Time is a funny thing...

I'm sure it's been a popular day for reflecting on the passage of time. 

It always is for me. But for a different reason.

Nine years ago today (that's right, on the first anniversary of 9-11), my life changed forever, in ways that I couldn't even begin to comprehend, when I gave birth to my first daughter, Aidan Lucy.

Nine.

It blows me away every single year that yet another has become history.

They pass in the blink of an eye.

I tell myself with every birth day that comes and goes that this year, I'll savor every moment. This year, I'll be more patient. This year, I won't let the little things get to me.

But then life happens. Mornings are rushed. Evenings are too short. Christmas comes and goes. Summer flies by. 

And another year is gone.

Nothing makes time fly like watching your children grow up. 

But nothing can fill your heart and soul with joy and pride in quite the same way either.

I'm one. lucky. mama.

We made the most of this birthday weekend by hosting 5 girls for Aidan's first sleepover party. I have to say, I think it was a roaring success! (no one went home and no one ended up in tears, so that's a success, right?)

The weekend ended with one very tired girl and a couple of very tired mamas. But it was definitely one for the books!

Happy Birthday to the (not so) little girl who fills me up with a kind of love I never even knew existed.

♥

What a trip!

Just back from our whirlwind trip to Canada for my brother's wedding.

It was amazing.

Really, how can you go wrong with a location in the Canadian Rockies?!

We only got to spend two days in Banff but we made the most of it.

And then there was the wedding...

You've never seen a happier couple.

Click here to see more of the photos (click on a photo and then click on it again to view as a slideshow on black), and check out my photostream for other pics I took during our trip.

I'm working on getting settled back in and re-opening the shop. More to come soon!

Congratulations Scott and Nora!

I love you both to pieces!!

xo

Working late

and loving every minute of it...

First Days

We're settling into our new routine here at the Buffalo Ranch. Alice started school.

Real school.

In an actual school.

With buses and classrooms and older kids and everything.

She's doing great!

She wouldn't stand still for the standard I'm-in-my-backpack-standing-in-front-of-the-front-door photo, so I had to catch her on-the-go. Here she's showing Mama a stick that she found. You can see that she's also carrying the ever-present pig. She actually leaves him... uh, her--the original, male, anatomically correct pig was lost on vacation and has been replaced by this female, anatomically correct pig--in the car without complaint when we get to school.

Alice's first days of school also mean my first days on my new studio schedule. I can't even begin to tell you how much I love it. I get to spend about three hours in the morning working in my studio and then I go pick up Alice from school, we have a lovely lunch together, she goes down for a nap, and I get to go back to my studio. 

When nap time is over, we play for a little bit, go pick up big sister from 3rd grade (she wouldn't stand still long enough for a picture either!) and play some more.

Bliss I tell you!

xo

Home at Last!

I feel like I've been away for a year!

We've actually been home for about five days now, but we've been busy dealing with a broken refrigerator, sending Aidan off to 3rd grade, and trying to find our lost cat (he showed up at our back door like nothing ever happened after we spent three days searching every square inch of our neighborhood, knocking on doors, posting fliers, climbing fences, setting off car alarms...).

Anyway, we had a lovely and restful time in Western Massachusetts and I was even a little sad to leave. We did a lot in our three weeks there, but the best part about all of it was that it was just us being a family. Stephanie was working, but it somehow felt different there than it does here. Maybe because everything else, all of those pesky little day-to-day things that get in the way (like broken refrigerators and lost pets) were out of mind. So we just got to enjoy being together.

We did a lot of this:

A little of this:

And our fair share of this:

But it's good to be home. I appreciate my sinfully comfortable bed more than ever. And my studio. Oh how I missed my studio! I finally got to work in it again yesterday. The familiar sound of singing silver as I sawed and the strangely comforting smell of vinegar warming in the pickle pot brought a smile to my lips and to my soul. 

So good to be back.

The shop is open again but I have to admit, the shelves are a little bare. I'm going to be busy working on custom orders for the next ten days and then I'll be off again! To Banff for my brother's wedding! I'll be back in the studio on September 7th and will start work on restocking the shop then. I'll also be wading through my custom order list, so if you're waiting to hear from me about a custom piece, I promise I haven't forgotten about you!

Finally, I'll leave you with a few pictures that I took over the last couple of days from home with... MY NEW CAMERA!! I am very excited about it. I've wanted a *real* camera for some time now. Every time I tried to take pictures of my work with my old point and shoot it ended in cursing because I knew how I *wanted* the shots to look but it just didn't have the capabilities. So when it was time to reinvest some money back into my business, this is what I decided to go with. I'm a happy, happy girl!

Actually all of the photos in this post were taken with my new toy. I'm still learning how to use it (but I am shooting in full manual!):

This is Spooky, the cat who disappeared without a trace for three mysterious days. Here he looks like he's saying, "She's mine. Watch your step or I will cut you."

And this is Boo. He's quite a looker:

And this is our amazingly talented friend Lance who shows up randomly at our doorstep with his guitar and serenades us while we eat our dinner (at least that's what happened on Thursday!)

Alright! More to come soon. But for now it's time for me to hop into my sinfully comfortable bed.

xo