we threw a "baby shower"

My husband has a brother, and his brother has a wife, and his wife is almost done growing their first little baby.
WE ARE SO EXCITED!!

This is Amanda and Paul. Their child will obviously be better looking than any of us.

Tim and I are beyond excited to become an aunt and uncle! We're so excited we threw a party.

It started off as a baby shower, but then it couldn't be just for girls because Tim HATES gender-specific gatherings, LOVES this baby, and would never stand to not be included in this.  So it became a co-ed baby shower. Then we decided to ditch the traditional baby shower games, so it was a co-ed baby shower with no games...and by then it was starting to not seem like a baby shower at all so we wondered if we could bring wine? Amanda didn't have a problem with us toasting to her baby so we just decided to turn it into a dinner party with presents for the baby and wine for everyone but Amanda party.
And it was a blast! Girls, when you get knocked up, come to me. I will throw you this kind of party.

Little baby shoes! I die. And must capture it on my iPhone.

We normally have a big flat screen TV sitting atop this credenza, but I didn't want it's foreboding presence in the room during the party, so it was banished to the guest room and I thereby gained enough room for 4 people to sit! Win. 

This is Keane. He's a happy guy.

And since we needed a picture of the four of us together, here we are clutching confetti and then throwing it everywhere:

"Hey guys, can we do that cheesy picture where you're both making a heart on Amanda's belly? Just for kicks, really, no one will think you're being serious."

  And then they couldn't stop laughing long enough to try to take the picture.

Until they did. Thanks Paul :)

"Mon petit Chou" is French for "my little cabbage", a classic term of endearment.

And don't worry. As soon as this baby is born I will plaster his or her picture all over this blog for years to come.

me and my fear

I think it was a few weeks ago that Tim was talking finances with a friend, who urged us to get life insurance policies. We agreed that it was the smart thing to do, just in case, and then the conversation went on.

As we were getting ready for bed that night, Tim brought it up again and reaffirmed that he really wanted to get that done soon. If anything happened to him, he wanted me to have more than just our savings to sustain me for a while. I quietly agreed, and then Tim promptly fell asleep while I laid awake, anxiety eating at me, tears running down onto my pillow.
The cruel voice of fear, writing sad storied in my head.

Before I was married, the fear was that I would never find someone to love me. It followed me all day, influencing my decisions about where I went and how I spent my time and what I wore and how I valued people. Born out of lies, insecurity, and despair...all unnecessary, I know this, but there it was.

So I'm lying in bed crying, all worked up that the man I love (who's so at peace, he's asleep, mind you) will fade from my grasp like a vapor, and I realize how easily and regularly I get to this point. All it takes is erratic (read: normal) Chicago traffic to make me gasp in fear, or grip my seat with anxiety that we'll be in a crash that will take him and leave me. Or if Tim orders a cheeseburger when we're out, I get all bossy and patronizing, making him feel guilty for his unhealthy choice that will probably cost him his life and my happiness down the road. Or if he crosses the street too slowly with cars approaching, I pull him by the arm towards the sidewalk.

I see the pattern of course, there will always be something to fear. I'm sorry, future children! Besides that, the greatest product of my fear has never been the fear realized: it is my behavior. Fear makes me controlling, angry, anxious, insecure, condescending, and the list goes on. ALL negative side effects of a needless condition.

And then, laying awake and afraid that night, I just gave up and gave in to the fear. I submitted myself to it as a real possibility, admitting that the worst of the worst could happen to me and then if it does I would make it. I would eventually be ok, because ultimately, my wellbeing and peace doesn't rest on Tim or any other person or thing that will expire. This isn't a "strength within self" mantra, I don't have that kind of strength and I don't know how to fabricate it.

The God who put me together can take me apart and He can take care of me through it all. And I'm not supposed to live in fear.

And, I swear to you, this is the only relief and answer to my fear. The only hope for sleep and peace and hope in my tortured night. Trusting, having faith, in a God who loves me is the only remedy for my weak heart and tendency to be bitter, self-focused, and hard to live with.

I just thought I would tell you about me and my fears, in case you get afraid too.

giving love: 2012

Valentine's day.
Last week, Tim and I weren't too sure what to do with ourselves and the social pressures and expectations put upon lovers on February 14th.
It's our first married Valentine's Day, which is interesting, because now that we've established our home we get to make our own rules about how we do holidays and traditions and such, especially the menial industry driven holidays like Valentine's.
At some point we made loose plans to just spend the day doing things we think are fun. But even then I wasn't sure Valentine's Day would stand out among others, or even if I really wanted it to.

It turned out to be a truly wonderful and memorable day.

We slept in late and didn't feel bad about it, followed by our usual late breakfast plus just a little lovey inspiration with the raspberry jam so I could add a picture to the social media heart themed feed.

Then we settled in the office and started getting work done.  I checked my email, and saw something that made my heart stop.

This was all too reminiscent of Valentine's Day 2011. I had just gotten home from a special date with Tim and saw another email that halted my breath and made me ache inside. A dear woman that I used to work with sent out a request for prayer, because her daughter had just been diagnosed with Leukemia. As I read her story, I was hit really hard with the reality of what she was facing. Jennifer was in much the same life stage that I was: young, in love, soon to be married, when all of her wonderful plans were interrupted by cancer. I couldn't imagine their family's pain and paid close attention to their battle over the next months.

Last September, Jen needed a bone marrow transplant. Out of solidarity, and because it was the only thing I could do for her besides pray, I signed up to be on the National Bone Marrow Registry. Thankfully, Jen's doctors found a donor for her last Christmas and she's in remission, but still fighting cancer as hard as she can and battling fears that it will come back.

When I initially signed up, a little bit of research kept me from getting my hopes up about being able to donate my own marrow; there is a 1 in 500 chance that a donor in the registry will be matched with a patient. But now that I've been identified as a potential match, the odds are up to 1 in 12 that I'll be asked to donate.

This makes me so giddy!!

This season I'm in right now is one of plenty, and I don't know why I get to have all that I do. Every day I'm asking myself and God what to do with it all.  How can I give back and share what I've been given?
My good health is literally priceless,  and I think about this a lot. We all live in a time of unprecedented advances in medical technology that actually allows us to take what we have in terms of health--our blood, our marrow--and give it away to people who are sick. Are you grasping this?

A simple procedure could mean the difference between life or death for someone else who needs what you and I can freely give. Even if it doesn't work out for me to donate marrow (and the odds are that it won't), I have at least given someone an option in a very option-less situation, just by returning a cheek swab in the mail and being willing to take a needle for them.

Today gave me some really great inspiration for how to spend Valentine's day in the coming years. Giving whatever I can out of love, in whatever capacity that looks like over the years, has made my joy full.

Here are today's events from Jen's perspective. An excerpt from her reflections on the 1st anniversary of her diagnosis:

I would really encourage anyone who reads this to sign up like I did. It's so easy.

January recap + first impressions of Oak Park

Well. where did January go?
We got on a plane to leave France on January 10th and landed directly into a whirlwind of activity that has only recently settled down. Moving mostly looked like this:

I thought we'd be able to make a quick job of it, but I was wrong. As soon as we got back to the States,  the busyness of high booking season swamped us. For a solid week, I did nothing but email with potential new clients and arrange meetings to talk to them about shooting their weddings.  

Friends and neighbors who may ever consider hiring a wedding photographer: don't wait until the second week of January! This is when EVERYONE else starts their wedding vendor search for the coming year and dates fill up so fast.  Also, September is apparently the new June when it comes to prime wedding dates. I am sad to be missing two very dear friend's weddings this year because we already had their dates booked, but we're also feeling extraordinarily blessed to have a full year of work ahead of us. 

More on that later. 

What you need to understand right now is that we lived in that chaos pictured above for about 10 days longer than originally planned because clients and meetings trump packing and moving. And I only had one tantrum about it.

I've picked up a few easy transition skills due to my nomadic tendencies, and this is one pictured above is a favorite. The first belongings I bring to a new house are always very dear to me. It helps me form an attachment to my new home and feel like it's my safe place. This is the "Je t'aime" (I love you) print I got for Tim for his 25th birthday last April and it also served double duty as decoration at our wedding. I know I'm long overdue on telling those stories, but just love me and forgive me. I'll get back into it soon! 

Tim, iPhoning on the office floor before furniture got there. Do you know how dangerous it is to iPhone this way? If you get too relaxed, you're liable to drop your iPhone onto your face, which HURTS and you can guess how I know this to be true. I still do it this way, though. Tim too. We like to live on the edge. 

Snow and 20 degree temps doesn't stop us from asking 6 of our closest to haul our shtuff up to the 3rd floor. Look at these troopers. 

Just look at them I tell you! Amanda (in the red scarf) is 8 months pregnant here--not that you could tell because she's still looking so fine-- and she even helped haul in boxes and load up my new kitchen.

Side note: when Tim got dressed that morning, he specifically said he wanted to wear his yellow hoodie because Peter always wears his own identical yellow hoodie when he has to do manual labor and then they'd match. That's what best grown men friends do I guess? 

Seriously--our friends worked so hard to help us get settled. They got all cold and sweaty and bruised and sore just so we can live comfortably in our new apartment. That was such a gift. 

Our first breakfast in our new apartment. We take breakfast pretty seriously, if you can't tell. 

The view from our new office. 

We are seriously loving Oak Park. It's the perfect blend of city and suburb. We can walk to a grocery store or walk to the El stop and take the train downtown. The architecture is amazing and keeps me so inspired. It's quiet. It's old. It's diverse. It's almost perfect. 

One of the most refreshing aspects of it for me has to do with race relations and city planning. I lived in Kansas City for 5 years before coming here, and as much as I loved that town, it was hard to deal with the after-effects of racist city planning that took place in the early 1900's. Even now, Kansas City people and neighborhoods are very monochromatic and there is little overlap and interdependence between the black and white communities.  Every day as I went from school to work to church, I passed back and forth between two opposing worlds that had such a hard time intertwining. I thought this was normal in the MidWest, but Chicago is proving otherwise to me now.

Especially Oak Park. It turns out that while Kansas City was tightening their hold on segregated neighborhoods, Oak Park was making concerted efforts to integrate the community and enforce fair housing regulations. I can really feel this missing tension when I walk around the Lake Street shopping district, meet my apartment neighbors, or sit in a pew at a neighborhood church on Sundays.  People look each other in their different colored eyes and smile around here, and it's made a wonderful impression on me. 

Have a wonderful Monday, you dear people.

Our time in Paris

1. Gare de Lyon 2. the window of our rented loft 3. the view from the top of the steps at Mont Martre 4. Mont Martre Basilica 5. Le Tracadero 6. Under the Eiffel 7. Lady on the Metro 8. drinks with old friends 9. & 10. in synch by the Seine 11. Notre Dame Cathedral in a spot of sunshine 12. inside St Paul's Cathedral 13. Musee du Louvre

It was a profoundly moving experience to be in Paris with Tim. I went there countless times as a little girl and grew very bored of the city by the time we left France when I was 13.  I had completely lost the vision for what an extraordinary city it is.
Spending the last 11 years in the USA has shown me what an incredible feat it is to build up a city full of masterpieces and then keep the culture of art appreciation alive from generation to generation. Architects drawing their dreams and knowing their work will take longer to build than days they have left to live.