Favorite Photo Friday - Hope Springs Eternal

Portrait of  my sweet Grace, taken last Sunday.

I had to look up the meaning of the little idiom, "Hope springs eternal."

It means that under difficult circumstances, people will always hope for the best - that better things 

will come down the road. No matter how bad things have been, they can always get better. 

We are hopeful and grateful.

Grateful for the outpouring of kind words and prayers for us right now.

We deeply appreciate and feel your prayers.

Dan has interviews next week out of state, so we're praying 

they go well.

Thank you to so many people who have reached out to me.
(And you know who you are).

We love you all.

Enjoy these beautiful early Spring days.

love, Gail

Sunday Snapshot - With Spring's Arrival Comes Changes

It seems that the only constant in life is change.
People come and go. Things come and go.
Neighbors change. Houses change. Kids grow up.

Some of life's changes come with challenges.

We've had our share lately with my husband losing his job recently.
We'll be busy wrestling with some of those challenges, so I may be blogging less.
The biggest challenge is that fear of the unknown and not knowing if we will move or stay.
You have to prepare as best as you can for whatever life may throw at you.

I've thought long and hard about whether to even post this and 

pretend like everything was just fine.

But it isn't.
It really isn't at all.

Please keep our family in your thoughts and prayers.

10/52 and Texture Tuesday - It's a dog's life

Zoe - nearly 10 mos. old.

Taken yesterday afternoon of her resting.

What a life this pup leads, no responsibilities

other than to sleep, bark, eat, lick and sniff.

I almost forgot how she loves to roll in the snow.

She's a sweetheart.

Pretty nice life, ya think?

I used two layers of Kim Klassen's 

'Happy Hearts' texture.

The first at linear burn and the second at soft light.

Favorite Photo Friday - black and white

"Beauty is not in the face; beauty is a light in the heart."

~ Kahlil Gibran

(One of my favorites, taken about 3 weeks ago, I am loving it in black and white).


Those eyes clearly show what is in her heart.




Edited with Florabella's High Key bl/w action
from her Classic Workflow actions.
(Which I highly recommend!)

9/52 - Spring clean up

"The great purge and clean up of 2012"

I've been MIA from blogging lately and I hope to explain that a little better

eventually.

We are all healthy thankfully.

With Spring fast approaching I've been taking advantage of 

the time indoors (when it's still cold outside) to take 

inventory of the mess in my basement and house.

We've lived here for 6.5 years and I've never really purged our closets,

cupboards, rooms and the beast of our basement.

I would never show a 'before' pic, it would be way

too embarrassing.

Anyway, the purge and Spring clean up and organization has started 

and I think it's been therapeutic in many ways. 

Time to think, reflect, donate, recycle, throw away junk, and get ready for a ginormous garage sale in May.

We also have listed many things from Dan's late mother's home on Craig's List.

Have I mentioned how much I love Craig's List?

(Antique dollhouse that was my husband's Grandmother's when she was a girl).

8/52 and Favorite Photo Friday - a Dad and his daughter

I don't know about you but I'm a daddy's girl from as far

back as I can remember. 

Last weekend was Grace and Dan's first father-daughter dance.
I guess there were around 500 people that attended,
3 photographers to take pics, and a DJ.

Grace was a teeny bit shy and thought the music was kind of loud.
She had fun with her girlfriends and giggled and laughed.
She did dance with her dad and
they had a great time together!

And it's no surprise that Grace is a daddy's girl too. :)

Father - Daughter dance

Feb. 2012

Love is in the air

Only from the heart can you touch the sky.

~ Rumi

A hundred hearts would be too few
To carry all my love for you.

~ unknown

kisses are a better fate
than wisdom.

~ e.e. cummings

Happy Hearts Day...

xo

7/52 - happy hearts

'Without Valentine's Day, February would be...well, January.'

~ J. Gaffigan

Miss Grace has been chompin' at the bit so to speak

about making and decorating cookies for her Valentine

party at school on Tuesday.

We baked them together Saturday night and Sunday afternoon did the decorating.

Actually we had a little assembly line going...

I was the icing person and she was the decorator.

(Cookies were yummy too).


On a different note, Grace is the star student for her class this week.
We made a photo board for her to share with the class
and she's bringing in a few favorite personal items too!