The End of a Great Summer

Wow. I cannot believe this summer is already over. Tonight, my feelings are bittersweet, because I'm excited for this school year, but I love having us all home together; we quite enjoy one another really. Even though Adam has been back at work for a month now, it has still felt like summer around here. We've had a wonderful summer. Our summer began with a visit from Soley, her boys, and Mikaron; we had a great time drinking wine in the backyard and chatting as the kids played castle, webkinz wars, and Wii. We were then joined by Adam and Rich for a weekend with our home stuffed past capacity. I always love my time with Soley and Mik, and it seems to just get better as our children become close friends, too. After Soley's family left, Mikaron stayed for a few more days. As always, the visit felt too short; my time with my best girlfriends always fills me up, gives me perspective, and makes me wish we all lived closer to one another

Shortly after they all left, we left for our big summer vacation: we drove across Nevada, visited with my Uncle Mark and family outside of Sacramento, and drove to the Redwood Forest from there, where we camped for three beautiful, fun nights. The Redwood Forest was super fun: huge trees, beaches, AND banana slugs! Then we took two days to drive up the coast, getting us to Gramma and Poppy's home. We had a great time there, slip-and-sliding, eating delicious meals, going to a butterfly sanctuary and a world festival in Salem, and enjoying a huge family reunion. My mom, Oma, joined us there and took the girls down to Eugene, where they went to a children's choir performance, a wave pool, saw "Up," and fed some cute goats. While the girls frolicked with Oma, Adam and I got to spend two glorious days in Portland. I don't know who had more fun. It was really, really great. Then, Adam and I joined the troop in Eugene to play at parks, scooter along the river, play mini-golf, visit alpacas and goats, and dye yarn. After all that fun, Adam did the impossible and packed all our stuff back in the car and we headed back home.

Once home, we got to celebrate lots: July was filled with the 4th, Grace's birthday (7!!!), and Pioneer Day (Utah's holiday which is seriously bigger than the 4th around here). Grace's birthday was definitely the most fun. On the big day, we swam at our favorite outdoor pool, went out to her favorite sushi restaurant (is she cool or what?!), and had cake and ice cream back at home with Jenn, Matt, and the boys. A few days later, we had her hiking birthday party, which was really, really fun. A few kids couldn't come because of vacations, but she had a nice group of some of her best friends, the weather was surprisingly cool, and we didn't lose anyone. :-) We hiked home to have a water balloon fight and ice cream sundaes.

After all that was done, we settled into a really relaxing summer of mostly swimming, playing with each other and playing with friends, playing in the back yard, and going to the library. We didn't do a whole bunch of "stuff," but we had a really great time. Grace learned to ride a bike and swim this summer, Anna read countless books, I started running and my eye is doing better all the time, and Adam went on a short backpacking trip with one of his best friends and began his new position in July as the Director of Teaching and Learning at Weber State.

Now, Adam starts teaching this week, Anna starts 4th grade and Grace starts 2nd grade tomorrow, and I begin my training to be an Interventionist (tutor) at the girls' school this week. It will be 17.5 hours/week, which I hope will be just about perfect. We'll see how photography goes this fall; I had a couple of photoshoots in July, which went well, but I'm still taking it slowly as I still get headaches when I take a lot of pictures. So, I'm hoping to be busy, but not too busy... That's always the goal, isn't it?

Even though we didn't take pictures of a lot of what we did this summer, I put together a slideshow of the pictures we did take:

If you want to see these photos bigger, and much better quality, or if you want to order anything, go here.

I'll be sure to post Back to School pictures tomorrow! (sniff)

Dance Recital

Yes, Anna's dance recital was in May... But, that was also when baby Sam was born. And anyone who knows anything about me knows that a baby's arrival means me taking hundreds of pictures. So, I took pictures of Anna's recital, then took hundreds of pictures of the most adorable baby ever, and didn't even remember having taken any pictures of said recital. Until a few days ago. So, I've finally posted them onto Smugmug ( http://kjohnstonphoto.smugmug.com/ if you want to see more).

(If you look on that site, you will get to see "Big Grace," the daughter of a good friend of mine, and my girls' idol. My girls absolutely love to carpool with Big Grace every week: she is silly, open, and kind. Honestly, if my daughters are as great as her when they're 15, I will be blessed indeed. Both girls wish Adam and I went on more dates, so Big Grace could babysit more. I think we should definitely listen to them... I took lots of pictures of her, because the batteries on all three cameras her family brought died right when the recital started.>

I was super proud of Anna, and it was fun to relive that night working on these pictures. Most of you know Anna loves dance--and her commitment to dance ramped up quite a bit when she started taking Contemporary in addition to Ballet and then started with the dance troupe her teacher started up in the Spring. Anna was dancing three days a week for a few months--and her dedication really showed in the recital. Best of all, she really looked like she was having fun. She shone. I teared up (both at rehearsal and at the recital). There is something so beautiful about seeing your child do something so completely and so happily.


This is Anna with Emma, one of Anna's best friends since they were four.

Pixie Grace

So, for months now, Grace has wanted short hair. I don't know why it's taken me so long to relent... I love short hair, I constantly stressed out about how messy Grace's hair always was, and I knew she could pull off short hair with her adorable face. I guess I was worried she didn't really mean it; I mean, if she hated it, we couldn't just paste the hair back on. But, for the last two haircuts, she's asked for short hair, we've gone with the cute a-line, and she's repeated that it "isn't short enough." So, today, we went to get haircuts and we went as short as Grace wanted. And, again, Grace is right. She looks absolutely adorable. And she loves it. She has been all smiles since getting it cut. She's off showing it to Sam up the street right now. But, first, I had to take some pictures:

Oh, Anna got her hair cut, too, with some layers. She still wants it long and is planning to grow it out to donate to locks of love. I think she looks gorgeous, too. (She also loves Grace's hair.)

Potter Mania

We all listened to the first Harry Potter book on our road trip to Oregon last month, and Anna is currently reading all of them; this has begun something of an obsession for both girls of everything wizard-ish. Last week, they dug out their Halloween costumes from two years ago, added some Harry Potter charm (thanks to a good friend's Potter Party we got to go to), and I had to pull out my camera. I haven't taken many pictures of the girls lately, so I thought I'd share. :-)

Lucky Me

I have been blessed enough to have been busy doing this recently:

This adorable little one is only five days old here.  Having not known whether or not I was ever going to be able to take pictures again only a few weeks ago, each image feels like a gift to me.  I feel so lucky that I am seeing well and able to take these pictures.  I had a horrible headache the rest of the day after this shoot and my eyes were sore, so I won't be doing it often yet, but I'm getting there.  

If you want to see the whole gallery, they can be found at:  http://kjohnstonphoto.smugmug.com .  Then just click on the first gallery.  (For some reason, the gallery isn't loading normally; clicking "refresh" will bring up the images; I'm trying to get that fixed... Annoying!)

Adam's gone this weekend to New Orleans, so it's just us girls.  We're planning on having a good time tonight with friends, will be busy with the cookie booth all day tomorrow, and perhaps have a movie night Saturday night.  Hope everyone has a good weekend!

Orange Belt

Almost two weeks ago, Grace tested for her Orange Belt in her martial arts class.  She did amazingly well.  She is so calm and focused!  She was even better prepared for this test, mainly because she knew what to expect and knew to trust herself and not worry about what other kids were doing.  We were very proud of her--but I think she is even more proud of herself!  

Grace showing off the many stars she's earned by doing chores every month (red=300-399 chores; blue=400+ chores!):

The yellow and orange belts waiting while the white belts tested:

Grace doing "TK 1", taking down a boy :-)

Grace after getting her orange belt, shaking Bhak Bonnie's hand (her only female teacher, who can kick some serious ass while still being super cute--a GREAT role model for a little girl!), the whole group after earning their belts, and the proud girl.

We ended the evening by going out for malts, fries, and Grace even got a strawberry tart.  It was quite a decadent end to a great evening.  Now she's moving towards earning her purple belt!  (which will be a while...)  

a blur

I have lots more to write, but I'm only on a brief escape from helping in Grace's class during a surprise assembly, and wanted to share...  

It seems obvious now, but I was talking to Grace's teacher this morning and saying how much better I'm doing now, etc., but how most of January and February were spent obsessing over my eye and the stress of all that and I don't remember much else.  She responded, saying, "yes, it was all just a blur, literally and figuratively."  I like that.  A lot.  Because it really, really was.  

But, yes, it is getting better.  I'm doing more, feeling more like myself everyday, and still healing well.  I go back to the doctor next Thursday--on World Glaucoma Day.  I'm thinking about bringing a cake.  With a big eyeball on it.  All those wonderful people in that office need a huge thank you anyway.  And, what's the point of having glaucoma if I can't have a little fun with it, too!  :-)  Glaucoma Day.  The whole concept totally cracks me up.  

March 12.