I’m joining Leigh Kramer for this month’s What I’ve Been Up To
Has your summer been as hot as it is here? Humid and hot. As in, walk outside the door and you’ll find yourself glistening with sweat. Still, I love it, and school is approaching fast for our oldest.
Therefore, it’s the perfect time for me to take the August Break. If you are new to this, Susannah Conway every year encourages taking a break in August where we share photos on social media, but don’t write. For me, this year its perfect timing since I want to relish every bit I can get before Taryn heads to school. To really enjoy these last days of summer. So, with that, this will be my last post this month.
Learning
How to really set up my day and have more productive mornings/days with the Morning Makeover by Crystal Paine. Some things I do already but was never really conscious about it, and others, like cleaning the kitchen the night of dinner (don’t tell!), are now a priority in the evening. My husband and I had a couple of meaningful conversations about setting up the day so we both have better, more calm and productive days. So far, I think it’s working! We don’t feel like we are trying to wrangle and survive through our days, as much.
All about Periscope! I can’t believe there is another new form of social media and I joined it. I also can’t believe I love it. Twitter created this real-time video platform and so far it’s fun, interactive and authentic. At least the people I follow are fun – there is a lot of laughing, and it’s basically a conference call with a bunch of friends.
I did my first scope this past week and showed everyone a natural light photography set up I made. I had an assignment this week to create a light, airy, ethereal photo and my set up was for that type of shot. So I scoped what I was doing and why. Everyone watching also got to see my little office space and, on the other side, the messy playroom – ha! I plan on processing the photo and putting up a video right here on how I processed it. (Just wait ’til September). I am not ethereal photographer so this will be a challenge!
I took another small workshop from Clickin’ Moms called Unleashing Your Inner Artist by Lisa Furey, and the first exercise she required opened up my eyeballs to my style, where my heart belongs, and what and how I should shoot and process. I’ve been long time Instafriends with Lisa, which is the first reason I bought the breakout, but she did such a fantastic job and even started a small group for us to chat. I also learned some new tricks in Photoshop from her! Here’s a taste of one of the first assignments:
I love this one because she is 5, heading to school for the first time and looking into her future.
Making
Pesto, lots of it. I have basil again this year, and I’ve snipped and made plenty. My family loves a pasta that I make with it, so we are ready to eat it through the winter! I’ll do a post on how I make the pesto and use it once I can figure out my formula for the pasta. Right now, I tend to throw it together until it’s right. Basil is fantastic because the more you snip at it, the more it shoots off and produces.
We are also making a little vertical garden. We painted these pallets that sat against our house for the longest time. We’ll be adding jars and containers to the pallets and planting our plants in those.
Doing
Lots and lots of pool time!
And biking/running on our greenway where they have the best artwork on the big pipes.
I’m also switching to a new computer! So much work, and I’m struggling to get Lightroom to work with the new one. So I’m backed up because of it. But, my work time is cut in half! I never realized how slow our 5-year-old computer was. I used to multi-task using my old one, now it makes my brain explode trying to multi-task ;).
Remember this bridal shoot? We attended their wedding! And somehow my husband and I got into a picture together ;). It’s dark, but there we are.
Shooting and gasp! starting my photography business (cringe). I’ll do model calls this month for Lifestyle shoots and portraits and am so excited to get started! In the Notebook for August, I’ll share the website and give you an update. If you are in the Western NC area (Hickory, Winston, Charlotte, Boone, Asheville, and everything in between) then send me an email if you are interested in the model call. If you know of anyone, send them my way. The session is free and you get 10 images free. I am specifically looking for families in home or on location, and senior portraits.
I did another engagement shoot this month too. It was fun and I’ve got some great images. I’ll share a post later with all of my favorites, but here is a peek:
We also joined the green smoothie challenge this month from Simple Green Smoothies. My husband lost weight, and I felt good that I had good food in my body at a time I normally only put coffee in. We’ll continue drinking them everyday. It was another habit we started this month that makes our day, so we’ve decided to make it a part of our lifestyle. Plus, we have tons of recipes now.
On the Web
Bring Back Handwriting! Please.
When a Southerner Tells You How To Cook Green Beans, Shut Up and Listen. Because, yes! Basically loved it because the imagery in the article stirred a lot of my memories growing up stringing beans.
Serving Gifted Students – Because I feel like all the news etc focuses on catching up students who are behind, we tend to forget about those gifted students who need just as much attention and special focus.
My favorite photos this month (they are all phone photos cause, yes I need to spend some time on my other photos):
