lucky Albion Fit winner

Man I’m so excited to name the winner of this give-away.  The person who wins out nearly 1,000 entries sure is lucky! 

Here she is (picked from random.org):

Sarah who said: “pinned the Icon Emerald Green suit. Stunning color and just might hide muffin top:)”

Sarah, send your contact info. to me at sepphotography dot com and I’ll get it right over to the folks at Albion so you can start picking what you want to put your winnings toward.  I think you should send us all a picture of you wearing that emerald green suit :)  It is a beauty.

For everyone else who is attached to those gorgeous things over on the Albion site, never fear.  The owner (Liz) has graciously offered $15 off of anything you would like to buy through the next week.

Just enter the code “71toes15” at checkout.  Thank you Liz for such a generous give-away (and for making such beautiful products)!  And thanks, readers, for all the great response.

Happy summer swimming and exercising for that swimming for everyone!!

life lately

Albion Fit {a give-away}

I get to do a new give-away each week for the next three weeks.

I feel so lucky to have generous readers offering to give away some pretty awesome stuff.

The give-away this week is $200 credit to pick from amazingly chic swim suits or fitness clothing at a company called Albion Fit (check it out here).

It features tennis wear and super well-made, comfortable swimwear.

Company philosophy from the founder:  “All of our swims are modest and sophisticated and make women feel comfortable and beautiful. We use fun techniques like ruching to cover up areas that women might want to keep a bit under wraps, and all or fabrics have great compression features, removable bra cups, and the suits last forever.  All our fitness items use the nicest fabrics on the market.  They all have wicking features, anti-microbial so they won’t get smelly, and have great compression features.” 

Their flagship store just opened at the beautiful City Creek Mall in Salt Lake City, which is kind of cool.

I got my own polka dot swim suit to test out if it lives up to the hype and man alive I really love it.  Here I am wearing it:

I know, I look super young, right? 

Ha. 

I just figured you’d rather see that cute girl wearing it than me.

There are some really cool vintage-y swims on there along with some funky ones and classic ones…I love the styles.

But let’s get to the fitness wear because the lovely tennis-playing Elle gets to model that:

…and she’s a cutie.We LOVE that skirt.  Is it not so darn cute?  It’s called the “Match Point Pleat Skirt.”

And Elle is gonna be so mad at me for posting this one…but I couldn’t resist.

I love the ruching on the tank:(It’s called the “love racer” tank.)

Love this skirt too…love that it has pockets.(Let’s just be glad those shoes aren’t going to be given away…except to the garbage can…)

But that’s just the tip of the iceberg.  There is SO much stuff on that site.  Things you are going to be drooling to have.  So here’s how you enter to win a wad of cash ($200)to spend on whatever your heart desires over there on albionfit.com. 

There are three ways to enter and you can do all three if you’d like extra chances:

1. Like albionfitness on FB (here).  Then come back and enter a comment.

2. Go to albionfit.com and pin your favorite item on Pinterest.  Come back and leave a comment that that deed is done.

3. Leave a comment about that favorite thing that you pinned back here.

I’ll announce the winner Friday morning.

Love, Shawni

sometimes Max lets us have fun with his hair.

Let summer begin.

(He’s still taller than his dad :)

Happy Mother’s Day…

…to all the amazing mothers in my life. 

How I learn from you!

A couple months ago on a beautiful spring day I sat with a group of inspiring women from the “American Mothers” organization.

As each woman gave a word of advice to the new mothers going to the national convention in New York, love of motherhood seeped into my heart filling it to the brim.  This lady standing here below is the one who made it overflow:

You can’t see her very well because I was trying to be incognito with my picture-taking.  But I was compelled to take that photo because I wanted to remember not really the words she was saying but how she made me feel as she was saying them.  She has so many motherhood years under her belt.  She exuded goodness and love of the opportunity we mothers have to help shape little minds. 

To teach little souls to fly.

And I left that meeting that I really hadn’t had time to go to, got there late, left a little early, thanking my lucky stars that I was there and that I get to have examples like that in my life.  That I get to be a mother.  That I get to stand up for motherhood wherever I go.  That when people ask me what I do for a living I get to proudly state “I raise children.”  I raise the little souls entrusted in my care from a loving Heavenly Father. 

I know there are many kinds of mothers out there.  Ones who are struggling with trials I can’t even comprehend.  Mothers who aren’t even mothers yet but who mother those around them with all the love that a biological mother would. 

I am so grateful for a day to honor motherhood in all it’s varieties.

Because really, what C.S. Lewis said all those years ago still rings so true today:

“What do ships, railways, mines, cars, and government exist for except that people may be fed, warmed, and safe in their own homes?...[the Homemaker's] job is one for which all others exist."

(More on what I wrote about Motherhood with that quote on a guest post years ago over here.)

And I’m especially grateful for my Mom (more here).  And my Mother-in-Law.  And how they have shaped my own motherhood.

Happy Mother’s Day!

Lake Powell in the nippy spring–110 toes

Somehow from someone at some point in raising us kids my parents got the idea Lake Powell would be a cool place to hang with your family.

So they did some research and decided to pack us up and head down to that gorgeous place.

I think part of their research involved the realization that renting a houseboat would be way cheaper on the off-season.  So they thought, “why not go for Easter?”

So we did.

And we loved it so much it became a tradition.

Now, I will tell you from experience that Lake Powell is not a place you want to leisurely swim and ski in March or April.  It is a giant pool of ice water.

I’ll also tell you from experience that it knocks your breath right out when you jump into it from the top of the houseboat.

And in the mind of a teenager/kid getting your breath knocked out by doing something daring like that kind of rocks.

We didn’t have a ski boat anyway.  We were all about the ambiance.  And the card games.  And the being together.

I wish I had been into photography back then.

I wish I had gorgeous pictures of the sunsets against the red cliffs.

Or the day our houseboat got stuck on a rock one year and we had to wait and wait for a giant tug-boat to come pull us off.

Or when my 10-year-old brother almost hit a cliff while driving the boat.

I wish Elle could make up one of her little wing-dinger videos of us listening to our “Big River” sound track and climbing up big huge walls of red sand.

And I also wish I had a better memory to remember everything.

And the fact that I already wrote some of the highlights of this part of 110 toes back here.