Six Month Balancing Act

A couple of weeks ago my niece asked me to take six-month photos of her son - my great nephew.  And the question is, what do you do with a six-month old boy who wears 12 months clothing but still can't sit up on his own.

The answer is, you play a balancing act and hope he doesn't fall on his face.

And sometimes, it just doesn't work.

Bradley/LeMmon Wedding

A few weeks back, I volunteered to help my nephew with some shots at his wedding and somewhere in the process their regularly scheduled photographer couldn't make it so on the fly, I ended up shooting their whole wedding.  Still not totally sure how that happened but that's not the point.  As some of you know, weddings are not my thing.  I don't even like going to them, let alone shooting them.  There's just something about the stress and the drama that just makes me want to curl up in the fetal position and cry - so much so that I've already decided that if I ever get married, I'm eloping in Vegas and Elvis is walking me down the isle (don't actually hold me to that, but don't be surprised either).


In the two hours we were at the Bountiful Temple between the luncheon and the reception, we were rained on, snowed on, slushed on, sleeted on and hailed on.  Then about fifteen minutes before we had to leave for the reception, then sun came out.  Go figure.  Anyway, here are some of my favorite shots, including the iffy lighting, gray skies, and the wet hair.

iheartfaces: Blue

This weeks assignment was Blue. Just blue. I thought and I dug and I came up with a whole list of images that could work - but we're only allowed to enter one so I picked this one:



This was taken at a pier somewhere in Oregon (Newport, I think) when my nephew and I were on a bit of a road trip up there. I love the bright blue water and the blue sails and how the white boats pop against the deeper colors.

whew, I'm glad that decisions done.

Blue Decisions

The blog iheartfaces does a competition every week which I've entered once or twice via blog and flickr. But I haven't really bothered with it lately. But since I haven't posted in a while I thought I'd jump on it this week. The theme is Blue. Nothing more, nothing less. Just Blue. And being a bit lazy, I dug through my archives rather then actually taking out my camera (bad, I know - but that would have required me to put on pants). I suck at making decisions but you're only allowed to enter one photo. So here's my solution. One post showing all of the pics I could have used, and then a second post with the one that I did pick. So basically you get one post for the price of two . . wait . . that's not right. And since they're from my archives, most of you have already you will have already seen most of them. Deal.

I really wish I had time to take a poll or something on what to post but I don't so I guess I'll just have to figure it out on my own.

PS I've realized that I don't shoot enough blue. Nearly every shot I've found is either a blue sky or blue water. I think it's time to branch out.

Hansen Family

I may have bitten off more than I can chew, considering the size and insanity of my family. I've got a project that I'm working on as a Christmas gift for my family that I really don't know if I'm going to be able to pull off. For it, I need portraits of each and every family. But they're less than enthused about participating. Example: My brother, Casey. After about 5 minutes of shooting, he said, "I'm done." And was just that. So I did some more shots with his girls instead.


Actually, if I'm being totally honest. I took the girls and handed the camera to another one of my nieces, Jourdan and let her do the pictures while I supervised. She's been taking photo classes in her high school and seems to have a really good natural eye.


I also managed to get a couple pictures of another one of my brothers and his new family. Chad and Dianna have just recently gotten married and have eight children between them. They live in Missouri and unfortunately, were only able to get Dianna's three youngest girls here. So I did what I could.



And somewhere in there . . I managed this one:


And that about threw me over the edge.

Beutler Families

When I was home last weekend I did some portraits for one of my favorite nieces in the history of EVER. And I'm not just saying that because we share DNA and have very similar personalities. She's just that cool. Ask anyone. She wanted pictures of her with the hubby and his brother an wife. Plus the dogs. Seriously freaking cute.

Anyway, I'm heading to Vegas tomorrow so I don't have time to post tons of pics from their shoot but here's a little teaser for you.

xoxo
Jj





Poor Sammie is getting pretty old and slow. Nic really wanted pics of her with Russ because they're pretty convinced she's not going to last much longer. And I've got to say, I love how this shot shows the love between them.

Home again, home again

jiggity jig

What is that, anyway? And how annoying is it that if you hit enter while you're in the title line, blogger will automatically publish your blog, even though it's totally empty. So for those of you (HA! Like I have any uber quick followers like that) who opened this post and it was totally empty, I sincerely apologize.

Anyway, went home to good ol' Sevier County for the 24th of July celebration and I have all of these thrilling pictures that I would really like to post for ya'll to see but unfortunately, I took them with my SLR so they're in my iMac and I'm currently sitting in Barnes and Noble on my laptop because the power is out at house which means no iMac and no internet. I guess I could bring the iMac down here as it is pretty portable, but I don't think they'd really appreciate it here and they may rethink their free wifi.

I'm all about the url links today. Well, actually, I'm just bored and that takes up a little bit of time. But look on the bright side, you now know what I shoot with, where I'm from, what kinds of computers I own and how I like my eggs . . no, wait . . eh, whatever.

So on Sunday (or was it Monday?!?) I went with multiple family members up to the "Elsinore Lookout Point". But don't tell ANYONE! It's a slightly illegal trail/road that a certain family member (who shall remain nameless) made on what I believe is probably BLM property. Well, you can tell people the point exists . . just don't tell them how you found out about it. It can be our little secret. Anyway, along the ride I did take a few shots with my digi point and shoot which I've got on my laptop so that's all you get for now.

Lauren, Kendyl and Kendal (aka Dad) getting ready to make the BUMPY trip

Chuck the Wonder Dog LOVES a good ride in the Ranger

Does this look like a road to you? Just wondering if I'm the only one that's a little skeptical.

And that ends the photo portion of our presentation for today. Maybe one day, when the power is back on, I'll publish the photos I actually took FROM the point. Consider this the most nail biting cliff hanger of all time.

But wait . . there's more! (I should be the next Billy Mays! Picture a thumbs up, here) Until next time, ponder this . . .

For some unknown reason, Chuck the Wonder Dog took to hanging out/sleeping under my mom's kitchen table while we were home. No idea what's up with that.