Newborn Photoshoots - Beckett

My friend Laurel had the most handsome little fella a couple weeks ago. Seriously, I want to keep him for myself. Since she said no, I settled for taking his pictures.
My other friend Bethany and I tag teamed it.

PHOTOSHOOTS GO SO MUCH BETTER WITH A PARTNER!
I wrote that big so that I remember to always have a partner when I do photoshoots with people. I've done a couple newborn sessions in the past, and they are always my hardest ones. But I'm learning... slowly. I learn something new about them with each time I do it.
So if anyone wants a free novice newborn photoshoot, call me.
I'll never get better if I don't keep practicing. And I can't start having tons of babies just to take pictures.
Having said that, Bethany and I were able to capture some great pictures.
(We had a lot of doosies too).
Here are some of my favorites.
Thanks Laurel for having such a beautiful baby! It was fun!

Newborn Photoshoots - Lucy

I actually did this photoshoot a long time ago.
Lucy was a month old at the time. She wanted to be awake for all the action.
She was super chill though. And ADORABLE!
Sorry you have to see all the many variations of the ones with Ryan (Lucy's dad) they were my favorite and I couldn't choose which one to post. So I did like four.

I think I waited so long to post these is because I wasn't going to at all. I was super disappointed with my lack of skills with this particular session. When I was editing, I noticed that her eyes in almost every picture were blurry. Arrrgg!
I later learned that my aperture was all wrong (I had it at 1.8). I needed to bump it to the 2's or something. The nose got all the focus, but the eyes (the most important part) were out of focus. Or one eye would be sharp, but not the other.
The lighting that day was also really dim. Which didn't help.
I've been working on this ever since (not the sunshine, the whole sharp eyes thing).
Thankfully, Andrea (Lucy's mom) was super nice and said she loved them. Hopefully she doesn't notice the blurry eyes... or read this post. :) Maybe she'll never know.
In all my humility, I am posting these regardless of my personal feelings toward them, because she really is a cutie.

It's done. Whew.

SUNY Upstate it is.
Woot!

It feels reminiscent of when we found out we were coming to Pittsburgh. A city I never imagined myself living in. A city I know absolutely nothing about! But hey, we will live in New York and that just sounds cool. A little over an hour to the Sacred Grove, about 4ish hours from New York City. We can visit Canada. And Utica... if we want (I love the Office). Boston is 6 hours away. We might as well see that too. See? Lots of cool stuff.

But I will just say: I cannot imagine a more horrific 3 days than the 3 we just had.
We have run the full gamut of emotion.
Sad.
Angry.
Worried.
Why us.
Hopeful.
Excited.
Let down.
Pitiful.
Disappointed.
Uncertain.
Okay.
Content.
Relieved.

It is extremely difficult for both of us to have any emotion left for this outcome.
We should probably be jumping up and down with excitement that we actually matched.
But we aren't. We are too emotionally spent. Completely exhausted.
Should sleep just fine tonight.
Perhaps it will set in tomorrow and then I will jump.
If I do, I'll get a picture.

This really is great.
I know I sound down. And writing this I probably look depressed.
But I'm not. I'm very happy. All day long I just kept praying "please let us match... anywhere!"
And we did.
What a blessing.
And the best part? We don't have to wait until Friday to find out where we are going.
Seriously, good luck to all our friends who are waiting patiently to find out where you matched. I hope more than ANYTHING you get to go where you want to go!

THANK YOU to all our very supportive friends and family who prayed and fasted and thought of us. We got dinner and ice cream and cupcakes and emails and text messages and hugs all letting us know we are loved. I can't express how much that means to us. We are so grateful for you all.

Okay. Let's get started on this next phase of our life.
Time to clean out the basement.

Did We Match?

The big question of the day is: did Josh match into an ENT residency program?
Unfortunately, no.
So, we will be doing this all week:

(image from google images)

SCRAMBLING.

This is not what we had hoped and prayed and fasted for.
But it would seem there are other plans in store for us.

So, as of right now, Josh has sent in his application to the only 2 open ENT spots left as well as some pediatric spots.
We will find out Wednesday if any of those programs are interested in him.

And since we're being all debbie downer today anyway, if none of those work out - we will probably stay here in Pittsburgh 1 more year during which Josh will do a research year and reapply to residency in Pediatrics.
We'll do what we have to do I guess.

I'll keep you posted.

Oh, and congrats to all our friends who did match! Yay!

A warm day is here, hurry! get outside and take pictures!!

The weather around here is like a freakin' yo yo.
It's freezing and snowing and windy one day, and like 55 degrees the next.
Whatever, we'll take what we can get.
And when it's warm, you can bet we will be outside.
That is, if we get out of our pajamas.
Lucky for us, it was warm on Friday (weekly park group for the kids in our ward)
AND we got out of our pajamas.
Shoot, we even looked kinda cute.
I forgot how much joy it brings to my heart to watch my kids run around like kids should, rather than be cooped up in our house playing with the same boring toys day after day.
I also forgot how little girls fall off jungle gyms if you are not watching closely.
Sorry Darce.
She fell from a pretty high platform.
Yeeeaahhh, her face got a wee bit scratched up.
Why do they even have drop offs on playgrounds? So dangerous.
Regardless, it is so nice to be finding playground sand in my girls socks and shoes and pants, and diaper/underwear, and fingernails, and hair, and coats, and other places too.
It was also nice to take pictures outside rather than trying my best to get good ones inside and failing miserably. I was beginning to think I was regressing in my photography skills. And while I am out of practice... I don't totally stink. On this particular day I was playing with perspective. Which explains all the pictures taken from above the kids. :)