Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Our Family Vacation to the West Coast!



Me with my two little ones at Hermosa Beach California on Vacation.
The family and I had a wonderful vacation in May and June! We visited our family in Las Vegas and California. I am amazed at how many pictures I have of myself! Usually I am always behind the camera and this time my wonderful husband took many shots of me with family. I also got the chance to photograph the beach as I have been yearning to do and also photograph some landscape on our way out. 

Here are a few of those:

Utah


Colorado






Hermosa Beach California

As some of you know the beach is my haven, my love and my ultimate peaceful spot. We are fortunate enough to have parents that rented a house on the Strand of Hermosa. 

The above image is of the house we stayed in and on the middle balcony is my wonderful FIL, MIL, SIL, Niece and Husband. My father in law calls me his DIL so you can see where I get the acronyms from. haha! 

I also got to meet a very special someone mentioned above for the first time when we arrived at the foot of Longfellow. :) 

Little Ms. Lauren
Those big blue eyes and sweet baby grin had me at hello. It feels good to be an Auntie for the first time! 

These two had an amazing time with family and did not want to leave, really this little cutie in the front screamed for Papa and Gamma and I don't think she really cared which one she got as long as she got one. This went on until we hit the Utah border. haha! At least she loves them as much as I do. The little guy in the back just wanted to play with his aunts and cousins and little longer and seemed to zone out on his DS to pass the time. 

We did manage to get my very desired, very much wanted, okay...had to have picture of us on the beach :) 

Even though my husband has his sunglasses on, it is the best I was going to get that day. He had eye surgery a few weeks prior so he can not be without his sunglasses in the sun. As I would have loved for it to be by the water, as you can see there were plenty of visitors on the coastline that day and they would have caused more distraction then the sunglasses do! haha! 

All in all we had a great trip and sadly we will not be heading back that way for a few years, which saddens my heart, but there are things we must prepare for in the future. 


Thanks for stopping by and enjoying a piece of our trip with us! 

Until next time...





Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Finding MY way...

"An open door is another opportunity to do great things."
Over the past few days of family chaos and planning trips I was reminded of why I wanted to photograph things, why I wanted to go to school to be a professional photographer. It was never for the money...but it did start to become about the money.  This June will be 2 years in business and 2 years of school in August. I have to say that I have been humbled by how much goes into photography and how naive I was when I started my business. Last year, by this time, I had already had a handful of sessions under my belt. This year I have had two. During this unplanned "break" I have come to really concentrate on school and how to perfect my style and what kind of photographer I want to be. I do love photographing families and couples, but I love working on my own, just walking around a beautiful scene envisioning an image in my head and then capturing it 10 different ways. In the past 2 years I have photographed 2 small weddings, 3 High School Seniors and a few families, kids, couples and special events. I have also photographed a Tattoo shop, Addictive Ink Tattoo and Piercing of Rapid City and Lost Autumn, an amazing Rock Band based out of Rapid City. I have to say they were the best shoots I had ever been on. On top of that I have been photographing for every class and with each class I have learned a new technique or way to display, alter (or not), compose and share my images. Right now I am working on an Art History Class where I get to paint and learn about our history in art and a Color Management class where I am learning how to sync all of my devices to output the perfectly colored image I saw at the time of capture. Over all of this I have learned that even though I am not swamped with business I am still succeeding in my own professional growth. I decided to delete all of my old work off of my Facebook today, in this came very little hesitation because I am wanting to share my new growth will all of you instead of bringing up the past over and over again. As much of a learning experience as my past has been I feel that I have grown out of that style of photography and am growing into a new phase and I want all of you to concentrate on that with me. With that being said, the above image is part of my new growth and images that will be flooding in over the next few months will be part of that as well. I might even throw in a few paintings. :) I am sure I will look back on this image in a few years and say "wow look how much I have grown since this image was taken." To me that is all the fun of photography, finding yourself, finding the art within yourself and creating art out of what you see. 

Until next time...Thanks for reading :) 

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Fast forward to present.

Yesterday we found out, like many things related to the military, that our request to Palace Chase (Going Reserve from Active) to California has been denied. As you see in my first blog I talk a lot about the beach and California. So, today I have been having a pity party all by my self. Needless to say going to bed feeling horrible brought on waking up feeling horrible. I had basically put my business on hold waiting for the answer to our prayers to pull through. Since we are not moving I am having to reevaluate my business and my situation here in South Dakota. Better avenues have to be out there, I am just not looking in the right place. My passion for photography cannot lower just because we are far from family. I am going to do my best to concentrate on whats important and how I can better my business with the resources that are put in front of me. Pushing negative people and places out of my head is the first step to getting myself and my business back on track. Some steps that I am going to take are listed on  http://www.dumblittleman.com/2010/02/50-ways-you-can-create-better-day.html 50 ways you can create a better day. He lists simple and easy ways to just be a better person and not let others aggression's get you down.

I am definitely going to have to reel in some business and my passion.


Wednesday, January 11, 2012

The Beginning



This image is one of my first...it helped me pave the way for greater things. Shortly before I took this picture I decided to start my business. Its now been a year and a half since I opened the doors and started capturing and learning more about photography. This has been a road cluttered with uncertainty, laughs and a feeling of pride. I decided I should take the step into blogging to try and expose my work to those that may not know it. I want to bring smiles and feelings to people. I want them to look at my art and feel something. So here I am allowing the public to really enjoy my work, or you may dislike it. Either way I am here and ready to grow.