so yea, remember the whole my husband is one of nine thing? what this means is that when all his kid having siblings get together in one spot, we have this many children running around (and this many germs...) :

i had my camera out the whole time, and was starting to shoot in RAW. it's taken me forever to get through these images. sometimes, i wish i shot film, because you would just get your pictures and that would be that. half of my lack of motivation came from how exhausted we all were every day after being around so many kids. and half of it was that i was so sad when they left that i didn't really want to look at all the fun we'd been having. then, in the mix, i started shooting RAW and really really prefer the post processing abilities that come with that, and going back and forth between JPEG editing and RAW editing was, well, a pain in the ass. but i knew if i didn't just get through them asap, i never would.

the great thing about this trip was i got to photograph my sister Tricia with her various nieces and nephews. since they live in DC she hasn't really gotten to spend time with the babies.

we spent a lot of time just hanging around inside. since, ya know, we live in new england and it's still freakin freezing...

we did go home occasionally. my little guy got his hair cut, finally. after all my whining, there is nothing quite like a clean cut little boy.

i spent a lot of time following Olivia around. sometimes, i put so much pressure on myself for every shot, every moment. that i forget to just take the moments for what they are. the lighting might not be perfect, maybe i was too busy cooing to get the focus right. i have to let that be ok when i'm just being with my family.

the expressions on this child are too much...