Archive for the ‘childhood unplugged’ Category
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Monday, October 2nd, 2017
i’m not a big hiker, so i’m not sure what came over me when i suggested a hike to some friends this weekend, but that is just what i did. we piled into a couple 4x4s and headed up a logging road to a mountain new to all of us. i’m pleased to say that aside from some muddy shoes and a brief crying fit (i’ll let you decide which one was me), it was a fairly successful outing and the views were a huge payoff. one of my favorite things about the day, though, was the number of volunteers we passed who were there to clean up and care for the trails. they were dedicated to their work and were so delighted to see us making use of them(especially with a gaggle of children) – it did my heart good.
go see all of the childhood unplugged contributors’ work at www.childhoodunplugged.com.
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chilliwack family photographer | childhood unplugged: june 2017
Thursday, June 1st, 2017
for easter this year, the kids’ school decided to do an egg drop off of the roof of the building. they were given the challenge and some limitations and my kids got so into it. sadly, we were in ottawa when the drop happened, but the teacher sent a video of allie’s winning design. she was so proud and was determined to keep her parachute to commemorate her big win (simon’s egg stuffed in the centre of a bag of microwave popcorn didn’t fare as well). we had some really windy days this month and a couple weeks ago she came to me asking for “those long sharp toothpicks”. not thinking anything of it i went about my business, only to find her an hour later in the backyard with packing tape, a fistful of skewers and a ball of yarn…making a kite out of her parachute.
see more at childhood unplugged!
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childhood unplugged: may 2017
Monday, May 1st, 2017
it was so fun to see my kids jump right into farm life while visiting my husband’s family, wanting to interact with the animals and know how they could help. i may not have grown up on a farm, but i feel like every child should spend some time there – it’s so good for them to understand where our food comes from and to appreciate how hard farmers work.
See more at Childhood Unplugged!
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childhood unplugged: april 2017
Monday, April 3rd, 2017
we spent a lot of time looking up. at the trees, toward the sound of the rain, at the mountains, to the sun on our face, searching for the evil queen in snow white’s castle. we also spent a lot of time looking down. for lizards and four leaf clovers, for flowers, at the water, at the sand between our toes. we reached one destination just in time to search for another. we drove and drove and drove. and then drove some more. we got to see a thousand year old tree and black sand and crashing waves and surfing goats and city lights and minnie mouse and a beacon of love in the desert and big rocks and small bugs and old friends and new ones. i can’t believe just how much we crammed into two weeks and i now have a list of places we will have to return to.
for those interested, i decided to limit myself to only my 24mm lens. i knew i didn’t want to lug around a bunch of equipment and only having one lens helped me to engage with my family and challenged me to see things in new ways. please go see the rest of my friends’ childhood unplugged posts as well!
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childhood unplugged: march 2017
Wednesday, March 1st, 2017
these are the days. the long, dark, wet days. the days we spend trying to distract ourselves waiting for the sun to return. so when it does, you better believe we run to it.
see the other contributors here: www.childhoodunplugged.com
Tags: childhood unplugged, chilliwack family photographer
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chilliwack family photographer: childhood unplugged
Thursday, September 1st, 2016
the weather took a drastic turn for fall this week and a few of us weren’t ready to let go of summer, so we headed up to the lake and forced our kids into its frigid waters. they thanked us later, i swear.
check out my friends’ stories of childhood unplugged here!
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lifestyle family photographer: childhood unplugged
Friday, July 1st, 2016
if you ever see a massive plastic beach ball in the store and you think to yourself “why would I want a massive plastic beach ball?”, just buy it. hours upon hours of entertainment…followed by a few moments of intense fighting and pain. it’s all worth it, just ask my kids (during the entertainment part). more childhood unplugged stories can be found here!
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vancouver lifestyle photographer | childhood unplugged: june
Wednesday, June 1st, 2016
i have a confession to make. i have serious “little red hen” syndrome and if you don’t know what that is, i suggest you track down a copy of the book and give it a quick read. not sure where it came from, maybe it’s because i’m a middle child and slightly obsessed with fairness (insert sheepish grin). all that to say, when the kids say they want something in particular to eat, i’m usually pretty quick to say yes…as long as they help me make it. this time it was strawberry lemonade, so off the the fields we went, in search of “big, dark beauties” (as they like to call them).
this is part of a series called childhood unplugged – lots of other great stories can be found here!
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travel family photographer | childhood unplugged: april
Monday, April 4th, 2016
i’ve had a hard time putting this post together for a couple of reasons; one is that it was a whirlwind and i am struggling to summarize it in words. the other is that the first few days of images from our travels and the build were lost – my memory card was corrupted.
still, i wanted to share a little bit about what we chose to do with our spring break. at the end of last year, one of my goals was to serve more together as a family and to connect on a deeper level with other families in our small community. a couple of weeks later, i was approached by two moms who had kids the same age as ours about potentially going to mexico with an organization they were connected to. to do what, at the time, we didn’t know. i said we were interested right away as it meshed with the goals i mentioned, but as i thought about it more, i began to question whether it was a good fit. looking back, i’m so grateful that we decided to jump in with both feet as it ended up being such a positive time for all of us.
we found ourselves in a small town on a hill, just outside san quintin, mexico, building a three room house for a family of five who had previously been living in a shelter made of scraps of plastic, fibreglass and cardboard. our kids were on site with us all week, helping frame the walls, paint the trim, build bunkbeds and generally entertain the crew. we also had the opportunity to visit a local preschool to do crafts and use our poor spanish to make them laugh.
while there is so so much i could say from how proud i was of my kids to how encouraging it was to build a friendship with this sweet family who had never even dreamt of being able to have a home that was safe and dry, i will just say that this was so much more than a “good experience” – i want this to be our way of life. i want to be looking at ways to love and serve others, i want our kids to think beyond their own needs and try to figure out how to meet the needs of those around them. while i have zero notions about saving the world, i have also been reminded that the small ripples created by loving others in tangible ways can certainly change it for the better.
click here for more childhood unplugged stories!!
Tags: childhood unplugged, mexico, san quintin
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vancouver family photographer | childhood unplugged: march
Tuesday, March 1st, 2016
growing up, we were a road tripping kind of family. pack the lunches, stockpile the books, cram three little girl bodies in the backseat of the tan (it was actually more skin coloured) corolla, roll down the windows and hit the road. but make sure you went to the bathroom before strapping in because there was no stopping until we reached our destination and if you had to go, you were going on the side of the road. and i loved it. it was all about getting to where we were going and negotiating how long little sister was allowed to lean on each big sister while we were getting there.
so when i got married, i had the same mindset. get there. but now i had this guy that wanted to stop…to trade drivers (“what? my dad always drove! and he had back problems”), to go pee (“you’re a dude, going on the side of the road is SO easy for you”) and to – brace yourself – get fast food (“so you’re too good for the soggy peanut butter and honey sandwich i made you four hours ago?”). it was pure chaos. add children. i was so confused.
6 years ago, our lives took a turn that we didn’t expect. we didn’t have any plans/jobs for the foreseeable future and we felt a little lost. in a moment of clarity (or a complete lack of judgement), we took out our savings, rented a motorhome packed up our three preschoolers and drove across the country. it is one of those crazy decisions that i am forever grateful to have made. we bonded as a family, we saw places you would NEVER travel to as a final destination (read most of nebraska), we connected with so many old friends and made new ones (the motorhome culture is alive and well, folks) and we enjoyed the journey. we saw a “point of interest” marker on the highway and we would pull over. we drove through detroit in rush hour and received so many expressive hand gestures from our road companions that we had to close the curtains as to protect our childrens’ eyes. we celebrated thanksgiving with a dear friend’s family (the friend wasn’t even there) in ontario. we saw a lake, we stopped. we had an impromptu parkour session on some concrete benches at a rest stop in eastern oregon.
the conclusion we’ve settled on in recent years is that for our family, at least in its current state, we need to enjoy the journey. so even on our little trip back from portland last month (5 1/2 hours of driving is peanuts), one of our kids announced they were working on a #2, so instead of finding the nearest gas station, we searched out this amazing playground, got coffee and played monster tag). did we get home an hour later than we would have? yep. was it worth it? absolutely. (check out my childhood unplugged friends’ posts when you have a moment!)
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