day 48/365: what happens when you forget about plants and leave them on your deck all winter.

my new sample coffee table book arrived today and it’s awesome…so much cooler than the last one. i wanted to take photographs of it for the blog, but it arrived a little late and i wanted to use natural light to photograph it, so it’ll have to wait til tomorrow. can’t wait for the new sample album to arrive in a few weeks (hopefully less!)!

sat on the deck this evening and talked to my dad. snapped some photos of a plant sticking it out in a shell of its former ceramic pot home. last year i planted a large flowering plant in this awesome green pot in the middle of the deck. it was supposedly the hardiest plant ever and could survive anything. i specifically chose it for these qualities because everyone who knows me knows that i can’t take care of plants to save my life.

so it did awesome in the summer and into the fall and winter, but, of course, i completely forgot that it was out there for the entire winter. so add snow, freeze it, thaw it, then repeat the process like twelve more times and you end up with a few cracked pots and little ceramic chips all over your deck. it looks like i went out there with a sledgehammer and smashed all of our pots to pieces during a particularly frustrating episode of lost.

it still remains to be seen whether or not the plant will come back in the summer, but it actually seems to be in good shape. i’ll know that our relationship was meant to be if it returns…because geez, i cannot be trusted to take care of plants.

potted plant

why 365?

day 6/365

this bucket of “tools” used to make  impenetrable sand castle forts and moats has sat neglected on our deck since august. occasionally we’ll have a bout of wind which blows a plastic shovel or two around or scatters some small plastic blocks into the neighbors’ yards. but besides gathering said “tools” from around the neighborhood, the bucket has large sat untouched. when it started to rain regularly from january on, the bucket filled up with water and inevitably froze within the past couple weeks.

now the bucket and award-winning-moat-building materials are frozen together…sitting on our deck and patiently waiting for summer to arrive so geoff can build another mellon arena out of sand.

icebucket 004 icebucket 003 icebucket 006

*tip: if you squint really hard and look west, sometimes it looks like summer’s already here.

why 365?

the opposite of listless.

wedding-sale

former teachers keep all their stuff…especially magnetic letters.

just a reminder of the few of the our sales going on:

– brides who contact me before august 15th are eligable for a $500 wedding package that includes all day coverage and all edited images on a high-resolution cd.

– all wedding and portrait packages are 10% off when you book before december 31, 2009, no matter the date you’re booking for.

in other news, i’m a little overbooked. :) not a lot! just a little. i’m going out of town this weekend which eats up a lot of my time, but i’ve never been to busch gardens so time will just have to wait. i have four shoots happening alone in the weekend after. i’m also doing some commercial and event photography on the side (in addition to portraits and weddings). crazy! lots of fun, though. part of the reason i love this job is that i get to meet all sorts of people in all sorts of places doing all sorts of stuff.

oh and speaking of shoots coming up, i am incredibly desperate to find a vintage suitcase. a client suggested it and i love the idea. i’ve been scouring the area thrift stores for the perfect one… i’m still looking if anyone has suggestions! i’d like it to be a hard case and preferably a bright color, a burnt orange, or a weird green (like a dark chartreuse color).

so i have a lot going on in photography land and in personal land (update: the kittens feel better and are 100% okay now after their vaccine struggle). and i am a person of lists in order to keep track of all of it. i make lists everywhere:

-on the fridge

-on the dry erase board in my office

-on the dry erase board in the fridge

-on my wall calendar

-on my desk calendar

-in my planner

-on my phone

-on pieces of paper hung up with magnets and clothespins in various locations throughout the house

i write lists. i cross things out. i highlight things i’ve completed. since i have so many lists in so many locations about so many different things, a lot of the subjects and items on the lists overlap. i can see at least 4 lists pertaining to my photography in my sight at this very moment. it’s a little overwhelming… especially since i probably wrote down the same thing in 3 different places, so it looks like i have a lot more to do than i actually have to accomplish. however! it is a great, great feeling to highlight things off the list. very therapeutic. sometimes there’s even a brief five minutes when you consolidate all of the lists and realize that you’ve done all of them! (note: this hardly ever happens).

most of the time i find myself highlighting items like i’ve done them but i actually just moving them further down the calendar. there’s a lot to do… and to sum up my life right now in photographs, there is too much of this:

lists

lists everywhere!

and not nearly enough of the following things:

sleep

sleep: specifically sleeping in your awesome sleep mask that you know kanye west would totally approve of.

028

and time: seriously. where does it go. i’m beginning to suspect my eco drive watch is not only running on solar power but also every second i spend on facebook.

and although i can tell you that i have been busy, i can also tell you that i’d be getting a lot more done if it would stop raining. really. i don’t remember it being this soggy last year, but this it’s been raining for over a month straight now every day and it’s messing with my allergies and my will to get anything accomplished. i am actually beginning to wonder if my first chance to see the sun will be when i go home to pittsburgh for my mum’s birthday in september. there is really something wrong with this picture if i am looking to pittsburgh to provide me with sunny weather. happy fun sunny awesome raleigh where are you? because all i see out my deck right now are mild doom clouds, a drowning plant, and depressed deck furniture that would like to be used:

blah

:(