Happy Birthday!

This past month has been as slow, slow, slow for Ever After Photography. I shot two weddings for another photography studio, and thats about it.

November, however, is going to be HUGE. It seems most of my Fall sessions will be done in the next four weeks-I have an engagement session, three family lifestyle sessions, a maternity session and a wedding. Most of my sessions take place during the weekend, so almost every weekend is completly booked. Not to mention the orders I've been getting from past clients-I think that everyone has started thinking about Christmas gifts and cards.

So you might be wondering what I'm doing this weekend. I'll be in Vegas, celebrating my 40th Birthday! I didn't know about the trip until a week ago, when my best friend took me to lunch to let me in on the surprise. Apparently, she has been planning this for quite a while, with my husband, sister and several of our friends in on the secret.

The funny thing is that every year I think I'm getting a surprise party. I look for clues and get my self all worked up, certain that I even know who is invited and where it might be. It NEVER happens. Every year the party only exists in my pitiful, sad head.

And so of course this year I was beginning to think that something was up. There were SIGNS. I could FEEL it. Then just as quickly, I'd crash, hit bottom with the realization that every year I do this to myself. There will be no party this year, just like there was none last year, or the year before.

But WOOHOO!!! I didn't turn 40 those other years! I was a measly, young, inexperienced 39 or 38. 40 is GREAT! The surprise was REALLY a surprise. I'm floored, flabbergasted, and flustered.

So I'm getting out of Dodge tomorrow morning, leaving for 3 long days of grown-up fun-no kids getting in my bed at 3 AM, no dinners to fix, no butts to wipe.

I'm not even taking my camera. Nope, no pictures. I'm taking a break from that, too.

It's going to be so fun, relaxing and filled with freedom. 16 hours and counting, I'll be on a plane. Whoohoo, heehaw, yippe!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thank you Gina, for taking me on this incredible trip, and a HUGE thanks goes to my husband, for holding down the fort while I'm gone. I can't wait until we can get away together, hopefully it'll be sometime soon.

Since it is a crime to post without adding some images, I'll treat you to some pictures of my kids' birthdays. G turned 7 in Sept., T is now 6, and M is a tender 4years old.

Happy Birthday to all of us!

Marie-Therese Gown GIVEAWAY !!!!!!!

Marie-Therese Gown GIVEAWAY !!!!!!!

This lady made a fabulous Marie Antoinette dress, and is GIVING it away. I'm posting a link to her blog here, because that enters me into the contest to win it. You never know- cuz you can't win if you don't enter.

K: Headshots

There is a little park down the street from my house that is just perfect for taking a few quick shots when we don't have time for a full-out session. I went out there last week with this handsome guy so that he could get a few head shot images for his modeling portfolio.






And this is K with his mom, Gina. Can you see where he gets his good looks?


Thanks guys! That was tons of fun.

Peace,
L

Funny Face

Me: "D, why do you look so sad? You should cheer up, nothing can be that bad."

D:


Me: That is the most pitiful face I've ever seen.

D:


Me: Well, you can sit here and make ugly faces all day all by yourself, or you can give me a smile so that we can go get ice cream with the littles. It's up to you.

D:


That's my girl!

Sharp & Co.

I ran down to my mom's flower shop this morning to do some quick shots of a few arrangements that she was working on. I only had about five minutes to do them because they were going into the delivery truck when I arrived.

My mom has a refrigerated display case, which is painted black on the side. I used that as the backdrop for this arrangement but I couldn't back up far enough to get the whole thing. Still, I think it looks pretty good:


This one was so pretty-I hope whoever received it likes it as much as I do:


This one would look great in my house:


I LOVE how this one turned out. This is just a shot I grabbed right before I left the shop of an arrangement that sits in front of the cash register. It looks almost like the painting I have over my sofa, but better. Now I'm beginning to think of printing and framing this puppy:


I think they all turned out quite nice- hopefully I'll find a spot for the images on the flower shop website once I've got it all laid out.

Every once in a while, I get the urge to head out the to the park to photograph my kids and their friends. My thinking is that it gives me the opportunity to practice my technique a bit without any pressure and I get to spend time with my friends at the same time. A while back, I did exactly that-well, sorta. I went with my MOMS Club to Landa Park for some duck feeding and playground playing, armed with a loaf of bread and a camera and psyched for awsome images of the kids.

Why doesn't anything seem to go as planned? As I've said before, I have a very hard time watching my kids and photographing at the same time. My mind just can't go in both places at once. So I got home, downloaded the images and, not being thrilled with them, forgot all about them until today.

For the last couple of days I've been cleaning up my hard drive-getting rid of images that I don't intend to keep, and so I took a second glace at the images from that day. Well hey-some of them aren't too bad.

This curly-haired little beauty is quickly becoming one of my daughter M's BFFs.


This is her mom, preparing to take a picture of her on the slide:

This is my version of the picture:

There is this little chair at the park which uses gravity and (I think) centrifugal force to spin. M thought is was so much fun because all you have to do is sit there, and it spins on its own. But it keeps going faster and faster. Just a few moments after this image was taken she was spinning out of control and screaming in terror-I think if I hadn't caught her in time she would have catapulted 10 feet, at least!

Of course, T had to try the chair from hell, with the hope of "flying like superman" but boring mom kept stopping him before he took flight. I think this image was taken as he was repeating "Mom, just let me go. I promise I won't get hurt." Yeah, right.

This one is a little dark, I could brighten it in Photoshop, but I usually reserve that step for photos that get printed.

So I'll continue to delete and move images, and maybe I'll come across a few more gems that I can post here.

Peace!
~L