for those to come for his recovery. It will be a challenging time for our family, but we know God is faithful to provide all that we need.

Out of surgery

The Dr. just came in to let us know that Kai is out of surgery and everything went well. He is waking up in recovery now and we should be able to go see him soon. The Dr said with how wide his cleft was he wants him in the splints for three weeks so his hands don't go in his mouth, as well as any hard food, to make sure it heals right. While we were waiting for him to go back to surgery he took two steps to Matt so he might be a walking boy soon! A good thing in the sense that it will be hard to crawl with the splints, but scary because of the chance of falling and hitting his mouth. The coffee table will definitely be out! Thank you all for your prayers and I will post more later.

So cute

Yeah, I finally got a picture to upload! I came into the kitchen the other day to find Kai amidst a bunch of things he had pulled out of the pantry and helping himself to a bag of crackers. I decided he was happy and was just having a snack so I walked out of the room to do something and came back to a trail of them all the way across the kitchen and living room. Who could get mad at that sweet face? Not to mention a good mommie would have him in a highchair. :)
Thank you all for your prayers as he has his surgery today. I'm going to see if I can go to sleep now, as I give my mommy anxiety over to God. I just wish I could go through it all instead of him. :(

sorry

I just published the post below and wow, sorry it's so long! Hopefully you won't mind at least skimming and seeing the prayer requests at the bottom.

updates

So I'm a little ticked at Mr. Blogger. I have tried for several days to get pictures to upload and no matter how many I try at a time, it will not work. I decided I would at least provide a written update and maybe someday soon technology and I will be friends again. Let's see, in the last month we've:
-Had fun at Hillfest at Northview, including Kai and Owen's first running race with grandpa
-Mommy went to Orlando for the MOPS convention and had a great time while daddy and kiddos had fun with grammy & poppa
-All been quite miserable with the stomach flu
-Visited the Bales in North Judson and got pumpkins at a fun pumpkin patch, oh and passed on the stomach flu, not realizing anyone was still contagious - oops.
-Started a photography business - working on a webpage that I'm sure some of you have seen since I have a couple anxious, but very supportive, friends :) It's not quite ready but I will send it out soon.
-sadly today got in a car wreck with the kids and our friends Sara and Luke. We were on our way home from shopping at Gap Outlet and seeing daddy at work, since he's on call tonight and got in an accident in an intersection. Nobody was hurt, thank you God! And the van, we'll see. She might be done. Fortunately for us, we have a good friend Josh who happens to be in the car business and was already keeping his eyes out for one with less miles for us. Let him or I know if you ever need a car. Their website is www.mats.org It is a great ministry that helps people find great cars at a really good price and their primary focus is missionaries or others in ministry but they are happy to help anyone! The other amazing way that I saw God today, which He has been teaching me to ask and watch for, was that within 10 minutes of the accident, my friend, Renee who works in MOPS leadership with me drove by with an empty van and enough carseats for them to all climb right in, not to mention she had Diego to turn on and keep them entertained and distracted. She took them and Sara home while I finished the details with the car. She was on her way to work, which was the reason none of her four kids were with her. Thankfully they didn't mind that she was late and I was so thankful to her and to our amazing heavenly father who never ceases to amaze me!
I think that's the main things, at least that I can remember right now.
Oh and prayers please for what's to come -
Monday is Kai's palate surgery which we would definitely appreciate prayers for. Poor kid is already teething, has an ear infection and a really sore diaper rash. He will be in the hospital until he decides to drink fluids which will hopefully only be a night, maybe two and then will come home with splints on his arms and lots of pain medication! Oh how I'm ready for it to be over.
A busy month on the wards for Matt. Lots of call and four days off this month. Fun fun :)

What says summer like an ice cream cone?

A day at the zoo

We had a fun and very hot day at the zoo with Kristi, Owen, Grandma, and Beth. Most of the animals were our despite the heat and the kids all enjoyed seeing them, as well as playing in the water. Macy, however, was not a fan of the dolphin show. Going in a big new place and turning down the lights was not her idea of a good time. That girl does not like what she doesn't know and is certainly not gonna be a risk taker! She didn't even want to exit out a door that she didn't come in because she wasn't certain what was behind it :)

Happy 1st birthday Kai!

We had a fun day of playing at the spray park on Kai's actual birthday. I can't believe he's one. He is the sweetest little thing and has me wrapped around his finger. I have absolutely loved having a boy and think it is so much fun seeing the differences that just being a boy bring about! God just creates them so differently. Even though, he is surrounded with girly things and has two sisters around, he still finds the only car in the room to push around, loves to bang and hit things, and gets really excited everytime somebody is throwing a ball and wants to hold it himself. He is certainly "all boy" and I love, love, love him!

three sweet friends who love princesses!

macy emma & kenna

i'm so glad i'm the third child!

Mommy never would have let Macy eat a popsicle when she was 11 1/2 months old. Boy does it feel good on teething gums! And mommy does say in her defense that they are real fruit ones :) yum yum
Boy am I messy! This stuff is running all down my arm and is all over my clothes - so much for the bib! Not to mention it's a girlie flower bib. Again, it's obvious I'm a third child. :)
Um it's gone and I'll have another! And throw a 1 year old tantrum when I don't get one and most definitely when I have to get a wipes bath! Can't I just stay sticky all night?

(These were taken before his birthday and yes he did turn one last week. I don't have the festivities posted yet because I am waiting on the adorable cake eating pictures and some others that are all on my mom's camera. I'll post them soon!)

We love to swim!

Go to Trombley's blog for a couple of really cute pictures Sara took when we went to this Indy swim park by their house -well and other more recent pictures of our family since she's a little more on top of it than I am!

Kai loves to tool around our neighborhood baby pool in his float. He can touch the bottom so he can go wherever he wants. It's so cute.

Indians Game

Kai had fun at his first baseball game, especially playing with grandpa!

Aunt Kristi sharing her love of cotton candy with Macy and Makenna - I'm pretty sure Makenna took this picture. She took about a hundred pictures, no lie, that night. Sugar em up!

The move

So these pictures are a little late, kind of like everything on my blog this summer, but it doesn't feel like it's really happened until it's on the blog. And so, here are some pictures from the move and of our fantastic swing set- hours of summer fun already! They are swinging fools!

Such a fun cookie cake a girl I am working with this year in MOPS brought over along with a yummy lunch when we were moving. Thanks Renee!

It is definitely feeling very home sweet home. We are pretty much unpacked and decorated and are very happy in our new house. This is some of my dad's finest work. If you're lucky he might do a mural on your family room wall like this! He is starting a painting business after all !
As you can see my great friend Sara did lots of work and was highly motivated by vanilla cokes!After a couple days of getting as much painting done, we started moving in the boxes - what a job!

Um girls, where are your boxes? This isn't play time :) I color on boxes! Kenna is our little artist. She loves to color on and with anything, including screws on freshly painted walls - looks a lot like black pen in case you're wondering :)

Big helper Emma !
Some of our moving crew - thanks to everybody who helped. You're the best!