Art Night

Last night I got to spent some time with my great friends, Kaylee and Erin. Kaylee is my friend from Phoenix who was in town for Thanksgiving. We got together at Kaylee's Parent's house for a little tradition started last summer called Art Night. We drank wine, watercolor painted, ate lots of good food, had wine, laughed at eachother, caught up, and enjoyed wine. There is something about Art Night that I always find so theraputic!

We were joined by Amy, who is their neighbor and actually is a real artist. She is also a lot of fun and is very talented, I must say!

Our friend Erin is a registered nurse. Somehow the conversation turned to how Erin had to overcome her life-long phobia of needles in order to make it through nursing school. She overcame, and admits she now loves to stick people. She said she even gets a run at it!;) Then we all stopped painting to pull up our sleeves for Erin to judge who had the best IV site. I know...What a roudy bunch of girls we are!! Oh, and in case you were on the edge of your seat over who had the best vein, it was yours truly.













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Pickles & Olives

Every year we go to both my mom's house and my in-law's for Thanksgiving, and every year I ask, "What can I bring"? And every year I get the same reply: "That's okay, honey. You don't have to bring anything". Sometimes it's a relief to hear this. But now I am starting to take it personally. Granted, I am no Rachel Ray, Emeril Lagasse, or Julia Child, but I can cook a little bit. It's like they don't want to burden me with anything that may pose the slightest culinary challenge.

So this year when I asked my mother-in-law what I should bring and she said nothing, I thought okay, fine. When I asked my own mom the same question, she kind of hemed and hawed, thought about it for a while, then told me I could bring pickles and olives. Something easy and that I can't screw up!

Maybe I am being a little bit of a Point Prover here, but I decided to go a bit over-the-top. Black olives, check. Gourmet olives, got 'em. Marinated mushrooms, those weren't even on the list and I got those too. I want to show that I am highly capable, thankyouverymuch.

Lily at Arcadia Point

Yesterday I did a quick shoot of Lily, who is the 17-month-old daughter of our friends, Steve and Becky. It was a beautiful day, and we decided to take the photos at Steve's parents' house on Arcadia Point. Lily was super cooperative- Almost too cooperative! When we were down on the beach, we could hardly get her to move. Although there were blue skies, it was pretty chilly and she just stood there frozen!

Lily is a beautiful little girl with really dark eyes and super long eyelashes. She remindes me a lot of Bella when she was that age.

My Fertile Office

There is something in the water in the dental office where I work. There are 10 women (counting myself and the boss- ok he's a guy, but he has babies, too) and someone is always pregnant. I have been a hygienist there for 5 years, and in that time there have been 11 babies born, and there are 2 on the way. With my pregnancies, I was one of four both times. The second time I shared a due date with one of the assistants. Two sets of babies share birthdays (February 9th and June 14th), and most recently one of the hygienists returned from maternity leave the same day one of the assistants gave birth. The patients think it's funny, and often our conversations go something like this:

Patient: So who's pregnant around here?

Me: Well, there's so-and-so, and so-and-so, and so-and-so...

Or it goes like this:

Patient: Did the pregnant girl have her baby?

Me: Which one?

Patient: The blond one.

Me: Which one?

These are some photos of one of the latest pregnancies. She was so fun to photograph...So cooperative!

Kaylee is coming home!

A few years ago I remember feeling really fortunate that I never had to endure the sadness of having someone close to me move away. I thought I was out of the woods, so to speak. I had my comfortable little world with my family close by and lots of great friends within walking distance of my house.

My best friend Kaylee lived just up the street. She is someone I have known all my life. Our parents were friends, so I have literally known her since birth. We weren't always close, though. In school we just ran with different social groups and our paths didn't cross much. We would always say "hi" when we did see each other, but it never went much beyond that.

Our friendship didn't develop, oddly, until our late 20s. We coincidentally had bought houses in the same neighborhood. She came over to my house the first time with our mutual friend Erin, to meet Bella the day we brought her home from the hospital. Later, when I had to return to work after maternity leave, Kaylee agreed to babysit Bella.

Kaylee and I were meant to be friends. I hope everyone is lucky enough to have a Kaylee in their lives. She is kind and loyal and sensitive and caring. Our friendship grew with each milestone...births of new babies, personal struggles, and losses. She helped me through the loss of my dad two years ago and even though at that point she had not been through it herself, seemed to know just the right thing to say and when to say nothing at all. When she lost her little brother last spring I did my best to be the friend she had been to me.

When Kaylee told me that her husband was taking a new job in Phoenix and that they would be moving soon, it was like somebody put a little lead weight inside my heart. On the day I had to tell her goodbye, I walked into her house where her whole family was coming in and out with boxes, loading up the U-haul that was parked in the driveway. At first I was first just making chitchat with her, then without warning burst into tears. Not the dab-at-the-corners-of-your-eyes cry, but the full-on, sobs and gasps kind of cry. It even makes me teary-eyed just writing about it. All I could say was "I have never had a friend move away before!"

Kaylee has lived in Phoenix for 6 months now. I miss her a lot. It's even hard for me to drive past her old house. But.........She is coming home for two weeks for Thanksgiving! Yay! I miss our laughing over lattes. Our kids playing and screaming and laughing. Long talks (and tears) over red wine. Art night and watercolor painting. Walking and talking and gossiping. I can't wait to see you, Kaylee.

One more thing....I can't believe I don't have even one photo that's just the two of us. I know what we'll be doing next time I see you!!

Rowan

Just a couple pictures of my sweet little mama's boy.