serendipity

just a few photos to share...

too tired to write a post that makes any sense, so I'm showing a few photos from grace's 7 year old portrait shoot a few months back. she asked me for a slideshow with her music choices- and it was almost 10 minutes long! it took so long to download off my site and a lot of people couldn't view it and are still reminding me about it. so I'll start posting here, a little at a time. since I really didn't know what she or we would do with this dvd slideshow (that she's shown to 2 people) I created the slideshow pages as 8 1/2 x 11's, kind of a super simple digi scrapping, that I'll have printed into a coffee table book. so these are some of the pages for the book (I'll share a bunch at a time because there are LOTS! and I should mention that 95% of the posing is all her)...

 

little boys...

I think I've figured out one of the reasons that I love taking photos of grace (aka torturing her) so often. sure she's my daughter and she's willing to indulge me, and I happen to think she's pretty much the cutest little girl ever (an opinion obviously related to reason #1). but she's my way of getting a girl photo fix. photography clients of mine are almost always boys- seriously. yeah I have one, boys are great and all that. and when I get to photograph a newborn or baby boy, it's really such an amazing honor that I fall a little bit in love with each of those boys. and then I remind myself as I'm driving home that I have one of those at home- a wild and monstrous 4 year old one of those, whose latest mess/disaster/behavior issue awaits me. that baby fix is satisfied instantly. but I miss the girl thing. I find myself begging friends to photograph their girls, just for fun. and I buy girly things with the intention of using them as super cool photo props. so that's my explanation and my defense for my grace pictures. as for the boys, here's some of my favorite little guys that I recently spent a long, long day with.

these are my friend J's boys. J is one of the funniest, most sarcastic people I know, which means we get along pretty well. I've been pretty lucky to get to know her over the last year and love that we've become friends. so I spent more than 4 hours at her house a few weeks ago hanging out, talking about her new business, oh and doing a photo session. I was technically there for photos of her 5 month old, and a little with big brother, mom & dad. it was the most relaxed, no pressure session- so much fun. and I like J a lot, but I am now so in love with her boys...

this is montana, a mellow little guy who was a perfect, easy little subject...

...which I always love.

but I especially loved him because he let me do this...

...and not only did he let me do it, he loved the basket so much that he sat in there FOREVER!

and this is montana with his big brother dallas, who loves montana as only a three year old boy can...

...meaning he likes him and he's "big brother" until he remembers that it's all about him (because he is 3 after all).

and while J had to feed montana and dallas and I were hanging out on J's bed having conversations about the dogs and whatever else we saw out the window (in "dallas-speak" of course, which is seriously the cutest thing), I let him have his all about me time. and this is why I am in love with dallas...

...because how could you not be? his sweet smile, those eyes, his silliness...and I wish J only the very best of luck in a year. when he's 4. thanks J!!

and that new business of hers?? totally cute custom baby blankets, burp cloths and even adult blankets, with seriously amazing super-soft fabrics and modern designs, that make me wish I had a baby for them (reminder: 4 year old boy at home!!) I can't wait to use some of her blankets in some baby sessions (90% chance of that being a baby boy, which won't stop me from getting girl blankets too). check out her blog while her website is under construction...

Blankets By Baby Inkie

check me out...

at the MF blog. because there are thrilling little facts and tidbits about me there! yeah, not that thrilling. but it's an honor to be the spotlighted designer for the month. I've been so fortunate to have worked with MF for the last 3ish years. not only are the products beautiful, but the company is pretty wonderful too! here's another recent MF layout I did, just for fun...

and a few more pics to share...the classic first day of school pics from july 28th (yep, that's pretty early isn't it?!) I also took some (actually normal looking) pics of wyatt on his first day of pre-k a few weeks later, but those I accidentally erased from my memory card, and am still horribly guilty about that. so here's just grace...

off to finish up some proofing and celebrate missing a typical monday this week!! 

neglected.....

my poor little blog. I really am so bad at this. it's one of those easy things to say I'll do tomorrow and then I just don't. so labor day is now over, fall is slowly on it's way here (my favorite time of year) and I've got some fun stuff to share coming up. ok and some fun stuff that's come and gone since I've been ignoring my blog. during that time I've been right in the whirlwind of school and the start of grace's first year competing in dance. it's been pretty crazy but actually fun, and I'm so proud of how hard she's working and how dedicated she is just because she loves it so much. both the kids are back in school, I'm back to volunteering in grace's classroom, trying to drag myself to the gym on a regular basis, and working. kind of a lot lately, which is fun and exciting. I'll dig up some photog stuff to share this week. the actual work (the paid kind) has been great, but I've gotten some fun stuff of my own, mostly of grace (wyatt's still in his bad picture stage, really really bad.)

scrapbooking's been a little slower. I guess I needed a big break after CHA. I've downsized a lot of my "commitments", in and out of scrapbooking, and I'm finally ready to get back into the swing of things. I've got a fun little something with one of my very very fave manufacturers coming up very soon and I can't wait to share! and tomorrow, I am determined to clean off my desk (and even the floor surrounded my desk) so I can actually create something.

for now, I have some fun pics from my mom's house where we spent the weekend. and I'm having a hard time deciding which image I like best and whether I like regular color or vintage color. and I have about 50 or so more to go through from my little mini-session with grace. here's two so far that I love...