Poor Emily

My poor baby is sick!! She's got a high fever I've been having a hard time getting it down. I'm taking her to the doctors today at 11:00. Hopefully we'll get this figured out soon. I'll update afterwards.

UPDATE:
Emily is fine, no ear infections so thats good. Doctor says it just needs to run it's course. He gave me a script just to make sure nothing is trying to develop since she did have a very high fever last night. They did weigh her so at least I know her weight for her 11th month, she's just under 19 lbs. Hopefully she'll be doing better soon. I feel bad she feels icky. Out of all my children she is certainly the most cuddley. She really wants her mommy when she's sick, I ended up rocking her in my arms today during her whole nap, luckily I found an interesting show about hair cutters on Bravo to watch while trapped on the chair. But I knew she needed her sleep so I'm glad I can give her that comfort. Good news, Jimmy's making dinner. Yippee!

Me on a Jury?

Can you believe I haven't posted in forever! Well a lot has happened so buckle up and hold on for the ride. Lets go over the weekend fast, did some pictures, took Emily to visit the grammies on Saturday. My awesome husband finished cleaning the scary basement, looks wonderful. Sunday we went shopping for school. I looooove shopping. Got the kids some stuff. They'll look adorable of course. We went to the giant outlet mall (love it) in Michigan City. Carters is still my favorite Emily store, cutest stuff EVER and the quality is nice without being too expensive. I got some adorable stuff, cute little leggins outfit, adorable jacket vest in pink of course and a brown with pink polka dots dress outfit, and a bunch more I'm almost ready for fall so I can see her walking around with it on. Ok now to today, Monday:
I had jury duty, I could not get out of it even though I tried. Man they don't let you off easy anymore. They basically told me to find a babysitter and be there. So yeah, Jury duty.
I arrived on time with about 70 other people. Large group. They draw your number out of a box for the panel. I got called 2nd (dang it). This was a pretty major crime so it would take all week. They give us basic case info and then the judges question the jury as a group. They ask if anyone needed to tell them anything in private which I figured I had some info from years ago that seemed like I probably should disclose to the judge. So I had to go back and talk to them in private about some uncomfortable things (a little awkward). Now I'm thinking surely they will dismiss me after hearing this info and I can go home. Well they don't!! I couldn't believe the defending attorney didn't want me out of there. So I'm stuck on here. They end up dismissing others and then sending us to lunch. So that sucked. I go home, feed the baby, stuff something down my throat and head back. No sooner had the judge walked in then he dismissed a bunch of us (all mothers) me being one of them. I could have skipped out of that room. Anyhow the interesting thing is when we first walked into that room and sat down I leaned over and asked the guy next to me if his was a lucky number (being the dork that I am). Well he ended up being called 1st with me 2nd!! Out of 70 people, I about died. Once I took my place next to him in the stand he leaned over and said "guess we both have lucky numbers". Now what are the chances of that.
But I made 33 bucks! So now we're going out for dinner! Hopefully I won't have to go for the rest of the week! Interesting day to be sure.

Flashback video my baby is growing up:

Quick late night post

I mentioned before that I took a few pictures of my cousin and his wife at her baby shower. I'm excited to meet the little one who is due on the same date I was due to have Emily last year (Sep. 18th). Now that I sent them their pictures I'm going to go ahead and post one on here of the two of them. What a nice looking couple and she is just glowing. So many changes going on around here with new little cousins and my brother getting married. Exciting stuffs! Well it's late, just wanted to share the picture.

Emily's 11 month pictures.

Ok so in case you were wondering what that video was about yesterday. I posted a video of a house that is for sale near me for a friend who is looking to move into the area. So yeah, I'm not losing my mind filming random houses I promise.

I'm happy to say that my wonderful husband posted pictures he took of Emily for her 11th month. They are up on her site. He took them all and cropped them all. He did a lovely job. I'm glad he took them, I usually always do but it's nice to have his hand and eye behind a month, when she looks back at them she'll have a set from her daddy and I think that will be special. I know they're special to me. So go check them out!

Kaylee and Nathan come back from camping today. I can't wait to see them!! I know they have a wonderful time.

Brother, Mother, Cousin.

What did we do this weekend? Well I spent a lot of it in South Haven. Saturday we were there for half the day. I got to congratulate my brother and Rachel on their recent engagement. Yay for that! It was nice to see them again, it's been awhile. Rachel got to show off her beautiful ring. I'm so excited to do their engagement pictures this fall! My mom had a spot taken off of her that came back cancerous which was a bit of a scare but they tested the tissue around and it's fine so she should be in the all clear. I believe they want to have one more test just to cross t's and dot i's. So it was extra nice to have a visit with the whole family after that bit of news. We went to the St. Joe Latin Festival in the evening. Kaylee and Nate got to whack a pinata, which is always fun and then I got to see some guy puke his guts out on stage after a hot pepper contest. Thats not so much fun.
Sunday I had to be in South Haven all day long so I took the kids and left Jimmy. I'd like to plan a day once a month where I take the kids out of the house all day long so he can do some Jimmy projects, things I just can't do or have a harder time doing. He changed the oil for my car, mowed the lawn, and really got a good chunk of the back half of the basement cleaned which needed lots of help. He went through some of the garage too. So he took care of some misc. stuff. I went to my cousin's wifes baby show. She is due Sep. 18th which is when I was due last year with Emily. So perhaps Emily will have a little cousin on her birthday this year. I took a few pictures of them, love baby belly pictures!! I'll sneak one up here later after they get to see them first. It was a really nice shower. After that I dropped the kids off with my mom and took care of a evening appointment (had one in the morning as well). Then I went back to my moms and took Emily in the pool. Kaylee and Nathan were already in. The big kids are going with my parents for a camping trip. They will be camping tonight and tomorrow night. I'm glad they get a chance to get out of the house a bit, I think they were going stir crazy. So that was my exciting weekend! I do have one picture to share. This is how Emily sleeps each night, she loves her puppy:

I'm always thinking about something!

Kaylee and Nathan spent the night at their Gram's house last night. I'm sure they had a great wonderful fun time. I got to do some shopping, what is it about picking up a few things that gets us girlies all excited?!?! Maybe it's picking out new fall clothes for my kidlets. I got some pants for Kaylee and Nathan (going to wait on the shirts until it starts to cool down). I got some outfits for Emily too. I kept leaning towards pinks and browns. I love Kohls, they have such cute baby clothes. Of course it's because I favor Carters and Kohls carries mostly Carters.
Speaking of Emily I've got to do a little update on her:
She can say "bye bye" when she waves now. She says "yay" when she claps. She claps when she likes something (mostly foods). She's really starting to say little words that you aren't quite sure if she really said or of it just sounded like she said them. Like today Jimmy asked her if she went swimming and it sounded like she said "swimming". But you're never 100 percent sure. She is now in a forward facing car seat (just this week). I'm still trying to ween her off of breast milk but I swear that child is in no hurry! She misses the dinner time feeding and thats it. She usually ends up walking over to me and pulling open the top of my shirt and looking in my shirt at my top friends or she'll whack her head into them a few times, this is something she likes to do at church or in public areas where tons of people are staring at me. She loves sleeping with her pink puppy at night and I got her new p.j.'s that have footies in them and she can't quite figure them out. I'll have to get a video up on how funny she is with them. She turns 11 months tomorrow! Crazy! Jimmy took her 11 month pictures for me today. I wanted him to take them, and crop and edit them so they were totally from him. I think that will make them extra special! I plan on having a simple birthday party for her with just close family and lots of pink!! Probably let her eat a cupcake all for herself!

My brother and Rachel set their wedding date for next year, end of May!! Yippee!! I made a decision too, I love childrens photography, I feel like I do the best with Children, I love working with them and I feel so happy doing it. So next year I'm still doing Weddings but I'm going to keep them down to one a month, perhaps a couple months with two. Weddings are a lot of work, lots of editing, lots of time. I feel like I spend a lot of time away from my family and husband who is only home on the weekends. Time goes by so fast and Emily is already nearly one with Kaylee and Nathan coming close to double digits. I've always put being a mom first and so I'll put more focus on that next year. This Wedding every Saturday is CRAZY! I seriously start feeling guilty, I don't know how other women photographers do it with small children. Because it takes a lot of time away, maybe they have a babysitter that comes while they edit, I hope they don't let the poor children entertain themselves all day. Of course thats any stay at home mom doing any work from home. How to juggle while spending time with children and husband. Weddings are not on my favorites list, a lot of people are focused on the wrong things at Weddings. Children are awesome because they are so innocent (mostly). I love catching their little personalities. I also plan on going in the phonebook this next year!! I'm thrilled to see where that leads me (and a little scared). So thats my deep thoughts for the day, HA!
So no video of pictures today, I'm on the Lappy. But check back for Jimmy's pictures of Emily. I'll post them when he's done with them!
XOXO

Last Weekends Peach Picking

I wanted to post some video's from last weekend when we went peach picking. We all had a lot of fun, even Emily! She thought the fuzzy peach was very interesting feeling. Thanks for everyones complements on my new blog!! I'm working on remembering to post a link on the side of this page straight to that blog.
Oh and BTW.... If you feel like leaving a comment but don't want me to know it's from you I have my photography blog set up to allow Anonymous comments but they are only viewable to me. Just don't pick on my pictures too much... ;-)
Nathan finds a peach:

Emily thinks they feel funny:

The time has come!

Alrighty, here goes nothing!! This is the link to my photography blog!
http://pbjodi.blogspot.com/
I've got samples from some of the work I've done. Mostly my favorites and some that have good stories behind them. Now I slack more at this blog then any of my other blogs and maybe now that I have made it public to my family and friends I'll be better at posting. I made the comments private so feel free to tell me what you think even if you don't care for it! But don't be too mean and break my itty bitty heart... sniff. I'll be posting a link to it on the side of the page at some point in the near future. Thanks for checking it out!!

Photography blog

I'm happy to announce that I'm making my photography blog public (I'm brave enough now)!! I have a few things I'd like to change and then I'll be posting the link on here either later today or tomorrow!! Be sure to check it out and let me know what you think!

CONGRATS C.J AND RACHEL!!!!!!!!

I don't know the scoop yet, all I know is I got a phone call from my brother at 11:00 last night announcing his engagement to his girlfriend Rachel!! I'm super excited for them. I was promised the whole story at some point today so I'll update this post later. Yay!! I get a sister!! I hope they set a wedding date soon so a certain photographer can make it ;-) I did steal a couple of his pictures on a site he had some posted:

UPDATE:

So my brother gave me a call after he got out of work today. Turns out he had quite the story. I guess he was trying to get one of Rachels friends to sneak down to the lake to take pictures of the whole happy event. He was texting back and forth a lot. Now he had just gotten home from a bachelors party and here he was being all secretive on the phone, poor Rachel she wasn't very happy about all the phone calls and him acting kinda strange. They end up bickering off and on that day. The went mini golfing first and he had put the ring in her glove box counting on her to drive, she ended up wanting him to drive so he was a nervous wreck about her going into her glove box. Luckily she didn't. I guess he made an excuse to get his sun glasses out of the car and then switched the ring to under the drivers chair. Well he ended up getting another text while at the mini golf place which ended up breaking the camels back. Rachel was none to please and they were discussing all his calls on the way to dinner. He wasn't paying attention and ended up being pulled over for speeding in which he got a ticket, ouch. So after dinner they head to the beach, he notices her friend pulling in right behind them and in a panic to get Rachel out on the pier before she notices her friend he speeds them right along. Her friend noticed the two of them in front of her so she tries to sneak around another way then wait by some bushes until they pass so she can be behind them. I guess the friend wasn't counting on cj getting out on the pier so fast because she ends up waiting and waiting for them to pass when they had already ended up on the pier. So the sun is starting to set and cj sees no sign of the friend. So he's trying to figure out what to do, he ends up asking an older couple to take their pictures. So the older guy agrees and then cj drops to one knee and pops the question.... aww.. Rachel, who was very surprised said "YES" and so it all ended up working out although they will always have quite the story. Crazy thing is they didn't even end up needing that friends help which means he would have never been on the phone with her which means no misunderstanding between the two of them and no ticket. Funny how stuff works out though. So congrats guys, I'm very happy for the two of you and I couldn't ask for a better sister then Rachel!!

Emily's first trip down to the water.

So I almost got those video's posted last night, almost. Then I got tired and they were giving me a hard time so I'm doing it today instead. The first video is Emily playing on the playground in the tunnel, she was talking a bunch in there. I also noticed she seemed nervous to crawl past that little crack, not sure what she was thinking about it. The second video is her first time touching the water, she really seemed to like it. I'm glad Jimmy was holding her hands because I'm sure she would have kept on walking right on in. Last video is of the kids enjoying hopping around in the water, a little more of Emily at the end. It sure was a nice day!!

Emily's trip to the beach, her playing on the playground:


Emily's trip to the beach: first time touching the water:


Kaylee and Nathan enjoying some beach time as well:

Bonding

I've been feeling a little guilty here lately. Why? Well it seems like this summer has just flown by and I've been so busy this year I haven't done as much as I'd like with the kids. School is starting in a few weeks and I just realized that Emily is a little over a month away from turning one and I can't figure out where time has gone. So yesterday we took the kids out for ice cream in St. Joe and then we walked down to the beach and let them play on the play ground stuff. We took Emily to touch the water for the first time. That child is going to be my brave one, she wanted to walk straight into the lake... if Jimmy hadn't been holding onto her hands she probably would have swam out and done laps. Anyhow, I'm up kinda early getting ready for another appointment and figured I'd post really quick. I don't have time to now but check back later and I'll put up some video of the day. XOXO

Pink roses and Grandma's booboo

FYI... I posted more pictures of Emily on her blog. Check them out!! I included some silly ones too.

My husband is so nice!! Today he surprised me by bringing me home lunch and flowers. Pretty pink roses. Aww.. thanks honey that was a great surprised. It's nice to have something like that brighten your day. Just puts a extra hop in my step!! And now I can look at my flowers and remember how thoughtful he was.

So yesterday I got a call from my mom telling me she got a call from the police telling her that my Grandma (her mom) had fallen and was bleeding. So my mom ran to see her at the hospital. Turns out she hit her head and was bleeding. My Grandma had not wanted to go to the hospital, she planned on just washing it off. Turns out she needed 16 stitches. That lady has an awesome tolerance to pain that I wish I would have inherited!! All I got were her big boobs, no fair!! My mom said she didn't even flinch when they numbed the cut or anything. Anyhow she's doing fine, back home resting.

Emily's 10 month pictures

Ok I went through some of the pictures I took and picked out a few favorites.
Emily's 10 month pictures:
Got some smiles:



















I love the pink bow and her serious face:



















Just relaxing and laughing at my mom:



















I want to kiss those little lips!!:



















So those are a few that I went through really quick. I'll post more tomorrow once I get a chance to go through the rest. Have a lovely night!

Best Ice Cream Treat EVER!!!!!!!!!!

I can not believe that today is Wednesday. This week is flying by already!! I've been editing, doing lots of laundry, cleaning, spending time with my herd of children and smooching on my husband. Oh, I found a new favorite ice cream. Culvers restaurant has that custard ice cream stuff. Well if you get the concrete mixer (which is like a DQ Blizzard) and have them mix in chopped up Andes thin mints, holy cow and a half!!! That is super yummy!! I actually like it better then the blizzard because they really dump a lot of topping in, ugh.. I better not think about one or I'll want one and it will go straight to my butt, or my gut. Anyhow, today..... Today I did some work. I also spent a lot of time with Emily because I'm starting to feel guilty with all the editing I've done the last few days. She really enjoys looking at books with me. We've been looking at a book with a lot of animals in it. I say "The cat says Meow" and then point to the cat. Now she'll point at the picture of the animal she wants me to name. She's starting to try to say the sounds, she can almost Moo for the cow only it comes out Mii which is awfully cute. I realized today that I have YET to take her ten month pictures and she's only got a month and a half before she turns 11 months. So I took time out to take her down to the kids school and took her pictures on the bench there. I think I got a few cute ones and I'm actually about to go through them now so I'll either post them tonight or tomorrow.

Happy Saturday Surprise!

I got a big happy surprise Saturday night after I got back from the wedding I was photographing!! My wonderful awesome darling daddy put in my new floor! I didn't even know it was in! THANKS DADDY PIE!!!!!!!!!! So much better then that icky tile. After my long day on Saturday I just spent the day Sunday with Emily. Poor Nathan was stuck in his room with a fever, not sure where that came from. Luckily he didn't mind spending the day playing video games and he seems to be fine today. Kaylee was at a friends house all day. She got to go to the peach festival and then swimming and all sorts of fun girl stuff. Jimmy spent the day in the half bath stacking my washer and dryer and then putting in a new utility tub and a toilet. I'm very happy to have more floor in and very happy to have my washer and dryer back!! YES! I have a mountain of laundry waiting. I ended up getting a nasty head ache yesterday, not sure if it's from the weather or just some stress build up. Usually if I take a little nap I wake up feeling much better which I was able to do. I hate when I get those. Today I plan on catching up with my laundry and sorting through some pictures from Saturday. Luckily I only had scheduled the wedding for this Saturday and nothing on Sunday so I need to spend this next week getting a lot done before this next weekend. I've got a couple Emily video's to post today, the first one she's doing some of her goofy Emily tricks and the second one I caught her climbing on a toy.
Emily is SO BIG:

This is a quick one, I caught Emily climbing (already):

It's August already!?!?

Emily learned something new yesterday, how to take the tops off of stuff. I have a container of snacks for her and she uses her teeth to pull the top off. Smart cookie, or hungry cookie, one of the two. I can't believe we're in August already thats craziness!! This summer is going by way to fast. Just listen to what a good worker bee I am. Yesterday I cut the grass, washed my car and trimmed the bushes and and and I finished editing some pictures! Wow, I need a pat on the head for all of that!! Of course today I've done nothing, ha oh well. I'm actually sore from all that arm movement. Wow, trimming bushes is sore. Jimmy fogged our yard for bugs last night so hopefully that will get rid of some of them. This year seems extra bad. Oh and my yard is full of tiny frogs, what the heck is it the plague? I'm waiting for boils to pop out on my skin. I felt bad because I kept running them over with the mower...ew little frog parts everywhere. Kaylee's over at a friends and I think Nathan needs me to whip his butt at Mario Cart so I'm off. OH oh oh... check out my photography website, I put a few more picture examples up in cause everyone has been wondering what I've been up to this summer. Not a ton, but a few more. I can't believe I have yet to take a single senior session, last year it was tons of them, this year is more familes and kids. Funny how that works. Anyhow, check it out, photographybyjodi.com