Today

Today was hard.  Today is ten years since my beautiful Mom died.  Ten years.  That's a long time to not see your Mom.  Over the last month I could feel the emotion building up and I knew today was going to be a hard day.  Over the years I have gotten used to it, I can talk about my Mom, tell new people I meet about what happened to her and I'm ok.  I am constantly telling myself that I should not  feel sorry for myself, there are so many much worse things that happen to people everyday in the world... and I am so very blessed.  I have so much joy in my life, I have so very much to be so grateful for, and I am.  Very grateful for a beautiful life.  But it doesn't mean it's not hard, it doesn't mean it doesn't hurt.  It is hard, and it does hurt.  Today I needed to cry.  The tears started flowing last night and continued for a good part of the day.  I cried tears of sadness, hurt, loss, love and hope.  I cried alone, I cried on the phone with my husband, I cried holding my baby boy in my arms, I cried on my front porch with my dearest friend, Kathryn.  The day is not over and I'm sure I'm going to go cry some more.

I love my Mom, I think of her every day, I miss her dearly every day.  I know she is happy, but I am sad for what I am missing out on.  I'm missing out on an adult relationship with my Mom, I feel like I'm such a different person as an adult and I so wish I could be sharing my adult life with her.  I'm missing out on a fun and loving Grandma for my kids.  I often wonder how different our life would be if she was here.  I can only imagine the fun she would have had with my kids.  The fun we would've had together.   I know she is aware of me and my children and what is happening in our lives, but that's it.  I don't get to see her with my kids, I don't get to share motherhood with her, my grown up friends don't get to meet her.  And I know they would love her.  I am sad for that.  And so I cried and cried some more.  Then I made cinnamon rolls.

 My little helpers

 Jensen's first cinnamon roll, he loved it! Well who wouldn't?! 

 They were pretty, and good, ya pretty good!

Thanks to my wonderful friends who remembered and who brightened my day, and to Ryan, the best husband ever, for being the best husband ever! 

I'm a mess, my house is mess, but oh my, does my house smells good.  

Focal Points

So, I've mentioned I got a new lens for my camera, which I am loving.  The first few weeks I had it, I needed to play around with it quite a bit to get used to the differences and also checking the focal points to make sure they are all "on".  This particular day, Jensen was enjoying his goldfish cracker snack, and being quite content I decided I'd use his eyes to check the focal points on my lens.  I was just switching focal points, keeping whichever one I was using on one of his eyes.  You know how I love to take pictures of his eyes!  Anyway, my "test" pictures were just so stinking cute of him, they were instant keepers rather than to be deleted.  So don't mind the goldfish cracker crumbs or the lack of composition to some of  these photos...I love my baby boys eyes and the expressions on his face.  

Ok Mom, enough, I'm ready to get out!  

Please, just get me out!  

He is the cutest.  

I also just want to say THANK YOU to so many of my awesome friends for supporting me in my efforts in going somewhere with my photography!  So many of you have been so encouraging and it has helped me immensely.  Thanks to my wonderful friends, Julianne and Kathryn, for letting me practice on their cute kids, from day one, when I had no clue what I was doing!  Thanks to my wonderful (and gorgeous!)  friends who have been my "practice families", The beautiful Hancocks, Blacks and Stapleys have all been featured on my photography blog, and also my fabulous sister and bro in law, Mark and Lisa.   I had so much fun taking all of their pictures and it has helped me start a beautiful profile!  Seriously, who knew having such beautiful friends could be so helpful?!  And also a huge shout out to 3 of my far away blogging friends, who happen to be amazing photographers themselves,- Jana B., Kate and Bekah.  I admire your work so much girls, and a compliment from you on my photography means SO much!  Thank you for your kind and thoughtful comments and great encouragement, again, it means so much to me!  And especially, thanks to my wonderful, awesome, fabulous husband, for not only encouraging me to learn and  work on something I love, but for being home to care for the kids so I can get out and do my photo shoots, and especially for providing me with the means to do so.  Couldn't get very far with out some good equipment, thanks so much Babe for all you do for me.  Oh AND thanks to him for designing my official "Josie Robison Photography" logo.  I love it!  Have you al noticed it on my last 2 posts?  I don't have it up on my blog header yet but I'm now officially stamping my photos with my name! He's the best.  

So thanks to all of you for your support and encouragement!   I am thrilled that I have 8 sessions scheduled for October!  Wahoo!  Bring it on!  Guess I wont be cleaning my house.  Oh well, it can wait, the dust isn't going anywhere.  

And one last thanks, to my stunningly beautiful and amazingly talented friend, the fabulous Lyndsi Houskeeper!  Lynds gave me the great opportunity to shoot her pictures for her upcoming new album! 

 If you don't know Lyndsi, visit her site, she is a beautiful inspirational singer/songwriter, writing music for the LDS church.  Anyone of Christian Faith will appreciate her beautiful music!  I will post more about her this week when I feature her beautiful photos on the photography blog.  Thank you Lynds for making me into a "real photographer"!  I was thrilled to photograph Lyndsi and am so excited that my work will be featured as her new album cover!!!!  (Not to mention, it's my first paying job, so she really did make me a "real photographer!")  Thank you Lynds, for the wonderful opportunity,  I can't wait to share your beautiful pictures!  

A WICKED Good Time!

Ryan and I had a wicked good time heading to Vegas for a day to see Wicked with some of our good friends!  I felt a little spoiled getting to see it a second time, but I was so excited to have such a great seat, (when we saw it in Portland in March, we got our tickets the day of and were up in side balcony) and of course going with friends made it all the more fun, and then The Cheesecake Factory just sealed the deal as pretty much making it the best date ever!  We had such a fun time, we drove down together with our good friends The Woodburys and The Esplins and also met The Schofields at the theatre.  Here we are...

 Love my man!  Thanks Babe, for spoiling me so! 

 The girls - Kathryn, Andrea, Staci and Me

All the couples - Derrick and Andrea, Dustin and Staci, Josie and Ryan, and Kathryn and Dustin

SO much fun!  Love Wicked, love Ryan, love my friends, love cheesecake!  

Our Walking, Talking, Mess Making Boy!

That's right!  Look who's walking!  And like a pro now too!  Jensen started with a few steps the week he turned 14 months.  2 steps quickly became 4, then 7, then 9, then we stopped counting as he started going further every day!  By the first weekend in August he was wanting to get down and walk all the time and giving me a heart attack every few minutes as he braved new terrain!  It has been so fun watching him toddle around, he's been getting steadier all the time, now he is practically running!

Exploring the backyard for the first time - 14 months

Getting the hang of it!

 And I love these little shoes he's wearing!  They were Pierson's and I just loved them, I got them on Jensen for a few Sundays then they were suddenly too small!

Braving the rocky terrain...after having enjoyed a delicious ice cream cone at Heidi's birthday party

And that little ice cream mess on the face, it's nothing, a smudge I'd say.  This is the messy boy I'm referring to...

 Mister "I'm so big I refuse to let mom feed me with a spoon anymore"!  At 14 months Jens also decided he wanted to use his own fork and spoon, I thought it was so adorable and so great that he was wanting to do it all on his own, I had never even tried to teach him.  Ha!  It's adorable all right!  Strawberry yogurt, not so bad.  

Chocolate pudding....

...bad.   He thoroughly enjoyed it I'd say.  But I can't say I thoroughly enjoyed the clean up.  Ya, I wont be giving him another one of these anytime soon.  

I know, makes you want to go dig into some chocolate pudding.  Or never eat it again.  Good thing he's so cute.  He sure does LOVE using his own spoon!  

Somehow another month has just slipped by and he is already 15 months old.  He is jabbering up a storm and we all love hearing him pick up new words each week, really it's the cutest thing.  This week he surprised us with a "thank you", talk about melt my heart.  Besides Momma and Dadda, his two best words are "eyes" and "nose".  He loves to point to your eyes and nose when you are holding him and also loves to find animals eyes and nose in any picture he sees.   I keep wishing I could just slow him down....  

but he just keeps getting faster...

...I had better get used to this, pretty sure I'm going to be doing a lot of chasing for the next little while.  

Back to School!

Where or where did the summer go?!  Part of me was so ready for the kids to get back in school - the part that likes to accomplish anything and go to the store with out 3 kids in tow.  And part of me was sad to see the summer come and gone so quickly.  Our summer was pretty low key and it was nice to be home and when Pierce and Madi were getting along, I was loving it.  It really seems that with kids every year is going by faster and faster, it was hard to believe it was back to school time already!  

I think Pierce and Madi were both a little bummed to have summer over, but as soon as we went to "Back to School" night, they were excited and ready to go!  That always works like a charm, meeting the teacher, seeing their desk, it just brings excitement, thank goodness for that.  Here is a look at my kids on their first day...

Madi, my big FIRST grader!  Can you believe it?  

 It is just crazy how grown up she is in the what seems like the blink of an eye!  She was very excited to be in school all day, to eat lunch at school, and especially to have her own desk!  Very thrilling for this little miss!  She had a great first week and I was very proud of her, it is such a huge adjustment being in school all day long and although I could tell she was very tired, she did great.  She was sad that her best friend Annie, isn't in her class this year, but she is doing well making new friends in her class.  I am excited to see her progress this year, I know she will be an excellent  student, her reading really took off this summer and she had been cruising through "Jack and Annie" books like crazy.  She read 2 of them today!  It is so fun to see her reading so well on her own and really getting into the stories and loving them.

Pierce, the very grown up FOURTH grader!  

 Seriously, blowing my mind that my boy is this big!  He really likes his new teacher and was excited to start 4th grade.  He doesn't have his best buddies in his class, but I am thrilled that he has 2 darling girls from our neighborhood (my cute Activity Day girls) in his class.  I've told him that they'll be giving me a report if he is ever naughty!  He has become very responsible lately and I know he will have a great year!

 Brother and Sister - this girl loves her big "bwudda" 

Sadly, our new traditional picture on the Todd Bench.  It was incredibly hard to believe that this week of school starting marked 2 years since Todd's been gone.  It is still so unbelievable to me, oh how we miss that little guy.  

Best Cousins - Pierce 4th, Madi 1st, Brooke 5th and Matthew 3rd.  I sure love these kids and am so glad we get to be close to them.  

We're off to a great start this year!  And let me just say how great it was going to Costco this week with only 1 baby!  It was a breeze!  

Photog Blog

Just a quick post to share the link for my new blog today.  I am having so much fun working on my photography, I decided to start a blog just for sharing favorites from the shoots I have been doing. I'd love for you to check it out, critiques and comments appreciated as I continue to learn! Thanks!
www.josierobisonphoto.blogspot.com

Pierson's Happy Birthday

As always, this kid was so excited for his birthday, and we were excited to celebrate him!  Pierce loves having his birthday on Pioneer Day and was excited for the all day festivities.  We started the morning early with a yummy cinnamon roll breakfast, when we had gone shopping at Costco, Pierce opted for the delicious looking cinnamon rolls rather than the usual muffin for his breakfast, not a bad choice. Here he is with his little sidekick...

Jens has been quite fascinated with birthday candles with all of our summer birthday celebrations.  

After breakfast it was off to the parade!  I love that Pierson loves going to the parade for his birthday.  Jensen loved it this year too...

I love this pic of him gazing after the horses. 

He also loves to clap, and of course, I think it's adorable!  

 My sweet NINE year old boy, his baby brother loves him so!

And what do you know, miracles do happen!  All 3 kids looked for a picture! 

   Wahoo!  Happy Pioneer Day!  Love my 3 cute kids.  

After the parade and a few games at the park we came home to prepare for the rest of the day.  We literally partied all day for this kid.  We filled water balloons and I made frosting.  Really yummy frosting.  Then it was time for the "friend party".  Pierce chose to do Laser Mania again after having so much fun last year.  I let him pick a few friends to invite and they had a blast playing laser tag and arcade games.  

 Best Dad Ever, Joey, Pierce, Jace and Isaac - his neighborhood buddies

After Laser Mania we came home for cupcakes and gifts...

 Isaac, Pierce, Jace and Joey - pretty excited for big ol' cupcakes!

 My handsome birthday boy!  

And just to you can get a really good look at the delicious cupcakes and frosting.  Really, it was so good, amazing what you can do with a couple sticks of butter! 

Present Time! 

Pierce was so excited for such fun gifts!  A Star Wars lego set from Isaac, a Nerf squirt gun from Jace and the cool new BYU shirt from Joey.  He has really gotten into Legos lately, especially the Star Wars sets and has had his eye on some cool sets.  He was pretty excited about his big "General Grievous Starfighter" from Mom and Dad.  

We also gave him a new package of Nerf gun bullets which he was thrilled about since he was down to one bullet, and some cool new shirts - BYU and Star Wars, you can tell what this kid loves!  And I love how he looks at me and smiles every time I want to take his picture, he is so good for me, I don't know why I can't Madi on board!  

 After friends went home we got ready for our "cousin party".  Pierce wanted to do a water party with the cousins and I was so thankful for Crystal being so gracious and letting us do it in her beautiful backyard. We had so much fun playing with our Hall cousins and were glad the Brooks could join us too!  

Joey, Matthew, Pierce - they had a lot of slip n slip fun!

Joey, Pierce and Brooke, what a good sport Brooke is to play with all these boys!  

The kids had a ball with water balloons and a water version of duck duck goose.  

Then Crystal had a great game for the older kids, she had frozen t-shirts and they had to put them on.  It is pretty hilarious to watch, they were great sports and had so much fun! 

The brave contestants - Brooke, Matthew, Joey and Pierce

Jensen decided the water looked pretty inviting... after Dad let him soak his clothes, he was glad Mom was there with a swim diaper.  We went from this...

 to this...

and finally to this...

He had so much fun splashing in the water!  

After plenty of water games and fun we enjoyed a delicious dinner and then enjoyed yummy cake and ice cream.  Did I mention the deliciousness of the cake I made?  I think I need an excuse to make it again, I don't think I can wait until next year when our birthday season starts again.  

 My happy birthday boy, (sporting the previously frozen t shirt he managed to put on) with Matthew

After dinner we headed to the cemetery to our new traditional Pioneer Day firework spot.  

Remembering Todd - We love and miss you buddy!  

I really do love this.  So nice to sit there as a family with Grandma and our cousins, close to Grandpa and Todd and enjoy the fireworks, not to mention no one around but us.  Perfect way to end a perfect day.  We had so much fun celebrating Pierson all day long.  I really can't believe it's been 9 years since my first baby boy was born.  He is such a sweet, loving and good boy and I am so thankful to be his Mom.  We love you Pierce!