Happy Valentines Day

Daddy got the girls a rose each. Mommy made heart shaped brownies. Claire got in trouble and got her Valentine Brownie taken away for the day (she'll get it tomorrow.) I have to say, I am stunned she was willing to take any pictures!

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!!!!

let there be LIGHT!

That's right... I have my studio lights up and running! YAY! I bought the lights back in November because I got a great deal, but I didn't get any of the equipment to make the lights work with my camera. I got to actually use some studio lights while at the conference in Detroit, so that fueled me to finally get the right stuff, and get mine up and running.

So here's how my weekend has gone. Get the stuff Thursday. Try to make everything work together in harmony when I get off of work at 4am. Fail misreably, and go to bed unhappy.

Friday, fresh and determined to make it work, mess around with them for over a half hour without anything working. On a whim, attach my backup camera, which works instantly. Compare the cameras, and FINALLY figure it all out.

My eureka picture:

Yep, its my cat Vash, on top of a suitcase that I should have put away a couple weeks ago. Adjust some settings, and get a proper model...



Well hello Claire Number Two. Yes, that is her name. And we don't shorten it! You must say it all out, or Claire (number one) will yell at you. Although neither of my girls were home... they had gone to grandmas with Daddy. So Claire Number Two made a good substitute.



Just relaxing in her chair. So after a while of shooting Claire Number Two, I decided I needed a better model. Perhaps one that could breathe. So I went trapsing around the house 'Here Kitty, Kitty'ing... until I found my sleeping cat upstairs. Brought him all the way downstairs, and somehow got him to not immediately run away when I set him down.



Whats that Vash? You don't want your picture taken? Tough cookies mister.



joke was on me... he bolted after this shot.

So today, I actually didn't get to play around in the studio until the girls' bedtime! Bedtime, however, did not deter me. Now, the thing with my girls, is at this stage in the game, you have to let them think that they in fact are running the photoshoot. Olivia wanted her pig to have her picture taken.



Thats a mighty fine pig Olivia! Can you set your pig next to you real quick?



Thanks lady! Nice smiles! Okay Claire, are we taking a picture of zebra on a zebra print?



Phew, almost couldn't see him there! Now, can he sit next to you, and you can both smile please?



....

I wish I could say that this is an outtake of Claire. But it isn't. She held this position, while I was doing anything and everything to coax a smile out of her, for a full 2 minutes. Then I gave up, because it was really bedtime, and I wanted to take a few picture of them together before we brushed teeth.





I'm really excited about what this means for my sessions! Opens up a whole world of possiblities, and I can't wait to dive into it!!

Well hello stranger!

So I haven't blogged in a while. I guess that would be a bit of an understatement! How do you start a post after taking an almost 5 month hiatus? I logged back into blogger, and saw that I had something like 15 new comments, which sounds like hardly any given I hadn't blogged in so long, but in reality, not a lot of people comment, so I was excited to see what I was in for. Turns out, there's cheap wedding dresses out there, insurance, a few websites that sounded terribly innappropriate, and one comment thanking me for helping him with his college assignement. I think I turned off my spam filter somehow...

So what have I been up to for 5 months? Taking a much needed blogging break, for starters! I love to blog, but I think I finally managed to burn myself out on it. It was kind of bound to happen. But I also spent a lot of time learning and spending time with my girls. I went to a conference in Detroit at the beginning of January, which totally helped focus me on where I want to be with my photography career. Definitely good things are happening this year for Platypus ;)

I might end up sharing some last images taken in 2010... but I might just skip those, and move on to 2011. So if blog posts seem out of order for a bit, sorry about that!!!!

I'll end this one with images of Claire. Every year in June, I take pictures of my oldest daughter Olivia in my wedding dress. My youngest Claire's birthday is in December, and wearing a wedding dress in 20 degree weather probably isn't the wisest parenting decision I could make. So instead, I take images of Claire in my fancy winter coat.

The focus actually fell on this closeup (silly fluffy fur caught it instead) but I like her expression in this one so much better than any of the ones where the focus was dead on.



For comparison, here's Claire at one year old


Such a dreary December day...

And then here's her at 2 and a half


She'll be mad at me when she's older, but I missed taking the image in December... I took it last June when I took Olivia's picture. I know I know, she's going to have such a second child complex!!!! I can't help that her birthday falls during the busiest month of the whole year!!! I was convinced when I took these pictures 6 months ago, that when I took her 3 year ones in December, they'd look identical (minus the snow.) But I actually think I was wrong... Claire's grown up a lot in the last few months (or as much as any 3 year old can I guess.) She's so much a 'big kid' and not my baby anymore. She wants to do everything for herself, and she can do anything her big sister can do. Silly peanut!

So here's 'baby Claire' six months ago


and my sly big kid now

Playing around at Easton

Easton Shopping Center has what I learned is called a "Splash Pad." When they first built Easton when I was in high school, I think the splash pad was more meant to be a beautiful water art type thing that you could sit and enjoy while taking a break from shopping. I would say within a year, kids started coming and playing in the water. Now parents bring their kids decked out in swimsuits, and they make a day of playing in the water. I used to make fun of those parents. I have learned in my parenthood stage of life, that you should never judge what you don't know. I take the girls to Easton, decked in swimsuits, to play in that water thing all the time. I really should stop throwing rocks in this pretty glass house I'm in.

So, this day we met up with Haley and Karen, and also our good friend Jacqui, who also had family in town. Big 'ol group of us!

Haley was, of course, soaked by the time we got there


Normally, Claire is our water-baby (totally brave and willing to get soaking wet even in full clothes) and Olivia is the scaredy cat. Claire had an off day this day, and really had ZERO desire to get wet... or be set down... it was tiring.

Olivia played her same song and dance where she wants her hands and feet to get wet, but not her whole body, or more specifically, her hair.




Also in our group - Becky, the last bride I worked with! I love Becky... she's adorable, and really is willing to do anything. It had been raining right up to when we went to Easton, so everyone had umbrellas on them. Jacqui convinced Becky to take an umbrella into the fountain, fully dressed, and pose for me. I love people!










I'm shocked I could even take anything, we were all laughing so hard!

During all this, Claire was being a pip. Refused to even be set down, let alone go and play. Frankly she was acting like a little baby, and not like an almost 3 year old. So she got passed from person to person, everyone trying to warm her up to socializing with us.

I always joke that Claire gets her blue eyes from Karen. EVERYONE on my dads side of the family has brown eyes. My mom has blue eyes, so thats where I got my recessive gene from, and made it possible for her to have blue eyes, but its just fun to joke that she favors Karen in the looks department (in reality, Claire is like a mini-Tim)


Oh, finally cracking a smile Claire?

There we go... all better!


Look, at this point she even let me set her down!!


Now we totally convinced Haley that she needed to drag Olivia through the fountain. Up until this point, Olivia had only ran around the perimeter of the thing. But Haley got her up and through the fountain ;)




Haley herself had zero problems going through the fountain. She wanted me to take some images of her walking through the fountain when it was going full blast




And then... we all held our breath... Claire walked towards the fountain


She actually enjoyed herself (somewhat) when Haley carried her through the fountain




And we'll leave on an image of Olivia's standard pose by the fountain


Butt sticking out so only it, her hands and her feet get wet


Here's hoping lots and lots of images can (slightly) make up for my lack of blogging of late. Happy Summer!!

The craziest family I know...

I couldn't remember the last time my family had taken professional pictures together. The last picture that had everyone in it was taken at Christmas-time, on my grandparents couch, and I believe I was in my early teens. Oh, and my cousin was sticking out her tongue. But that was back when you had to develop pictures before you could see them - so when she stuck out her tongue, we took a second picture. She looked beautful. And half the family had their eyes closed, or weren't looking at the camera. So tongue picture has hung ever since.

I think fate randomly brought my sister AND my uncle to Columbus Ohio. Sure you could point out that Jessie was in a wedding that weekend, and John came down because him and my Aunt were in Cleveland helping her family... I say fate. So we decided (without really telling those two... ooops) that we were going to take family pictures.

The five siblings


There were four dogs at the house this day. Three of them are in this picture!


My sisters and I


We got the images by me setting up my camera, on a tripod, and arranging everyone except me. I'd jump in, and my sisters good friend was kind enough to pull the trigger for us. One of my favorites? Friend John says "Ummm, I think somethings not right... its set up for something different" We start laughing because we know what happened... I took a series of pictures of the three sisters, and then just added my parents in without thinking. Resulting in this:


Nice.

We also did something I had seen done at a Sandy Puc seminar. She took individual images of family members against a solid backdrop, and then spliced them together later in the computer. I thought it looked neat, and was a way that I could individually direct each family member to look their best (Plus it's a neat size, so I know it'll get hung) The result?



And the individual of my sister (who I hate for looking so gorgeous- curse you Jessie!!)


And one final one to share... John yelled out, lets do a silly one! Which I will now do with everyone. Because the silly one is my favorite!