Photo Documentary

I'm intrigued at this style of photography.

I have a FB friend whom I was friends with during my SCAD days. She was a fashion major, I think, or maybe she switched. I'm not sure because we lost touch after freshman/sophomore year, and then after graduation, she moved back to Japan. Gotta love Facebook for the ability to reconnect!

Anyway, she had a baby the same year I did, but earlier that year. I tend to be drawn more towards people with kids Liam's age. She posts photo albums on her FB of her trips/adventures with her kid and family. I LOVE looking through her albums. They aren't the typical family-vacation photo album. They're not necessarily the most attractive shots - well, actually they are ALL beautifully composed shots. I guess what I mean is that they're not the type of "attractive" shots you'd see from a self-proclaimed professional photographer with visual elements like bokeh or depth of field or whatever... The photos are simple, unedited with natural lighting, but most importantly - tell a story.

I love flipping through her albums, admiring each photo. Her photos make me want to visit Japan so badly! She's got photos of her kid, mixed with photos of the landscape, mixed with touristy-type photos, mixed with photos of food she's about to eat. It's so awesome. Not too many photos of just her kid, which I know can get overwhelming and uninviting for others who just don't care to look at other people's kids. (I am guilty of taking too many pics of Liam, which is why I keep a separate Shutterfly site of all his pics to share with only those who care to see them all - mainly close friends and family)

I want to try this style. I take too many pics of Liam. You don't want to know how many. It's insane. I am a photo-hoarder! I just need to take more pics of the surroundings/environment. Like, Liam's got this funny look on his face, but what made him make that face? Or he's eating something that's all over his face... what exactly was he eating? Then maybe be very choosy as to what photos to show and stick the ones that I like a LOT in an album.

I also want to get a new camera... the Nikon D7000. Anyone want to give me $1200? :)

random thoughts

• Thinking of starting an etsy store for... something. Either to whore out my graphic design - custom invitation designs or templates or business card designs, logos, etc... any type of simple design work - OR - to sell custom paintings 
• I need to get back into a daily sketch or photo or something... at least a weekly sketch - how bout we start at that?
• Maybe I should start using this blog as an "idea/inspiration board" and post images or weblinks to things that will help me grow or give me inspiration to get creative
• I really need/want a new DSLR body. I want the Nikon D7000, but I also want a new lens, too because Liam has taken over my kit lens on my ancient D50. But first, I need $1200.
• word.

More paintings

I still have 2 16"x20" blank canvases and an 8"x8" square canvas from last year. The 2 larger ones are spoken for, at least in my mind. The people I plan to give them to don't know it yet, I don't think. They were meant to be Christmas presents, but I never got around to doing them with all the other chaos at the time. I think I need to use the paint I bought before it goes bad, as well. I still have an 8"x8"... who can I give that one to?

I finally bought my Concept 2 rowing machine (with an awesome Groupon: $100 for $500 off!). It's still in the box! :P We picked it up 2 days ago and have been busy with party organizing/cleaning (my mom's 60th birthday was this weekend) to throw it together and test it out. Tonight we will break it open and see how bad of shape I am in. Woohoo!

I also made my cousin some cupcakes for her 14th birthday. She's musically inclined, so she wanted music notes and staves as decorations - with a blue and purple color scheme. I printed out some sheet music for reference and piped melted chocolate onto wax paper. That was fun. I made my usual cream cheese icing (which I think I have perfected, so it's not TOO buttery tasting) and colored 1/3 of the batter blue, and another 1/3 purple. There were white, blue and purple cupcakes. They looked pretty awesome. I regret not taking photos of them before I packed them up in the sweet new cupcake carrier my Aunt got me. The report was that they were a huge hit with her friends and teachers. Everyone loved the icing! Yay me! 

Also on the plate, I've got wedding invites to work on and a few other personal projects, among the normal 8-to-5 and toddler-chasing. I still feel like if I were to just paint and/or decorate cupcakes all the time, it wouldn't be such a bad thing. I yearn for ways to make my life more simple...

Coming to terms

Caroline (8"x8")

Jessica (11"x14")

Kazia (8"x8")

These are the other 3 paintings I did for gifts last year. I wasn't allowed to post the family tree, but maybe I will replace it with my family and post it. (hmmm... Christmas presents for 2011?)

In regards to running, or well, not being able to run... I was thinking about screwing what the doc said and train for the 1/2 marathon anyway, but here and there, my knee would bother me and reassure me that running is not the smartest thing to do. ...at this point in my life anyway. I figure I will still make running a 1/2 or even whole marathon a life goal. I still have the rest of my life ahead of me. I'm not even 30 yet (for another 10 months)! I have a kid, a full time job and therefore virtually no time to do any training right now anyway. Maybe in the future, once Liam is able to wipe his own butt, I will get back into running. And who knows, at that point there may be some miracle cure to crappy knees. When I'm older, I'd be in a better place to afford the knee surgery anyway. Not a great way of looking at that, but whatever. I'm not giving up ALL hope, and I refuse to give up running. I just have to put it on hold for the time being. I am fine with that.

In other news, I'm only FIVE lbs away from my pre-preggo weight! I weighed myself on my cousin's bathroom scale for the first time since I was back in Savannah (Dec '10) - at the scale in our house. I think I have lost at least 7 lbs since then. I had some progress with the weight loss due to diet changes, but I was fluctuating. December was tough with the holiday treats! (I can't deny myself Holiday treats!!! They only come once a year!!) I got back on track with eating less after new years and I'm back down if not more so to what I was before the December eating madness! Weight loss with NO exercise!! Ha! It is possible! I can still be a lazy bum and lose weight!

But I need to start back on some type of exercise routine. I feel more tired at night most nights. Maybe my body's making up for the lack of sleep I got in December and parts of January. Who knows. Or maybe I'm being a normal person by trying to get 7-8 hours of sleep at night...

December = no sleep + sad news for my running shoes

Between Liam's 1st birthday and Christmas plus my normal day job and a couple freelance projects sprinkled in between, I have been getting zero to little sleep.

James and Jen

Jerry and Pennie

Paul and Shonna

Tracy and Eric

Val and Andy

This Christmas, I decided to go the handmade route for a few people to save some $ and to try out a new painting style - similar to my pet paintings I did a couple years back, but more simplified and mainly black and white. I did 10 total, but I did not get photos of 2 of them before I wrapped them and the other 3 I have not yet given to the recipients. I plan to do a couple more, I just didn't have time to do them and I also have to figure out a way to send a 20" x 16" canvas across the country! I will post the others on a later blog entry.

The freelance projects I did were for a friend's coworker's family album. He asked me to design a cover for the album and a family tree for the back cover. I really like how the family tree turned out. It's nothing visually spectacular, but if you appreciate clean/neat layouts you would like it too! I may post it in a later blog, I just haven't gotten permission to post it yet.

I also made some snowflake cupcakes for Christmas (with my high school favorite cookie - Peanut butter kiss cookies), which turned out really nice as well. I piped some snowflakes made of melted white chocolate and placed some on the cupcakes. (P.S. I LOVE my Ikea dessert platter! Thanks Sharon!)

In other, unrelated news... On the fitness side of things, I finally weighed myself when we went down to Savannah the 2nd week of December. Turns out I lose 3 lbs. since we moved back up to MD! Woohoo! 3 lbs. in 2 months may not seem like a big deal, but after being at a plateau for the longest time, it is progress. Though, there has been very little fitness associated with that loss (due to no gym access). It was mainly diet changes.

Also, last week, I decided to get my knee checked out since it had been bothering me ever since the last time I ran last month. I didn't want to run any more until I got it checked out so I could start my 1/2 marathon training. Well, the good news is that my knees are perfect. The bad news is that the pain I am feeling is due to my f'ed up cartilage rubbing against itself. The doc said that my body is trying to tell me something: that I should not be running. He said that If I want to get surgery, that I should keep running. It crushed me when he told me that, and I felt like crying. Running had been something that I liked doing; I could always run even if we didn't have a gym. It was fun entering races and trying to beat my previous time. It gave me goals to strive for. It was something that Joel and I could do together (even though we never actually ran together - side-by-side, we at least ran at the same time and location, haha). *sigh* I don't know. I wanted the doc to tell me that my knee would get better with time, then I could start my training. Looks like I have to see if I can get someone to run in my place next year. I don't know. I really want to do the 1/2 marathon and then just quit my running career there. If not, it will be a weak end to my running life. I kind of want to go out with a bang.

Fall/Thanksgiving Cupcakes

I survived Midnight Madness at the Mall on Black Friday!

...should be a t-shirt. My Black Friday (BF) cherry was popped with the help of Shonna and her sister Tracy! Shonna was a BF virgin too. I'm glad it was another thing we got to experience for the first time, TOGETHER!

Pics of my cupcakes...

Turns out the frosting was too buttery. I did use one WHOLE stick of butter. In the future I might use more cream cheese and less butter. I prefer the cheese flavor over the butter, but that's just me! They were still pretty damn good though, if I say so myself. :)

Crafty

I've got a few things up my sleeve for Christmas gifts... I'm planning on giving personalized *******s for presents this year. Not making too many of them because I have no time to do one for every one I know, so if you get one, you are special. Or more like, you are probably close family or friends that are pretty much family. I hope to post them all on here once they are all complete. I think photos of all of them together will look pretty cool. I just hope they turn out how I have them envisioned in my head.

Also, this Thanksgiving I'm making pumpkin cupcakes with cream cheese frosting with chocolate leaves. Much like the style of the cake I posted last year for my in-law's birthdays (see this post). Just in cupcake form and with REAL fallen leaves, instead of basil leaves. :) I hope the leaves I picked up are not poisonous... I made sure I washed them thoroughly, at least! Picture to be posted later.

And to add to my repertoire of craftiness/creativity... I'm planning my first birthday party! Liam's 1st birthday! It's on a budget (sorta), so I had to go cheap/lazy on a few things that, knowing me, I shouldn't have: like invitations (they were sent out via eVite...and you can't customize the templates!) and cake (no time!). I hope it all goes as planned. There's still a lot to do before then.

Pics of stuff coming soon. This is such a crappy art blog... no pictures!

P.S. On the weight loss front, I have no scale to weigh myself on, but I've been eating a LOT less in the past few weeks. Trying to maintain the "food for fuel" mentality, although I am pretty sure that tomorrow (Thanksgiving), I will break my streak! haha