The Sundsmo's

These guys add color and depth to life in ways unimagined. Alaina, Vince, Ally and all our furry and feathered friends keep us busy and playing different roles. For years it was our group and then our band of B-names. We adopted a little dog a month after moving into our first home in Tacoma, and despite trying several different monikers, Buddy kept his pup name as he was our little ride or die buddy. A year later Bella came into our lives and stayed and stole our hearts. Those two were inseparable and were always wrestling around with their kids. Many fond memories of our homeschool days with dogs in tow as we would wander out into the Pacific Northwest woods of Point Defiance Park, exploring, climbing, or playing hide and seek and "treasure hunting" in the rainy damp forest. Counting, letting the dogs off leash and they'd all scramble to hide while the pups happily rounded up their missing kids giggling up in trees or behind fallen ones or mossy boulders. 

   One brisk spring morning Buddy found a cat in the garbage can by our fence. Feeding him every morning as Lark and the dogs worked in the yard, Buttons made it clear he wanted to be apart of our chaos, spending more and more time with us until we got him scanned, contacted his previous owner and realized he was homeless. That first snow solidified the agreement as Mr. Buttons moved in for the winter and gradually adjusted to domestic life. We had a few rough years where Tyler lost his job, he got into a bad car accident and became bed bound. It took years to never really recover before getting into another car accident just three years later. He lost his job again, we ended up filing bankruptcy as even our side hustle with the pottery that we'd only just started up officially as a business two years prior was closed by the treasury as we couldn't make or report any sales. Tyler wasn't able to throw for over a year and even then, since that accident has never been able to sustain his time throwing without pain. Although after being shuttered this propelled Lark to learn and Tyler was quickly able to catch Lark up in a lot of ways, by sharing his own failures and learning and both pushing each other in skill. It was with this in mind, that they decided to relocate their family down to Lark's childhood home in Gilbert, Arizona at the end of 2019, two months before the Covid shut down. They had just enrolled the kids in their local school to better focus on their art when a month later they were back to homeschooling. It definitely was a 180' from their family plans but it allowed them time with their kids that they are fully aware they won't get back. They played board games, swam in their pool, went hiking with their dogs and did lots of movies and arts and crafts, and their neighbors were there for plenty of ups and downs along the way. During the pandemic though, Buddy was diagnosed with cancer and despite surgeries it kept returning. On the eve of having his leg amputated, he had a medical emergency but due to Covid the animal hospitals were operating on skeleton staff and unable to intervene and we lost him. He left such a hole in our studio, our family, and our hearts, not a day has gone by we haven't cried at the loss. 

 This school year the kids returned to in person school and that same week we found ourselves with a real live marmoset. Never in a million years would we have fathomed of such a thing but she was needing a home and some medical help and Ty brought her home to intervene. We are happy to say she is quite mischevious, happy and well on her way to recovery. 

  Valentines Day of this year, 15 years after Tyler and Lark's first date their kids talked them into another pup, Ty's dream dog, whom they promptly named Bagel. 

  When these guys aren't exploring, they're story telling, and creating, they're playing and laughing, arguing and connecting, figuring out their world for each of themselves on this oh so bumpy rollercoaster called life, cognitively aware of how blessed they are to be doing this all together.