Mom and Dad's visit

My parents and James and Lehi came to visit as well this past weekend for Asher's baby blessing.  We had a lot of fun with them and hung out at Gasworks Park in Seattle, ate some yummy food, toured the USS Turner Joy in Bremerton, took the ferry, and Shem enjoyed playing multiple games with Lehi.

 Lehi turned 17!  I can't believe how old he is now.  I made the cake for him and I loved decorating it!  I want to get into cake decorating now that I'm home.

 The USS Turner Joy was a lot of fun to explore because you could go everywhere on the ship without a tour guide.  Shem even climbed up into the gun where the army dude would sit and shoot the bad guys!  Asher was with him too in the baby carrier.  You can just barely see his face through the glass.

Remember the mud pit?

Back in April Shem finished putting up our new shed!  He has since put some nice stepping stones around it and right now we're trying to grow some new grass.  Doesn't my shed look amazing!  The neighbor's are so jealous!

Look here to see what the yard used to look like.

Here it is in progess and finished.

I absolutely love our shed!  It was one of the best things we could've done to our place.

Asher's baby blessing

We blessed Asher on Sunday at our church with the family.  Mine and Shem's family combined took up at least 5 rows during sacrament meeting which was quite a sight to see!  Shem's family talked about how their Dad would have been so proud to see that his posterity takes up that many rows at church. :)  I'm sure he was there though, in spirit, because Shem gave our child a very beautiful name and blessing.  I'm so in love with that man and so honored to be his wife and partner in parenthood!

After church we gathered at Dawn's house for lunch and enjoyed some good eats!  Everyone loved passing the baby around and Asher, I'm sure, loved the attention because he was a perfect angel all day.

Again, I failed to get pictures of Asher with my parents a midst the chaos of hosting and being the photographer.  Here are some shots that I did get.

 Uncle James with Asher.  Isn't Asher's outfit so adorable!  I love little boys in dress clothes.

 The McLennan's.  Fuzzy, but documented and I can't complain about that.

 Cousin Soren with Asher.  Quinae's kids are so sweet with the baby!  

 Dad taking a silly picture with the baby.

 Gramma T with Asher.

 Xander with Asher.  I'm sure he was trying to make his mouth move by putting his fingers on his lips and manually moving them.  

Another Day, Another Blow-out

Asher was eatting and this was the gift he gave me...

...Did I mention that he peed on me too right before he got into the bath?  

Just about 6 weeks old!

I can't believe that Asher is already a month and a half old!  Time is certainly going by much faster.  Here are some things that I love about my Bug:

-He pretty much is the best sleeper ever!  He will go down between 10:00pm and 11:00pm and sleep until 6:00am!

-He eats like a champ and likes to "tank-up" right before bed with two big feedings close together.

-He weighs 8 lbs. and 2 oz. now which means he's been gaining about 1 oz/day!

-He smiles

-He loves to be held

-He loves his swing

-Falls asleep to white noise

-If all else fails then the hair dryer is his (and our) best friend. :)

-He is a charmer and smiled for the lactation consultant on demand the other day.

-He is beginning to like bath time more as long as I turn the bathroom into a sauna before getting him all naked and wet.

-He loves our track lighting and will stare at it when I turn the lights on (it's the black and white contrast that gets him).

We love our little Asher so much and we can't believe how good he is.  Here are some recent favorite photos of him

 4 weeks old.

 4 weeks old

 The rest are all from yesterday after he peed on me, the carpet, over his head to hit the ipod speakers, and his binkies.  He also had a blow-out, hence the nakedness.  Asher before his bath at 5 1/2 weeks old and holding his head up on the boppy!



Oh Joy! She came to visit!

My sister came to visit about 3 weeks after Asher was born with Erik and Tristan.  They were here for 2 weeks (with a week spent at Ken and Nikki's in Portland) and it was craziness!  I loved seeing my sister though and I wish that I had been more up to doing stuff and less stressed, but it was still a lot of fun.  Her boys are so cute and a lot of fun to play with except when they are whining or crabby. :)  They loved baby Asher and were so good around him. 

Shem took Joy and the boys around to see a lot of cool things and I stayed home most of the time with the baby since his schedule was so unpredictable.  He had a meltdown pretty much every time we went out. :)

Oh, and as the stressed-new mom-sleep deprived-photographer, I failed to get a picture with my sister.  I didn't even get one of her with the baby! 

 Aunt Nikki with Asher.

 Marlie and Tristan love baby Asher!

 All of the McLennan cousins: Erik, Asher, Marlie, and Tristan being tamed by Joy.  Asher looks a little mad in this photo! :)

 Now he is really mad because someone just kicked him and Shem and I ran up to save him. :)  Good times.  Marlie still loving holding her "baby doll".

 Asher is definitely done with photo time here.

Joy and the hobbit door at the Botanical Gardens in Belleuve.

Random Roll of Film Found After 3 Years in Hiding!

Back when I got my 20D I sold my 35mm film camera so that I could buy a lens for my new to me digital camera and I thought, back then, that I was saying good bye to film forever.  Well, I just found this roll of film from 3 years ago and even though the colors are distorted and the images are grainy I'm in love with these shots.  It makes me want to buy back the camera that I sold and start to play around with film again.  It would be so much fun since I know a lot more about taking photos now than I did back then with all of the practice that I've had and it would also be cool to offer some film prints to my clients along with digital.  I'm not exactly sure where my business is going to go digital or film wise, but I can't help but dream about having the best of both worlds because I can't completely write off one or the other.

Here are the shots I found.  They are from a Thompson Family Reunion in July 2008.  We went to Fort Flagler on the Olympic Penninsula and stayed in some "army cabins" (?).  I wish that I had taken more photos because the roll came back with only 12 images, but I was an idiot back then and lazy with taking photos, so oh well.