A Very Festive 65th

(Photography Friday is a weekly post I write for Joanne at Oh Goodie Designs)

  

My mom, Linda, turned 65 earlier this month. Her birthday request was to have a dinner party for her and some of her girlfriends. Specifically, she wanted my sister, Blythe, and I to host and cater a party for her and her girlfriends…. 

Blythe and I had hosted and catered Mom’s 6oth birthday five years ago which was a great success. My sister and I really enjoy cooking and entertaining, but we also know how much work goes into making it perfect! Mom asked then if we could do another dinner party. We requested five years to recuperate. 

We planned the menu from appetizers to desserts and spent all day Saturday cooking and decorating. The food was yummy if I do say so myself: appetizers of hummus and Kalamata olive tapenade, tomato bruschetta with goat cheese, and a yummy brie with orange-fig marmalade, entrees of pork tenderloin and shrimp and orzo pasta, roasted potatoes, asparagus and field green salad, and not one but FOUR desserts! The desserts were the best - Bananas Foster Cheesecake, Crème Brûlée, Lemon-Champagne Bars with Strawberry Brûlée topping, and bright pink Macaroons by ~bonbon~. Fourteen of Mom’s friends came to celebrate. They all had a great time eating, visiting, and laughing. Mom’s guests were very complimentary of everything, and several ladies commented that they felt like they had eaten “out”. Blythe and I even had to politely decline a couple of other catering offers! 

 Serving Mom and her friends was truly a pleasure, but once every 5 years is our limit. We promise – we’ll do it again for 70.

The Digital “Shoe Box”

January 20, 2012

 (You can see my blog post every Friday at www.ohgoodiedesigns.com.  You can also 'Like'  Oh Goodie Designs on Facebook.)

Our family “snapshots” are my favorite photos, and more often than not, they are my favorite photographs to frame and display.  That still leaves me with tons of pictures to use in some way.  Consequently, my external hard drive has become a digital version of the photo “shoe box”.

….Oh, so you have one of those too!!

When I was growing up, I remember the boot boxes under my parents’ bed that held literally decades of photographs!  My sister, Blythe, and I would occasionally peruse through them, talking about the recent pictures, as well as the ones that predated us by 10-20 years, often not sure who was in the pictures.  In our 20’s, Blythe and I embarked on an enormous project as a Mother’s Day gift:  secretly snatch the boxes from under my parents’ bed (with Dad’s blessing), organize the thousands of photos, and put them into albums to give to Mom as a gift.  We managed to pull it off, slipping the pictures into albums in some sort of order that made sense to us.  Mom loved it!!  We filled 5 large albums with photographs!  (Incidentally, as the oldest of 4 children, I had the most pictures by far and filled nearly an entire album!  It was quite and interesting family experiment!!)

Fast forward to the digital age…  Where are all of your family photos??  Are they on tons of CD’s or on your computer’s hard drive?  Do you get them printed and store them in the “shoe box”?  Or are they still on the media card that is STILL in your CAMERA as you read this??  Ummm, I think I might be guilty of all of these…

As I said before, I am a former scrap-book devotee.  I have many albums of my children’s early years, Christmases, school activities.  I cherish these albums, and I hope that my boys will, too, as they grow up.  I might even let them have some of them one day….maybe, if they’re nice to me.

In recent years, I have found it harder to keep up with my “traditional” albums and consequently have turned to “digital” options for my albums.  Making photo books online is quick, easy, user-friendly, affordable, and can be as detailed or simple as you make it.  What I most enjoy about making photo books is that I can make anything from a “Year in the Life” albums for grandparent Christmas gifts to an album of my sons’ favorite art projects.  I also love that they are more the size and thickness of regular books, making them much easier to store and display.  And the CHOICES!! There are multitudes of online photo book companies to choose from!  I have personally used Shutterfly, Picaboo, Mixbook, and Snapfish for our family photos, but there are many, many choices on the web!

My absolute favorite projects are our family vacation albums.  This is a great way to showcase all of your great vacation photos (I always take lots and lots) and is a unique way for your family to reflect on the great memories made on the vacation.  We have albums from beach trips, San Diego, New York City, and Disneyworld to name a few.   I think a vacation album is the best souvenir of all! 

Bottom line:  Do SOMETHING with your pictures!!  Don’t leave them in an actual or digital shoe box.  Start working on that digital album.  I’m starting a new project today!

Ready, Set, Shoot!

January 13, 2012 

(This is my first "Photo Friday" post for www.ohgoodiedesigns.com.  You can see my posts there every week.  I will be sharing tips, ideas, funny stories, and hopefully a little inspiration.)

As the “photojournalist” of my family, I take a lot of pictures.  If you were to ask my 12 and 9 year old sons, they would probably tell you I go a little overboard, and they are probably right.  I can own up to that. 

In all fairness, it’s their fault that I have this obsession … I take all these pictures because of them!

I have been very intent over the years to try and capture as many events in pictures as I can – birthdays, vacations, sporting events, etc., and chronicle them in albums for my family to enjoy for years to come.  I must confess that I’m not as good at the second part and have gotten WAY behind – I’m a former devoted scrap booker who’s quickly becoming a digital photo book maker.  (We’ll save that for a future post.)

Life’s big events are the easy things to photograph.  The times I have to “remind” myself to have my camera ready is for the little moments in our everyday lives.  I want to capture my boys playing with their friends in the back yard or sharing a quiet conversation with a grandparent.  It will be those little things that I will miss the most if I don’t capture them now. 

After the Christmas holidays are over it’s easy to put the camera away until the next event.  Don’t do it!! I keep my camera close by (and sometimes my phone) to catch those unexpected shots.

Keep the camera out and snap away.  I’m not suggesting you have a sit down portrait session nor do you need some huge fancy camera.  Grab what you’ve got and use it to capture the candid moments – the smiles, the silliness, even the tears.  You’ll be so glad you did!

Cousins December 2011

I photographed Parker, Alyssa, Sage and Luke right before Christmas, so that their parents could give Grandma the only thing she really wanted: pictures of her grandchildren!  I think all grandparents want that, right?

 

 

The Cowles Family December 2011

Melissa is one of my coworkers, so I was so excited when she asked me to take their family portraits! Melissa, her husband, Landon, and her adorable kids, Olin and Nora, were so fun to work with.  It was a very chilly day, and they were great sports, as we traipsed up and down Main Street in Boerne!

The Larsen's November 2011

Always fun to work with, Erin and her family wanted a relaxed family session.  They are very involved with soccer, so we had to incorporate a little fun!

Estes Family November 2011

Michelle asked me to do an impromptu "mini" session on a Sunday afternoon.  She wanted 1 pic to use for their Christmas card.  The awesome thing is that their backyard opens up to a park!  So with a short golf cart ride down into the canyon, we were at our location!