This made my day!

It's a ninja cat, it moves without being seen and the music goes perfectly with the little clip. Seriously, I keep watching this one, it's hilarious!

10 Years

Jared Benjamin High
September 23, 1985 - September 29, 1998

Here are some of my favorite pictures of my sweet brother.....

September 23, 1995

My brother, Jared, was born 23 years ago. So today I might make some dirt cake (his favorite) for us to enjoy.

Taken by my dad


One of my favorite memories of my brother.......
One day while beginning to drive home from church, Jared, who was about two years old, got out of his car seat and moved behind the back seat of our van. This van had two vertical doors and he opened one of them. The door swung open with Jared hanging and swinging on to the door, having a good ol’ time. As we drove down the road at about 30 miles per hour, we began hearing horns honking and people were pointing with terrorized faces. This gave us a hint that something wasn't right. We stopped slowly and mom ran to the back of the van to investigate ... and there Jared was, hanging on to the door, smiling. Jared was having a great time but mom and dad were "freaked". This boy was destined to be a stunt man for the movies, we just knew it. It didn't take long for us all to be laughing about this incident. - partially copied from www.jaredstory.com with a few of my additions.

Our Getaway

We flew to Toronto last Tuesday for a 1-week getaway, just Larry and I. The boys spent the week with their grandma, but we called them every day. Jared started asking us how many days we had left on Wednesday - only one day into the vacation. We sure missed them too and are happy to finally be home with them. They forgave us immediately for leaving, we brought them some souvenirs as a bribe, I love that we can buy them off so easily :)

While in Toronto, we went north, south, east and west to explore the beautiful area. It's so beautiful and green, lots of lush trees and some that were on the brink of turning all shades of fall colors. We went to Niagara Falls, Palmyra NY, and some little towns within an hour of Toronto. I loved the little towns with their old rock houses and turn-of-the-century architecture. Larry loved the helicopter ride, he was as giddy as a school girl. I took about 200 pictures, but will post a few of my favorites here.





Taken from the helicopter....


When we were here with the boys last summer, they saw this "pirate" ship off the side of the road on Lake Ontario. So this time we stopped to take a picture


This butterfly has decided that Larry needs a little decorating :)


One of the highlights of our trip was touring the church history sites, here is one of the Sacred Grove. Beautiful is all I can say to describe this, it was a perfect day and the light came down just right for me.


Taken from Hill Cumorah - I just loved the puffy clouds!





From the entertainment district at Niagara Falls - I was playing with the low shutter speed.

A funeral and a wedding

Yesterday we said our final goodbye to Uncle Leanard who was buried in a local cemetery. There were many there to mourn with the family and show support. It was good to see family members whom we have not seen in awhile. The Honor Guard was there to send Uncle Leanard off with military style - it was nice of them to do that. The service was beautiful and some lovely things were said.

In the early afternoon, I headed off to photograph a wedding. There was joy and everyone celebrated the union of a very happy couple. What a difference in atmosphere from funeral to wedding! I'm very excited at how my raw 'straight out of camera' photos turned out, but it will be awhile before I can post any - I have so much to do.

Here are a couple of photos I took at the cemetery.

First day of Kindergarten

David was so excited for school today, he ran right to the bus and didn't even look back to wave at me. When I met them at the bus stop up the street, he ran to tell me how much he loved school. His enthusiasm was way over the top!


And both of my cookie monsters...

Beautiful

I had a wonderful photo session this past week with a great couple, I am just so pleased at how they all turned out. This one is my favorite, there are more on my photo blog.

A Holiday Couple

Today is our anniversary, we've been married for 8 years. We sort of nicknamed ourselves the "holiday couple" because our relationship took a new step on different holidays.

Larry and I met at a church function in the summer of 99 and we became acquainted right after he'd signed his life away to the Air Force. We were only friends when he left for boot camp. While in boot camp, he wrote a letter to me (and 20 other friends from church). I could barely read his writing and at the end of the letter he told me not to address it to "the big L" - something his friends lovingly nicknamed him. I thought it said TO address it to "the big L" so I did. I also wrote on the back of the envelope, "sealed with a lick cause a kiss don't stick." It was just for fun, I didn't think I'd see him again anyway so a little flirting couldn't hurt. Poor Larry, he was made fun of for that one. Lucky for him, it was close to the last day of boot camp. He went to Florida for tech school and we continued to write letters.

It was over Christmas break that we really got to know one another over the phone. On Valentines Day, he and I were unofficially engaged (which meant he wanted to make it official with a ring). He proposed on Independence Day (ironically) and we were married over Labor Day weekend. That's why we got the nickname "the holiday couple."