Posted on May 9, 2010
Today is Mothers-day back home. We were invited to be at Bianca’s school for pedicures and snacks. It was a lovely little “party” and they sang us a love song, gave us paper flowers and bracelets.
Afterward we headed to the shops to gear up for Bianca’s birthday party tomorrow. I took some pictures I wanted to share on this day and hope to share maybe this evening. But first there is a hundred things to do. Including a private newborn session this evening.
Although I share most of my sessions on the blog I sometimes have private sessions where a family would rather keep their session private for whatever reason. That is completely doable and I am quite used to it.
So happy Mothers’ day to everyone. Hope you got spoiled rotten!
Posted on March 8, 2010
I asked Bianca some questions to see what she is all about. Pretty boring answers but here goes:
- Q: How many brothers and sisters do you have A: 3 brothers and 1 sister
- Q: What is your favourite thing to do? A: Building blocks (I assume playing with them, maybe because she does this with her sister)
- Q: What is your favourite food? A: chocolate (no shocker)
- Q: What is your favourite book? A: Princess book
- Q: What is your favourite song? A:Oh Canada (the anthem, who would have thought?)
- Q: What do you want to be when you grow up? A: A dinaosaur (t-rex) and an astronaut (that should be interesting)
- Q: How many kids do you want when you get married? A: 7 (Oh boy, what are we in for?)
- Q: What is your favourite thing about mom? A: She’s nice
- Q: What is your favourite thing about dad? A: He’s funny
- Q: What is your favourite thing about yourself? A: being good (hmmm must remind her of this one more often)
And by her request we added another Question:
What is your favourite colour? A: No shocker, its pink!
Posted on February 14, 2010
It’s that time of the year again where we get to be as quirky and gushy and sweet as we want to. All hearts and flowers and pinks and reds. I made these for the girls to hand out. For the 4year olds we have been punching holes in the corner and stringing ribbon through to make a necklase. They are so proud of their little cards!
Enjoy your valentine’s day!
Posted on February 8, 2010
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My poor little one had a terrible week last week. Doctors told us it was a heavy allergic reaction, we still believe it was a virus. What ever it was it covered her little body in rashes. But luckily its gone now and hopefully the little scars will also disappear soon. She is much better and I couldnt help taking some snaps today. I wish I had planned it out more as these are just snaps. Maybe next week I could do a more planned out shoot with her.
Posted on January 17, 2010
This week’s post about something I have a special place in my heart for, is:
Posted on January 4, 2010
Not many words today, just sharing some personal pictures while playing with my new background paper. Today is Bianca’s first ballet class after being away far too long from it.
“Hi mommy, I wanna pretend I am not even here, or you are not even here”
“And what will you be doing in your imagination then?”
“I think I am flying away”
“and I think I am sitting in Grandma’s arms and she is telling me a story”
Posted on December 30, 2009
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I am going to try to show you on Wednesdays that snapshots can be super special as well. While on vacation I relaxed and took a ton of snaps. My personal little project was to take “memories” and about 7 great shots that I want to turn into a 7 canvas display in our hallway. Often times one tend to either want to take perfect pics and thereby stressing too much or only snaps, but there is a midway. Enjoy the picture taking process and capture those little beauties in our children!
Here is one of Erika. She is such a friendly little thing yet she is inquisitive and serious and usually in photographs only the serious face shows. Why I love this picture is that its the serious face but you can see the intent and somehow she looks serene as well.
She was sitting with her Grandma while having a coffee at a play area in South Africa. I love her eyelashes and so I took out the camera and was taking some detail pictures of her trying to capture the lashes. I zoomed out to capture her when she became so intent, trying to put a straw back into a juice bottle or something like that (exactly what escapes me now). I think this will be one of the small square canvases that makes it to my canvas display!
Posted on November 19, 2009
Well, it’s been a rush but everyone has their galleries (except one newborn that I said I’ll do in the new year), everyone’s orders so far have been done.
We are off to South Africa in about 90 minutes. Well, that’s to say the Limo service is picking us up at 7pm. I am quite excited to visit my parents again. They adore the children and the children adore them.
I have no idea how much I will be able to be on-line since things work a bit differently in South Africa. There is still one collage to make, and I’ll be waiting for any orders up to 24/5 Nov. Then after that we are off to Jeffrey’s bay. Well known for their surfing.
So watch out I might just come and post some surfing photos, that’s if they surf close enough to shore:)
If I don’t manage to check in before then, very Merry Christmas to everyone!
Posted on October 29, 2009
Time for a little personal post. Today was the first after school activity day and Bianca did football. She loved it. Only girl between all the boys. They ran and kicked balls and she even scored a goal.It was pretty hot though, have to remember to stock up on sunscreen and water for next time.
I got some action shots. These are only snap shots, and I cropped out all the others trying to catch her so the quality is not perfect:
Posted on October 17, 2009
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I ordered a new product about a week ago and it arrived this morning. I am very satisfied. So much so that I think its my favorite mount product now. It’s a step above the regular mounting of prints since it adds dimension to the mount. A shadow mount is a print on lustre paper, mounted to styrene, in turn mounted onto a wooden frame. The dark wood frame is about 1.5 inches thick and therefore the picture really makes a statement. Really lovely.
I chose 2 pictures of Bianca in 11 inches by 14 inches to mount and hung them below each other. Perfect effect, precisely what I wanted.
And from the side:
Posted on October 7, 2009
Seeing that it’s the calm before the storm (since I am fully booked from the 10th) I thought I will update my personal photos a bit. It was fair that I get some of my second daughter since Bianca got her turn yesterday.
Here is little miss opinionated, telling me some kind of interesting story that unfortunately I haven’t been able to unravel. She is walking so good now and loves wearing her little shoes. She kind of stomps around (I think so she could hear them go clunk clunk on the floor).
Posted on October 5, 2009
I had to share these, we took advantage of a beautiful location when I went over to a look at the light in a client’s house. Now I know what beautiful pictures we will get of her girls too!
Bianca is getting too big too soon. I love the second shot of her since we have one where she sits exactly like this when she is about 20 months old, in Dubai in a park, she just had a red hat on. Great comparison shot!
Posted on September 29, 2009
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This morning I got to sleep late as Bianca is off school (teacher’s and parents’ meetings today and tomorrow). When I eventually made my appearance both girls were dressed in pretty dresses, hair lovely. Gorgeous.
So what does a mother do? Horded them into the studio for some pictures:) Erika was not completely happy, but it truely was a momentous occasion since I have no pictures of them properly together.
I have been waiting for this forever and now have my picture for my next 16″ by 20″ canvas. Going to order tomorrow! Here is the result:
Posted on September 27, 2009
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I’m posting now since tomorrow will be full day. An ordering session in the morning, Bianca’s ballet in the afternoon and in between all that its Erika’s first birthday. We have already had the party but she still needs extra special attention.
Where has the year gone? How is it possible that my little girl is already one? She’s my last baby so its bittersweet. She’s walking comfortably now, and she is just so cute and always friendly its truely been a blessing to have her in our lives.
The funniest thing she does at the moment is going crazy when Teletubbies comes on the video. We have only introduced her to them during the long week end and already she goes crazy when the 4 chubby tubbies say “E-o”. Her favorite is the baby sun. Its a good thing I saved al 4 the stuffed toy tubbies from Bianca, as they will surely become her best friends.
Here is a little collage/storyboard I made of her party. (for fellow photogs – most of these were taken at ISO 5000! The 5D II surely handles noise so well)
Posted on September 1, 2009
So often an event occurs that you just have to capture. Usually snapshots will be the way to go, as you cannot always focus on perfect composition or see to perfect settings of apertures/ ISO’s and shutterspeeds when your little one goes to big school for the first time, for example. These are the times I take snapshots, I am even relaxed enough to take the camera off full manual and move to Tv setting.
Using the Tv setting one sets the shutterspeed (stay above 1/125 for children) and put the Iso on auto. The camera will then automatically change the Iso and aperture to try to get to the best exposure. You don’t have as much control as before and your pictures as a result might not be as perfect, but for those snapshots occasion its far better than trying to struggle with manual settings and then missing a special moment, or worse, having a crying child to attend to.
When you do have those snapshots and want to do something different with them, I’ve found collages to be lots of fun. You could even process the pictures differently (here I added a teensy bit of paint effect and used another OTSS action called “a little sweetness”) and combine the pictures together. If they were to go in a home album or journal why not add a banner bar with the title.
One can go so much more elaborate (and all the scrapbooking ladies could make these collages look super, even if its digital and not physical paper) but since it is Bianca’s first day of school after all I don’t want to be late to go pick her up, therefore I only did a quick collage as example.
For photogs: The top left picture was taken at 3200 Iso! Not a perfect shot but I am well impressed with how the Canon 5D Mark II handles noise. Now I don’t have to miss any snapshots because of a lack in lighting (seeing as the 5D does not have a built in flash).
