Thursday, February 21, 2008

"Meet ya there..."

So-This is my Brother ElderRyan Wade Forsyth. He is currently serving in the Antananarivo Madagascar Mission....holy crap...I still can't believe he lives there! and NO...I still haven't seen the movie. I have been thinking about him a lot this week and wanted him to know that I love him. I was VERY VERY VERY emotional after he left. I remember flying to Utah (after not seeing him in months already) attending his farewell then rushing out of the house the next morning at 7 A.M. for a flight back to Omaha. (The man sitting next to us on the airplane that morning thought that somebody had died or that Jarom should QUICKLY administer some kind of sedative to put me out of my misery....I was crying so loud it was humiliating!) but that is a whole different story...
... I rembemer quickly waking him up, hugging him, and saying " Meet you back here...right here...in 2 years, deal?" It was so sad....mainly because my family went from being all together...to being at every end of the earth. Not quite...but it sure felt like it:) I moved to Omaha, Ryan to Madagascar, Kayla to provo...and Stephen was left to pick up whatever pieces were left of my mom after all of her kids fled the nest so quickly! It was so hard for us at first to be so apart...we are a very close family and had never done it before! I am happy to report we survived...and have made the most of it. We actually have LOVED our experiences and grown tremendously.
It has been such a fun thing to experience this "mission" with Ryan. When he left we had exactly 2 years left here in Omaha...and that is when and precisely WHY we made the pact to meet eachother....be back together as a family... like we belong....in 2 years.
The time is so quickly approaching... I have been thinking about how great it will be to be reunited!!! There have been times in the last two years that we have become so submerged in our lives that months would fly by without a tear or a day of "homesickness".
....but I still have the dreams where Ryan walks into my Kitchen. Or even better...he gets to meet my little Jaxson. Those are the days and moments that are so CLOSE I can almost taste it:) I found out this week that Ryan will Fly Home on the morning of June 5th! Jarom, Me and Jaxson will "come home" on May 12th. Talk about some perfect timing!!! All I can says is...."We did it Ry! I can't believe it went so quickly and I am so excited to see you. We have gone through this "being away from home" together and shared many letters full of "hopes" and "plans" for when we both come home again. I know it will be everything we expect...and I can't wait to catch up!"

oh ya...and I can't wait for Lake Powell too...it is much better with you there:)
~I LOVE YOU~

9 comments:

Pam said...

Such a sweet post Kristin! It just made me want to cry when I saw Ryan with those darling boys. It's wierd when you seen your brother living in a place so different from ours. I can't believe your brother is almost home. How fun for your family to be together again and for him to meet Jaxson. I'm afraid to say that I can see Ryan getting married quickly...he is so cute!!

The Johnsons said...

Cute post! It will be so fun for Ryan to meet Jaxson. I had Kael and Aidan when Chris was on his mission. I actually had Kael 3 weeks after he left. It was hard to think that he had never met either one of them. Also, crazy that you are moving home on the 12th. We are moving there on the 12th. We will just wave when we pass some where on the freeway! :)

Chelsea said...

Oh that's exciting!!! I can't believe its been two years! Crazy how time flies...he will die when he meets Jaxson:)

Pam said...

Hey Kristin, I was wondering how to get my blog printed. If you know will you tell me:) Thanks!!

Brittany said...

I agree- this was a very cute post! I know how much you love your family and being at home in Utah and I'm so excited that you get to go home soon!! I am going to miss you like crazy but maybe someday we will live close again. At least in the same state!:) I can't believe it's been 2 years!

Allyson said...

I just love this post because I remember when (before the mission) Ryan would always come out and ride horses and do random things with Josh (my nephew...in France.) I remember listening to Ryan talk about something one night at my brother's house and thinking, "this boy really has a lot of things figured out!" I was way impressed! Anyway, I feel like Josh is my little brother and he comes home June 6th! We'll be celebrating that week for sure! I've missed him SO much! I'm sure Madagascar was an amazing place to serve. He'll have a ton of cool stories!

Jessica Kettle said...

awww cute post! I have no idea how i am going to cope when my bro leaves this summer! ugh. To answer some of your questions, I do take pics of max in front of backdrops (aka sheets) or white walls in my house. Also, my room is not painted yet, and all of my bedding and everything in my room is all white too. THe light in my bedroom window in the morning is incredible, so I stick him on my bed alot and do pics in there. If your aperture is low, the background blurs and is all light. Then if you have any dark spots, just blur and dodge in photoshop. That is AWESOME that you got cs3, it is amazing, even though it may be overwhelming to use at first. As far as eyes, I can't take all that much credit. I have to say, Max really was blessed with an amazing pair of peepers. He gets compliments on them all the time. However, you will find that natural light illuminates eyes a lot and gives them that extra sparkle. if you look at my blog, look at Max's most recent pic with the white backdrop. it was facing a window, so his eyes look really sparkly and bright. Then look at the spaghetti pics- still cute, but his eyes look much darker and not as sparkly. Also, when you add more light and contrast in photoshop, it just enhances them more. I would highly recommend messing with CURVES in PS. It is a fantastic tool. click on the line, move it around, and see what kind of look you like. If you want to get a little crazy, select Jaxson's eyes and use the unsharp mask. it REALLY makes them pop, and you can see every little detail in the eye. DO NOT go too high. It will look crazy and fake. I do this sometimes on eyes that appear too light in pics or not sparkly enough. I did it in the top pic of max and it adds just a little punch. Often with Max, I skip it though, his eyes usually do the work for me. I really think the light is the biggest thing. If the light isn't good, the rest won't give you the results you want. Actions are fantastic, but It is still important to know the basics- curves, levels, color balance, etc. If you don't have a handle on these, your action pics won't look as good. I have the color actions by lena hyde from designaglow.com. They are a great basic set for about $30. But like I said, you need to know how to prep you pic for the optimal result. I also use curves a lot rather than actions, or use actions and then further manipulate the image. Sorry for the novel. Hope that helps! P.S. Turn off your flash and Take your camera off auto. Start shooting in P or Av so you can control exposure, white balance, and and flash is manual. Your manual or a book would be helpful, I don't know of any off hand, I have heard "UNDERSTANDING EXPOSURE" is awesome. As for photoshop, I would just browse the lib. or book store and look for one with good explanations and step by steps!

Suzanne said...

kristin, i can't believe your leaving so soon! and like two days before our birthdays! im so bummed out about it, but im so happy that you get to be with your family and see your brother soon. hopefully we'll be able to see eachother again after you move back to Utah. Im gonna miss you so much! by the way....your brother is so freakin HOT!! :)

Angie said...

Hello to my fellow bloggers... Really it's Angie that does the work, but I will take credit for some. Thanks for the comment. I decided that you can't truly blog until you are pregnant or have a baby, hence the long delay. It sounds like you guys are doing good and you have some great pictures. Ohio is good. Teeth are cool. If I ever get sued I am calling Jarom. Angie thinks you are such a cute girl (she had me write that). We hope to see you guys is the LBC sometime when you are home. Make sure to give our nations congressman a beautiful titty twister from his future dentist. Stay in touch and blog on dudes.
P.S Add us to your friends list.
Aaron