Honesty, Artistic Interpretation and Beauty

Ready for some honesty? Here it is: ME, with piles of sorted laundry behind me, in one of 2 or 3 shirts that still fit over my belly without me constantly yanking my pants up to cover its watermelon-cold rind...

Yep, that's it, my thermal. And one of two pair of jeans that fit. I have my black yoga pants, but you can only wear those so many days in a row (with three kids making sure they don't stay unblemished) before they are out of commission until laundered. So most of the time I'm in my flannel jammy pants and a long sleeved T (I have confiscated all of Adam's, but if they're mine, once again, three inch strip of 65 degree belly skin above those jammies...). There are times that honesty does NOT feel the least bit beautiful. But so much depends on where your focus lies; not just your photographic focus, but your mental focus.

Right now I am typing through a contraction. Here comes more honesty - turn your head for a line or two if you're squeamish - I lost most/all of my mucus plug by yesterday afternoon, so these contractions that I've been having for weeks are getting stronger and doing their job. I can feel the pull, opening up that door for our precious baby to come through. I went to bed early last night after talking to the midwife and labor team with contractions at 10 minutes apart or so. I slept right through them (except for the ten times to get up and empty my bladder) and I haven't timed them today, but last Friday I was 90% effaced and 3 cm, so we're looking at the next couple of days here as being a new birthday to mark on the calendars. It's exciting at the same time as being frustrating, tiring and emotionally draining. So there's some honesty...

(Insert space, which this stupid blog won't put in for me right now, no matter what I try...)

Now, are you ready for some artistic shine to it? There is beauty to be seen in everything, especially in bringing a new life into this world. And sometimes you just need to get over the every day mundane blah of the end of pregnancy with a little self-love for what you're cookin'. So yesterday I spent some time with my camera and my "fitty." (Pause for another contraction...) After I took the first shot you see above in an attempt to get a real picture of me at the end of this pregnancy, I had to find some beauty in what I KNOW is beautiful - not necessarily the honest, tired portrait of me, but the reality of what my body has been working on for the last 9 months. And these are the shots that me and my 50 mil came up with. I love them.

I love the lighting.



I love the focus.

I love my stomach.

Not necessarily for the old stretch marks from three previous pregnancies, or the visual effect of the network of veins, like the roots of a tree, sprawling all over, but for what those landmarks signify and what they are doing for my fourth little bundle of perfection. I love the artistic interpretation of honesty. The honesty of life is beauty if you know how to look at it and where your focus should lie. So I'm going to go put in a load of laundry so I can labor in my one pair of yoga pants, knock that nasty cob web out of the corner above the computer that I just noticed, put on a cup of chamomile tea and drink it out of my favorite tea cup. It's simple, white, with the word "Enjoy" raised on it's side. It helps keep my frame of mind on the here and now, helps me enjoy frustration, tiredness, and unknowns. It helps me remember my artist brain, which sometimes gets lost in the day to day. And that, honestly, is beautiful.

Photoshoot, Take Four

This will be the last of my photo shoot posts. After the shoot in my last post for my friend Judy, I made a stop home to nurse my littlest and ran back out to meet my friend Crysta and her family. I have to admit I was a little nervous about this one. I had never tried to photograph a family as large as hers before. There are 8 in her family (although the oldest couldn't make it), nine if you include our best doggy buddy Luci who we dog sit when Crysta is away. But in the end I got a couple of good family shots and learned something new. I have a new favorite subject to photograph, and it's the male gender! Who'da thunk it. I have taken lots of photos of women and children, and it's usually quite easy, because they are emotional beings who wear there hearts on there sleeve. Not so with the gentlemen. So it is ever so gratifying to nab a shot of a man, be he grown or adolescent, that shows his true spirit, some raw emotion, because they hide that so well. But in a photograph there soul shows through more blatantly than I would have expected, and I love it. Oh, and a disclaimer: I edit my photos, usually having a natural coloration, a more antique coloration, and a black and white for each picture. Adam does NOT like the antique, he says it just looks like it was improperly exposed and it is washed out. I love it, I think it adds so much depth and character to the photo. I just didn't want anyone to think that I just took the picture wrong :-). Oh, and this post has a ton of pictures, because I wanted to include individual pics of everyone. All of the photos are on my Flickr site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/naturemama/sets/72157609841407645/

Photoshoot, Take Three

Okay, now for the third installment of my recent photo shoots. These were taken on Sunday the 26th of October. I ran down to my friend Judy's to do some photos of her and her family. I am having such a hard time chosing a small number of photos to put in these posts! There are just so many I love of each family, but here are my favorites of Wayne, Judy, Regan and Aidan!

There simply are way too many good ones! I'll stop adding here, but if you would like to see the full set, just check out my flickr site set of the entire photo shoot: http://www.flickr.com/photos/naturemama/sets/72157608760566975/. I should have done the same with yesterdays, so here is a link to Shayla's family photos, also: http://www.flickr.com/photos/naturemama/sets/72157609159096716/. Tomorrow we'll tackle the Bourdon family photos!

Photoshoot, Take Two

My good friend Shayla wanted some family pics for her Christmas cards this year, but she just wanted to be able to have them on disc to print herself. Enter me and my Canon Rebel XTi! I took tons of shots of her and her family, put them directly on to her computer, and gave her a copyright release form. It felt good to take tons of pictures of her family and provide her with all of those pictures - no set number, no set package, no set number of poses (my least favorite part about professional photographers). The following weekend I did the same for two other friends, and I am considering making it a business next summer... We'll see what happens. I love taking pictures of people, especially when I can capture the essence of a person in a photograph. So here are some of my favorite pictures from my photoshoot with David, Shayla, Briella and Jenna.

Photoshoot, Take One

This begins the first of my posts featuring my latest photo shoots. I will start with the photos I took of Baylee, the little girl I babysit, for her 2nd birthday. I took a couple of hours when she was here one day to take her outside and snap, oh, about one hundred pictures of her as a surprise for her mama, Christie. I can't believe she's two, and I wanted to commemorate that for Christie with some good pictures. We really had tons of fun, and I wanted to share some of them with you all. I have three other recent photo shoots that I will post next, if I can manage to chose favorite photos to post - I love them all! But I should have time to get to that now, since Dear Husband has stepped out of management (YEAH!) and is home for more than 12 waking hours a week now! I can't even begin to put our enthusiasm into words here. It is so nice to have him back, here to spend time with us for more than just that one day a week. Max hasn't let him out of sight or touch the last two mornings that he has been home, and of course Bella and Kane are making up for lost time. And I have been CLEANING, because I can without interuption! So, here are those pictures I promised before going off on that tangent, and I should have more up within the next couple of days, because I'll have time to with ADAM HOME!

Headshots!

After Bella's birthday bash, I took advantage of the soft evening light and took headshots for my brother-in-law, Lucian, and his girl, Stephanie. They are both attending Wright State University for acting and needed updated headshots. It was very refreshing to get out there and use my camera and my skill for someone other than my kids. And Stephanie was the first person I ever photographed whom I didn't really know. So I thought I would share with you some of my favorite shots. I'm still playing around with some, using my software to sharpen them up. I may come back later with some in black and white and other such alterations. For now, I just wanted to share with you my first experience taking headshots! Hopefully not my last. It was fun learning beforehand what is required for headshots, and playing around with angles, background and lighting. Of course, as always, having good subjects makes a huge difference! Thank you, Lucian and Stephanie, for letting me take your photos. You made my "job" easy!