Meet Amy and Zac - Engagement session

This morning, up early to do a sunrise engagement session for Amy and Zac. Such a sweet couple - the smile all the time, game for any sort of picture, even some of their own. Very relaxed and too easy to take photos of!!

This flat out, is my favorite picture of the bunch. (so far). She likes the quirky/out there/ different stuff and had on the cutest pair of green runners. Yeah like I'm gonna miss that!

Funny thing happened. I was taking a pic and she said "oh this is an Elsie shot". I said "Elsie?" She said yeah, my maid of honor's friend Elsie from Springfield.

Me: What is Elsie's last name?

Her: Flannigan.

WHAT!? LOL.

Small world, because I LOVE Elsie Flannigan. She's so sweet and quirky and I read her blog like EVERY DAY. Such a weird small world. I feel flattered and honored that she compared something I did to Elsie.

I'm hoping I get to do Zac and Amy's wedding also, they seem like a fun couple that would an awesome quirky wedding (and photos) :)

ok, I'm up. sheesh

I think I'm up to one day a week I sleep past 7:15.

Sigh.

8:30... is that a lot to ask? Seriously.

This morning was another "too much stimulation at one time" morning... that included Tanner not setting his alarm clock and me noticing that I heard no movement.. then Gene letting his van idol for 14 freaking HOURS (felt like anyway).

-Grouchy-

A couple cool self portraits I took on frosty pic morning a few days ago.

Some of my fav things:
-Corn
-My clothesline
-Awesome DOF (depth of field)


Reflection in the back door... so you can see how crazy I look in the mornings.

Today, tons to do. We have the garage sale this weekend so I have to work on that. I think a lot of things are already done, they just need to be toted down there. Anything unmarked will be marked tomorrow afternoon. The big thing is scrounching around the house and finding all those things I swore I was going to sell whenever a garage sale came around. Like... all my wedding stuff that's piled in a corner, that ginormous suitcase that takes up 1/2 the weight limit on *it's own* ... and I haven't flown anywhere for 2.5 years anyway. etc etc.

THINGS GO AWAY!

YAY for going away!

System of a Down - Eric's Seniors

Remember Eric?

I did a few of his senior portraits about 10 days ago. Tonight I sat down to edit the rest of his pics. Many of them don't need touched, several need some light editing.

Of course, I got side tracked.

Eric's favorite band is System of a Down. Now to be fair, I'd never heard of them before, not my normal genre, that is, if I have any sort of genre to start with. Can I be honest? I kinda like them. LOL.

{Teenagers everywhere officially declare SOAD *not cool*}
hah.

Anyway, I have worked to incorporate Eric's band in some of his photos. I realized that one pose I had him do, was very much like a poster that he brought for me to work from.

Here's what I created for him:

I hope he likes it because it's one of my favorite senior pics EVER!

Yay for days that don't suck!

I have news... but first:

Couple senior photos for Seth. Of course, this is nothing that would EVER go into the yearbook or senior slide show. Didn't turn out exactly as I was imagining it, but I'm 75% happy with it. The top one is my favorite.

Now, for the wee bit of good news and then the big good news.

Wee good news:

We got new phones! YAY! Finally. Mine had been just turning off in the middle of a call (on full charge) and Gene all the sudden couldn't get a signal most of the time, so we decided to get new ones. To be fair, those tiny sliders we had lasted us over 3 years so they were really good phones. They had nothing like those for the new ones :( We switched carriers too, and now I get 2-4 bars *in my house*. I no longer have to stand by the sink to talk on the phone.

really good news:

Last night after I posted, I started to head off to bed, but instead decided to peruse ebay. I bought a new camera!! It's a lightly used Canon 30D and I even got 10% off from ebay by using paypal (had a code they emailed me). SCORE. It was just the body, but I didn't need a lense anyway. I had a buget in mind, and I came up short almost $200!! So I think I might buy myself a new lense too! (or a flash, I need want both).

And to top off my day, and it's only 9:30, I have several ppl interested in photography work! YAY!!

PS. Did I mention gas in Maryville is $2.18/gallon?? :p

Oh winter... Your undies are showing.

Quickie post before bed as I'm tired, and been putting off posting all day.

Saturday, we went to town, and had our breakfast that we planned. It tasted great, but took forever, so we probably won't go back there *either* ARGH.

Afterwards, Gene wanted to know if there was anything else we needed, and I said not really. We decided to swing by hy-vee to look at meat. Of course, he got some because meat completes him. Now, on Saturday it was windy and kinda chilly, and I was wearing flip flops because they went with the cute top I had on. My good shoes that I'd wear in the winter with "cute shirts' I wore the other day and got big old rub marks on my heels. Time for the trash I guess! (I'm going to find another pair tho someday).

Anyway, I mentioned how my feet were cold and I needed cute winter shoes... so we ended up in Payless. BOGO.... so I ended up with 2 pair, and then we found some other cute shoes we bought for xmas and bought 2 more pair. As we left, he said again "anything else we need"... me... "No, well, we could swing by JCPenney".

JCPenney here sales pretty much nothing but clothes, shoes and some bedding. That's it. I think they must be a tax write off for Penneys because they have super sales there. I've told you before about the contest me and mom have for who can "save" more....

Well... we won.

We spent $45 and SAVED $740.60!!!

We bought stuff for christmas that we really did not need! LOL. We got jeans, shirts out the wazoo for .97 each... regular $20-$40. We also bought dresses for the girls. The cutesy ones that cost way too much money .. $45-$50 for $2.97 each! We basically bought the whole rack. I left one and now regret it.

We have christmas, birthday and easter for a year for some ppl bought! whooop!

LOL. I told Gene we should go back and save that again so we could buy a big screen tv with our "savings".


This morning, I got up early again. This early stuff sucks.
But, I did look out the window to see all this pretty frost.

I'll post more pics tomorrow. I did some more pics of Seth, which were pretty decent, and I have a couple other things, but at the moment. The bed calls my name.

Hate to be the bearer of bad news - but damn it's cold!

I got out this morning and decided I wanted to capture some fall leaves. I don't HAVE a lot of fall leaves in my yard, but that did not deter me! For the record, the 2 photos above, I did have to lay on the ground, with my head/camera right next to the tree. Shallow depth of field rocks.

Blurry bits make me happy.

The corn out here is past ready to go. I noticed yesterday that the corn looked shorter. On closer inspection, the wind really did a number on it, and lots of the tops are broken off. In other news, I saw a big combine go by this morning. If you stick your head out of the door, you can hear them harvesting. I'm really hoping I catch them here so I can get some good pics. I've even contemplated climbing up on the roof for a good angle. LOL. *I am scared of heights and ladders - but still considering it*

More corn, but much like the trees, I was laying on the ground. YES.. my head was in a cornfield. *just a little bit*

Obligitory annual single fall leaf photo. What is it about single fall leaves that people "get" that they are artistic? This one was buried under some ICE. No wonder my windbreaker jacket wasn't breaking much wind.

Said above pic I really pushed the saturation and hue. It pops now.

This one, unedited other than just a crop. At this point, I was getting too cold and so it was time to go back inside.

A couple days ago, it was late and I went to the sink to get a drink. I looked up an saw this:

Isn't he sweet? heh. He admitted that it had been there a couple days.

Now the quandry. Do I leave it because it's sweet? Or do I clean it because it's obvious the window is dirty?? ARRGH

Ohh... and wanna hear the really stupid thing I did?

Saturday, When I was getting ready for the bridal fair, I was using the miter saw outside cutting trim (yes, I own my own compound miter saw that gene got me for xmas last year. AWESOME. This year I asked for an electric finish nailer. heh). Anyway, I needed electricity, so I unplugged the washer, plugged in the extension cord and went on my way.

I didn't sweat plugging it back in because I was busy and it's hard to reach behind the washer to plug in, and well, wash day wasn't until monday.

So this morning, I go to plug in the washer because it's now wash day. I look at the plug and say to myself "this is not the washer plug". I plug it in and Ughhhhh.... hear the freezer kick on.

*insert sick feeling here*.

The freezer was off for TWO DAYS.

so I basically pushed everything off the freezer, and opened it. Water ran off the lid behind it. Look in to survey the carnage.....

Salvation!

Everything was still frozen!

It had defrosted on the sides (thus the water), but everything was still frozen solid.. except for... all those STUPID PEACHES I spent hours working on. *slaps forhead*. I'm really irritated about that, but happy that all the meat was fine, cuz trust me I would heard about it. LOL.

Commercials that must die!

My list of products I think I'm never going to buy until they stop these commercials:

1. Freecreditreport.com - the first few commercials were tolerable. The last couple must die.

2. Saved by zero - must die

3. Five dollar foot longs - must die

4. Bowflex - giving his fat clothes to his fat friends (douchebag) - must die

5. Ground control to major Tom. Must die. (don't even know what they are advertising, the song is just SO STUPID)

There are more - I know. I just can't think of them all or I'll start singing their irritating jingles.

Bridal Fair... CHECK.

Well the bridal fair is finally offically over! It was a lot of work for just a couple hours but we had a lot of fun!

I wanted to do something "different" so I displayed my photos on a pair of cruddy antique doors hinged in the middle. I think it turned out *really good* myself. I've got that vintage shabby chic thing happening, which I think really caters to the customers I'll be servicing.

Amber and I. Amber asked me a week ago if she could come down too because she's offering makeup artistry and wedding hair. Make up artists especially are rare around here!

Here's one end of the table. I don't know why I didn't get the other side, but it basically had our entry forms and a basket of brochures

Tanner took my camera and went upstairs, here's our booth from above. It looks really messy from this angle LOL. and wow do I need to get up to Amber's to get my hair colored!

Gene got this shot, it's right before the show started and the booth was PACKED with all the models for the fashion show. These girls were awesome and so sweet. I made sure that even tho none of them were getting married at the moment, that they all had a coupon and a card. They were very interested in all my photos.

I'm very optimistic how it all turned out. Personally I think that we'll probably end up with at least 2 bookings from it (I'm confident of one for sure) and maybe up to 3-4. Pretty good considering that there were around 25 brides!

There were two other photographers. One that I had not see her work before, and both did really nice photos. Both also brought a large slide show, I had tanner bring his laptop with him and we showed my slide show also. Many people stopped to watch, but I also made sure they had a copy to take home with them. I gave out around 10-12 of those I think.

Funny - the first bride I talked to is getting married on the fourth of july!! heh. I told her we had a garage sale coming up and I was getting rid of most of my wedding stuff and told her when it was. That will be awesome to a.) get it out of my dining room and b.) help out another bride save some $$!! She was really sweet... only engaged a week. I think she was overwhelmed!

Amber did well also, and she thinks she'll probably get 2-3 bookings from it. Over all, it was a good investment. Now, when I want to do another one, most of the work is already done, so I can just pick up and go!

Latest flickr inspiration...

1. Rhinefield House Portrait, 2. .circle of strength., 3. vintage beauty, 4. Bokeh For Sale (2 for 1 special), 5. A Window Light Portrait - kath01, 6. m o r g a n, 7. Please don't cry, we're designed to die, 8. Untitled, 9. he....and then i.....well...so, 10. black mercury, 11. fallen, 12. chelsea, 13. eden, 14. the .barrens., 15. Michelle, 16. Seth - Senior 2009, 17. girl on red stairs, 18. Jacob, 19. Jordan, 20. Jacob, 21. My love for you is a journey, Starting at forever, And ending at never., 22. Baby Dedication Isabella, 23. Senior Portrait, 24. Making a Statement, 25. engagement session, 26. Flores, 27. things are good..., 28. proof78, 29. bridge, 30. Which one?, 31. Untitled, 32. Farm Wedding 007, 33. Lia, 34. cup of sweetness :D, 35. Ethan, 36. cup of Ethan ;D

Amber waives of ...... corn

It rained AGAIN today. I'm so tired of rain. The weather has been so weird too, one second it's sunny, the next it's literally raining. But it makes for awesome clouds (above)


That's was the view from my front yard.

To be fair, here's how it really looked:






Got a few things accomplished so far today. Brochures are done, printed and folded. Coupons done, ready to go. Contracts printed. Started packing up stuff to go.

Still have to get the display pieces done (tomorrow outside in decent weather) and assemble one album - which if it doesn't get done, it's not the end of the world. Oh, and I have to get some entry forms made, which will take me about 5 min.

Not feeling all that well lately. I woke up at 7:30 and didn't feel awake until 10:30. Had a headache until 12:30. Got a weird hurt on my right side of my head - think it might be a sinus and/or ear infection. Yay me.

I'm sure you missed me...

I know. No posts yesterday. I'm sure you all survived.

I was busy, tired and basically, there really wasn't anything to report anyway. All I did was work on albums all day, go to the chiro, go to WW, etc. Got my 16 x 20 print for the show. It rocks. I think I did a good job of picking the right photo. I now wish I had 12 for a kick ass display, but the fair is 2 hours, I'm not going to kill myself over 2 hours.

Printing contracts at the moment to take with me. Going to work on finishing up brochures. I go the inside done last night and finally hammered out pricing as I wasn't happy with what I had already. It needed tweaked.

I'm seriously so sick of rain. Supposed to be better tomorrow - but it was supposed to be better today so we'll see.

Speaking of saturday, found a breakfast place so I think we'll try that out in the morning. It's like our little "thing" we do on the weekends. We've not been very happy with Hy-Vee lately as their kitchen staff is *very slow*. I think we'll give them some time to regroup. We gave up on breakfast at the truck stop over a year ago as they were worse.

Another headache this morning sent me on an online pillow search. I'm so picky about pillows. I want a *feather* pillow but the one I found that looks awesome is $85! Um. ow. course that's less than 3 trips to the chiro so we need to weigh that out. My problem is, what if I hate it?

Speaking of pillows, I wanted to put one over gene's face last night. He was snoring so loud it took me 45 min to get to sleep. I poked him a couple times and he rolled over - to snore in my face! GRR. Finally he must have fell into a deep sleep because he went to super quiet sleeping and 3 min later I was dead to the world. And he has the nerve to complain that I snore!

OK, must work. Probably won't post again today unless something fantasitical happens, and I'm in my jammies at 10:30 - so I don't forsee that in my near future.

Yawn.

Woke up early today. I had to go potty, I was sleeping on my stomach and needed to roll over and Gene got up and get ready for work *too much stimulation at once*, so I gave up and got out of bed at 7:15. In return, it's 9:00 p.m. and I'm sleepy ready for bed. But I always am this time of night. (I usually get my second wind around 10.

Another day of this:

Blech. 2 down. One to go.

It was raining so hard last night, and lightning. I could barely get to sleep, then instantly it was like someone turned off a faucet. It is much quieter here with the foundation, so that part is nice.

What I accomplished yesterday - a pile of DVD slide shows for the bridal fair, I'm really happy with how they turned out. Tanner was a big help. I designed the label myself. It goes of course, with all the site colors and such.

Today, spent a good chunk of the day assembling albums of past weddings, engagements, babies, maternity, etc. Stupid me, I ran out of adhesive, and when I went to town, forgot to get anymore! (I failed to write it down which is the kiss of death).... so, I have to go get some tomorrow. I'm so sick of walmart.

Tomorrow - buy that adhesive and finish albums, and buy the wood for the door to make my display.

WORK ON BROCHURES.

I'm gonna get there with nothing if I keep putting it off. 4 days!

Tired of Tayen yet?

If so, you'll have to get over it, because I'm not done yet!!

Somewhere in all my busy-ness, I edited a couple more pics from the Tayen session.



My favorite of the bunch. Love the fluffy clouds and the blue sky, and Tayen just on the cusp of being airborn. I really pushed the light in her eyes so you could see how happy she looks!

These trucks are setting off my spidey senses all morning. Basically - it's that idling truck issue I have (which for the record has nothing to do with blaring music - der lol).

They are hauling corn out of here and since this is the main road back to the highway, busy busy all day. We still have corn here, and no rain, so I'm expecting it any time.

Got all my DVD's burnt and the labels made for the show. I got the prints ordered last night, and will probably have them tomorrow - which is awesome fast considering they come from Kansas.

All I really have left to do is information packets and assemble albums. Both I've been putting off.

Something's gotta give.

You can't stop progress

A view of the house today....

This is how it's going to look for around a week. With 4 days of rain coming, he couldn't put the concrete epoxy coating on as it needs 12 hours to dry. Plus things never go as fast as contractors promise :) But I'm happy he actually shows up. He's also a very nice guy and does good work (from what I can tell so far). I'm happy with it as we can tell the house is warmer already (gene's very happy the bathroom floor isn't cold in the morning). I'm happy because I have to look out the window to see if the wind is blowing or not.

A sad, sad sight.

The corn just up the road has been harvested and around the corner the other direction was being harvested this afternoon. You can stand outside and hear the combines. With the rain coming, I'm figuring that they'll probably run all night. I really want to get good pics as they harvest here next to the house. I don't know why - I just love the corn. It's going to be so sad when it's gone, and feel so different here.

Here's my creepy pumpkin man and my halloween tree I bought at the craft show. *cheap* Love them both

King of the beasts loves the new window in the back door. He also likes to sleep on the dryer now. Just because it's cute and what's a week without a jingles picture?

In other news, last week at weight watchers the leader was talking about this week, just doing something different. Sooooo... because I actually listen, and because I agree, I decided that I would do something different.

Exercise.

I used to be a gym rat. At my peak I was going twice a day averaging around 2-3 hours *per day* in the gym trying to work off the weight. That's kinda what burnt me out. *big time*.

So it's been probably a couple years before I really put much effort into exercise (and I can really tell). So today, after I washed dishes, vacuumed (about gave mack a coronary btw), did all the laundry, went to town and ran my errands.... I decided to just buck up and put on the workout pants I bought 2 weeks ago and walk. Only commited to 20 min, but I made it.

But... I dragged this home with me...

He's cute.

I love him.

I want to keep him.

Sigh.

I named him Charlie Spats. cuz his feet look like he's wearing spats, and well, he looks like a Charlie. Now that I look at his picture, he does remind me of Charlie Chaplin. heh. So don't tell Gene, but i gave him gene's leftover breakfast milk. Because *ew* he saved it for me to use on my cereal and I got icked out.

The I think he decided that I rocked, because he took up residence on the back deck, and I figured that wouldn't fly with Gene, so we got in the car and I took him back to his house. LOL.

Something tells me I'll see him again.

Went to the chiro again today. My back has been hurting because of the last adjustment he did on me. I was waking up at night after he adjusted my lower back *which did not hurt before that*.

I had already decided that if he charged me, I'd pay it, but I wasn't coming back. He did not charge me. YAY for customer service! He did however, want me to come in several times to get my neck adjusted and to see if we can keep it in place for good (because I'm having a lot of headaches).

I also spent this eve working on assembling an album for the show/Seth's senior pics. I'm really annoyed because I get about 2/3 done, and realize that 5 pages had no adhesive! GRR. So now I need to write them to let them know Maybe I'll get a free album out of it. Or at least a discount on the next one. Let's text that customer service thing again.

I also finally decided on which prints would be my display prints at the show. Those are on order. Now I only have some albums to assemble for random baby/maternity/wedding/engagement/kid pics - which means a boatload of printing the next few days (but all at home I think).

11:15 p.m.
I'm thinking of trying out this "sleep" thing that everyone keeps talking about and see how it works for me.

Yay!

The most exciting thing going on this weekend is this:




The start of the new foundation. It's a false foundation, but it's better than zero, which is what we had, and it also will add substantial value onto the house. Basically, it's like someone handing us a check for $5,000

One thing I've hated about this house, is the old worn out skirting, and then last winter, we just "got by" by putting plastic over that. But that didn't keep out Ms Racoon, and I wasn't going "there" another winter. This is supposed to cut down on our heating bills by around 25-30% and I suppose our A/C bills will be a lot better also. I'm happy that also our house will not feel like it's in the Wizard of Oz when the wind picks up.

He's supposed to be done in the next couple days. *looking forward to that!*

So why are you looking at a lump in my bed? Well, this is Jingles. It's how he looks when he gets cold and tired. Oh and I find this amusing.

Just sayin'.

Other happenings:

• Had chicken and noodles yesterday
• Had Beef and noodles today *sigh* don't ask.
• Went to the Craft show with mom and Amber on Saturday. Mom cut out early to go see her *real friends*. Amber and I had fun, both were fairly reserved - both got christmas shopping done. Then we had lunch and talked for a while. We both need to do that more!
• Speaking of Amber. She is going to start, along with her hair styling, a make-up business doing wedding makeup. *very good idea* So if you live in Maryville, Lenox, Bedford, Creston, Corning, Clarinda, NW Missouri, Southwest Iowa - email me, and I'll get you in contact with my make-up artist sister. (put all those towns for google keyword searches :)
• Put out a few more Halloween decorations.
• Went to Hodge Podge in Maryville (cute bi-annual temporary boutique), got there late and spent more this time than I did last time when I was there when the doors opened.
• Got a second antique door at said "hodge podge" to make a display out of for the Bridal show.
• Burning DVD slide shows of my work to give to brides. (it was only a defcon4 argument between the 3 of us at different points - we're all over it now).
• Getting closer to getting prints ready - *so many pictures* Can not WAIT to show you all the pics from the show.
• Noted that gas in Burlington Junction, MO was $2.37/gallon. ACK. (full of awesome sauce) but I was kidding about that enonomy thing. Hope I didn't jinx the universe and you should expect an implosion in 3.... 2.... 1.......

I think that's it for now! Probably more tomorrow. I know I've been posting later, but I've been getting up first thing and doing work/errands and put off posting til afternoon.

A peek for Eric

Today I did a shoot for Eric. Eric just so happens to be the son of two people that I went to High School with, so I got to revel him with stories of his Mom, Dad and uncle Jeremy. LOL

He has his Dad's eyes - and his mom's hair. You can definitely tell who he belongs to.

Wonderful guy, and just awesome to take photos of. Can't hardly take a bad shot of him! Well, except he's REALLY TALL and I'm REALLY NOT so I had to get out the step ladder a few times ;)

He's a wee bit of an urban rocker type, and I think mom is a bit of a country girl time, so we found a happy medium so everyone could be happy.

Other news to report... but that will be another post. It's late, I probably am off to bed ASAP!

Yeah my kid is good looking - what of it?

I am working on another sample album, this time I want it all to be Seth's senior pics (that way I can keep it for myself too). I needed 20 pics for it, and only had 3-4 in it already. So I spent a good chunk of this morning working on editing photos from his shoot.

I'm super happy with them now.

Sometimes I look at these pics and am amazed how handsome I think this kid is. Of course, I'm biased being his mom!

I really looked forward to taking his Senior photos - I waited 18 years to take them!




A little artsy.

This one, you can really see how he has his dad's lips. He also has the most beautiful eyes (and would be irritated I said that publically) - but he's always had amazing eyes and eyelashes. Why is it that boys get long eyelashes and curly hair and girls DON'T. LOL

This pic I edited to make the street # 2009. It was 829 before, and I didn't like it. About 10 min later - I had it changed!

I can't decide which of these I like best.