The birdies 13/52-17/52

Oh my, am I remiss in my weekly portrait posts. I’ll try to catch up in one hodge podge of a post. The blog has taken a back seat to life in the real world. That’s how it goes sometimes, eh?

So here goes, lots of portraits in one post – and not even in chronological order. As you’ll see I’ve been using my phone’s camera feature more too so the quality isn’t the best. But I guess I’ve seen worse, so I’ll just leave it at that and move on! Onward.

Easter 2014. Chris took the girls Easter dress shopping this year for the first time. Don’t they look smashing?!

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So Phoebe isn’t a big fan of the camera right now…IMG_0988

Both birdies at Triple Falls again.IMG_0832

Kid in the candy store.

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Soda fountain. Wren’s watchful eye.IMG_0677

The girl hardly EVER naps. Except on long road trips after some light reading.

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Spring has sprung. Ice cream season is here!

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This kid. She loves her naps. And her “owl penguin.”

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One of the highlights of our trip was the time we spent at the Belle Isle Conservatory in Detroit with my Mom. A beautiful place and newly reopened. It felt so great.

Wren. Flower arranging.

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Phoebe Jane on the loose.

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Phoebe and Wren at the Belle Isle Nature Center (now called the zoo).

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As soon as it hit 70, the girls were in their swimsuits in North Carolina. Funny kids.

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I’ll try to get back on the regular weekly posting wagon, but I’m not going to make any promises… Any links to your portraits that you’d like to share?! I’d love to see them.

back?

summer

I’m ba-ack. Sort of, well, I think. I’m making no promises. I almost forgot my login credentials, that’s how long I’ve been on blogging hiatus. It wasn’t intended, but it just kept going. And going. And going. And pretty soon, I was gone. No, I wasn’t even unplugged. I just wasn’t blogging. There were moments in the last few months that I stopped and thought, “I have to write about this, capture this.” But life goes on. I’ve got hundreds of photos and funny quotes, stories, insights, video clips from the last few months. I wonder, do I create a recap post, or just move on? Maybe a little of both…

Are you still here with me? Thanks for clicking in. And cheers to a wonderful summer, lovelies. I hope you’ve had some sandy toes.

three year blogiversary

threeyears

It’s been a little over three years since I started this blog and it’s made me take pause and reflect. Well, reflect as much as you can in very tiny increments of time with two birdies fluttering around. You know, I know you do, yes?

Like almost anything, change is inevitable and so it is with this little corner of Cyberspace too. I’ve written about a lot of different things and places I love, personal experiences like the loss of our first daughter or dieting, and most recently the blog has become more of a journal of my birdies with photographs and a few words here and there. It’s become more of an attempt to savor this fleeting time. Such is life, the ebb and flow.

I’ve dabbled in trying to monetize this space with sponsored posts and I’ve dabbled in writing for other blogs like Design Mom and Punky Brewster. I’ve done giveaways. I’ve also had regular features that have come and gone like Click On or Sunday Confessions. Remember those? I’ve posted about favorite recipes or home renovations, crafts and DIYs.

I’ve started (and stopped) other blogs and I’ve helped other people get into blogging. And I’ve wondered from time to time about starting different blogs based on different interests like gardening for children or an exploration of documenting our children’s lives. I’ve spent a lot of time wondering about the meaning of this space and why I come back here regularly. Blogging is a creative outlet, it inspires me to create, to be a better photographer, to write more clearly and thoughtfully, even to be a better parent. And for whom? It’s for me, it’s for my children and it’s for you: the community that blogs create.

We all know that blogs are not real life, but a carefully-curated snippet of life. Mostly the beautiful, the fun, the things we really want our children to remember or an image of how we want the world to see us. Over the years I’ve tried to temper this reality with more “real” posts about the challenges of raising small children in today’s world and the realities of a somewhat isolated life at home.

I’d love your input in the comments area, please and thank you. How long have you been reading? What keeps you coming back? What kinds of posts do you enjoy most? What other blogs do you enjoy reading? What would you like to see or read more of/less of here? What are some of your favorite blogs to read?

Thank you for being here with me, whether you’ve been clicking in for three years or three minutes.   T H A N K   Y O U !   T H A N K   Y O U !   T H A N K   Y O U !

under the bed – 1

Under the Bed: a new series of documentation.

I took a video of an interview with Wren at 3.5 a little while ago and thought it would be fun to document the life of my wee ones in other ways than the thousands of photographs I’ve taken. I’m always a bit surprised and amused by what I find under Wren’s bed when I get to (finally) cleaning underneath there… so I thought it’d be fun to share. What do you think?

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What other ways do you like to capture the snippets of your wee one’s lives as they race by? Find anything interesting underneath their beds recently? Other than the dust bunnies…?

Hey, Homies!

Hey there, Homies! OK, I know, I call you my lovelies, but you get the idea. Take a minute to head on over to Apartment Therapy’s annual round-up of favorite blogs. Vote for us in the Family Blog category. Scroll on down to Squirrels in Wren’s Nest (speaking of, I’ve been meaning to ask you about helping me come up with new name, but that’ll have to wait…) While you’re there, check out all the cool blogs. Soooo many were new to me and I really enjoyed clicking in on a bunch of new blogs with creative insights. Bliggity blog on!

Punky!

I’m excited to share that I’m a guest blogger again today for Soleil Moon Frye’s site, Moonfrye. Still pinching myself because Punky was one of my childhood heroes and here I am, sharing my thoughts about being a new parent on her site. Really?! Check it out here. I wrote a piece about never saying never… ever had a similar experience? Yeah, I thought so.

Moonfrye!

I’m excited to share that I’m a guest blogger for Soleil Moon Frye’s site, Moonfrye. Punky Brewster, lovelies, Punky Brewster! Well not exactly, because she’s all grown up now and has moved on to having beautiful children of her own, writing Happy Chaos: From Punky to Parenting and My Perfectly Imperfect Adventures in Between, developing The Little Seed, an eco-friendly kids boutique, and more cool stuff.

Click on through to read my guest post about toddler mayhem on Moonfrye. Enjoy!