2013: Month by Month

December 31, 2013 Molly 4 Comments

I wanted to take a post to reflect on 2013. It’s been an interesting year. 2012 was truly a roller coaster– the highest highs, and some pretty low lows. 2013 has been like it’s lamer roller coaster neighbor. The one with all the hype, but really kind of a let down. Not to say that we had an awful year, but we certainly had a transitional year. There was much that we hoped would happen that did not happen yet. I will be relieved to move on to a new year and I have much hope for 2014! [I apologize for the vagueness there. It does NOT relate to adding to our family.]

Some highlights of 2013 include:

Celebrating Gus’s first birthday home!
Our short trip to Pennsylvania in March
Celebrating Aaron’s sister’s new marriage and Reed and Lena being a part of the ceremony
My new job
Spending 6 weeks with my family in Pennsylvania over the summer
Lena starting school (and Reed going to 1st grade)
Our trip to Colorado

Like last year, I am sharing one picture for each month.

January: 3 little goofballs. Don’t they look so little here?

February: Gus’s first birthday at home.

March: Visiting cousins in PA. This trip was the first time that all 9 had been together and our first time meeting baby Hugh.

April: Climbing trees. As it gets warmer, they’d always seem to be outside.

May: I just love this one. Do I need to say more?

June: This is a hard one for me to choose, because a lot happened in this month. But, this sums up a good portion of our summer at my parents’ house. I’d finish working and find them outside, having fun (under the supervision of my wonderful mom). I love their bikes thrown down in the alley behind them, because that, too, was a huge part of our summer.

July: Their first trip to our big family reunion.

August: This image is what opened up the door for me to start exploring night photography, and I love it because of that. I also enjoyed this brief camping trip with Aaron, Gus and the dogs.

September: Our Colorado camping trip, I have many fond memories of this trip. Some not so fond, but I’m glad we got this time together!

October: Halloween cuties.

November: Thanksgiving Day, spending time with family. I think this captures a little bit of that.

December: My littlest man in front of the tree.

You can see 2012’s month by month review here.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Everyday Life, Project 365

Dear Monday…

Image December 30, 2013 Molly 1 Comment

Everyday Life, Photography, Project 365

Sunday

December 30, 2013 Molly Leave a comment

We spent the day celebrating Christmas with Aaron’s family. Unfortunately, we missed last week when all of his siblings were there, so it was just his parents and brother.

It’s a long drive to their house. Which apparently means I take selfies with Reed and my dogs.

I’m super cool.

Lena and Gus have bucket seats next to each other. I tickled Gus’s feet for awhile, but he wanted more, more, more and I quit. Someone else took over.

And this adorable thing happened.

This makes me happy. In the midst of people and many toys, I found her with her nose in a book. I can’t imagine how much more she’ll enjoy books when she can read all of the words.

Lena just adores her Uncle Micah.

Presents were opened. Lots of presents. Including envelopes which probably seems odd, but I promise you, Reed and Lena will use them up fast. And maybe we can even use some of them to write thank you notes!

I went out for a brief walk with my dogs, and saw several cardinals. I love their bold color against the starkness of winter.

And my dogs are ridiculous. Ridiculous.

Everyday Life, Photography, Project 365

An Elk in Kansas

December 29, 2013 Molly 2 Comments

Aaron had to work this morning, but I wanted to do SOMETHING today. It was a bit warmer and a good day to go somewhere. I love Kansas for its wide open spaces and general tranquility, but it does seem to lack tourist attractions. Unless you want to visit the Agriculture Hall of Fame, the World’s Largest Ball of Twine, or the Geographic Center of the Contiguous United States.

I settled on the Maxwell Wildlife Refuge, a bit of a drive, but we’ve never been there before and it has both bison and elk. Aaron and I have seen both in the wild several times at various National Parks, but our kids haven’t. In fact, the only National Park they’ve been to so far is our trip to Great Sand Dunes back in August. We probably should fix that soon.

The start of our trip. Reed told me that he wants a camera like mine. I explained that it’s something that could easily be broken or damaged by little hands. But, he can start learning and handed him the camera manual.

This quickly happened. Gus took the best nap he’s taken since he moved to a big boy bed. Score!

Unfortunately, we missed out on the tours, as it was so late in the day. We could see both a herd of bison and a heard of Elk in the distance.

We decided to drive around, hoping that we’d see something. And we spotted these guys.

We drove around a bit more, and unfortunately, the only additional wildlife we saw was some geese.

On our long drive home, we stopped for some Barbecue. It was on my bucket list of things that we needed to do with Andrei. Have I told you that Gus is in this adorable phase where he comes up to me often and says “I want a hug, please”? He’s started doing it with Lena, too.

He just presses his little body into hers. And, I love her reaction.

Everyday Life, Photography, Project 365

My Ukrainian Girl

December 28, 2013 Molly 2 Comments

When Andrei saw us taking photos on Monday, he told me that for a welcome, bread is presented on the rushnyk. I googled it and I found some interesting photos.

rushnyk, women, bread

(source)

So, I wanted to try this with Lena. We don’t have any of this traditional Ukrainian attire and I didn’t feel like trying the incredible ornate bread, but we did our best and we had fun.

And the outtakes…

Reed came out and helped me for a bit. Then, it turned into a silly “what does this bread smell like?”

I told them that we weren’t going to eat the bread, after it had been touched and sniffed, so if they wanted a nibble, go for it. which turned into this…