I love how these bright yellow tulips are just reaching for the sun!

I love how these bright yellow tulips are just reaching for the sun!

The tulips are finally starting to bloom in Kansas City now that we’ve had a few spring-like days.

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, this past weekend we attended Purple Stride, a Pancreatic Cancer Action Network 5k. After seeing my twin cousins’ facial expressions in this photo from the event, I couldn’t help but share it. If you wrote your own caption, what would it say?

This weekend my family participated in PurpleStride, a 5k run/walk for the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network. This year’s Kansas City event has raised $297,000 – a HUGE growth for its third year. The best part about the event? It’s more than just a walk. It’s more like a carnival with booths, thousands of people, and a huge kids activity area complete with a blow up slide, face paint, crafts, and popcorn and cotton candy. I love how this event is raising awareness about pancreatic cancer. In 2013 45,220 will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in the U.S., and 38,460 will die from it. Hopefully fundraisers like this will change those grim statistics.
See my photo from the inaugural Kansas City walk.

I couldn’t think of a more fitting photo to celebrate Earth Day than from one of the most beautiful places on earth – Glacier National Park.

I’ve been team captain for our Relay For Life team for several years, so I’m constantly trying to come up with creative fundraisers. Last year I decided to try my hand at selling photographic prints, and I raised about $250 with that fundraiser. Not too bad! Naturally I want to beat that number this year. If you like my photography, please consider purchasing a photographic print. You can pick one of the Kansas City photos below, or you can pick any photo from my blog. Visit etsy.com to place an order. And if you don’t want a print but you still hate cancer, the American Cancer Society and I will happily accept donations to Relay For Life. Thank you for your continued support!












This is a photo I took several months ago and never posted, but I’m gearing up to re-open my Etsy shop to sell Kansas City photographic prints as a fundraiser, so I thought I’d share it with you today. Several of my prints are already for sale; the rest should be ready tomorrow! 100% of proceeds will benefit the American Cancer Society Relay For Life.

We’ve had a lot of rain in the last two weeks, which I guess is a good thing since we were in a drought last year. Unfortunately the rain, coupled with the cold weather, has made it hard to spend much time outside.

Tonight I attended a National Geographic talk about birds of paradise. The talk (by a Nat Geo photographer and ornithologist) was so informative, and the photos were incredible! It made me realize how little time I’ve taken to photograph birds. Maybe I just haven’t had the patience for it, but I want to be more intentional about it in the future. Here’s one of my few shots…nothing in comparison to what I saw tonight.

For those of you who have been asking, here are a few photos of our new home. We moved March 9, and of course it took us awhile to unpack and settle in. Here are a few long overdue photos.






