Finally able to visit again!

Punk was recovering well and the doctor felt that he was ready to see visitors again....yay!! I went to visit him at noon by myself because I couldn't wait until the evening when Eric got home. :) He was SO excited to see me. He practically jumped out of the student doctor's arms and into mine. He was so cute and just snuggled his head into my neck. I sat with him for a bit and could tell he wasn't feeling quite himself as he kept moaning and I have never heard those noises come from him before. But the good news is that he was looking and acting a lot better than when we saw him on Sunday...so things are looking up overall....yay!!
I didn't even think about him needing to get shaved for his surgery so I was a little surprised when I saw that a quarter of his body had been shaved! Petting skin is just plain weird! :) You can see his bare skin in the above picture. Eric took this picture when we both went back to see him this evening. He was SO tired that he was falling asleep with his head up. Poor little guy! We gently laid his head down on me and he crashed. The student doctor said there are a lot of loud dogs there now, so he isn't sleeping much.
This picture is a self portrait I took at noon. :) Me and my little Punker!

Man, I love that little guy!

A Basic Tune Up...

is what the doctor said Punk got today. Who knew an 8 month old was already in need of a tune up! I thought those happened at more like the 20,000 or 36,000 mile mark!
He went into surgery at 9AM, they were sewing him back up at 1:30 and had his x-rays and bandage done by 4:30 when they started to let him wake up. He had some SERIOUS nap time today!
The tune up not only consisted of putting his leg back together, they also pulled one of his teeth! What a day! We've been worrying about his one baby tooth that didn't want to fall out. We knew we didn't want to put him under just to pull it knowing how tough it was for him come out of anesthesia last time...so we put that on the back burner. That was until Punk decided he wanted to try the whole anesthesia thing again anyway. Too bad he couldn't have found a way to have Maddoxx help him write a note to us letting us know he was totally cool with trying anesthesia again....no, instead he decided to take extreme measures to let us know! :)
The bummer is that the doctor wouldn't let us come to visit him at all today. :( We have to wait until tomorrow to see his cute little face again. We were told that we won't be able to take him home tomorrow either, we have to wait until Wednesday or maybe even Thursday!
Who is in with me to run a covert operation to rescue him sooner?!?!! :)

"It's the wrong leg, its the wrong leg!"

is all we could say to the student doctor as she brought Punk in the waiting room to see us. There was a look of much confusion on her face as we kept repeating those words. To her, she thought we were telling her they casted the wrong leg....nope! We were trying to tell her that this is a new break on a different leg than last time. But we couldn't get that out of our mouth...the only thing that came out was "it's the wrong leg!"
With us being out of town yesterday, there was some confusion as we tried to relay Punk's medical history over the phone. He DIDN'T break the same leg after all! No way! Punk is never afraid of anything and breaking legs certainly doesn't scare him away from being a daredevil! Apparently he thought it would be a good idea to see what it was like to have a cast on his right leg instead of his left. So he did.
I really don't know if the break on the different leg rather than the same place on the same leg is a good thing or not. Right now, surgery is still on for tomorrow to do the bone graft and metal plate. After talking with the doctor tomorrow morning before surgery we will know more. He wanted to go with those extreme measures when he thought it was the same break on the same leg. I'm not sure what this new information will mean for his surgery.
The good news is that we did get to see him today and snuggle with him for a little bit. Yes, I cried, I just wanted to take him home with me! I don't want to wait for 2-3 more days! The house is SO quite without him. Maddoxx is bored out of her mind and either sleeps or mopes around until we mention Punk's name and she goes to look for him.
Punk was nice a drugged up when we saw him. Poor little guy was so out of it. They have him on a lot of pain medication. I don't think he's feeling much of anything. :) I am anxious to see the pictures the doctor took at the initial consultation. The student doctor today said the leg was at a 90 degree angle....yuck!! But I still want to see! Say a few extra prayers that surgery goes well and he handles the anesthesia better than last time! And so the Punk saga continues...
P.S. check out the size of that cast!! It really is as big as the picture makes it look! I couldn't believe it when I saw his little puppy paw sticking out the end! They REALLY have his leg stretched out in there!

Punk broke his leg.....AGAIN!!!!

Not even joking! Same leg....broken again! We get to go see him tomorrow, I will hopefully be able to post some pics of the little guy then.
We were in the middle of taping a wedding when both of our phones were buzzing in our pockets. As soon as the wedding was over...Eric called back. By the time I found him, I got in on the end of the conversation and all I heard was, "he's in the hospital". I had NO idea who Eric was talking about and then I found out it was Punk... again...I should have guessed!
Punk was having a lot of fun on his play date while we were working the wedding. He has got to be the BIGGEST klutz in the world though! He lost his footing on the step and ended up breaking it again! Go figure...only Punk. 8 months old and already had 2 broken legs.
He was in good hands and was well cared for for which we are SO thankful! (thanks guys!) He has to stay overnight at the ISU vet hospital until they can do surgery on Monday to put a plate in his leg. Hopefully we can bring him back home on Tuesday.
The good news is that we do get to go visit him, so we'll be heading to visit the klutzy little guy tomorrow...yay!! We miss him already!

RAGBRAI in '09?

RAGBRAI came through town yesterday...it was SO exciting! I got so caught up in the moment...SO caught up that I even thought that we should do it next year! So I started observing a bit more closely and started coming up with a shopping list.

It went something like this...

I saw a dad and his son on a tandem...that would be perfect! The son looked like he was having a great time, even taking both hands off the handle bars and waving to everyone...definitely looks like a gig I could handle...as long as Eric was in front. :)

THEN I saw a tandem with the reclining type seats...that would be even more perfect, I added that to my list.

(Not done yet) THEN I saw a trike bike with the reclining seat...I was in awe...and love.

(Still not done) THEN I thought about what my ultimate bike/shopping spree would be. It would be a tandem with reclining seats AND 3 wheels...that is how I want to go on RAGBRAI! Sounds posh doesn't it?

And then I started noticing the "get-up"...and that included spandex shorts and shirts. That's where my dream of RAGBRAI fell apart.

P.S. I told Eric and my dreams for the day and his only response was, "so who would the tandem with reclining seats and 3 wheels be PERFECT for?" :)

Have any of you ever gone on RAGBRAI? I'm so curious how you made it all the way across the state! Tell me more!

Top Secret...

This weekend we got to do something totally fun! We got to capture a session that is going to be a surprise gift! I LOVE surprises....well, I LOVE surprises that I get to be a part of, to be "in the know"! Because of the surprise factor, I cannot show any humans from the shoot...but I can show you these guys that made their way into some of our portraits. :)


This is the 2nd surprise this month that I got to help with! I'm loving it! I would love to keep helping with portrait surprises, so if you have any ideas, let me know and I would love to help you pull it off! It is never too early to start thinking about Christmas gifts! :)

"free photos for help with handy work!"

Home improvements/fix-it jobs are just NOT our thing. I wish I could adequately describe just how NOT our thing they are...but I can't.

Maybe exhibit A would be the fact that we are still trying to take the pond out of the back yard...2 years later!

Exhibit B: We went without light in the bedroom for 4 weeks just because neither of us wanted to face the fact that it was broken...more than just needing a change in light bulbs. If it was just a light bulb change, that may have only taken us 2 weeks to get to. :) Ridiculous, we know!

Finally last Thursday I just could not stand having no light in the bedroom so maybe I kind of, sort of, maybe just a tiny little eensy weensy bit threw just a tiny little tantrum. I think it revolved around the fact that I couldn't see the clothes in my closet and I was tired of using a flashlight...that was in need of new batteries...so it was so dim it was useless anyway. And maybe I just might have told Eric that from that night on, he would maybe, sort of, kind have to be in charge of picking out my clothes to wear until the light was fixed. I think 2 minutes later, he was on his way to Lowe's at 9PM to pick up the new light kit. :) Funny how that works isn't it?!?!?

Once he got home he somehow went and found the bigger better tripod flashlight...still not sure where that was when I was using the dim one to pick out my clothes! Using the flashlight (reminder, it's 9:30PM and there's no light in the bedroom!), he attempted to install the light kit that the person at Lowe's told him was universal. You know where this is going don't you? There is NOTHING universal about the light kit! We boxed it back up and did what any normal couple would do...ignore it.

So here we are 1 week later and we still had NO LIGHT! Tonight we went to Lowe's to get a whole new fan and light combo. We were not even going to try to mess with finding another "universal" light kit. Of course we ran into a few snags, it wouldn't be a project at the Smidt house without PLENTY of snags along the way. It ended up that I had to make yet another trip out to Lowe's to get more parts. And this is where it gets really good...

As I'm leaving, Eric says, "I'm going to start working on the leaking toilet (side note: it's been leaking for months!) while you're gone" I looked at him, knowing and FULLY understanding our luck with plumbing issues, and said "are you sure you really want to start that on a Friday night knowing this could mean we could be without this toilet for awhile?" He says, "yeah". Ok, who am I to argue? I mean I've been begging to get this leak fixed FOREVER!!!

I think you know where this one is going too....yeah, we ran into a snag...not sure when we'll have it back in operating order. It's 10:15 PM now and Eric is at Lowe's getting a hacksaw...this should be interesting!

Quick re-cap of our night:
1.) lose power to half the house to get the fan installed. This includes losing power to our router which equals no internet.
2.) Maddoxx is moping around the house, then we realize Punk is no where to be found. We searched everywhere in the house and the outside, including the dirt by the fence to see if he's made the great escape. Just as I'm about to issue an Amber Alert, we find him in the garage. He snuck in there with Eric and he won't bark unless Maddoxx is around (for real!) so we had no idea where he was! Poor little guy was excited to see us again!
3.) run into snag with fan, Eric decides to work on toilet while I run to get more stuff.
4.) Eric turns off water to the house to work on toilet...runs into snag while I'm out. (I KNEW I should have used the facilities before leaving!)
5.) Now I'm without electricity to half the house, no internet AND no water!! I decide I should just start cleaning.
6.) I start with the windows...3 windows in, I can't get the window to snap back in. So I take it all the way out...hit the dry erase board on the fridge and then that came crashing to the ground and broke. Perfect, just my luck I say.
7.) I call in Eric for re-enforcements, I'm convinced I have broken the window. Once he took the window, I left the room, I couldn't take it...everything I touched was turning to ashes!
8.) Fan and light are installed and the best news of all is that they WORK!!!!
9.) Still waiting for the water to return to the house, toilet still out of order...going on 10:30PM.

I think I'm ready to post an ad in the paper, "free photos for help with handy work!" It is just not our thing!! We can run a mean camera, but this handy work is for the birds!

P.S. I do apologize to all of you waiting for your galleries and proofs to be posted...I'm blaming this one on the house!! This is exactly how I did not anticipate spending my Friday night! Believe me, I would have MUCH rather been working on your galleries!! I will be in touch soon!

Halstead Family...

My definition of the Halstead family....truly d..e..l..i..g..h..t..f...u...l, yes, that would be it, truly delightful!

They invited us to their beautiful acreage to have a little fun with their family...they wanted bare feet and family piles. Perfect, just perfect! Wouldn't you know it, their acreage fulfilled my love of red barns. Not only did they have a red barn, they had a red wagon, a hammock, a perfect climbing tree and plenty of animals to make us feel right at home.

Little Carli will turn 3 is just a couple weeks and she totally kept us laughing....the whole time!


Carli has a "pose" and this is her "pose" with the rest of the family trying to imitate, others couldn't hold back their laughter! Oh...my...goodness! Priceless!


I love how the sun is shining through the apple climbing tree here. Have I already mentioned this is the perfect acreage...and I'm in love?!?!?


And this image is one of the many reasons why I LOVE that Eric and I are a team on every shoot we do. He gets to see this and capture it! Love that Radio Flyer!


Halstead family - thank you, thank you, thank you for having us out! We loved capturing you in your element and felt like we were just part of the family. We could have stayed there all night capturing you guys hanging out! As I said before...truly delightful, you all were truly delightful!

Marcia and Brent...

When we saw the Cold Stone Creamery trailer pull into the park where we were going to start Brent and Marcia’s engagement session, we knew we were going to be off to a great start! Eric has seen this trailer in a parking lot and always thought it would be so fun to use it during a shoot…what luck! It brought itself to us!

This was a HOT session….in more ways that one! Aside from the heat and humidity, these two brought their own heat to the session! There’s no doubt about it, these two are madly in love!

Marcia brought her cute little giggle and Brent brought plenty of one liners….what a pair! You guys are awesome and our time together went far too fast!

Marcia and Brent, we cannot wait for your wedding in eastern Iowa!! We know it will be a guaranteed good time to be had by all! We are definitely looking forward to having more fun with you guys!!

{Kayla} 2009 KandE Senior Model

We had our 3rd senior model shoot this week! We were laughing so hard throughout the shoot, it was impossible to get a more serious shot out of her. We tried everything and it just turned into more laughter. I have ALOT of images like this...


We finally figured out the trick…completely tire her out!

At the end of the 3 hour shoot, she was so tired and her cheeks hurt so much she couldn’t keep a smile on her face to save her life! It was perfect for the camera!
Apparently we didn’t tire her out as much as we thought because she still managed to hit a homerun in her first round tournament game that night! Way to go rock star!!

(p.s. don't mess with her on the field or court! She's a 4 sport athlete and brings her A-game every time!)

The most amazing part of this whole shoot had to be her hair! For those of you who know Kayla, you are probably thinking these pictures don’t even look like her…her hair is down! Doesn’t it look AWESOME??? I don’t think that I have seen her hair down since she was like 3 years old! (Side note: Yes, I’ve known her since she was that little! She’s my cousin and I still can’t believe that she is already going to be a senior!)



Kayla – thanks for hanging with us for a few hours and making our stomachs hurt from laughing so hard! Oh and Kayla Rose, you looked beautiful with your hair down…do it more often girl!! ☺ I loved it! We can’t wait to see you at ISU next year!! Go ‘Clones!!

Houdini

We were driving back from the weekend in Okoboji when we heard some rustling in the back. As I turned around to see what the dogs were up to I found Punk waking on the ground and starting to make a jump to the front seat! Now, to many of you, I’m sure you’re wondering why this is blog worthy….WELL, our dogs sit in their doggy seat when traveling…securely buckled in. The word now in question is “securely”.
Is the seat still secure or do we have the next Houdini on our hands?!?!? We have no clue how he escaped from the seat…when we left, I buckled him in…15 minutes later he was snuggled on my lap with no help from me!
Maddoxx was mad at first being the only one left in the seat. She quickly adjusted to enjoying the seat all to herself!
She generally takes up ¾ of the seat and leaves Punk to curl up in the tiny little space she leaves for him. I think Punk is now enjoying the larger real estate that my lap has to offer!

(On a side note…Punk has mentioned he is interested in trying an underwater escape next, the doggy seat proved to be less than challenging. We’ll keep you posted.)

Punk really enjoyed his little vacation...he ate MORE than a 2 lb. puppy should eat in three weeks! Here he is really enjoying helping himself to grandpa's licorice...