Look Away

Morning Light

Hey have you guys ever been out of the house early in the morning? It's actually quite beautiful. I typically do not join the living until that beautiful early morning light is long gone. However, I have just discovered this thing people call "morning" and...I think I like it.

Yesterday I dropped John off at school at 6:30 am and drove around scouting out possible locations for some upcoming shoots. I had some spots in mind and I wanted to see them when the lighting is best. Typically I like to shoot a couple of hours before sunset, so the equivalent to that would be a couple of hours after sunrise in the morning. I was a little early, but that's ok.

It was such a beautiful morning. The sun was shining! The weather was warm! I had coffee! And my camera!

Here are a few of my faves.

Check out my Shutter Sisters post tomorrow to see one more photo from this outing. It's weird.

My mug

When I was in Peoria last month I went to one of those paint-your-own pottery places with my friends. I had never been to one before but it was fun! I made an argyle coffee mug.

I'm drinking my coffee out of it right now. Thank you Amy for mailing it to me!

GRP

This is our Guest Room Penguin. He watches over our guests.

 

tiny plant

This plant is about 2 inches across and has been this size for over a year. My dad gave it to me and I have since almost killed it, recently brought it back to life, and am now determined to make it grow.

making an appearance

Oh hey there. Nice to see you again.

Ahem.

So, John and I went on a little walk/hike last weekend at Schramm Park. Here are a few pictures from our time there.

Love this last one. I might need to frame it.

 

Cave

I don't even have a photo to add to this post because I haven't picked up my camera (for personal photos) in weeks. It's not that I don't want to, but life has been getting in the way. Last week was a really crappy week, so if you have e-mailed or called me recently and not heard back, that's why. I've been hiding in my cave trying to deal with the stresses of boring adult stuff(both cars breaking at the same time, meeting with an accountant to do taxes, doctors appointments, bills). On top of the stressful boring stuff, I am also extremely busy with some stressful FUN stuff. I'm going to have a Paige B. Photography booth at the upcoming Women's Living Expo here in Omaha. The expo is this weekend, and I am running around like a mad woman trying to get everything ready. And while it is stressful and scary, it is also fun because it's MINE. And I get to make it look however I want. Unfortunately, this is the part that also makes it stressful because I want it to be perfect and reflect my style. It's like planning a small wedding.

So yeah, I might start crawling out of my cave next week. And then I'll start returning phone calls/emails and taking picture/blogging. Until then, I've got 4 Million things on my To Do list. Bye!

How to have a good birthday

1) Listen to good music while you drive home from a photo session

2) Stop and get a mocha frappucino. Use a gift card to pay for it.

3) Sunny skies

4) Go shopping

5) Get some birthday texts

6) Go to a cute Italian restaurant with your husband and find out they have happy hour half price bottles of wine and half price appetizers. Sit at the bar and talk, eat and drink wine.

7) Go home and open gifts and cards

8) Eat a dessert that someone else made for you

9) Watch American Idol

10) Go to bed with a laptop and surf the web

Recap

Well I made a solo trip to Peoria last week to visit my family and friends. Two days before I left for Peoria my new Canon point and shoot camera arrived. Ours had been broken for about a year and I was really missing the portability of a little camera. So all of these were taken with the p&s.

Out with my girls:
 

Hanging out with my grandparents

My dad's cat Lucy

Using the timer

Driving back to Omaha:

Grandma sent me off with homemade chocolate chip cookies

Pulling off for gas in Dexter, Iowa

That's all for now! I'm excited to have a lightweight, tiny camera again.

Newspaper Art

For Valentine's Day I wanted to get John a Sunday newspaper subscription. We haven't gotten the paper since we've lived in the new house and I thought it would be nice for us to just hang out on Sunday morning, reading the paper and drinking coffee. But I didn't think that handing him a rolled up newspaper was very romantic so I created a piece of art for him that was representative of his gift.

I just used a piece of thin plywood and painted it white. Then I glued on the newspaper parts and painted the shading and details over top.

(remember you can always click on the image to view it larger)

I forgot to take a close-up picture of the bottom right. But I cut out individual letters from the paper to spell out "love, paige". And right below that is the date that I created it (February 13th, 2009) taken right from the top of the paper.

Here's a close-up of the rolled up paper

I looked for an article that had a "fine art" theme as opposed to something depressing about the economy or a robbery. This one happened to be about a musical in Omaha called "Swing Swing". I just picked words that I liked and put them on randomly.

This took me about 2.5-3 hours. If I had more time I probably would have added more detail. But it got my point across and John likes it : )

woodland creatures

Last month when I was trying to do more creative things everyday I created a set of three collages. I'm not sure where I got the idea to use magazine pages or why I chose these animals. But it was fun and I think they turned out pretty cute.

I began by buying three 8x10 canvases and then painted them green. Then I sketched out the animals and decided on the color scheme for each animal. Over the next couple of days I cut out the colors I needed from various magazines. I was looking for certain colors, but I also wanted interesting textures. I organized them in labeled envelopes (orange, brown, gray, etc) as I cut them out. From there I was ready to actually create the final product by cutting out the shapes and attaching them using Mod Podge glue and a sponge brush. When I was done I put a coat of glue over top to seal it.