photography

dear mr. frogger

who resides in my throat. go home. you are not wanted here. i do not like your species. i am quite frightened of you in reality and avoid you like the plague. why oh why must you make your home within the realm of beaten down body? have i not shown you love....albeit by avoidance? please, kindly pack your bags and move to warmer parts....preferably not into anyone who resides in my beloved home. sincerely, chasity furse

i am off....to the texas med clinic this evening in hopes of a negative strep test and a bottle of anything....tequila is fine....that might ward off whatever it is that is trying to make me miserable during a week where i must not be miserable.

despite my sickly self (i felt ok this a.m.) i got to venture back up to the school today to shoot staff photos for my former co-workers and rockstar women who selflessly devote their time to the little dudes at the preschool. so nice to be surrounded by so many beautiful faces. loved being there with them and praying with them today before the start of the day. a bit of nostalgia.

then as i came home to prepare for 2 weddings and a meeting in austin with another lovely bride & groom all scheduled for this weekend...mr. frogger set up shop and pretty much ruined my day.

i have no photos to share at the moment....perhaps i'll ask the attending dr. to shoot a snappy of my throat? eh?

or maybe i'll just find something pretty and post later. :D

hasta pasta!

barely hanging on....

i survived the 2 day shoot at the preschool. today ran smoothly for the most part. i wasn't as tired initially but i can feel myself crashing now so just a short quick post to say i survived!

and we're on the countdown now to parker's 1st birthday. i'm in complete denial. he's not walking yet but he has taken a few steps though he hasn't quite figured out that he can do it. he is talking up a storm though with his adorable little "mamamamamama" "babababababa" "dadadadadadada" i mean, seriously people...does it can any better than that?

here's a little shot of him the other day just chillin' on the floor. i don't catch many moments like this anymore.  this is my fave shirt of his right now....it's him ....hands down...totally him. :D

sheer exhaustion

i can't hang. I can't punch a clock and i will never again be able to have a "real" job. I am ruined. eternally ruined.

I was up at the buttcrack of dawn today....for me that's 6am. the quality of sleep i got last night was a good mix between when i was in labor w/ parker and sleeping on the crap-o-cot a couple weeks ago when hudson was in the hospital...so 6am came entirely too early for this chica. plus, i was up late playing this.

I went up to the preschool where I use to teach and started the 2 day process of photographing the little darling children for their spring photos.  1/2 way up to the school i decided to ditch my entire planned shoot w/ a backdrop (so not me) and decided to just do a few of the props w/ the little greenery that was around outside on the grounds. jana came up to help, thank goodness. she brought me my daily crack in the form of a chai tea latte from starbucks. i think i would've crashed and burned by noon if she hadn't!

it went well. i realized how much i miss those cute little dudes up there ( referring mostly to the kids here but the teachers pretty much rock too ) the kids were adorable. just so stinkin' cute.

we wrapped up early and i was home by 1ish but i was soooo tired. i had to take a nap! i'm so pathetic.

i head back up tomorrow to wrap things up. hey, jana....i'll probably need a venti tomorrow. :)

i'll leave you with a couple photos i snatched up a few weeks ago when driving around w/ michelle shooting some urban stuff for a church project. a little off the beaten path of what i usually shoot but fun stuff regardless.

6 years of kisses & cuddles

Today Hudson is 6. He's still my cuddlebug. My lil' dude that still gives me kisses everyday before he gets out of the car at school. He still walks up to me for no reason and tells me he loves me. He sits by me on the couch and puts his head on my lap. He still wants me to scratch his back at night when he needs help falling asleep. He still tells me he wants to marry me.  He's still my baby....even if there is another baby a wee younger than he.  He was my baby for 5 years so I don't know that I've quite let go of that yet.

But today....he is 6.  He's over half way to 10....double digits.

I feel like he got a bit cheated today. It was a crazy day. I had a shoot after school so even though I was at his school to take in treats for his class I wasn't here when he got off the bus and that bothered me. But I was here w/in 30 minutes and he was fine.  He played with his buddies for a while and then we headed out to La Hacienda for dinner. We always let them chose where they want to eat and my kids are rockstars when it comes to picking dinner. We aren't hanging at McDonalds for bday dinners. No they are picking places like Johnny Carinos, Macaroni Grill or La Hacienda. Works for me! :D

When we made it home from dinner he finally opened his presents and it was nearly 7:30pm so I let him stay up until after 9pm, which I'm sure I will regret in the morning when he doesn't want to get his happy little hiney out of bed.  But I will try to remember his sweet kiss goodnight tonight, when he whispered to me that he loved me more than his new roboraptor.  What more could I ask for?

Here are a couple shots courtesy of Mark......obviously not the photographer of the family. :D

I miss my 5 year old already. 

I love this dude. love him.

Happy birthday lil' man. You are my heart, soul and the one of three reasons I wake up every single day and thank God for the honor and gift of being alive and well...and for being given the privilege of being your mommy. :D

hibernation, tutu's and junie b. jones

i hibernated this weekend.
and i made a tutu.
and i accompanied my 2 oldest children to the magik theater for a hysterical little junie b. jones ditty.

and because i am good like that i have no photos of the tutu or from junie b. what is it with me not taking photos of anything that might remotely resemble my life these days? so strange. my children are so neglected.....or lucky depending on who you ask.

friday i took hudson & brooklyn down to the magik theater (one of my favorite places on earth) to watch junie b. jones & a little monkey business. totally cute. loved it.  i was the loudest person over 4 ft. tall laughing hysterically in my seat. hudson began to sink down lower and lower into his seat and at one point began to resemble the kid who was terribly embarrassed of his mother.....but i'm sure that couldn't have been what he was thinking. and honestly, i needed a good laugh because only a short time before that i was biting my tongue to keep from yelling obscenities out my minivan window about the lack of convenient reasonably priced parking downtown.

saturday...we chilled. i did nothing that even bears repeating. i bought tulle to make a tutu and was in bed by 11:30. exciting times.

today, i rolled out of bed because my body could take no more. it ached as if i'd been in hibernation mode all winter.  i adjusted my disheveled ponytail and looked at the clock.....it was 12:35. yes, i had in fact been asleep for 13 hours.  which could explain why it's nearing 1am now and i'm still awake.  needless to say, we didn't make it to church. i think i was still trying to play catch up from all the sleepless nights on the crap-o-cot in the hospital a couple weeks ago. that, and parker is teething so the endless night wakings are really kicking my a#$. even after sleeping for 13 hours i was completely unmotivated. though i manged to hit party city to pick up some goods for hudson's bday party next weekend (he'll be 6 tomorrow) and swung by costco to order his cake and grabbed some dinner.

pretty chill weekend.
can't complain.

busy week ahead.......but at least i'm feeling rested. :D

Tara & Alex

i am so behind on posting sessions and i apologize but i am posting out of order now. :D just this once because it's late and i was working on these anyway so I thought i'd just load them up and call it a day....or night.

these were from tara & alex's engagement session a few weeks ago.  lovely lil young things. it was so freakin cold, and raining so they were all about cuddlin' up for me. we worked fast and had fun! here are a few for your viewing pleasure.

I'll be shooting the wedding at the bright shawl downtown on March 1st and i'm so thrilled to be a part of this day. tara's mom is one of my best friends and i just adore their entire family. can't wait to post the wedding pics! congrats tara & alex! :D 

big stuff, little stuff

and all the stuff in between.

my blogging habits are getting no better. once i have a system worked out i hope to be more consistant. until then....not so much.

lots been going on. hudson started his first full week back to school today after his bout w/ bacterial pneumonia and being hospitalized. thanks for all the prayers. he is doing well and back to his crazy little self.

seems like so many people in my life need prayers right now. so much going on.  crazy how things all happen at once.

i'm revamping the website. i'll probably be getting a new blog...but i'll still host this one with my archives. working on branding which means a new logo, colors and all the fun little pretty things that we get all giddy about and wrapped up in...and then soon realize we need to actually do WORK. working on marketing materials.

lots of fun shoots coming up and i've got some catching up to do here on photos as well from past sessions. it's just been so crazy.

might be going to boston in april. mark has business out there and i want to tag along since i've never been. hope to line up a workshop or some fun stuff to do.

k-off to administer meds & tuck in kiddos!