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It Starts With Us.

Posted on February 17, 2011

So I came across THIS website via Shannon Sewell and I immediately signed up! How can you not?

This weeks challenge?

This week, find someone who’s in a place that you once were, and do something to help them out.

I think this is awesome. And although Kim and I aren’t really that far along on our journey as photographers we might be ahead of where you are right now. So this week, with inspiration from Shannon, we’d like to give back to YOU. Leave us a comment on this post telling us how you think we could help you and we’ll choose one winner sometime this weekend. The winner will get a one hour phone conversation with one of us! To talk about whatever you’d like!

And seriously you guys, go sign up for It Starts With Us… such an amazing idea!

Just because a post is sweeter with a newborn…

Playing with some new processing… LOVE experimenting sometimes!

Ok, go comment and let’s chat!

Grace+Emma+Jack=One Year Old | St. Louis Triplet Photographer

Posted on February 17, 2011

We got to meet up with the Freeman triplets last weekend and it was the EASIEST session with them we’ve had! And if you’ve ever worked with triplets you know you plan for the craziest+longest session of your life! HA! These little ANGELS surprised the heck out of us by flashing us smile after smile and moving super quick! Angie and Brendan (and Grandma!) left in a cloud of icing leaving us wondering how it went so smoothly!

Love how the cake smash ended! With Jack confused, Grace mad and Emma elbow deep in cake! HA! It was so awesome and SO messy!

We ADORE this family and it’s always hard to say goodbye to our Baby Planners but we love that these three are so big and doing so well! Thanks for letting us capture their first year Freeman’s and we hope to see you again soon!

Featured: Inspire Me Baby

Posted on February 16, 2011

We are THRILLED to have little Mac featured on Inspire Me Baby, an awesome baby photographer blog+resource full of crazy inspiration!

Go HERE to see our feature!

And go there every day to see other great photographers and giveaways! I haven’t won yet but I keep trying!

Happy Wednesday!

I write the best posts in the shower.

Posted on February 14, 2011

Or out running. When my mind can go blank and I’m doing something completely monotonous like jogging or showering I find myself not thinking about my life or my future or world peace. No. I write blog posts in my head.

And then I totally forget them.

Last night I was up until about 4:30am with sick+puking girls. Oh and cutting paper for Bailey’s Valentine’s Day party in her Kindergarten class that she wasn’t able to attend. It was so insane that I was equal parts up in the middle of the night cleaning puke or holding hair for puking and cutting paper. And this morning was a crazy frenzy to finish the paper cutting. Every time I kill myself for something like this that will go completely under-appreciated I swear I’ll never do it to myself again. But I know I will.

(I was in charge of decorating the bags for the kids to gather their Valentine’s in and instead of sending in bags+stickers or something easy, I hand cut all you see above, bagged them individually and even organized the extra pieces for whatever parent could be there to run the craft I had to miss. I think it turned out cute but MAN was it a time suck!)

(I was also in charge of the Bingo game and rather than look online for a Vday inspired printable Bingo game I decided to add cut paper to antique Bingo cards that belonged to my Grandma! Again, 25 squares on 18 cards. 25×18=A LOT)

So I spent the day dealing with two sick girls and a crazy 2 year old on less than 2 hours sleep so at 5pm when I was cooking dinner and looking forward to Chris getting home I surprised myself  by deciding to RUN instead of take my long awaited shower. I read THIS post by my sweet friend and decided it just had to be done.

And DUDE! I rocked it! After having not run at all for at least 3 months (I think) I ran for TWENTY SIX minutes without stopping! That may seem totally pathetic to some but for ME it was so freaking awesome. Back in the fall I started the C25K and almost finished it before the first snow hit and the hills around the Allen’s house became too hard to run on. And if you’ve never done the C25K before it basically has you walk for 90 seconds and jog for 30 seconds (at least the first few days) getting up to running for 20 walking for 10 and so on. It’s supposed to ease your old+fat+out of shape body into running gently. So today when I cranked it back down to WEEK 1 DAY 1, started the music and started walking I changed my mind quick and found myself jogging. AND I DIDN’T STOP! Every time that voice said, “WALK” I said (in my head), “F-YOU BITCH!” and I kept running. It was so rad to scream obscenities to my “trainer” and totally kill the run!

And like Katie said, it felt good to shower the sweat off and not just shower b/c it’s the next day.

While running I thought a lot about the season changing. Today was in the 50′s I think and the sun has been an amazing sight. I really wonder if I have that seasonal disorder b/c the last couple of days has seen a vast improvement on my entire attitude towards life even with the pukes hitting our house. It makes me want to move to Florida but then I wonder if I would appreciate the warmth if I had it every day. Maybe I need to get a little gloomy to appreciate the change you know?

It also struck me while running that I’m more hopeful than I imagined for Parker. In high school and college I had really bad exercise induced asthma. I would have to stop runs short not because my legs were tired but b/c my lungs protested too much. Tonight I stopped running b/c my legs were Jello and my lungs screamed they wanted more! I grew out of it. Out of my asthma I mean. It just gave me hope that with the right diet, good supplements, a healthy home and TIME Parker will be just fine. A happy+healthy kid.

I was thinking today that it might be fun to kick the gloom for good with some giveaways on the blog! We’ve had a few takers since I mentioned it on FB earlier today and I wonder if anyone else would be interested in offering something to giveaway in exchange for a shout out to your business? Giveaways are fun and it’s a neat way to get your name out!

Which reminds me to tell you all that we have NOT forgotten completely about our Love Light giveaway from Christmas! We just forget to take a photo of the winning card every SINGLE time we’re in the studio! We have two sessions this weekend so I PROMISE to not forget this time!

Speaking of Love Light! Did you guys see our article? 10 points if the two couples made famous read this and comment or if you know them! HA! Here are some shots in case you missed it…

How ironic is it that we’ve stopped taking weddings and we’re in the Wedding issue! Is it ironic at all? I use that word wrong ALL THE DAMN TIME!

We had to send in 15+ images for them to chose from and it was interesting to see which ones they chose! The top is from one of my first Love Lights back in the Jodified days and the bottom image was from a COLD night last year! Just neat to see what they liked and wanted to print!

THANK YOU to Professional Photographers Magazine for featuring our Love Light idea! A lot of people are now using this idea (Lyndsay is rocking them out!) and it’s just cool to know we were the first!

This kid hasn’t graced the blog (or my personal blog) in forever because he’s in such a little stinker phase but today while he was looking out the back door at the birds I grabbed a few shots.

Total third kid with that paci in his mouth! It just screams “You’ve given up as a mother!” every time he has it! HA! Seriously, I kind of have given up in the sense that it’s going to be a fight to take it from him and right now I don’t feel like dealing with it! We’ll just put the braces on a credit card some day!

And just to show you how pathetic the other two were today…

So sweet and so pitiful! Hope they’re feeling better tomorrow!

And with that I’m signing off! After a day of constant “Mommy can you…” and I felt the need to blog.

Happy Valentine’s Day! Nothing remotely romantic happened around here but man did I love on my kids today and that’s way more how I’d like to spend my Valentine’s than with candy+roses.

One year old triplet sneak peek coming soon!

Why I’ve not been up all night. AKA- my non-crafty Valentines

Posted on February 14, 2011

For the record, yes, you can absolutely buy a box of 24 Valentines for $3 or less.  For the record, my kids beg and plead for those, and I’ve only ever been able to do photo cards for my preschoolers before they totally started balking at that idea.  So my littles happily took their Kitties & Puppies (Grace, complete with tiny tatoos!), Toy Story, and Hello Kitty store bought Valentines to pass out today, but I also sent in a little bit extra.

For Grace, we did these iPhone printables wrapped around a box of Brach’s conversation hearts.  You can find the printable HERE

And then both Thomas and Sophie took little treat bags filled with Hugs & Kisses

The middle school boys have outgrown Valentine parties and are having an Ice Cream party today…. which I am making a mental note to NOT volunteer to send in toppings & bowls & spoons for ALL THREE BOYS.  The thought was to knock out all the volunteer responsibilities with one party, but not so easy (or cheap) to keep track of who takes what and then sending the bags and bags of stuff in (because middle school boys, at least mine, are not to keen on mom crashing their party so I wasn’t exactly invited to attend).

So, should I will be picking up some seriously sugar & party high kids this afternoon… with basketball games and dinner in the crockpot on the Valentine evening agenda, oh so romantic, huh?

Hope your Valentine’s Day is fabulous… stayed tuned for the Freeman triplets again… they have turned ONE and we had their session yesterday! 

Why I haven’t slept in a week. Valentine-style.

Posted on February 10, 2011

You would think I had newborns again I’m so tired! Staying up until all hours of the night NOT because I have a nursing baby or sick kids or even a looming work deadline, no, I’ve just been busy driving myself crazy making Valentine’s. For my kids. Who absolutely don’t care and would be MORE than happy to hand out cheap store bought ones from Walgreens. And aren’t store bought Valentine’s like $3 each or something? I won’t even tell you (for fear of the wrath of my husband) what I’ve spent on printing photos and buying craft supplies! HA!

But I do this to myself.

Because I absolutely love it.

It’s worth all the money and time and late nights. In fact, I’ve been happier this week just looking forward to my crafting time late at night after I finish a little work! I had no idea how much I missed crafting!

And you guys, I’m not very good. It’s not like I’m HER or HER or HER (three of my favorite crafters!). It’s just SIMPLE stuff. But it’s so fun. Cutting paper and finding the right glue and mixing patterns. OH FOR THE LOVE. So great.

For Parker I took ONE damn photo of her before she refused to take any more so this is what I had to work with. I printed wallets photos and ended up gluing a heart to match the hearts in the photo so she could write her initial. A simple addition but I love it. Then I bought cheap bags from Target, added two hearts to the front and after she filled it (one bouncy ball and two Dove chocolate hearts) I folded over the top, punched two holes and tied on one more little heart. The wallet photo goes inside the bag. Seriously simple but like 5+ steps to completion so just a bit time consuming! She LOVES them though. She helped me glue the hearts on the bag, she filled the bags, she wrote her “P” and by then she was bored!

For Gray it’s the same basic idea as PJ’s. Main difference is that I ripped off the end of his photo and glued it to a piece of paper, added the little heart and signed his name.  At the top of the bag, instead of tying on a heart I used a piece of torn paper, folded it over and tied on the twine. Super simple. He “signed” his name on the back with a Sharpie and some scribbles… this little dude would rather kick a ball than color and after FORCING him to do this activity it made me realize how much I need to encourage his fine motor skills! Coloring every day will be in his future!

Bailey’s is my favorite and SO simple and SO not my idea! I stole it from HERE with her permission of course! I used a quick snap shot I did of Bails before school one day, added in some Vol. 25 overlays and WHAMBAMTHANKYOUMAM her Valentine’s were done! She is SO excited for the Blow Pops because “MOMMY! It’s a sucker AND gum!” HA!

I adore THIS artist (who I actually know in real life b/c she was my reading buddy when I was in Kindergarten and she was in the fifth grade) and buy her cards all the time from Moonbeams in Kirkwood. But this time I wanted to take inspiration from her and make my own… so this is C’s V-day card. He could care less so it’s just hanging above my desk!

Then I actually did take a card of Leigh’s I bought, cut it up and redid it a bit for my mom. Not really for Vday but just because she’s awesome. All the time. And I wanted her to know…

The “true love” stamp is from HERE, one of my all time favorite stores!

And although this project is from last year, it’s still one of my favorites the kids have done!

All I did was buy a CHEAP canvas from Hobby Lobby, draw a heart with pencil and give the girls two colors of pink paint. I told them to paint the heart one color and the outside another color. Once the paint was dry I used a Sharpie and added the black lines. This one is my parent’s and I have a set of four that I adore! Just an idea in case you need something for the grandparents!

AND because I love to see the behind the scenes… this was my “studio” this morning!
My parent’s house doesn’t get good light in the morning so although it was FREEZING outside I went to their front room and opened the front door all the way to get as much natural light as I could. Then i shoved the snowmen out of the way and used the top of the piano. SIMPLE. I think my ISO was at 800 maybe? For all of our Fresh Classers I thought this might help!

Now, I need to get off the computer because I still have lots of bags to finish for Gray, Bailey’s need to be put together and OH THE HELL YEAH I am in charge of the craft and game for Bail’s class party Monday! Paper cutting HERE I COME!

Joseph | St. Louis Newborn Photographers

Posted on February 9, 2011

This poor sneak peek is SO late because this darn site was down for so long! We still have no idea what happened but thankfully someone smarter than us at Go Daddy FINALLY figured it out and here we are back up and running!

And we get to start the end of our hiatus with little Joseph!

You will notice that Joseph is AWAKE in some most of his images… which is not normally what newborn photographers want! In fact, we work tirelessly to get babies to sleep peacefully enough that we can pose them and move them from prop to prop during our sessions. It’s why our sessions can take anywhere from 2-5 hours… because we are VERY patient. Very.

And then there was Joseph.

Julia and Matthew paid our extra session fee to have us pack up our studio and come to their home to avoid taking their little man out in the cold during flu season. So we went and in over FIVE hours we got two shots. Of him awake. The little dude just wouldn’t go to sleep! Finally we had to call it quits and head home offering to let them come to the studio a few days later hoping his awake day was caused by a growth spurt or something. It’s happened a few other times when we’ve had to call uncle and have the family come back, and the second day is always a piece of cake.

But then there was Joseph!

Bright eyed, calm and WIDE AWAKE! HA!

We seriously did EVERYTHING, short of giving him some whiskey, to get him to fall asleep! We just kept laughing that this kid was our kryptonite!

Luckily, Julia had asked us to use two of her own props (the sled and the cradle) so we were able to swaddle him and get the shots she was hoping for. Then we did some other swaddle shots and about four hours into the second shoot we finally wore him down! Then we posed and shot like crazy women before he woke up again! HA! I think in total we worked for about 9 hours! Not a typical newborn session that’s for sure!

But look at how cute this little stinker is!

Even when he is awake!

And Julia and Matthew? Two of the sweetest and relaxed parents you’ve ever met! We adore this family even though their stinker of a son will go down in the Fresh Art history books as the hardest newborn photo shoot ever! Maybe baby #2 someday will sleep soundly and we can break the record for fastest newborn session ever! HA!

Thanks to the Bergman’s for being patient with the double session AND for waiting so patiently for this sneak peek (we did finally give in and post them on FB b/c we felt so bad about the site being down!)… and thanks to all our blog readers who waited patiently for the site to come back up!

Looking ahead we have some newborns about to be born and this weekend our fun Baby Plan triplets have their ONE YEAR session! AND the cold is breaking with some warmth this weekend! YAHOO! AND it’s almost Valentine’s Day! Photos tomorrow of what my kids are passing out to their classes… nothing spectacular but I always love to see what other moms are doing so i thought I’d share! Happy Wednesday!

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