My Little Lady

It has been way too long, but if anything was going to get me to find time for a new post it's my sweet daughter. It's Kailyn's 4th Birthday! Every year I put together a collage of how she has changed. For her first birthday I picked a photograph from each month and designed her birthday invitation with them. I still love it and always will. It is one of my favorite keepsakes from her first year.

I had no idea just how much my life would change when I met this little girl, the very first time our eyes met. She has taught me so many things, completely changed my goals and my life in a positive way. I could not imagine where I would be right now, I just know I would not be nearly the same person I am. I will save most of what I have to say about my amazing daughter for her photo album, she is so special that those details are just for her and our family. Although, I will share with you her amazing smile, it's too contagious not too!

This year she seems to have grown up so much and I couldn't wait to get her new collage done to see just how much she has changed. I picked one from when she was born and each birthday including this year.

In the back of my mind I'm already thinking about what she will look like next year and what her collage will look like when she is 10! =) I would appreciate if it would all go just a tad bit slower though!!

Rylie

I love Mommy & Daddy Studios because I get to see the little ones grow up through the years. Rylie is 4 already, he is growing up so fast! It was so much fun to photograph his family and see how much he is changing.

Since I had a chance to snap a few of his family, I though I would post my favorite of little Bella with her mom. She's just so adorable too, I had to share!

Benny & Family | KE365 | Day 117

I had so much fun photographing Benny and his family. Benny is six and he is full of energy. He ran around constantly the whole hour without hardly tiring.

Here he is below, once he had worn himself out a little but as all parents know... it doesn't last long!

Benny found every dead end in the little maze at Cox Arboretum and loved every minute of it. He stopped in one of the dead ends and did his favorite dance with his dad. The shots I really love are always the candid ones, his dad reached out to give Benny a big high five... you can see how proud he is. Definitely one of my favorite shots of the day!

Another candid shot I love...

3 Girls & The Root Beer Stande | KE365 | Day 115

We headed down to our local Root Beer Stande for a nice lunch with my nieces for Day 115. Our family hasn't been there in years and the girls all had a blast for their first time.

Kailyn was being so sweet giving Natalie some hugs, it's really hard work having to find patience to wait for you root beer float!

Both images were shot at f/4.5.

Ursula | KE365 | Day 114

Had so much fun photographing little Ursula again. She is such a happy kid, always smiling and exploring life. Does she have a gorgeous smile or what?

*LOVE* the profile shot of her, she was captivated my the gorgeous river.

The Popcorn Festival | KE365 | Day 110

We enjoyed a day at the festival with family for Day 110. This is my daughter and her cousin walking down Dayton-Xenia Rd. enjoying the Beavercreek Popcorn Festival and each other. They are probably in the middle of singing It's a Hard Knock Life or something similar. =)

Shot at 1/320s, f/5.0, ISO 100

I wanted to capture the big scale of the event but realized I would need a good focus point. Having the girls as my main focus in the foreground gave more perspective to the festival in the background.

Freedom Kids

I would like to start this post by saying Thank You. There were so many individuals and families that stepped forward to make this happen. The idea started only a short time before the Freedom Kids event but as you can probably tell by the turn out that it evolved into something much greater. I set out to photograph some children and design something to say thank you to all the Veterans that have served our country. I decided to use Honor Flight of Dayton as my gateway to finding these Veterans. Honor flight is wonderful, they work on a donation basis and send Veterans to all the memorials in D.C. that were built for them, in honor of their service. Most of these Veterans have never thought of going to the memorials as a possibility, Honor Flight makes it happen for free.

I was so proud to be part of this community of people that stepped forward, these kids were amazing.

Through the whole design process the ideas started to evolve into doing a poster or large print. With large number of kids involved and desiring for each child to get their spot in the final print and also for the fact that a good deal of the Veterans this was intended for are elderly, doing a larger print just made sense.

I don't want to say too much about the designs itself as I don't want to influence anyone on how they might like to vote. I would love to hear any feedback anyone might have or even just a quick comment to add your vote would be great.

You can find the Freedom Kids Designs here. Feel free to post a comment here to let me know which you would like to vote for or just leave a comment in the design gallery.

50% of profits from all Freedom Kids print sales will go to Honor Flight of Dayton through September 27th so make sure to get those orders in before then to help send area Veterans to D.C.

unknown thought KimberlyElaine365 D30

As I'm looking through all my images for D30 I'm realizing that there is definitely a theme going on. I'm seeing my big girl all grown up and looking at the images it made me think of my favorite song, my new favorite song that is.

I really think favorite songs have a lot to do with what state of life you are in. For a long time my song was Rearviewmirror by Pearl Jam. Now for those of you who know this song, I don't relate to it literally however the music is rocking & passionate and being an artist I can easily relate to the lyrics symbolically. I spent most of my teen years and most of my twenties living with this song as my theme.

Then something happened and the way I looked at the world completely changed. Certain things that had held such importance to me for so many years were just not that important any more. These things no longer defined who I was as a person, I define me... not what has happened to me. A tough, and long lesson for me to learn.

My husband and daughter had such a big impact on my life, on the way I think about things and weigh their importance. My new favorite song is powerful and motivational to me, I had to listen to it everyday the final year I worked at my last designer job. Listening to it every morning gave me the will power to show up there, deal with every obstacle that would find it's way into my office, and somehow smile back defiantly at all those... shall we call them "obstacles."

The state of life I'm in now, I appreciate wholeheartedly.

My new favorite song... Unknown Thought: by Pearl Jam (of course ;)

All the thoughts you never see 

You are always thinking 

Brain is wide, the brain is deep

Oh, are you sinking? 

Feel the path of every day 

Which road you taking? 

Breathing hard, making hay 

Yeah, this is living

 Look for love in evidence That you're worth keeping 

Swallowed whole in negatives It's so sad and sickening

Feel the air up above Oh, pool of blue sky 

Fill the air up with love All black with starlight

Feel the sky blanket you 

With gems and rhinestones!!! 

See the path cut by the moon 

For you to walk on...

 

See the waves on distant shores 

Awaiting your arrival 

Dream the dreams of other men 

You'll be no one's rival 

Dream the dreams of others then 

You will be no one's rival...

You will be no one's rival 

A distant time, a distant space 

That's where we're living 

A distant time, a distant place 

So what ya giving? 

What ya giving?

The main reason it made me think of the song when I was looking through Kailyn's images from Day 30 was that she was so deep in thought. I have no way of really knowing what's going on in that brain of hers. So many things to thing about, so many decisions to make in life. Who knows where her path will go but I love watching the journey.

"Freedom" Ideas for 365 project

I've been thinking about some ideas for my 365 project, because with 341 days left- well it is somewhat daunting to imagine that I will have something worthwhile to photograph every single day although I think I have had great luck so far.

Since the 4th of July is coming up here and I have had interest from several mom's about having me photograph their children for the project I was thinking that I would have a childrens shoot at the park. The theme for the challenge that day would be "freedom" in honor of the 4th of July. The only requirement being that I would like to have all the kids that participate where a red, white & blue color scheme. I would love to have at least 10-15 kids but would settle for at least 5 in order to hold the event and will take as many children that would like to participate.

From KE365 Day6 In Memory

The event will cost nothing for the parents to attend and have the children photographed. It will be held at Cox Arboretum in Dayton. I was thinking I would set a time (to be determined very soon- the two days I am deciding upon are July 3rd or 4th) and have everyone meet at Cox to shoot for 1/2 hour approximately. Parents will have the option to purchase the 365 challenge "Freedom" image from the day and any other images that may be taken of the child/children during the shoot. 10% of all proceeds from the event will be given to the Honor Flight Dayton which flies veterans to see the memorial that was built in honor of their service to us and our country.

I would love to hear from you and be sure to let me know how many children and what ages they are if you would like to be included in the event. If you are interested please comment below or feel free to message me on facebook. Once I know for sure I have at least 5 kids interested I will post the official date and time to see how many we can get to participate.

Joy KE365D1 (Day 1 tasra365)

Today will my first day in the tasra365 challenge (http://tasramar.com/join-the-challenge/tasra365-rules/) in which I will take my camera with me, research at least one photographer, and read one page in my camera manual every day for one year.

I was going to start the year long challenge on my birthday May first... but as life would have it, just didn't work out. My family traveled down to Mississippi where my husbands parents were, where my father-in-.law was trying to recover from a serious reaction to,heart medication. Life has thrown many obstacles in our path lately, in fact this whole year. Somehow we always make the best of it, the most, and always make it through. My daughter Kailyn brings our family strength, love and pure joy. Children have this way of distracting you from the negative by bringing you so many positives, by bringing you joy. They don't even have to try, it's just natural and it's who they are.

My first images for the challenge are of this pure joy that I describe above. You can see the clear look of it in her eyes, the bright shining stars that they are. Even on the hardest days in life, children have the power to show you the light at the end of the tunnel.

Although these images were not taken today, I know they are important to me to use as my first images in the challenge. The reason I want to do this challenge to strive to be a better photographer and designer is not just for myself, but to show my daughter that you can be happy in life with what you choose to do. You can always better yourself and seek to be the best you can possibly be.