Hi Peanut,

You’re officially a year and a half now. I don’t know how that happened. In my mind, you’re still a baby, but then I see you running around, trying to catch your brother, and pulling out the coloring books and Crayons because your favorite thing to do is “coyor” and following multiple-step directions and…you’re just so big.

But you still fit on my hip, tucking your legs around my waist, wrapping your arm around my shoulder. It’s one thing I distantly remember savoring with Henry, knowing that it wouldn’t be long before I wouldn’t be carrying him around anymore. And now I find myself treasuring the same way you fit on me, knowing just as before that it doesn’t last long.

Your hair is growing in (yay!) and the curls in the back of your head are bopping everywhere in the heat and humidity. Just last week I was able to make a teeny, spiky little pony tail on top of your head—that’s the hair that’s been the slowest to come in—and it made me smile all over again that my lifelong wish of having a daughter came true. One of the things I have looked forward to most about having a daughter is doing your hair—braids, curls, twists, pig tails, the whole bit—and though it’ll be a while yet before anything more intricate than a single, pointy ponytail can be done, knowing that we can spend time together doing your hair someday makes me so excited.

You continue to be a daddy’s girl and you shriek with joy when he comes in the door. You can hear the garage door from anywhere in the house and immediately go on alert, “Daddy? Daddy?!”

While you still love to read books and will gladly bring an endless string of them to us to read to you, you have also picked up a love for coloring. The shelf with the colors and books is easily accessible to you and barely an hour goes by that you’re not dragging everything out. Your fine motor skills blow me away because you hold the colors, skinny or chunky Crayons, in your right hand exactly as I hold a pen to write. I don’t know how you learned that, but when I first saw you do it, I actually took a picture to make sure I wasn’t imagining it.

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My best friend has been begging me for years to take her boys’ photos and I have always declined, aside from, of course, candid photos when we are playing together. Then, when they thought they were going to be moving across the country, her one wish was that I take their pictures before they move away and there was no way I could say no. (In a miracle, they didn’t end up moving and I think I remind her probably at least once a week!)

What made this whole session so much fun was that it was like photographing my own family. And in a way, they are. Pagelyn and I met when our oldests were just a couple months old. Our kids haven’t known a life without each other and we are constantly adventuring together, whether that means a simple trip to the park or an hour drive to try out a new museum.

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This family, oh, how I love them. Let me just show you the wonderful times we’ve had together so far: their wedding on the family farm was so much fun to photograph and was one of the first weddings I ever photographed (here and here), then, after years of infertility, I got to photograph them while Lisa was pregnant with their daughter, and again shortly after Vaida was born. Last fall, right after Vaida’s first birthday, I got to see them all again for some family photos and, oh, what a joy to celebrate with them their little family!

After a few months of thinking she had a sinus infection, Lisa has very recently been diagnosed with brain cancer, specifically glioblastoma. She is one of the most positive people I know and is overflowing with peace and determination, even facing this mountain of a battle. In February, she had a craniotomy surgery and the surgeons were able to remove 90-95% of the tumor. She just finished her second week of radiation and told me, “The staff and doctors are so great. I’m feeling good and am surrounded by blessings everyday!”

There are several fundraisers set up to help Lisa & Andrew with Lisa’s medical expenses as well as to donate to brain cancer research. If you know Lisa or you want to help this family, you can click through here.

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Out of all the families I got to photograph last fall, at least 1/3 of them were former wedding couples of mine and those are some of my favorite sessions! It’s such a fun reunion to get to see these people again, now post-wedding with little kids of their own! I said this in another one of the blog posts, but it needs to be repeated: From witnessing first hand their love during their engagement session and their anticipation for their wedding day to then celebrating their wedding day with them, with all the joy that comes along with it, meeting their families and seeing their support system, and witnessing their vows. As much as I love weddings, there is something especially sweet about the aftermath of the weddings when I get to meet their child(ren) and see how their love for each other, however flourishing it was before, overflow now into a brand new human. It is truly one of the sweetest of life’s cherry-on-top moments.

Stephanie & Matt are just the most fun couple! I have gotten to see them several times since their wedding and watching them become parents to little Silas is just, well, even better than watching them fall in love with each other. They are both lovers of nature and exercise (one of the reasons we shot their engagement session at Sugar Bottom!) and I love how much Silas also loves being outside, clearly a place he’s comfortable!

I cannot handle how happy he is!!

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I was so excited to get to photograph the Duerksen kids two days in a row! (I got to photograph them the day before with their dad and stepmom!) As I told Jenny, I so highly admire the co-parenting philosophy that her and Patrick and Vanessa have taken on. It’s such a beautiful thing to witness parents working so well together and truly, genuinely loving each other and getting along! I’ll never forget something Vanessa told me once: “We just decided that we would never, ever speak badly about anyone else.” And while that seems so simple, relationships are hard and sharing is hard and life is hard. So, to be able to make that decision and stick to it is something that is truly admirable. I have so much respect for this whole family and how they work.

This session was easy because, hey, grown kids can listen to directions so well! But we did run into misting rain and it was getting really cold! They were so flexible and were able to come a little early to avoid most of the rain.

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The Ohloffs are another family dear to my heart as I got to photograph Elizabeth and Seth’s wedding last fall, perfectly complete with their adorable daughters as flower girls. In the fall of 2017, I had taken their engagement photos on one of the coldest days I could remember (I have since beaten that record this past winter) and they brought their daughters along then for just a few family photos so it was fun to be able to photograph these gorgeous little girls three times now in one year!

I also love Beth’s style (remember that houndstooth coat and yellow pants from their engagement session???) so I was taking rapid notes on the girls’ outfits here. Look at those navy striped leggings and that fun floral print and those little cardigans? Like, everyone is so perfectly paired without even hinting at being “matchy.”

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