Emily Lyn-Cook

This is Emily. She is four years old and super cute! Her mom and Aunt brought her and they were fantastic at getting the cutest little smiles out of her :) Her dad is American and her mom is Japanese and so she of course speaks English and Japanese and I seriously think that is THE coolest thing ever! I wish I could speak two languages, and it is awesome that she will grow up bilingual. So here is the cool bilingual four year old!




She was a great little model and was really workin' the camera!

PS. Yes, I changed the layout to my blog and I like it better, but I am still trying to figure out how to get my images bigger, cause that would be better...

FOUR Years!

Four years.... FOUR Years! I literally had to think about it for a minute last week as I realized our anniversary was coming up. Has it really been four years? That sounds like such a long time! That means that we have known each other for six years, and that is just a chunk of time. Now, please excuse the lack of recent pictures. I am at work right now and have not been on the computer at the house in quite some time (which is completely awesome!). So I am making do with stealing shots from my old blog :)

So, yes, four years. My favorite thing right now is that Brian is here. He has been home for about a month straight now and is not leaving anytime soon! I really don't even know what to say. Four years of marriage, Santa Barbara, graduating college, San Diego, Navy, Japan, Travels, moving again... so many big changes and yet we are still the same. We like to tease each other, use lots of sarcasm and movie/The Office quotes, and wrestle. It has been a great four years and I love that I am still learning things about him.

One thing I learned this last year is that he will never say anything bad about anyone. If he says someone is a good person you can take his word for it cause he wouldn't lie. If you ask him what he thinks of someone that isn't the greatest, he will honestly tell you that that person is not the greatest, but only because you asked. Otherwise he would just avoid talking about that person. It is funny to me that it took me so long to realize this, but it really wasn't until this last year that I realized he would say nice things about a few people and I never really believed him and then I would meet the person and say, "Wow, Brian, yeah he's a really cool dude". I know, I should believe him, but I am just skeptical. I have learned though that I don't need to be skeptical with Brian's opinion (on people that is :) So here's to 4 years! We're gonna head out to Yokohama and explore this afternoon, take some fun pictures, and enjoy Japan while we're still here! The picture below is just one of my favorites that Brian sent me while he was away. It's not often that I get to see some good scruffage on his face ;)

Ah yes, thanks to Brian I have documentation for my first ticket EVER. It's wonderful how handy that fish eye is. First I would like to point out how wonderfully long my hair is getting (that comment is for you Melody). I was not speeding, I did not cut someone off, I did not in any way place anyone in any danger, but they felt the need to give me a ticket. I got in a right hand turning lane and decided that I wanted to go straight, then I LOOKED and saw no traffic coming and went straight from the turning lane. Immediately I hear a siren from the police car that is sitting at the light across from us. Not good. I knew it was for me cause the timing was just too right.

So I pulled over into a parking lot and the first thing the guy says is, "Do you speak English?" NO (I said it very nicely). His English was fine, and he proceeded to explain why I was pulled over and that they were giving me a ticket for 6,000¥. That's fine. Whatever. I broke the law apparently, but it was the SAFEST law breaking thing that I have done here. So on Monday, Brian went and paid both our tickets at the post office. Wait, what? Both? That's right, Brian also got a ticket :) He got a ticket for driving through a round about thing at a train stop that was for "taxi's only". So, yeah, been here for over 1 1/2 years and we are almost leaving and we both get a ticket in the same week. Why.

Janelle

This little sleeper is Janelle. Fantastic, content, little sleeping baby :) Despite all our efforts to wake her she slept through pretty much the whole shoot. Sleeping babies are pretty darn cute though so it was cool with me :) This is Angela and Jeremiah's first baby and they are just beaming with excitement! Such a cute wonderful family. I am very happy to have had the opportunity to photograph them and capture this special time in their lives.

I mean, really, how stinkin' sweet is that?

Auburn

Shugo is now in Auburn. Since we are moving in August we thought it would be better to move Shugo now before it gets really hot so we don't have to worry about them not letting him fly out when we leave. Last May when Shugo got here it had been a rough trip for him. He was feeling very sick and was not happy. He didn't even feel good enough to wag his tail when he saw me. So, leaving on Friday, I was a little nervous about the trip. I didn't want to put him on the plane, but it had to be done and when I got him at our layover in Seattle he was AWESOME! Happy, healthy and clean! He even got back in his crate for the remainder of the trip with no problems :) Things could not have gone any better. He seemed a little bit sleepy on the ride home from San Francisco airport, but it was a long trip since we hit Friday afternoon traffic...

I have not seen any of my family since October 2008 and let me just say that I am pretty sure I will never do that again. That is just way too long to not visit my family. I was only there for a quick two days, but it was really great to be able to visit with everyone. Below is a picture of me with my parent's St. Bernard, Gunther. He is a BEAR! SO HUGE! He makes Shugo look tiny!


I had a St. Bernard, Sandy, who died early in 2009. Gunther was sad, and he has since lost his mind. Seriously. On that table is my nephew Joel's lizard, and Gunther is apparently in love with him. He sat there staring at him for hours. The other dogs came and went, but he stayed just like that. He sleeps in front of the lizard's cage on the deck too! ALL DAY LONG. Something is seriously wrong with this dog. I love him to death, but he is now officially cookoo.

My sister's kids are below. They have gotten SO big! They are a lot of fun, and I can't wait to be back in August to spend more time with them :) It was a great trip, and I am glad we are moving back soon cause it made me realize how much I miss my family and the countryside!

Monique and Derrick

I had the pleasure of photographing Derrick and Monique's wedding this past Saturday. I was a bit worried on Friday because the forecast for Saturday had rain, but we lucked out! Everything went very smoothly and they looked wonderful! I LOVE Monique's dress. Very beautiful and unique. The shot above is one of my favorites just because of Derrick's face. It makes me smile every time. I promise photo shoots with me are not as painful as that face makes it seem :)



Monique is absolutely stunning here, despite the fact that she was pretty cold. It was sprinkling a bit, but we were safe under the trees. We finished just in time for it to start raining a little harder.












The happy couple :) I am so glad I was able to document their wedding for them!

Brian's Back!

Military life... it is truly something else. Brian's ship pulled in this morning and since I work for MWR marketing I was able to sneak away from work for a bit to see them pull in. I have never been out there to watch them pull in and it really wasn't anything special, but a little bird told me that they would be "manning the rails in their whites". That little birdie was wrong :( Since they have been gone for more than 57 days MWR had a little welcoming picnic thingy set up with food and drinks for the families while we waited (which is what I needed to get pictures of). And of course there were little American flags for the kids.

I cannot really explain or describe what deployments are like. They are always up and down. I generally get in a good rhythm and life goes on without him. In an odd way we just have separate lives while he is gone and then when he returns we fumble through reconnecting them. For instance, this week I am going vegetarian just for the heck of it. I know I don't eat very healthy a lot of the time so it is just a one week, I am going to eat really healthy kick, not like I plan to BE a vegetarian. So when Brian came off the ship to say hi, he mentioned something about trying my weird veggie diet (which I totally would not call it a "diet") and I jokingly said this was a permanent thing and he gave me the "your crazy/who are you and what did you do with my wife" look. That's my favorite thing about him coming back. The little things that change along the way and by the time he comes home it's like getting to know each other all over again. It can be annoying, but it can also be fun too.
My favorite thing is seeing the loving families. The ones who show up super excited. I know over the years the military can wear on you and going through a 6 month deployment for the 20th time is not the same as it was the first or second time. But I think it is just as important as ever to never loose that excitement for them to come home. It is a difficult balance, but we cannot allow our lives to separate so much that we loose that excitement. I don't know the family below, but I definitely dread the day I have children and have to deal with a deploying husband.