Slideshow - Wood

Teen shoot

I had fun this past weekend with these 4!

Stay tuned for more from their fabulous shoot!

I heart faces - We ♥ kisses challenge

This weeks them at i heart faces is kisses. I had a lot of fun ideas for this challenge. But nothing was as fun as conspiring with my husband to get this photo!
There are so many things I love about this picture. First of all the handsome gent in it. I love the kiss applied by yours truly! I love the glare of the son off the truck. I love that you can see his left hand reflection. I love his blue eyes. Well I could go on. But I will spare you. To peep more entries to their kisses challenge visit i heart faces.

Goals!

"People who write down their goals earn 9x as much as those who don't."

Wow, guess what I am doing today!

My Eulogy

This past Tuesday I attended Spread the love with Justin and Mary Marantz. It. Was. Fabulous! I loved every minute of the 5 (yes 5) hours they spent talking. In fact I think I could have listened for 5 more. Three quick words I would use to describe spread the love.

1. Emotional


2. Intense (actually this one is theirs, but I couldn't agree more.)


3. Informative

I'll give the low down on why I choose these 3...

1. Mary had me chocked up with in 30 seconds. I am not even exaggerating. Her emotion and passion is contagious. B-T-W, it wouldn't be the last time either.


2. The five hours was jam packed full of information. I have 12 (half) sheets of notes, and I feel like I still missed some things.


3. Well... if the 12 sheets couldn't prove this one. How about the fact the it was all pretty much brand new information.

What was really neat was that it wasn't specific to just photographers. While I think every photographer would benefit from it. Anyone could attend, and there life would be so much richer.

Toward the end of the night they had everyone wright there own Eulogy. Then if you wanted to read it you could. There were a few brave souls. Me, not so much. But I did want to share it on my blog. Lucky you!

If Lori was here with us today she would have told you that she probably couldn't even spell Eulogy. If she had to take a stab at it she would have guessed u-i-l-o-g-y (I really had that). She knew in her heart of hearts that she would never work a 9-5. Once in a Sunday school classroom full of teenagers the teacher asked each individual what they wanted to be when they grew up? Most of the children listed very respectable professions. Like teacher, doctor, and lawyer. When it was Lori's turn she didn't even hesitate to answer Mother. The other kids snickered, and she didn't care. There was nothing she looked forward to more than finding the man she would spend the rest of her life with, and mothering his children. Only a few short years later Lori married at the ripe old age of 20. Almost two years later her first son was born. Followed closely by their second son just two years, and one day later. It would take almost another 3 years for their third son to be born, and complete their family. Lori loved to stay home with her children, and was very thankful for her husband's hard work and sacrifice. In the months that would follow an unexpected love would enter her life, and it would change forever. She fell in love with photography quickly, and whole heartily. She put her heart and soul into Calhoun ink while still maintaining balance in the other aspects of her life she was already so proud to have accomplished. She passed her love for people and capturing them with the camera onto her husband, and three son's who still run Calhoun ink today.

That was pretty much as far as I got. It's not profound, but it's me. I think I'll take it.

Lori

i heart faces - Places I love

I want to start challenging myself to participate in more i heart faces challenges. At least two a month. I am so excited for next weeks I can hardly stand it. I already know what I am going to do. Anyhow, this week is places i love. If you know me well at all you know how in love with Jerome AZ I am. In fact it is my very favorite place in all of AZ. I love it so much I have already been there twice, (just in the past year) and plan to go back quite a bit more. Since my husband knows of my love affair he willingly tags a long with me, and I think is even happy to do it. I also credit Jerome with helping me find who I am as a photographer. Okay, here are a few of my favorites from Jerome, and a few of the reasons why I love it so much.

It's full of fun shops, and art galleries.

The old rustic architecture is any photogarphers dream.

I love the nostalgia, and the history. Oh, and it doesn't hurt that the food is good too!

Just in case you aren't up on your AZ history. Jerome was an old copper mining town (set on a hill). It's population peaked in the 1920's, and then quickly dwindled in the 50's when the mind shut down. In the 60's in was considered a ghost town even by the less than 100 people who still lived there. Today it is a national landmark, and state park.
To see more of the places people love visit i heart faces.

Sneak Peak - Wood Maternity

This shoot turned out to be my most exciting yet! Not only are the pictures amazing, but it turned out to be quite the adventure.

A week or so ago I asked a friend if we could use their property for a photo shoot. They were kind enough to let us, and I was so excited! After we finally figured out how to get in. Trying to avoid the barbed wire as much as possible. (Thanks to Kelli who finally found the small gate opening.) We begun to set up shop. Only to realize their was a heard of cattle now coming toward us. Although I don't know if they consider 10 a heard. Anyways, they were huge, and had horns. So we made are way back. I begrudgingly decided to knock on the door, and ask what we should do. My friend said "oh you just need to shew them away. You might even need to give them a little push." I'm sure my look was a sight to see when I said "and they won't push back? Even the one with the horns?" She said no they were females, and they really like to eat the grapefruit from the trees. Also that they were just very used to humans. We however were not so used to them. But we decided we would stay anyways and give it a whirl. I am so glad we did.

Here is the teenager. I call her that because she isn't quite as little as the baby (which was so cute), but you could tell she wasn't full grown either.

We thought maybe if we threw a few grapefruit (thank you Patrick) they would go away. That plan quickly backfired when they wanted more. So we decided to scratch that, and carry on with pictures. At one point they were completely surrounding us. So I put my mean face on (yes, I have one. Just ask my kids.), and shewed them away. Which didn't work as well as planned.

Eventually it must have been dinner time. Because they all left at once . We were grateful for the peace, and the lack of excrement.

Now with out further ado. The absolutely beautiful pictures.

I was so excited to finally be able to use the beautiful bamboo bench I picked up.

There were these beautiful berries (which I'm sure are not eatable) everywhere. They made for such yummy pictures. Here they are watching the sun as it began to set. It cast the most beautiful yellow glow across the entire field. YUM!

Maybe my favorite. I don't know yet!