The wind beneth my wings....

This last Friday, Aug 15'th was my mother's 50'th birthday!
I wanted to take this time to recognise my mother for the wonderful woman that she is! I would have to say, I truly believe that I ended up with the BEST mother in the entire world!!! I feel so blessed by the lord for the fact that he gave her to me! My mom truly is an angel from heaven above! I seriously do not know one person that does not love and respect her! She is one of the least selfish people I have ever had the opportunity to know, she is always looking for the things she can do for others and hardly ever thinks about herself! She has one of the strongest testimony's I have ever heard and felt! She is so strong in her beliefs and dedicates so much of her personal time to service in the church for her fellow friends, family, and church members. She has always, always been involved in leadership positions in the church which take up a lot of her personal time and energy and she does all that she is asked without complaint and with a big smile on her face. My mom is also highly respected in her job and has an amazing reputation among her work colleagues. She is absolutely adored by all of her children and grandchildren, as well as her wonderful husband! My mom has worked a full time job, had a leadership calling in church, kept a clean home, cooked a homemade meal, attended every athletic event, and been an amazing love and support to all of her children as well as her husband. There are so many times where I ask myself how one person can accomplish so beautifully all of the things she seems to accomplish daily. As busy as she has always been she has always been one of my Very Best Friends! I can talk to her freely about anything and I love that! I love the way that she keeps us (her kids and grand kids) in line, she does not discipline us out of fear or anger, she disciplines us out of respect. I remember one time I did something wrong and my mother said one of the things that has stuck with me forever, she said "Wow, I thought I did a better job at raising my daughter. I suppose I did not do as good of a job as I thought." I just wanted to shout "NO MOM!!!! You are perfect, it is all my fault, I am just totally dumb sometimes, I promise to never ever let you down again, please, please do not blame yourself!" I have always had the most respect in the world for this woman, and I could not ever bare to see her hurt and never ever wanted to let her down. She has done so much for us kids! For a few years of my childhood she was a single mom of my sister and I. She had to work full time to barely make it by. But I remember every single day when she would pick us up from the babysitters she would spend every moment she could with us, making sure she missed nothing! She is the strongest woman I have ever met in my entire life and I try every day to even be half the woman she is! I would be pleased with myself if I could do half the things that she does as a wife, mother, friend, sister, daughter, and more! I am so lucky to have her and I do not ever want to think of living even one day in the world without her. We have a unique bond that I know will never ever be broken. I thank the lord every single day for giving me such a righteous example to pattern my life after! Thank you mom for EVERYTHING you have EVER done for me and for ALL the things you will remain doing for me and my family! You will NEVER understand the depth of love I have for you! I will do my best to make sure you know as much as I can explain in words! I LOVE YOU and Happy Birthday, I am so happy you are only at the half way point!

Tag Your It!

OK so I suppose how this goes is as soon as you see that you have been tagged you need to get up and take these pictures, no time to clean or whatever else you want to do. I guess it is a look into your every day life without having time to fluff! These are the ways we get to know one another...I kinda think this one is silly but cool at the same time! So as hard as it was for me to not pick up, I DID IT!!!
Here goes... my daily life!

Favorite Room:(I have 2 favorites so I just took pics of both of them! O and my dog follows me everywhere and apparently LOVES the camera so that is why he is in most of these shots...show off!)
This is where I spend pretty much most of my home life!!! Kip and I both! I have a blanket out because whenever I lay down to do anything on the couch I need a blanket...strange I know. I am also reading Breaking Dawn...sitting on the blanket! ITS AMAZING!!!!!! You have to read it!
This room is not one of my favorites for the decorating we have put into it, obviously, but I would have to say that this is my "HAPPY PLACE"....from sleeping of course ;)

Your Closet:
No I did not clean it, I just have problems. Everything is sorted by color and then sleeve length. My sister does it too!

Toilet:
Aaaawww...also a happy place. J/K! SO get this!!! My husband has had to train me to put the toilet lid down, he can not stand the way it looks when it is up! Most men can't even put the toilet seat down and he has to have the lid down too. I actually like that I have been trained because it prevents my dog from drinking the water and getting it ALL OVER MY HOUSE!!! He is the messiest drinker I have EVER SEEN!

Laundry Room:
There are still cloths in the dryer, I hate folding and putting away! NO FUN!!

Refrigerator:
Lots of food for two people!! Needs to be full of healthy food!

Favorite Shoes:
I have recently remembered how much I LOVE RUNNING!!! These are Echo's favorite shoes because it means he gets to go out! I love these shoes!

What your kids are doing:
Well as for right now this is my child, and as for now this is what he is doing...just waiting for me to get up and go into another room so he can follow me. The poor dog never stays in one place for long when I have things to get done because he has to be in the same room as me!
And this is a representation of what my little HUMAN kids are doing right now! Being perdy little eggs! Hopefully to become something in the hopefully near future!

Self Portrait:
Here you can tell I totally did not take the time to fluff!!! EEEEekkkksssss!!!
OK so I choose to tag Melissa(Idaho), Becky(Utah), Sunny Joe(Utah), Britt(Utah), Effie(???Chicago right???), Hilla Bean(Idaho), Bryan(Moving far, far away), Ryan(Georgia), Dacia(Idaho), and Chels(Pensylvania??? Right?)! All of you because you live far away and I have never ever seen where you live and I wanna see it!!! I also do not get to see you regularly so I want to see an every day life of you folks!!! LOVE YA ALL!!

Girls Just Wanna......

.....GET NEW CLOTHS!!!! A week or so ago my good friend Lyndzee, who throws the funnest shindigs ever, had a clothing swap girls night!!! We had SO MUCH FUN and I think that I ended up going home with more clothing than anybody else there. I took full advantage of people not liking their old cloths that I happened to LOVE!!! I tried to play fair? But I am loving my new wardrobe and am SO GLAD that I was invited, not only for the cloths but for the fun, fun, fun we had and the company we shared.
We decided at the end to do a small photo shoot with our crappy little camera's in the nasty outfits we could put together. Here are some of the shots I got. I do not know what was going on with my camera for a few of them. But eventually I got it to work.
ENJOY Laughing your head off!
The whole group looking nastified!
Lyndzee
Cindel
Jenn
Katie S.
Megan
Katie G. looking like Austin Powers, you should have seen the shirt with the jacket in person. SO FUNNY!
Me
While there all dressed up like a nerd I got a call from Kipper telling me that he got an interview with LA City Fire Department. It is on our Anniversary and My Birthaday Sept. 2nd! We are SO SO SO Excited for him to be to this next step in the long long process. What a good way to start our 3rd year! He is doing everything he can to prepare to do well in his interview! Wish us luck, well, him he needs to do all the work, I just love and support!

BFF's

So our little Echo has found his match. His cousin dog Bella a Yellow Lab is the same age as Echo and they have almost identical personalities. It is so stinking cute to see them together, they seriously LOVE, LOVE, LOVE one another! Every time that Kipper and I go down to San Diego we now bring Echo with us so he can have some Bella time. Which is good for both him and Bella because they are both totally Exhausted by the end of the play day. We LOVE it!
Now every time we are going to get into the car he is waiting to see if he is invited, he seriously Loves his car rides and is so good in there as well. I am especially impressed when he needs to ride in my little car, he is so well behaved as long as he gets to sit in the front with mommy. He loves to be close to us and the back seat is just WAY too far away for him. He cracks me up! He now can recognise my sisters house and freaks out in the car when he see's it as we pull up. He jumps out of the car as fast as he can and just runs up to the front door and sits there till I get there to open it. As soon as Amanda answers the door he runs through her house straight to the screen door just begging to go out and play with his BFF! It is so cute. They have been known to play NON STOP for up to 6 hours. Here are some cute pics from our last trip down to San Diego.
Echo Boy!
Bella Girl!
Echo, Makenna, and Bella

Tug of war with a popped Soccer Ball!
Cute litte mommy Amanda and Makenna who is being such a big girl these days.

Totally sleeping in the car like a person and zonked out from a long day of playing. The whole hour ride home! SO CUTE!

A Few Faves

I had the wonderful opportunity to shoot the wedding of good family friends of ours, Dev and Lisa Patel! Congrats to you Newlyweds!

Dev and Lisa were a total joy to shoot, they were patient even though it was HOT outside and Dev had to have been cooking in his tux. The day was absolutely Beautiful, not a cloud in the sky. You could not ask for a more beautiful wedding day.

Here are a few of my favorites. I have not really had any time to edit them or even go through them all but here is a sneak preview!