Little B

Little sneak peak... I get to take more pictures of this darling baby girl next week. How lucky am I?

Mum and Dad love classic B&W conversions, but I just love this one in color... twilight is so beautiful.

T. Family

Most photogenic family in the world award goes to the T Family... oh my goodness. I think I deleted a grand total of five pictures from their shoot. And those were just because they were out of focus- my fault. I could have posted their entire session.

Mama to Mama Hats

If you recall this post, I thought this was a fantastic idea for a service project... and I finally followed through and used this for a Mom&Me activity in our ward. We made about 25 hats total during the activity, and then I finished up a bunch after everyone left. In total we shipped off 52 hats to Mama to Mama.

This is one of the easiest projects I've ever done, and it would be a fantastic project for beginners, youth group projects, or a service project with experienced sewers. I cranked out about 25 hats in about an hour and a half (cutting, pinning, sewing, and tying knots) if that gives you an indication of how simple this project is...

... and I can see why the stretch in the fabric is an absolute necessity. We tried them on the babies at our activity and they fit the heads of babies from 3 months to 21 months.

Shirts from the Gap made the coziest hats... and striped shirts made the cutest.

To those of you who participated, thanks! I think we'll be doing this one again...

Easy Christmas Gifts, anyone?

I was in charge of two stations for our Relief Society's super saturday last weekend (more pics to come)... I tried to make the crafts as easy as possible, so I made a simple tutorial for both. I thought the burp cloth craft would just be ridiculous as a picture tutorial since it's so easy, bu it really helped having the clip tutorial around so that the ladies could work at their own pace without needing too much direction.

I thought I'd pass it along in case any of you are looking for easy peasy Christmas gifts for little girls or babies...

please let me know if you have any questions. I just screen grabbed the pdf files, so click to enlarge or please email me if you'd like me to send you the full file.

and thanks to Jessica for your help and design inspiration for the clips...

Super Saturday

Here are some pictures from super Saturday... it was a bit insane running two booths, but it was sure fun!

Something new

I am horrible at shooting landscapes and such, but I love learning new things...so I made my Dad take me out to show me a few things while we're down here in lovely Colorado for Thanksgiving. I love having a wide angle lens for stuff like this, and today actually got me really excited to think that perhaps in the future all my landscape shots might not stink. I love shooting architecture... always have... but pretty much anything involving the great outdoors has been thoroughly uninspired. Thanks for getting me outside, Dad!

And thanks to Winter Park, Colorado for the fantastic scenery and old farm buildings near our cabin... we are here for Thanksgiving/family reunion and having a blast!

Isn't it amazing how literally a few adjustments can make a huge difference in exposure. It's so fun shooting in manual mode! A pain... but so much fun when you get what you want!

Just one

we miss you Buddy

Every time I eat this delectable treat I miss my buddy.

Well, both my buddies really, but I always think of my buddy Jacob. That's what I used to call him before he decided to move himself, my sister, and my darling niece to California. The nerve.

But he did introduce me and Kyle to Rondele, so I guess when we miss him we can just have this tasty treat and think of all the good times.

Rondele is the best... it's a bit hard to find and it seems to show up at local grocery stores and then disappear again. I couldn't find it at Macey's, so I tried Smith's. And it was even on sale! Our favorite variety is garlic herb. It's fantastic on artisan bread, crackers, sandwiches, or straight out of the tub. Though I wouldn't know.

If we could ship hot french bread and Rondele to you, we'd do it, buddy. We can't wait for Christmas!

What I've been up to this weekend...

Three family shoots, a stack of blueberry pancakes at a lighting demo, in-laws in town, teething ten month-old, busy husband writing about a thousand 30 page papers (seems that way), working from home, taking care of my babies, eating at Goodwood and the Cheesecake Factory, lots of Wii bowling, wow it was an exhausting but amazing weekend.

And yes, it really is 2:30 am. I can't sleep. But I have been very productive.





ps. I can now see why many photographers opt to post only black and white photos... blogger kills colors dead (no matter what sort of tricks I try, rgb conversion, screen grabs, etc.) I wish you could see these on my screen :) laaaaame.


My weekend was full of...

this...

And this...

And this...

More to come....

Simple Things...

It's amazing how something so simple can turn my day around. Lilies are my favorite. They smell amazing, they last forever, and I love to watch them bloom. They have helped me through a rough couple of days.

Lilies remind me of so many occassions: birthdays, anniversaries, school plays, recitals, happy events, sad moments, etc. Friends and family know I love them, so I am delighted whenever I receive them. Today whilst picking the pollen off a freshly bloomed lily- you have to because they stain like mad- I remembered one of many memories with lilies...

I was hanging out with Heather and Jonathan and Robbie back in like 1998, the night before my dear friend Jonathan moved to Italy. We were at Macey's at Olympus Hills and I smelled a lily that didn't have the pollen removed... and that nasty orange stuff got all over my face. Good thing Heather helped me get it off (I have no idea how we did it... that stuff stains everything!) before everyone else saw. So remember to remove those bits of pollen or you, your clothing, your carpet, or your tablecloth will be in big trouble.

Funny things, memories. They have a way of brightening up the greyest of days.

Another Giveaway

Old Town Imports is doing another giveaway... this time for two Leaf Platters!

Random.org just happened to select two friends last time, so give it a shot! And before it picked two numbers that happened to be friends, it picked two numbers that happened to be two of my sisters. No joke. So I obviously had to let it pick again due to nepotism. Sorry Stace & Rin!

Link HERE