Katharine Elizabeth Photography {the blog}

I’m so glad I got to meet the family of this little 3 month old. He was so cute and had so much personality. And his parents were so great and go-with-the-flow as I moved them around from here to there. Plus, the light in their home was wonderful and the park right behind them was just icing on the cake. I felt lucky to be there.

I caught up with these guys at their lovely cabin west of the Cities.

Their beautiful family is like a snapshot of the wonderful-ness that is “Minnesota Summer.”

In addition to their fun and easy going lake time, we were also able to grab a couple of images beforehand.

For which I am so thankful. What a beautiful family.

This beautiful little girl was so sweet and cooperative when I visited her home. I had a great morning taking her pictures and can’t say enough about her easy-going parents and her adorable, colorful, photo-friendly nursery.

What a sweet girl and wonderful family.

A few of you know that early in July, we had to put our 16-year-old cat, Tibby, to sleep.

For anyone who has been there, I don’t need to explain how awful it is when it happens and how much you ache in the days that follow.

My husband and I got Tibby when we were 19 years old and moving into our first place together.

Tibby was just a kitten. Just a little, yellow puffball.

And we were just teenagers. Fresh-faced and happy and pretty sure we knew everything there was to know about life.

Tibby was with us through a couple of crappy apartments, through our college years, our first house, the birth of our two kids, and the building and moving-in of our current home.

I could write a book about what a little hellion kitten he was.

And all of the weird quirks he developed as he aged.

But I won’t.

I will just say this: Tibby was just a silly cat, but he became a kind of ‘shared experience glue’ that helped our family feel connected. We had inside jokes about him, the kids sang radio songs and substituted his name into the lyrics, we had elaborate storylines about his goings-on during the day while we were away, he made appearances in lunchbox notes and drawings for the kids, and we always guessed his opinion on family matters when things were put to a vote.

He was just a cat.

But he helped our family feel like a family.

He was a good kid, as we always used to tell him.

Tib, you’re a good kid.

We miss you tons.

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The house has been so empty without Tibby here; and we knew we weren’t meant to have a pet-less home. It’s not right for our family.

So we’ve added a couple of new personalities to our home…

And I am hopeful that they will bring new shared experiences to the family.

Experiences that we can add to the funny and memorable variety platter that Tibby has already given to us.

It’s possible that our neighbor has the cutest 5 month old ever.

She had him out in the backyard one night this week and I pretty much fell in love.

Oh my goodness.

Swoon.