Before It Withers » Just another WordPress weblog

My former assistant running coach and good friend Katie has a beautiful little girl who just turned 6 months old this week and guess who was blessed with the honor of capturing this phase in pictures???  That’s right.  Be jealous. 

And the only downfall is that I may have to pay them royalty fees one day when a photo I took of their daughter makes me a fortune.

Boop!!!

The monster was THISSSSS BIG!!!

ACHOOOO!!!  Bless you, little one!  

“That is enough pictures for today, Meredith.  I need my beauty sleep!”

This is Meredith signing off…hoping you liked the pictures…and also hoping you will let her know what you think…and also hoping she can take your pictures too!!! 

I had the privilege to take engagement pictures for two people who will soon be part of my family!  I had the pleasure of spending a few days this summer in California with my future in-laws.  My fiancé’s brother Kevin proposed to his bride-to-be earlier this summer.  I am so excited for them.  They are so perfect for each-other and happily in love.  It was a short and sweet photo shoot because there were many other photos taken during the trip but these were the official ones.  It was a fun shoot despite an unexpected mishap halfway through.  Congratulations Jackie and Kevin.  I love you guys and hope you enjoy your pictures.  I can’t wait to see you at our wedding!  Miss you guys already.

And so it begins!!!

And now some paparazzi  pictures… And I loved the way they were standing and holding each-other so I wanted to get some areal shots so I stood on the bench that both of them had just sat on and fell all the way through.  I broke the antique bench in my in-laws-to-be’s front yard.  Ugh.  Haha.  It was quite entertaining.  Sorry Lorraine and Bruce. And just in case you were wondering, we got the bench back together.  We just didn’t stick around to see if it would hold anyone up anymore. Hope they are all you hoped they would be.  I had a blast taking them and playing with them the past few days.

Lots of love,

Meredith

This is my home for now.  Enjoy

  The walking bridge..this is for people who can’t walk on water like Jesus but want to go from downtown to North Chatt where all of the fun lies.  

The walking bridge should really be called the running bridge.  Because that is what all of the cool people do on it.

Welcome to North Chatt!!!

The Chattanooga Aquarium

Watch out for these suckers.  They can be the death of your bank account.  You will get tickets.  The city of Chattanooga stays running because of these things.  Park in the UNUM lot and walk.  It is much safer than trying to keep the meters fed.  

This is where the Chattanooga Mocs get their game on and where all of the famous artists come to make their music.  And best of all, it is where the circus comes with their tigers and elephants and clowns.  And not that I care, but the monster trucks do their thing here, too.

You can walk to anywhere worth going in Chattanooga.  Do it!!!

Chattanooga is in Tennessee, not Georgia.  But this street is home away from home for me.  I make a homecoming every time I am waiting for a green light at this intersection.

This cute little patio table is located at what they call the Bluff View Art District.  There is art on a bluff.  And there are fancy-schmancy restaurants there too. Some of the art on the bluff.  It looks out over the river towards the walking bridge.

The Hunter Museum of Art.

This is Coolidge Park at night…and that is the walking bridge at night.

If only we all had such passion!  What joy and emotion.  This is exactly why I want to spend the rest of my life around kids.  I don’t care whose kids or what kind of kids or what age of kids.  But I want to be around faces like this.  The faces that know little pain and never wonder what this whole life thing is all about.  They just live.  They are fearless because they don’t know any better.  And I don’t think that is such a bad thing.  I wish I could live without doubts and fears and worries.  Maybe if I did a camera could easily capture what I can with my camera.  Kids’ eyes just glow with life and freshness.  Being around them makes me seek that.  When I am it tends to rub off.  How can you stay mad or stressed or depressed when that is what you get to witness?  When you smile at a kid they smile back.  When you laugh a kid will laugh not knowing why they are lauging.  I am going to be a teacher.  And more than anything I want to teach my students to hold on to life, not take it so seriously.  I will teach them.  And it will not be all fun and games.  But I want learning to be fun.  I want them to become just as passionate about the world around them as they are about the life inside of them.  They’ve got lots of curiosity, my job is just to direct it.  If I can find something to teach my kids that brings them as much joy as that parked jet ski brought to my cousin, Wade, then I will count my career a success.  

Give em a jet-ski and teach em how to ride.  That’s what I say. 

305 words…what do you say?  What do they say to you? 

Ju

After I no longer had to feel stupid about finding him worth my attention, I began to open up. We became friends. Turns out I had to try too hard to keep him from seeing the smile behind my eyes. Then I began to see his eyes were smiling back. I thought maybe he felt the same way. His eyes were smiling at me too, but he never did anything about it. I started to think he was a just a flirt, you know, one of THOSE guys. Then on Valentine’s Day I found a king-sized snickers bar with a “secret note” sitting on the windshield of my car. With that came a long phone conversation between two people who aren’t phone people followed by the perfect Chattanooga date experience. He parked his car on 4^th street and we walked across the walking bridge for some Clumpie’s ice-cream in Coolidge Park. Who knows how long we spent on that park bench talking about everything over a scoop of Oreo ice cream I forgot I was going to share. It was perfect. I learned that there was so much more to this guy than the mystery of the kid-loving California boy with long hair and tattoos. Then a walk back to his car, then a “not wanting the night to end” statement said by this boy, and a walk to the downtown hotel to see my mom and my sister who had just arrived for a weekend visit. It was in a conversation with my mom that the move back to Claremont first came up. I remember a bit of my giddiness easing, but not disappearing. I made a mental note not to fall for him, just to enjoy it while it lasted.

That plan didn’t last very long. This picture was taken just a few weeks later on a weekend spring break camping adventure at Cloudland Canyon. Never had Brian had such a large gulp of outdoor air…aside from the sandy west coast beaches. On the first morning of the two-night camping trip with a small group of our friends, we awoke to the surprise of three inches of unexpected snow. IT WAS COLD! Very, very cold. But it didn’t stop us from taking in the beauty of the place we came to see. We hiked and saw it all under a thick blanket of snow through the small opening between our face-warmers and our hoodies We were trialing a group of experienced outdoorsman. This type of exploring was nothing new to them. It was as if they were making a game of it. How much can we see? How fast can we get there? Brian and I were too busy being amazed at the quiet beauty that surrounded us, and taking in what was beginning to develop between us. We let them go ahead. There wasn’t much to say. Well really there was too much to say. So we didn’t say much at all. He didn’t say what he thought might scare me away. I was just trying not to let him hear me telling myself that I couldn’t fall for him.

The next morning our friends had to hit the road for home. And the cold snap followed them right out of the park. Because as soon as we were ready to walk around again, there was no need for ski jackets, long-johns, and gloves. We left the tent in just pants and long-sleeved shirts. Not too long after that, a tee-shirt was plenty. It went from feeling like a spring break ski trip in Colorado to feeling like a spring break should feel. And that is the condition you have found me in the picture.

We were nearing the end of our hike and there was a moment where my heart ignored my head. And then it was too late. I know the moment that my heart decided that it didn’t care what lied ahead. I wouldn’t let myself believe it was love until later, but it was. My heart knew what my head ignored. It knew the wall I had built around it wouldn’t be there for long. So there I am in the tree. Brian is standing on the ground laughing at me sitting up in the tree that was bent in such a way that it begged to climb into. And I am looking back at him with a face that is somewhat mad that he had let me fall for him, yet not mad enough to hide my smile. Little did I know that the man behind the camera had already decided he wasn’t leaving me behind…ever. Somehow he knew it would be worth it.

Picture #1

February 16, 2010

Worth more than a thousand words: 1117