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!!

Relief | KE365 | Day 122

Something about those first days back at the park in spring time, such a relief.

As a mom, it's amazing to go back to the park after being stuck inside all winter and see all the new things your child can do this year compared to the year before. Just another reminder to me of how fast life goes.

Two of My Favorite Things | KE365 | Day 121

My daughter's eyes are two of my favorite things. I'm sure it's the same for most parents with their little ones.

She can light up any bad day I'm having. She is perfect, just the way she is.

Sick Days | KE365 | Day 119

My poor sweet thing is so sick. I have never seen her like this and could not resist documenting it.

At least it made her smile when she saw her picture! She is my sunshine and I cannot stand to see her like this!

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.

Carefree Flying Daddy's Girl | KE365 | Day 103

Sometimes the best shots and the best moments in life are the ones that just happen. One of my favorite shots of the day I happened to catch by accident on the way to the car, the 'carefree' image. 

shot as 1/1250, f/5.0 at ISO 100

  

The next image 'flying' will be a personal favorite for me well probably for the rest of my life. My husband soloed his first plane at 16 years old before he could even drive a car legally. So, flying has a big special place in his heart, mine...
and now our daughter's.

shot as 1/500, f/3.1 at ISO 100

shot as 1/250, f/7.1 at ISO 100

I would have to say if I had to come up with one bad thing about the 365 project is that you end up having more images you want for your walls than actual space to hang those images! I designed the shots into some quick album pages which should help with the dwindling wall space issue!

With personal issues that have been coming up for me the past week since I took these images, I have realized that no matter what happens in my future I will always have these two amazing people and I am so lucky and a better person for it.

FREEDOM kids KimberlyElaine365 D39

It is amazing what a small idea can turn into in just about a week. Imagine if there had been more time to prepare for Freedom Photo Shoot, how many would have participated? It makes me wonder how big this event could actually get. As soon as I came up with the idea I shared it with a few people who gave such a warm response it made me decide to announce it as an event. I hoped to maybe have 5 or 10 kids come and be in a Freedom image together. Instead we had over 25 kids! It was wonderful to see all those people come out for this event. It was wonderful to hear the response from all those same people and it was wonderful to see all those Freedom Kids.

I didn't realize how much this was all going to mean to me. Honestly two weeks ago, I was just coming up with ideas for my 365 project when I got this image of the Freedom Kids in my head and I couldn't get rid of it. As soon as I thought about how to get all those kids together, Honor Flight popped into my head. Although I myself am not military, growing up in Dayton right next to the air force base makes anyone have connections to Veterans and the service they have given to us. My husband realized last week right in the middle of planning this event that all four of our grandfathers served in World War II who along with terminally ill Veterans happens to be the group currently being flown to D.C. by Honor Flight. It is quite a remarkable thing to realize that all 4 of your grandfathers committed to such a heroic an honorable task. It also makes you realize just how many people in this country care so deeply for freedom.

Although it was hard and stressful to organize an event like this in such a short time it was so worth it. It made me feel so good to hear about all the people who wanted to donate gift certificates or their time & talent towards a raffle to help get more monetary donations for Honor Flight. There were a lot of community members who donated something up until the very last minute, it blows my mind to think of what others would have done had I actually given them ample time to prepare.

The above image is my favorite image of the chaos behind an event like this. I knew ahead of time that arranging something like this with kids on a hot day would be a challenge and there would probably be some unhappy or even crying kids. To a photographer who likes to capture candid shots and reality, this is a perfect scenario. I love all the images I captured that day, I love the happy ones and I love the sad ones. They all symbolize freedom to me, the good times and the bad times that we all get to live out everyday because of the freedom our Veterans have given to us.

Ahhh, the Freedom Kids. Adorable just as they are. I felt it was important to color tone this image, I gave it an aged look and then pulled the red, white and blue from the kids outfits. I feel like the color effect gives it such a patriotic feel and I think I will most likely use it for the Veterans card.

I think I realized just how hard it would be to get a good Freedom image with all the kids as soon as I saw how many were showing up. I am very happy the the image I ended up having the most children in (above) although I wish it could have had everyone in it, that is just about an impossible task with small children involved. That is why I knew it was important to get some individuals of the kids too and they were eating the camera up, it was adorable.

My favorites are always the individuals, especially when they are right in the middle of something and don't even notice you. Those images always turn out to be the favorites.

 I hope I was able to get some individual shots of all the children that participated, but with a public event it is hard to know for sure. That is why I would like to offer $50 off a session fee to any family who participated in Freedom shoot. The discount will be good if you book your session and get a deposit in before the end of July. This could be used towards a session in another month as long as the session is booked with deposit before July 30th.

I have so many more images of the kids to edit and will be working on them in the coming weeks along with a couple designs for a card for the Veterans. Check back in a few weeks to get updates on the progress and there will be a link to view the Freedom Kids images. I know everyone is anxious to use the images from the shoot but I would really appreciate if you would keep the images intact as they are if you choose to link to your own accounts. There will be opportunities once all the images are processed for parents and family to purchase group shots, individuals and any collages or designs that were done in the process. It will also be possible to purchase image files and rights & participants will receive a watermarked web file for posting to their own facebook accounts. All prints sold in the weeks after the gallery is posted will have 50% of profits donated directly to Honor Flight Dayton.

I really want to thank everyone who was involved in this. My entire family was such a big help from watching my daughter, to making star shaped rice krispie treats, storing donations, donating stickers for the kids and of course all the hands on work they all did the day of. There were many members from the community that donated and they will each get recognized in the card for the Vets. For now I would like to just mention who they are as I always like to help those who are helpful to others. Some of these businesses were so warm and generous it just blew me away and I will continue to use all of their services. So just a little mention of who these people are: My Favorite Muffin in Centerville, Massage Therapy by Ashley B. Calcutta-Hasting LMT, Athena's Bridal, Rocky's Pizza Ring, Katie's cosmetics (avon products), Balloon & Party Loft, Dairy Queen (near intersection of Alex-Bell & 741), McDonalds (by SICSA in Kettering). 

I want to personally thank you all for what you did to make this even happen. Even down to my littlest participants, just your presence was appreciated and I'm sure we will have a fabulous thank you card for the Veterans to come from it!