Christmas Happenings

Well, we're back from Christmas "vacation" without the kids. First we went to my sweet mother-in-laws house and spent some time with her adorable foster children. It is never boring there. She has 3 teenage boys and 2 little girls, 3 and 6. I had taken all of their pictures at Thanksgiving and was able to bring the prints at Chritsmas. They turned out really well:



So we stayed six days with Chuck's mom and family. During that time we did some shopping, played video games, broke up fights among the little kids, held Gracie almost non-stop (she decided to be a Momma's girl this week and demanded to be held). When I could break free from Gracie we did some baking on Christmas Eve and helped the kids decorate gingerbread cookies. Christmas morning we let the kids open their presents and that evening when Chucks brothers showed up with their families we opened even more gifts. Unfortunately, Jonathan's sleeping pattterns got so out of whack that he was an absolute terror that night - a real brat when it was time to open presents. And Gracie was sleepy too. Poor thing - she is so snotty lately that she cant sleep!




For Christmas I took pictures of all of the grandchildren for my mother-in-law, at the request of the sister in laws. We presented these to her Christmas night:


She seemed very happy with them. The next morning I rearranged all of the pictures on her wall - something she just never has the time to do - go figure! Then, we were off to Oklahoma for Christmas with my family.
My sister Tina had Christmas at her place this year. She had it decorated so beautifully! And she prepared the dinner and had it set out so neatly. She is starting a small catering business - so it was so professional. Santa (Uncle Dan) also showed up and gave the small kids gifts - it was wonderful.






We spent Saturday with my folks (my sister left for Hawaii that morning!). Then this morning we got up and left the kids behind for an exciting week with Granny and PawPaw - the babysitter has this week off and we both have to work, so they were kind enough to offer their time and home to our poor children! Next Christmas I will be sure to coordinate with the babysitter before putting in for leave (which by the way has to be done in August!)
So now we are home and setting up Guitar Hero - we splurged on the way home after having played it all Christmas at each relative's house (besides my parents). Sorry, George's father-in-law, but we returned the Tony Hawk game that you got Chuck to put towards the Guitar Hero.
Other things on the agenda for the week: Read a book at Barnes and Noble while drinking a Mocha - I saw a friend post that as one of her favorite things to do sometime back and have soooo wanted to try it, and now have the opportunity - I know, big whoop - but when you have two small kids its such a treat! Also, I plan to scrapbook - I can spread everything out on the dining room table without concern that Gracie will eat it. I'm going to clean and organize - sure...we'll see what happens.


Hope you had a merry Christmas!

Getting better, maybe?

So, I've had the opportunity to take baby pictures lately! It was fun - and they turned out really well. One is my niece, Lily, and is the other is a client. I really like doing these baby pics - maybe this will become my specialty - baby pics and senior pics. My next venture, if my friend is still willing to be my subject...maternity.

More photo news

So...I got two photo orders today. One from Red dress's aunt in Pennsylvania, and another from her family. Woohooo! Now I have a lot of work to do to get it ready. Then, this week I am going home for Thanksgiving. I'll be busy there too though doing some more senior pics for my niece (she is my willing guinea pig) and some pics for the kids on the other side of the family: semi-posable kids!- Not that I particularly like posed pictures - but at least they wont be running wild like my kiddos, and a three month old niece - which means possible sleeping baby pics :)
Fun fun fun!!!

Happy happy!!

Well, on the one hand happy. On the other hand I am at home right now because Jonathan came home sick from daycare - diarrhea and feeling bad :(
But, I was really really happy yesterday because the parents of the girl whose senior portraits I did that I blogged about (complained about) finally called! They said they were sorry for not getting back to me before, but they have been having trouble picking which pictures they want - with talking to family members to see which they want, etc. They actually are planning to buy one of my packages plus the CD!!!!! I am so happy. As you may have read in my previous post, I was really bummed about not hearing from these people for over 3 weeks. I thought they must have not liked the pics and went with someone else, since my rule is if you don't buy anything you don't pay anything (no sitting or session fee). But the mom said they really liked them all and were just having such a hard time picking which ones they wanted and how many of each, etc.
So, there we go. I am a worry wart. I can finally rest easy about this!! And maybe I am becoming a good photographer?

My new toy

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Originally uploaded by Sweet Portrayal

Chuck got me a black backdrop for my b-day. I've been forcing Gracie and Jonathan to model for me : )

Good Business?

So I decided what to do about the red dress girl. I am going to send her an 8x10 of the one of her on the bench and wallets of her in the letter jacket, just so she can see how the pictures will look printed. I will also tell her I can send her a pic for facebook if she friends Sweet Portrayal. At least maybe that will guilt her dad into at least let me know what's going on. Any more suggestions? This is so much harder than just taking good pics...(not that that is incredibly easy)

Me and my insecurity

Click on the one above, it looks really nice full-screen.



There are a lot of things that I could write about now, but I am going to write about the most selfish and conceited one.
So I did this senior photo shoot almost 3 weekends ago. I thought that the pictures turned out really nice. Of course, they could have been better, I suppose, but to me they were definitely worth the price. As soon as I posted them to my website, the parents seemed very pleased. They wrote, "there are too many wonderful pictures to choose from." Then that was the last I heard from them! I emailed the father (the one who contacted me in the first place to do the pics) twice now and he hasn't written me back. Monday, I resorted to calling, just to see if they wanted any special effects or anything (like darkened borders or something) - at least that was my cover. I wanted to know - were they really not pleased - did they go somewhere else? I still haven't heard anything back from them. Usually people email me after the session quite a bit. And they always respond to my emails - I'm really worried. On the other hand, their online viewing doesn't end until December 17th, so maybe they are just procrastinating - too busy to write back.
I feel like a single person again, waiting by the phone or something. I know I'm obsessing, but this is important to me.
Let me know what you think. I posted a few of the pics to the blog, and you can see the rest at www.sweetportrayal.com, then online proofing and "Jennifer." The password is "senior".

Yay Fall, and yay Gracie!

Thursday was Gracie's first birthday!! I got some cute pictures to commemorate:





On my wonderful Wednesday, I took the kids to Creve Coeur Lake. I pushed Gracie in the stroller as Jonathan rode his bike. Speaking of wonderful Wednesdays, I have begun to consider going back to full time. After all deductions, paying babysitter, etc, we would be netting another $500 per month. We could really use it, but we can live with what we're making now...tightly. Is it worth it?? I am going to poll the audience - look in the sidebar and vote, please...I need some guidance.




In other news, I received my first paid photo order this week. It may be the last for awhile since it is getting cold outside and I'm an outdoor only photographer for now. I did book a session this week for the end of November. Then I realized I would be out of town for Thanksgiving, so I'm going to have to reschedule.
Oh, I almost forgot! Gracie is now a walker!!! She has been stumbling around for awhile, but on her birthday she really started walking on her own! Yea, Gracie!!!

If you go to www.sweetportrayal you will see why I haven't written on my blog in forever. I have been kind of busy with trying to start my "business." I know - it's like the worst time to try to create a small business. The good thing is that the start-up costs are low. The hard part has been trying to find clients. I dont like talking about it at work - a select few know about it. I don't go to a large church, and I really dont want to make an issue out of it there. And other than those two places I really dont get out much! So, I'm having to rely on referrals. I got my first few free clients from craigslist and have one appt booked for an actual paying client who is a relative of one of my free clients. I have another free session this weekend, and she is going to have me do a paying session for her cousins in November. So...if I build it they will come...right? Here are some of the family pictues I took:



You can see more at my website.
In other news...Gracie has built up to fours steps in a row. She climbs the many stairs in our townhouse at lightning speed. She is a very good dancer as well. She stands in one spot with her hands on her hips sometimes and moves her hips from side to side - very cute! Jonathan is fully potty trained! I gave him a haircut yesterday and he is looking good! Chuck is in his surgery rotation and he really likes it - learning a lot of various stuff unrelated to feet. I, as I have said, have been really busy with Sweet Portrayal, however I have been keeping up with my Step aerobics class! Chuck took some pictures of my Monday (Columbus day) for my website. I am finally back to the weight I was before I had Jonathan - hooray! And my legs are more toned than I think they have ever been in my entire life. I'll post some pics.

New pics!

You know how I put the ad on Craigslist for free senior pictures? Well, I've had several people contact me about this and actually had a photo session Saturday morning. I couldn't have asked for a better model! This girl was beautiful and really knew how to pose. She was one of those people that looks really good when she doesn't smile. I have to admit, I was pretty nervous about doing the session beforehand. But I think the pictures turned out really nice - I was very very pleased. I did some more reading up and fiddling with my camera after I took my niece's pictures and it really seemed to pay off. So, just click on my flickr box to the right to see the new pics...they are in the Seniors batch mixed with my niece's. Let me know what you think of them...I really appreciate comments in flickr!

My website

Well, it's not great, but I'm ready to show my new website, www.sweetportrayal.com. It's for my photography "business." If you look at it, please ignore all the ads, and focus on my site - it costs too much for now to go ad-free.
Now, don't think I see myself as a professional because of this. I really just created the site so that I could use it to find some subjects to practice on. Since we dont't have many friends here, and no family members here, willing subjects are hard to find. So I posted an ad for free senior pictures on Craigslist. But of course, you can't post an ad asking people to let you take pictures of them without letting them see that you're not totally untalented...although I have seen some people post their "portfolio's" and they look like something I took when I was a kid. It's like they say, "better to stay quiet and let people wonder if you're an idiot than to open your mouth and remove all doubt"(or something like that). I just hope that people that tell me my pictures look good are telling me the truth, because somebody had to have told the other people that posted their portfolios that they looked good too. Well, I have to learn somehow...and I havent had any luck finding a good course yet, so I guess for now I will just be reading and practicing as much as I can.

Gracie pictures

 
This one's cute too! I know, they're basically the same.