Faces

Me, Melissa, aka. Mom

Ivy Mae. This picture is so "Ivy". Love it.

Vitali, smirk-smiling. What else?

Misha. Always aware of the camera.

Max. To me, every picture of Max looks exactly the same.

Hannah. This girl is growing tall and beautiful (pardon my bragging).
It often reminds me how soon she will be all grown up...

Steve. Be still my heart.

Annette. This girl loves to play in the dirt. Sand is no exception.

waves

Water

Critters

Annette caught this lizard that I call a gecko.
But it's not; I just can't remember it's real name.

Can you see the baby alligator?

I believe this is called a skink.
Not as exciting since we often these blue-tailed
fellas crawling around at our own house.

Sand

Sand removal:

Overheard at the breakfast table...

( I love this recent photo of my pre-teen. It makes me chuckle!
She was teasing me a bit with that eye-roll
but I think there was a hint of a thirteen-year-old in there as well.
She's really not so snobby. hee hee) *

Hannah (age 10, bragging to one/all of the other kids) :

"...In only eight years I'll be considered an adult! "

Me (age 35, pulling my nose out of the washing machine to call upstairs) :

"Well, only eight years AGO you were considered a toddler!"

*click on the eye-rolling photo to see Hannah's own blog.

Annette

I enjoy taking pictures of my kids. There, my secret is out. Phew! Now I feel better. Confession IS good for the soul, as they say.

Wanna know something else? I like when things match color. Like that bow in Annette's hair that matches the pink in her lips and cheeks pretty darn perfectly. And how that blue in her eyes is the same as her shirt.

Another thing I can't help noticing is that she is growing up! She's losing a lot of that little girl-ness and is starting to have a pretty young lady look. I really enjoy watching her grow older, almost as much as I dread it. :-)

One of my favorite photo subjects:

Sweet Ivy Mae.

I love having this five-year-old little girl in the house.

I love the braids and the flowers tucked into them.

I love the wispy hairs that float free and get bleached almost instantly in the sun.

And pretty blue eyes full of smiles

and this:
But, how could my youngest already be losing teeth???

(sigh...)

Not again!

Bike. Face. Driveway. Ouch.

Blessed.

Happy Mother's Day!

Pictures of me with my honey...

Steve was out in the hammock the other day... ...and so I decided to join him.

I had my camera and thought I would take a picture of us:

A little close,

trying again...
Heh, heh. Not a good one but funny enough to publish!

Then Vitali, short, six years old, and wiggly, offered to take our picture:A shot of how we look to short people who wiggle--a little blurry.

Ah, well, we'll try again some other time!

Rainbow

We saw this amazing rainbow the other night.
Unfortunately, by the time I grabbed my camera it had faded. I have seriously never seen a rainbow this bright! Even the purple was clearly visible. Awesome!.