Ronnie's Ohana

as many of you know, we are HUGE supporters of our military, so when i received a call from one of my fellow servicemembers asking if i could take some family photos before he shipped out for a deployment, i was more than happy to acquiesce to his request. as it turned out, we actually knew some of the same people in the military. it's a small world after all.
on with the post!
meet ronnie, giji, rinnah, and... i can't quite see that other kid. he's running as fast as dash. maybe his name is dash...

or was it spiderman? no, that's not it either.

almost there. give me a minute. his name will come to me.

it's JONAH!
this little guy was just a ball of energy and so so fun to take pictures of. he kept shooting webs at kim and i. do you have any idea how difficult it is to get spidey webs out of your hair? i don't know how i was able to keep my lens clear.

ronnie and giji have a super fun ohana. they all have the most amazing smiles. they may not have seen it, but i was smiling behind my camera every time i pointed it their way.

we tried flexing their face-making muscles in several ways.
here's ronnie's duck face, as requested by giji.

this was jonah's you-seriously-want-me-to-be-in-these-pictures face.

and the super g-force face.
check the big-wheel shirt. i miss my big-wheel.

getting the point?
these guys are f-u-n. fun.

rinnah's hat was so cute. jonah thought it would look great on his mom. i agree.

if you spend a couple minutes with these two you'll see how warm their hearts are.
that's not sun flare you're seeing. it's the glow of love. they're soaking in it.

such a beautiful ohana.

these flowers look hideous...
next to giji.
she has such natural beauty. i couldn't take a bad picture of her if i tried.

i love giji's smile here. it just feels so warm and full of love.

these guys were such a pleasure to work with. every moment was filled with happiness.

eventually the sun set on our time together. as much as i love san diego sunsets, this one felt kind of sad. i really enjoyed spending time with this wonderful ohana.

just as we were wrapping up the most insane thing happened.
true story.
moments after this shot was taken, the ground started shaking and...

the fountain erupted in a fiery shower of lava!

ok, not really, but you could imagine if it did.
it would be pretty hot in balboa park.
right now ronnie is still over there in harm's way, so please join me, his family, and his friends in praying for ronnie's safe return.
thank you so much for your service ronnie. i've been there before myself, and i know how hard it is to be apart from your family for so long. God Bless you, and the thousands of other servicemembers over there with you.
i hope these images help home seem a little less far away.