A promise is a promise

Well, now that I am home and staple free as of today, slowly starting to feel better and hurt less--I thought I would go ahead and tell you of the last snowmobile trip of the season.  In my previous blog I did share a couple photos, from the ice shelf on Lake Superior. 

This has to be the most amazing thing. I know it's not super significant, but since I have never seen anything like this, nor had my husband or my son, it made the trip worth it.

Let's start here, snowmobiling is NOT my favorite thing to do. I actually find it very boring, let me tell you why. First, you ride by yourself and talk to yourself, please don't misunderstand; you have a group of people, but you are on your own snowmobile using hand signals unless you stop. Second, it's very easy to get cold. Third the trails can be really rough. Fourth, the towns you stop at, usually miles apart, consist of a bar/restaurant and a gas station, usually not very nice.  Fifth, well I could go on all day as to why I don't like it...but I think everyone gets the point.
Do you want to know why this trip was the best trip ever?
We went all the way up to Newberry in the U.P. The last trip to Newberry, well it wasn't great. This time we arrived right after a snow storm which made for wonderful trails.

It was also really cool when you were riding down the trail and there was snow as high as you! When we were stopped, I stepped off the trail to take this photo

and the snow was up past my knees!
The whole time I was riding, I kept thinking I can not wait to blog a bout this trip! The trails were smooth, the snow was piled up and the tree stumps looked like mushroom because of the giant piles of snow on top of them. It was beautiful!  As many times as I have been snowmobiling, this trip will always be remembered, with the smooth like butta trails and the ice shelfs!  Oh it was the first time I got to go snowmobiling with my son too! 


More photos:






This blog should have been done sooner, like right after I got off the snowmobile, so you would have been able to feel my excitement, but like I said, I will never forget this trip.
Until next time friends!

OCD and the Labo Fam

I think I have a little touch of OCD.  I have a hard time with odd numbers.  When I turn up the radio, it has to be on an even number.  When I edit photos, any sliders have to be set on an even number. I also like things to be even, for example, if I plant a flower, I have to plant another to mirror it.  I prefer things to equal.   Silly right?  I know, I make fun of myself all the time and I try really hard to stop on odd numbers and I let my husband plant a LONE tree in the middle of the yard (I secretly want to rip it out, but he thinks we have compromised)  Now your wondering why do you care?  I just wanted to give you a peek into my brain.

As promised, some photos from my recent shoot.


You may remember Roland, I took his picture before he had a baby sister. They are totally leaving for New York at the end of this month and I am going to miss them!

Here you can see Roland is really not feeling a family photo.
and he wasn't feeling it here either.

Dad did get him to smile for me:


You should know that even though Roland is a mama's boy, he loves his daddy:



So to the Labo family, Thank you Roland for smiling for me, thank you Vayda for being so adorable, Thank you Matt for fighting for our country and be safe out there, and A HUGE thanks to Amber for continuing to come to me for her photos! Have a safe trip to New York and visit me when your in MI!!!

For the rest of you stay tuned, I am getting a new lens hopefully tomorrow--and I got a wide angle extension and fish eye extension--there will surely be some new photos just for the fun of it!

The celebration of Life

Last Saturday morning, I posted two blogs before my husband even got out of bed. There were also promises of new abandonment photos, and I did go out and get new shots of an awesome abandoned house right near my home that I just happened to find when coming home one day.  Here is a quick preview:

and I will share more of that with you later, I promise.

This was the same Saturday that I got the call that my great grandmother passed away.  Friday my mom sent me a message telling me that she wasn't doing good, so my husband and I made the decision not to go to the boat to be home in case something happened.   When we visited the medical care on Friday night I never expected the call Saturday morning.

So, this is my great grandmother, and all I can think of is how this is affecting my grandmother, The two of them were best friends.  They did everything together and grandma took care of great grandma for almost two years up to this point.

 What I want to share with you is some of my memories to celebrate the wonderful life of this woman, my great grandmother, who had an impact on so many peoples lives.


These photos I took for her 96th birthday, which was in March. It was so funny because she was ready to have her photo taken, she got her hair combed and what not, and as soon as I put the camera away, she started laughing and putting out big ol smiles--and I missed them.

Though I have a lot of photos of her, I won't be able to share them here because they have been moved to storage, here is one that I found that we took for the birthday party the family threw for her:

This one is my favorite.

Many people don't get to have a this much of a life time with their great grandparents, I always brag that my son had the ability to spend quite a bit of time with his great great grandma, and she was just tickled by him all the time. Truly I hope that Jaden can have the sort of relationship with his grandmother's that I had with Granny Armstrong and that I have with my grandma Blake.

Last night I was trying really hard to get this blog out so that people could understand where I have been, because I haven't been very active anywhere, then I decided that I want to make this blog a "celebration of life". Many people were reminising yesteray at the dinner gathering after the funeral, and some of my favorite memories were brought back.

When I was like five or six, Granny and Gramp still had quite a few animals on the farm, and I was always so happy to stay the night there with them and get up early in the morning and go feed the animals with grandpa, one particular time, it was rainy and super muddy (much like our current weather)and I got stuck in the mud, and gramps had to pull me out of my boots and set me up on the hill to go back and get my boots out. Another time I fell and scraped my shin up (I still have a scar) on the back stairs and I remember Granny cleaning it up and getting band aids out. There was a cherry tree we used to pick cherries from. There was a strawberry patch behind the big barn. Every Saturday for many years, I would go down there and mow the lawn because Granny had asthma, when I got to old my cousin Jason took over that job.

There are so many great memories that I have and I could go on and on, and I am sure that my family has many great memories as well. Yesterday, I took my camera but I couldn't bring myself to get it out. Everything was wonderful and there was a great turn out. Thanks to everyone.  Oh and sorry if this is rambling and unorganized.

There was more.....

There were more families:





This was a Christmas present for their mother, I have been told mother cried! That makes me happy--I was able to get this done quickly for them!

While away

This is the photo that I used for Bills Lawn Care Christmas card this year.
I intend to do some more before and afters, but right now I am catching up with blogging. It's been a while!

So, I had to do our X-mas family photos, and our x-mas card:






And of course our x-mas card came out of these: