recording session

After my friend Cassie sang at Miles' dedication this past summer, we offered to record her singing if she wanted a demo disk or just for fun.  Finally we were able to find a time to get together and do it.  John's studio is the perfect size for him, but add more people to the mix and it's pretty tiny.  I tried to get some shots but had minimal space and light. I was sitting out in the kitchen shooting most of the shots through a narrow slit in John's office french doors, so keep that in mind when perusing the shots. Btw, I LOVE Cassie's hair. I wish I knew how to wear headbands in the funky way she does.  
It was awesome to have our own little live concert in our home on a chilly Friday night.  We LOVE her voice and she writes her own music.  I just eat up creative people.  Oh, if you look closely, there's John in the upper left corner. 
Ok, how adorable is Cassie in these headphones?  Bless her heart, it was kind of a challenge to play the guitar part separately from the singing. She had to sit on her hands to keep from making noise when she sang.  Stamp came in and did some tap dancing on the plastic floor protector to help with the noise making.  That Stamp, she just has to be where the action is! 

I love that I was able to get the shot of her guitar like this and I was all proud of myself and then John said, "Yea, but she's just tuning, not playing."  Ugh! Leave it to a musician to notice that!  I was trying not to make her too uncomfortable by snapping a bunch of pics, so I tried to be quick.  I'll be shooting her again soon for a cover so I'll get another chance. ; )
Notice her beautiful engagement ring in this photo?  She just got engaged last week!  We are so excited for her and her fiance Jason because they are the sweetest couple.  Oh  my goodness I can't wait to see Cassie as a bride. She's going to take my breath away!  

When the CD is done, we will (with permission, of course) be posting her music.  She's so beatiful in so many ways. We love you Cassie!

Hyperbets at Sunset, by John. ;-)

Another sunset, another chance for John and Betsy to play! Give us a beautiful sunset and a camera and we are set. I know, I know, we've done this before, but they are so much fun, I couldn't resist posting. (And yes, I went nuts with the colors, but wouldn't you too? I love going nuts on the colors when it's just for blogging fun.)

Last time we did a sunset shoot we went for sweet mommy and baby shots. This time, it's too cold for baby so I just got to be my good 'ol hyper self.  By the time John got a turn, I was too freakin cold to shoot him. (bummer because it's FUN!) We took a bunch of zany shots but I restrained by just posting these.  Enjoy. 

Tree pose by the tree for the yogis in the crowd.  
I'm channeling my inner Michelle Kwan here.  
Yes, I took my coat off here to try for more graceful arms.  Can you say Brrrrrrr!? I'm wearing short sleeves!  (Yes mom, I'm taking my Vit. C!) 
I'm telling you, the next time there is an awesome sunset, swing by our house! We could have all sorts of fun with two people. Oh, the possibilities.  

OMG, I won!

What a great week! If you've been following the latest in my life, you'll know that we just got me a new Mac so I can get serious about getting my photography business up and running. (Yes, I was smart enough to call Mac and request the black friday pricing today since we ordered ours the night before Thanksgiving, but I digress.) Yesterday, Jessica Claire, one of my favorite photographers that I blog stalk daily had a contest up. (You know I LOVE contests!) It was asking for a creative photo of what you are thankful for. I can choose from some of her different products for my prize, but I'm so getting a Shootsac

I can't believe it, but little 'ol me from Fort Wayne, Indiana won! I have been dying for a shootsac ever since I saw my friend and awesome photographer, Bobbi (here's a link with her shootsac) got one and definitly every time I lug our nerdy Canon bag around.

So check out Jessica's blog to see my winning photo (the photo won't be anything you would expect!) and also, look for John's entries in the runner ups. She did a wonderful job of including so many of the absolutly beautiful entries. If you only look at one blog today, this one is great because the photos will make you smile and remember all the beautiful things to be thankful for.

click here for Jessica's Blog with winners

Thank you Jessica Claire! You rock!

the shoup family

When we arrived, Braden was excited to show us his tractor. His Grandpa, who lives next door on this really cool farm, has the real thing. It's been months since I have seen Braden, but he is so outgoing that he just opened right up to us right away. I can't even tell you how sweet these kids are.

I could tell when Molly opened the door that Kenna wasn't having the greatest afternoon. I had been there a couple weeks ago myself with our own photo shoot.
Look at this precious face! I love that you can see her two little teeth.
The shoups have THE perfect set up for raising children. Grandpa's farm next door and a sweeeet swingset in the backyard. Nothing is as cool as Lightning McQueen though!
Braden was playing the quickest game of peek a boo ever here. It's a miracle I caught it! Thank goodness I did because his face is precious here!


Braden LOVES riding on the tractor with his Grandpa. Here are just a couple we captured.




Bless little Kenna's heart. We were supposed to do this shoot right after her nap time this past Sunday. But it was the yuckiest rainy day ever. So we showed up right after school at 4PM. I knew we would need to work fast because little ones get HUNGRY the closer to 5 you get and sure enough, she was struggling. So I took that opportunity to snag a shot of Dave and his little guy. By the way, I was in the same first grade class with Dave! It's so amazing to look back and remember someone that long ago and then see them all grown up with a beautiful family today. A hidden blessing of living in the same city your whole life. : )

Today started out to be a beautiful day, but as we approached their house the clouds started rolling in. It was some pretty tough shooting conditions for rookies like us. Oh, and it kept changing too! It dropped temperature pretty quickly as well. We all had teary eyes and runny noses by the end of the shoot. That farm has the most amazing photographic possibilties so we hope to return next spring when everybody has a full belly, rested and it's about 20-30 degrees warmer!

Thanks for letting us take a peak into your sweet little world Dave and Molly. We can't wait to come back! (hint-hint!)

sneak peak from today's shoot

These are my sister's kids, and my neice and nephew, Kurtis and Emily. I had a little family shoot today and I'm only through a small portion of editing the photos (before John had to jump on the mac to write) but so far, this one is my favorite. John caught it so I can't take credit. Enjoy, more to come soon!

John took a really cute pic today while we were testing out cameras before the shoot and he just posted it on his blog. It will make you smile, he wants to make a huge print of it for his office becuase he likes it that much. (You will probably think he is nuts, but it makes me happy.) ; )

...$?

Miles has informed us after enjoying his morning paper, that with the dollar hitting an all time low against the Euro and British pound, he wants to make sure we know he expects his future tooth fairy payments to be paid in pounds.

We told him to try reading the Feature section instead of the financial section and that we would discuss it once he grew some teeth!

Kids these days....Sheesh!

pom

We had about 20 minutes of sunshine today. Other than that, it was a gross grey day. November is my least favorite month. It used to be February, but once Miles was born, it's now up in rank. Anyway, I'm trying to enjoy every month and find little blessings in even the grey days.

A grey day makes this pomagranete look that much more brilliant. Not sure I would have noticed the colors had it been a bright sunny day.

Enjoy!

OMG, Bobbi's photos are AMAZING!!!

Remember when i blogged about getting our photos taken? I talked about how we had to strip Miles down to his diaper before he was ready for the shoot? Oh, and of course, there was mention of a bad hair day. (You know me and my hair...) Well the photos are in and we are THRILLED!!!!

I'm soooo stealing some images from Bobbi's Blog becuase I just can't wait for the real thing to arrive:




We walk the pugs three times a day so it was important to capture this.


For the rest of the samples, go to: Bobbi+Mike's blog of our pics

If you guys aren't already stalking her blog, you should be!!!

We have many, many bare walls in our house so i'm thinking i want to do some super big prints of some of these. Maybe even a stretched canvas. Even though we have 8 million photos of Miles that we could do Christmas cards with, I'm excited to have some of our whole family to put in a card. Yippee! Last year's Christmas card totally blew. The funny thing was I was too tired from my pregnancy to do good cards. Ha! Like I knew what being tired was!

I love great photography. I will definitly be doing this next year, perhaps in early summer, though catching bobbi in the middle of wedding season may take some convincing. ; ) It's awesome to have a photographer come to your home for many reasons. One, you learn from them how to be a better photographer yourself. Secondly, they capture a side of you that you have never seen. (I really didn't know my nose was shaped the way it was. Seriously.) Third, they capture you and your spouse together being parents. Usually we are either posing for each other or talking to each other from behind the camera. I think that will be a neat thing for Miles to have someday.

Ok, I'm shushing. I have a project I need to do for the NTAF this evening, so I better stop blogging!!!

Thanks for looking!

Becky & the kings do coffee and some shots...

Camera shots, that is. ;-)


John and I got a new camera yesterday because when we shoot photos one of us is always dancing around begging to take a shot. So we are now a two man shooting crew. More on that later.

So today we got to shoot for the first time without juggling cameras. It was AWESOME. We shot my sister-in-law, Rebecca. (That would be Andy's sister, not John's, as he has only brothers.) As you can see she is verrry photogenic. Miles came along too and he was a really good sport. Oh, and regarding the location, it's my favorite coffee shop, the Mocha Lounge. I have been dying to go shoot there because they have a lot of windows and some great light with all the widows. Their parking lot gave us a little bit of grunge and some woods to round it out. Oh, and it's right down the street from us, so quick travel time for Miles in case we had to escape quickly.


John captured this one. He is THE MAN!





Then into the coffee shop we headed...

Becky loves jewelry and always wears cool and funky stuff. I had to capture this sweet ring. It reminds me of Jurasic Park. (You know, the mosquito in the amber...I'm listening to that soundtrack right now, so it's on my brain too.) Look at those lips too! This is one of my favorite photos. Oh to have her skin!


John captured this one. I like how the wall art reflects in the coffee table.








Here's Becky giving her Blue Steel look ala Zoolander. Ok, I have to quote the movie: Becky, you are really, really, rediculously good looking. ; )


Go to John's Blog for a behind the scenes look at the shoot.

Go to John's photography portion of his website for a better view of the photos.

Can I just say an AMEN that this blog is complete? Blogger went KAPUT right in the middle of loading this so I have been doing this one photo at a time and about ready to stick my finger in my eye. An hour and a half later and I"m done! It's 1 AM and I'm going to bed! Thanks for looking.

sunny schick saturday

After a bit of rain this morning, I noticed this leaf on our patio with these beautiful beads of water on it. It was hanging out there all morning, waiting for me to capture it.
John and I had some errands to run and we have been wanting to swing by Sunny Schick, a local camera shop, so we headed out there today. My mom watched Miles so we could have the afternoon to ourselves. After doing a bit too much damage to our credit card at the camera shop (more on that later!!) we took some time to practice snap some photographs downtown to get some experience shooting in a richer environment than our house and yard. (I have been DYING to get out of the house to shoot, but it's not so easy to keep your eye in your camera and on your baby at the same time.)

By the way, we aren't in love withourselves, it's just that all of our friends were busy this weekend with Halloween stuff, so nobody was available for a shoot. So sharing these photos is not about sharing photos of ourselves, it's more about sharing the shots we have captured. We love shooting other people as we have enough photos of ourselves to last a lifetime. Tomorrow we are going to shoot my sister in law, Becky, so stay tuned for her. We had so much fun playing with our camera, though it was freezing outside!

I LOVE the detail of the ivy in this one and of course, John is such a cutie.


I think this picture above is kind of funny. I look like a commercial for a drug company, like I should be saying, "I found a hormone therapy I can trust. So can you with Zeritol." I'm such a dork, but that's all I can think of when I see that photo.
We found this trash bin by the Salvation Army that had glass, broken christmas ornaments and all sorts of trash strewn around it and it made for some awesome texture. We weren't able to really capture that, but perhaps next time we will. Here's the best one from that area. BTW, we attracted some attention from the workers who were very curious. That was a little interesting, but they were just curious and wanted to give us some tips.

I can't tell if I like this shot. John likes it, so we'll keep it. I was standing next to this part of the trash bin that had allll of this shattered glass. I wasn't standing close enough to it to make the shot make sense, so it ended up being a head shot.
Shiny, happy John!


After cropping this one 8 million different times we finally made this shot work.

No Miles on this shoot. You'll have to see the post below for one. We had SOOO much fun shooting but we left the house with a half dead battery (duh!) and we were cut short. Glad we get to play again tomorrow! Becky is BEAUTIFUL, so I'm excited about getting some great shots.

To better view the photos, go to: John's website

or check out his point of view: John's blog