A Mike Life – The Life of Mike!

This and That

// November 3rd, 2010 // family

It’s amazing how focused I can get on something new in the span of a year. Jina would probably tell you that’s what she loves about me and also struggles with. When I see something I want to do or achieve, I go full-bore…110% and usually end up doing a great job at it.

Pop Critics was one such thing. It was a fun idea, but I put my heart and soul into it and we took the website to an amazing place in less than a year. Who knows where it might have ended up if I hadn’t realized how much it was interfering with life. It was fun, but not the thing I needed to be doing anymore.

Photography is different. To me this was always there inside me waiting to get out and in the last year I’ve come to realize that more and more. With that of course has come the focus and the drive to be better and do better. And good things are happening.

All that to say my lack of writing about my family, myself, my little girl, my beautiful wife…is something I regret having put aside. Not as much for the people who enjoy reading it, but just for me being able to put my thoughts and feelings down on…paper. Electronic paper I guess.

So with that being said…here is what is going on with us.

Lyla…is almost two years old. Just a few weeks to go actually. She’s headstrong, stubborn, fast and independent. As frustrating as all that sounds and can definitely be, it’s also the stuff I love about her the most. She says “No daddy” in about the sweetest, cutest way possible and it makes me want to smile even though I know I need to correct her. She loves to take off running down the street, she hates being in a stroller that’s not moving, she doesn’t always like the shopping cart…she just wants to explore everything around her on her own terms.

Some recent pics of her:

She’s talking like crazy. Just in the last week she’s started asking what things are. “Ah…dis?” So we tell her. She belts out words and things we haven’t heard her say before and aren’t quite sure what they even are. She says things like “Thank you daddy”, “I love you momma” and lots of stuff. She doesn’t like her feet being dirty. She now loves bubble baths. She loves plucking the flowers in the front yard and dropping them to the ground.

One of the best moments recently was Halloween. Lyla was dressed like a bumblebee and there was just something emotionally overwhelming watching her experience trick-or-treating for the first time. Seeing Jina walking down the sidewalk, holding Lyla’s hand, Lyla’s other hand holding onto her candy bucket…it was amazing. I got to take her up to the very first house for her very first time saying “Trick or Treat!”

Of course, she just said “Treat!” But that’s all that matters really right?

She also would say “Thank you” and it’s about the sweetest thing you’ll ever hear, so people got all nuts over how cute she was.

Some pictures from the big day:

I have a ton of stuff to talk about and don’t know if I can squeeze it all into this one post. We are doing great living downtown…it’s been an absolutely dream for me to be so close to work. But in general we love our neighbors, we love how close a lot of things are, we love the house and the bigger yard and are happy with our decision. It’s been an adjustment for sure…we feel a bit far away from friends now, but are looking forward to meeting others down here as well.

Jina has been working hard trying to get everything looking how she wants…it’s been a month already that we’ve lived there and things are finally looking almost done. We do have the guest house to tackle next, so that should prove interesting.

This Friday I am displaying photos at an old house downtown along with 5 other photographers. You can read all about it here. I’d love for anyone reading this to come on down and see all our work, meet us and just hang out for a bit.

Here are just a few random pictures from the past few months in our lives!