Wallace's 5th Grade Photos

Wallace is graduating elementary school, and the teachers asked for a current photo as well as a baby photo for a slide show they do for the kids. This slide show meant a lot to Anna, but Wallace is more confused by it than anything. He just wants to make sure he’s not the only kid submitting photos. I’ve assured him that if he doesn’t submit photos, he will be the only one who doesn’t. And since I haven’t been the best at taking photos lately, I needed to get him out and actually take a current photo of him. I am so pleased with how well they came out!

He really fought me with getting dressed for this. He wanted to just wear what he already had on…or a sweatshirt that he wears every day. We compromised on this.

This is the photo we actually ended up using. :) So handsome!

And even though I hauled one of our super heavy iron chairs out to the trail behind the house, we didn’t end up using any of the seated photos. Oh well…at least I got a workout.

He decided to go with this baby photo. It’s pretty cute, and it was fun to go back through all the old baby pictures. I got my camera when he was a baby, so it was also interesting to see all of my original filters, and all that blur… yikes. Even Wallace was commenting on it.

Carson's Senior Pictures

I was so excited to get to shoot Carson’s senior pictures this year! What an honor. She drove all the way out here from Houston to take photos at some of her favorite summer places. Before she could even get here though, my computer hard drive crashed! Fortunately, my son just got a new gaming computer, and the components for gaming and photography are surprisingly similar, so I was able to make it work (even though I totally gave his computer a virus….so sorry buddy). Wallace helped me go through the processed photos this morning to pick out our favs to post here. :)

Beach House 2022

I love the beach! The trip I look forward to all year.

I was so happy that Ruthie and Hannah got to join us for the whole week!

I decided to try to learn all about fill flash on this trip. Meh…The verdict is still out. It’s obviously got it’s limitations. I took one photo of Henry without the flash, and the shadows across his face were definitely much more noticeable, but the bokeh in the background was also nicer. Tradeoffs.

Well…I mean, it definitely made a difference here. With his hat and his back to the sun, we’d never of seen his face.

Okay…enough camera talk. Cute kids playing at the beach!

Wallace got a pretty bad boogie board rash. He also realized that together we failed to pack any shirts for him. lol. So he got a couple of souvenir shirts to wear over and over again.

Ice cream truck! Meredith dropped her first one and came running back over before I even got a chance to pay…

I love all the different choices.

He’s such an old man. He’ll always go for an ice cream sandwhich.

Must be something about youngest children and Sonic…

This was such a long day for parents. I think we had gone to the big slide before coming out to the beach for several hours.

The rest of the photos I have are from our second day of crabbing, and Ruthie took all of them. I have to be honest, she did an amazing job! I love a lot of her photos. So we did two days of crabbing this year because we were planning on a large crowd for stuffed crab night. Good thing crabbing is pretty much my favorite beach house activity!

Yummy!

So, our regular place is under construction. We’ve crabbed in this spot before though. Last year Jen and I crabbed all day and ended up here for the last half of the day.

Don’t you love his souvenir shirt? :)

Anna caught a crab!!!!

You stand in the water a lot at this crabbing location.

And there were so many jelly fish. After she got stung the first day, Jen got some fancy pants leggings for the second day!

So, I saw that Jen brought this crab “hook” with her that she said Matt likes to use. I told her it looked ridiculous. But then when all the pots were being used by kids, I decided to give it a try and fell in love with it! I ended up buying my own, and then Jen got me a net for my birthday! It’s such a fun way to crab!

I might look bored, but I’m just very slowly “luring” crabs in.

The kids caught a flounder in one of the crab pots for the first time ever!

And this is the tiniest hermit crab we’ve ever seen.

On the whole, crabbing was a success. Jen only cut her foot once, and I only lost one crab hook to the rocks. So…not bad. Everyone enjoyed the crab. I even learned how to pick them this year.

Can’t wait to do it all again next year.

Meredith's 1st Communion

Last weekend Meredith had her First Communion, a very special event 2 years in the making.

It took a long time after Wallace had his First Communion for Meredith to understand that she would have to go through the same 2 years of preparation that he went through before it would be her turn. And when she started this last year of religious education, she thought way back in September that any Sunday would be the Sunday. It took several weeks to get her to understand that it would not take place until May…for a good reason. She had quite a bit to learn.

So we spent our evenings learning prayers and watching educational videos, and there were a few weekends with religious workshops. She diligently attended everything, and was my best kid at memorization.

Way back in November I started to get concerned with all the shortages and panics that I should go ahead and get her dress early, so she picked it out online. She fell in LOVE with this butterfly dress immediately. It was the first one she saw, and even though I made her look at all of the other options by the same designer, she just kept going back to it…she knew exactly what she wanted.

We did painstaking measurements, and I’d even bought Anna’s dress from the same designer, so with that one for comparison, I felt confident she’d have room to grow into the size we bought….but it was a perfect fit back in November when it arrived! So, on Sunday, the top two buttons in the back actually weren’t buttoned. We could have buttoned them, but Meredith can’t handle being restricted in clothing, so she was much more comfortable leaving some space. Good thing she’s got long hair!

After learning the ropes with Anna, I also chose to go straight back to the super friendly discount bridal shop with Meredith to get her veil. They were very sweet. She was a bundle of energy and excitement that morning. She’d been looking forward to getting her veil for months! I took her dress with us so we could get a perfect color match, and the store attendants were ohhing and ahhing over the dress and the 3-D butterflies on it. Just in general making a fuss over Meredith. Every time Meredith went to move across the store she would literally JUMP with excitement before moving, and I’d have to whisper to her to walk and not skip or run anywhere and to be careful not to knock anything over. “Don’t touch, don’t touch, don’t touch!” Then she’d be literally hopping in place. We ended up deciding to replace the tiara we’d already bought because it just wasn’t a great fit and rhinestones were falling off of it constantly, so she shopped for a new tiara there as well, and then she decided on her veil. The shop owner even helped me replace a rhinestone that had fallen out of the old tiara that we’d brought to the shop with us. They really are the best bridal shop in town. As I was checking out, trying to pay her and keep an eye on Meredith (who of course was acting like a bull in a china cabinet) at the same time, the shop owner very sweetly said to me, “I have one just like her, it’s totally fine.” I can’t explain how much it means to me when someone says something like that and has understanding and an appreciation for Meredith’s energy rather than a disdain. I love Meredith just the way she is, I wouldn’t change a thing about her. I wish everyone could appreciate and have patience with her “energy”, but I realize it’s challenging for some people. I’m just so happy when I run across people who get it, and I love to pay it forward to others who have girls like her and make understanding comments like the shop owner did to me that day.

About a week before the big day we finally went to get Meredith some shoes. She was all about comfort! So, her white sandals are super cushy, and I had a hard time keeping her out of them for the entire week leading up to the mass. But she knew she did not want to deal with uncomfortable shoes on her big day. This girl is wise beyond her years.

I was glad the week before he big day she let me do a practice run on her hair because we learned some things….#1. It took forever, 2. She needed a chair to sit in, #3. She also needed an iPad. So, on Sunday, she wasn’t grouchy, and we got it all done in time! Soooo much hair spray! My arm was sticky.

I was so proud of Meredith for getting through her First Communion mass like such a big girl. This was one of the first masses…if not possibly the very first mass that she did not at some point completely lay out on the pew or the floor, or just sit on the floor…she did try several times to burrow her head into me, but she really couldn’t because of her tiara and her veil. It was a VERY long mass. There was a baptism in addition to the first communion, so it was an hour and a half long. They were really testing her limits of being able to sit still. She did great!

After the mass, Josh said to me, “You did a good job, she looked great.” And I thought about it, and said…”Oh…well hey, I didn’t pick any of that out.” Haha! Meredith put together her whole outfit herself. I had a tiny bit of say in her hairstyle, but not much. When I stepped back and really thought about it, I was just that much more impressed with her.

I want to thank everyone who helped in some way to make this big day special. It’s a day she worked hard to fully understand the importance of, and a day she will remember forever.

Ruthie's Chicken Show

So this year at the Montgomery County Fair, I was down one kiddo because Wallace had to stay home for a football game. He was not the least bit bummed though because Granny got him an amazing new Lego set that he worked on most of the weekend. I’m pretty sure he didn’t miss us at all.

At the fair, in an effort to curb the “when can we go to the carnival” whines during the chicken show, I got to the fair grounds early with Meredith and took her to ride the rides as soon as they opened. She and Anna got in a few rides and even got some funnel cake, a corn dog, and some cotton candy to eat while watching the chicken show. And do you know what….it didn’t work. I still heard carnival whines… I guess it’s just inevitable. It’s impossible for an 8-year-old to patiently sit and watch a chicken show while there is a carnival right behind her!

Oh…she also got some M&M’s.

Anna was ready to push any small child who got in her way to make sure she got the chicken on the carousel. Fortunately, we were early, and that wasn’t necessary.

For a while at the chicken show Meredith entertained herself by jumping all over Carson.

That only lasted so long…

And Anna read a lot.

Sarah appeared a bit anxious…as any chicken parent would be.

It was a l-o-n-g show. This guy was super thorough.

I didn’t have a lot of opportunities to get shots of the process, but Ruthie won! The whole show!

Chickens are a family affair. :)

From someone who knows just how much blood, sweat, and tears you’ve put into this…CONGRATULATIONS!!!