Photos

I feel totally silly posting pictures I've taken of myself, but once I have another subject to shoot and am not so bored with my days, I'll practice on someone else :)  I've been fascinated by "raw" things lately.

Do You See What I See

There’s a long sung Christmas song titled, “Do You Hear What I Hear.”   Today after talking to my sister about our love for Christmas music and reading from the awesome new Relief Society book, “Daughters in My Kingdom” I had a new little twist to the song mentioned above pop into my head, “Do You See What I See.”

I feel like often times it is easy to forget how good we have things in life.  It’s no secret that us women can be our own worst critics- forgetting all of our strengths and focusing on our weaknesses like they’re the most important part of us, but do we see what He sees?  Do we see the divine potential we’ve been created with?  Do we see the miracles that we help Him produce?  Do we see the tender mercies in simple life situations?

Granted we all have things we struggle with, things we wish we could do better at, but in general I think we all have a lot going for us- a whole lot more than we acknowledge.  I am always amazed at the peace that comes from my Heavenly Father when I pray to be able to be better at “something.”  Instead of showing me how bad I am at that certain “something,” He shows me what I’m already doing right, giving me hope and in a small, but very real way, He validates who I already am and my desires to become better.

Our Heavenly Father created us in His image… His image.  And with that creation, He imbedded within us all a bit of His divinity.  Do we remember to build off of that?  Do we neglect to see our natural goodness and potential?  Do we remember to see what He sees?

Charity, the pure love of Christ, is embedded into the Relief Society motto.  We focus on giving charity to others, but do we give it to ourselves?  Do we cut ourselves a break, see ourselves as He sees us, and allow ourselves time for healing and regrowth? 

I believe this is something our loving Heavenly Father wants for us.  He doesn’t want us to be self-absorbed, but He wants for us to see ourselves as He sees us- as His brilliant Daughters who have endless gifts and talents to share and develop.  I believe that He holds a tender spot in His heart for His daughters and will do everything He can to help us see our divine goodness- our raw beauty. 

Photography

Remember how I said I am going to be trying new things?  Well, photography has been on the tippy top of my list for ages now, so Rich and I made the plunge, bought a spiffy nice camera, and are self tutoring ourselves how to take fabulous pictures! (We'll get there some day... ha)
Here are a few of our attempts:

 (Leaves by Rich)

Look at this face I get to snuggle next to every night! How handsome is he?!

We have the cutest pumpkin patch here!  We want to go back when the lighting is more flattering to take some real good family pictures.  Maybe Mr. Baby C will be with us by then?!

(Pumpkins by Rich)

 Did I mention that I'm training to be a super sexy model?!  Rich doesn't mind... ;)

My Tuesday companion- he hung out on the sliding glass door all day!

Our ever growing baby.  I'm 37 weeks 5 days here.  We're, or I'm, SO ready for him to be here with us!

Most of our pictures at this point are just everyday objects around us.  Soon we'll get to practice people/baby photography though, which we're STOKED for!