Amélie ties her shoes

This did happen about a month ago but I know that you all wish you could have been there too to see Amélie tie her shoes all by herself for the first time (second actually but practically the same thing). Since you couldn't be there, I documented it for you! It was an exciting and momentous day for both of us.

I wish I had more to say but the combination of having to deal with a divorce that seems like it will never end, reading "A Reasonable Life" which, while it has some truly valuable lessons and makes a lot of valid points is actually quite a depressing book (unless you are able to find a group of your best, coolest, most resourceful friends who want to buy land with you and live self-sufficiently off of it), eating too many microwaved frozen mini corndogs (because of depression caused by above list), and then watching all of my netflix DVD of the L word in one fell swoop way too early in the evening - timing is everything when spending a Sunday night alone as you must plan the end of your TV viewing to coincide with the time you go to bed , otherwise you create a gap and then must find something to fill it with other than more mini corndogs - wow that run-on sentence went on for so long I don't even know where it was supposed to be going. I think mainly I have a case of the blahs leading to a lack of desire to write more which is probably a good thing judging by my last sentence.
Enjoy the photos of amazing Amélie and I'll try to perk up by the next time I post.

Yashica

Here is the latest design created by moi.

Budgie Smugglers

Here are some pics from Saul and Melissa's beautiful and fun wedding last weekend in Northern California. I am too tired still to write much. Plus the pictures pretty much speak for themselves! I had a great time and it was really wonderful to see everyone. I will post the stuff from the day after sometime next week.

My beautiful Auntie Sarah aka mother of the groom

The fam!

I just want to know exactly who got married? It looks to me like Saul is going in for a kiss!

Get ready here comes the hair...

I ask you, does hair get any better than that????

I think we all know whose inappropriate comments girl Erin is laughing at here!

Yes, our family is multi-talented. Saul dancing with his mom.

No comment!

My fabulous date Jessie being fed an apple by the guy in the pink budgie smuggler!

Vegas hangover and a big welcome to little Darioush

Congratulations to Brian and Shebreh. Baby Jamshid has now become baby Darioush and is adorable from the pictures I have seen. I think he looks a lot like his daddy right now but that will surely be an ongoing debate. I am still recovering from my Vegas hangover. No, I did not drink the $20 beers at the casinos. I mean to say that Las Vegas itself gave me a hangover and it has been a rough transition back, though I did have a lot of fun and it was incredibly inspiring to be around so many talented photographers. And I even got to meet one of my favorites, Jose Villa. Not only is he extremely talented, he seems to be a really sweet, down-to-earth person.
Being that I am still recovering, here are just a few more shots of Shebs and Brian. I will write more about my trip and hopefully put a few photos up from it soon.

Shebreh is so beautiful!

Thirty amazing years

So, this is me at 30...I had a wonderful birthday today and feel like my life is truly blessed because it is so full of beautiful people who love me and show me how much they care about me. I did have a few moments of melancholy thinking of all of you who I wished could be nearer to me physically, but I could feel you here with me and know that I am so lucky to have you in my life wherever you may be. Thank you all.

En attendant baby Jamshid

Last weekend I made a mad dash to California hoping to escape from the eternal winter that has set in here. It did rain the entire time I was there but it was such a beautiful, torrential, humid rain that I could literally hear my skin go "ahhhh" as I stepped off the plane. Tiff and Jörn and Shebreh, Brian and baby Jamshid were all kind enough to let me harass them with my camera. Here are a few preview, warmup shots of the belly. The rest will be coming in a few days.
It was so wonderful for me to get to spend a little bit of time with Shebs and Tiff and their amazing significant others (who know how to just get out of our way) and as usual I made sure to squeeze in visits with as many family members as possible and eat lots of good food (of course with the Hintzes those two always go hand-in-hand)! Karen even braved the storm sick to come to down to see me. I sure am a lucky girl.
My cousin Matt's band, the Spurts, had a gig Saturday night. They were awesome and we were not too cool to dance. How could you not?

If I had known there was a striped shirt dress code I would have worn one of mine too!

The fans love the Spurts so much you can see it in their auras (maybe I stayed in California too long - words like aura and hotboxing have crept back into my vocabulary)

Here are just a few of my favorite shots from Tiff and Jörn's "engagement" portrait session. They were all taken on location at Jörn's kiln.



Thank you to everyone who I spent time with last weekend. My visit was much too short and now I am back to the dreary Montana winter. But it was wonderful to see all of you. It was the perfect kick-off to my never-ending 30th birthday celebration.

For Pam...

I got two new things this week that I am very fond of. First, I bought myself for Valentine's Day some adorable little black heels (on sale at Target, of course). Second, I got my much needed new camera and 85mm lens. Naturally, once I had taken the camera body and lens out of their boxes and reveled in the newness of them I had to take pictures of my new shoes. Then I took some pics of my beautiful girls too. Savai always seems to disappear when the girls and I are having our photo shoots. Of course, before I could even get my pictures loaded onto my computer and correct them in Photoshop Pam had to outdo me and take a picture of every single pair of her shoes and she has quite a collection. The weird thing is that Pam did not know what I had planned for my latest blog and I had no idea what she was doing. I guess our love of shoes has connected us psychically somehow.

Aren't they lovely?


Miss Amélie being coy. I know that she may appear to be unhappy right here but really she is just in model mode.
Dirty, holey tights - the true sign of a happy girl!

And let's not forget crazy Miss Milou. I think that this picture captures her essence perfectly. She usually is moving too fast to even see her adorable little face.