Baby Girl Shower

Once school started and everyone was back in town, we hosted a baby shower for my good friend Kristine. My house was in demo mode so our friend Kristen offered to host.

She decorated her backyard so cute and cozy.

Lots of people helped with food and making it all come together so beautifully.

A few weeks later, I got a call in the middle of the night to come watch some of our favorite little boys when Kristine went into labor. A short while later, little Rosie arrived. I took the boys to the hospital to meet their little sister.

Rosie quickly won all of our hearts.

Valentine's Day

The boys dug right in to their Valentine's Day goodies when they got home from school.

Nash was the only one who was assigned to decorate his own Valentine's bag and of course, LEGOs had to be involved.

The boys sprawled out on the front porch to compare their loot.

They know that I despise Fun Dips so they thought it was hilarious to combine them and tally up the total number. What they didn't know was how many the trash fairy snuck away when they weren't paying attention.

Finn thought it was a good idea to have one lollipop on backup.

I'm not on top of much these days, but I couldn't break our tradition of designing handmade Valentines. This year's I Spy game was fun for all ages and goes down as one of my favorites.

Nash's Baptism

I took Nash to the same hills where I photographed Blake in preparation for his baptism two years earlier. Two years flew by and I couldn't believe we were already onto our second child being baptized.

It's too bad Nash didn't show any personality...

Christmas Greetings 2017

Crew's Pirate Pool Party

There was one week between spring break and Easter and Crew's birthday fell within that week. It was basically a nonstop party. Crew had his heart set on having a pirate pool party months before his big day. He was a pirate for Halloween and his love for all things pirate did not fade by April.

Blake had a pirate party when he turned six so it was a theme we were familiar with. Add in the pool factor and hosting it was a breeze. 

Crew talked to anyone and everyone for weeks about his upcoming pirate pool party. On the morning of his birthday, as we were making the final preparations for the party, he all of sudden realized, "Wait a minute, we don't have a pool!" I love that our lack of pool never dawned on him before that moment. Thankfully we saved the day and hopped on over to one of the 13 pools in our town, which happened to be deserted.

I'm all about simplifying the food for parties so we picked up pizza and added a few snacks and called it good. 

Crew preferred brownies over cake and I was just fine with that.

I made a few games that could be played throughout the party in an unorganized manner. I knew swimming would be the main event.

Our neighbors brought Crew an inflatable shark as his birthday present and it was the perfect gift.

Lots of pirate sword fights went on in the pool.

It was tricky to keep Crew's candles lit.

But he blew them out anyway.

Crew couldn't have been happier surrounded by friends, water and especially that shark. 

His birthday party certainly lived up to the hype.