Today I’m packing up my bags to head to California to teach for a few days. I’m so excited to be escaping the cold weather here for a bit. Even though it’s not supposed to be terribly warm there (by their standards), it’s relief from the freezing temps here in good old Indiana. And I’m happy I’ll be able to come back and share some new warm weather photographs on the blog, but for now here is another of my silly girl from last summer. I think this shoot is my favorite I’ve ever done with her…because she was so “Bella”.

For the photographers out there, this image was edited with my Summer Skies action set, specifically the Summer Pop and Blueberry Skies actions. We’ll be holding a sale starting tonight at 8pm EST. If you don’t receive our newsletter with the codes, all codes will be posted here or on the Actions Cart website so keep checking back.

Have a blessed weekend everyone!

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Yesterday I was organizing my images from last summer and had to stop to edit just one photo. It was so cold and snowy and this photo was so full of summer warmth that I just couldn’t resist. I hope you enjoy it too.

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Ahh…my favorite season! I just love the cool weather, pulling out my favorite sweaters, mugs of hot apple cider, trips to the orchard with the kids, the stunning trees and landscapes. Sigh…Indiana is a great place to be in October. Of course all of this loveliness puts me in the mood to shoot which is good, because it seems like everyone is in the mood for photos. Last year I got so busy I barely had the chance to take my kids out for any fall photos. I vowed to make sure I don’t neglect their photos this year. So here are a few of Bella from a shoot at a nearby park and field.

All of these images were edited with my Summer Skies photoshop action set. Guess it works for Autumn Skies too.

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Just wanted to let my lovely blog readers know that I’ve started another blog that I’m using to sell Miss Bella’s clothing on. You can check it out here. http://www.miabellastudio.com/bellascloset/

And since it’s not a post without an image…here she is in an outfit I may be adding. I just can’t decide if I want to let it go!

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I’ve always loved good food and by good I don’t just mean how it tastes. I love to buy locally grown, organic food that I feel great about feeding to my family. Ever since we moved out to the country I’ve had a big vegetable garden in the backyard (can’t say it’s always been 100% weed free, hehe) and I love growing my own food. There’s something that’s so deeply satisfying about walking out your back door, picking veggies that you planted and preparing them for dinner. We even tried our hand at raising chickens one year (and loved it) but found out our fence wasn’t quite high enough to keep them in, so they went to live at farm not too far from us. Chickens will be living on our property again when I can convince Damian to build the perfect yard and henhouse for them. In all his spare time, haha. I have books on sustainable living, books on raising poultry, books on heritage breeds of livestock, books on organic gardening and a whole folder of bookmarked articles online. Some of it just doesn’t work with where and how we live, but it’s still so interesting to me. I even loved it as a kid and wanted to grow and sell vegetables at the farmer’s market in greenfield. Somehow that dream never came to fruition, but who knows, maybe someday.

Okay, returning from my tangent…so one of my goals for this school year was to make the kid’s lunches. Yeah, can you believe that after reading all those books, I still let them eat a school lunch?! I know. But no more. I’m packing their lunches this year and we’re all loving it. The kids love seeing what I put in their boxes and I love coming up with creative lunches that I know they will relish. And to top it off, they are so pretty! Of course this means that I have to photograph their lunch because I just can’t resist prettiness. So enjoy their bento box (or laptop lunch) for today.

 Homemade pizza crust (with a little wheat flour sneaked in), organic pizza sauce, organic mozzerella cheese, homemade fruit salad from organic fruits, and not organic (GASP) chocolate and fortune cookie.

In their thermoses that I forgot to include they had Traders Point Creamery chocolate milk mixed with organic 2% milk.

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After what has been the busiest year ever for our family with my business growing in several directions, Damian switching jobs, me traveling around the world teaching, our kids and all their activities, it’s soooo nice to have 2 weeks to just RELAX. We’re 5 days into our vacation and I am loving every minute of being with the kids, Damian and my sister. Well, every minute except the nasty sunburn I got today…not loving Coppertone right now, Banana Boat did a much better job. My poor little Garrett got a little too kissed by the sun as well. But other than that it’s been so wonderful being here. The beach is gorgeous with miles of white sand and amazing emerald waters. Which of course has me wanting to shoot non-stop. Bella and I visited the beach just as the sun went down and I am in love with the results. The boy’s shoots are soon to come.

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I was digging through some old files for a client image and when I pulled it out the little girl’s curls reminded me of my little girl’s baby hair. So later I had to go digging through my personal image files and I found this one from just over a year ago of my little Bella. She was only 2 at the time and still had her sweet baby curls…which disappeared by the end of last summer. Why is that those baby curls have to fade? I just love them! We had her hair trimmed for the first time in December (the curls were long gone) and she had her first REAL haircut just a couple weeks ago.  Seeing her again with those adorable little curls just makes me sigh. They grow up so fast-way too fast.

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Bella is fascinated with animals of all sorts right now, but bunnies and sheep seem to be the creatures of the week. She was amazed to hear that the little lamb she chose to carry around all day was her grandmother’s as little girl, then mine, and now her’s. I have to say I feel a little amazed that this one little sheep has been there for 3
generations of little girls.

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I just had to post a few of miss Bella. I’ll be back with more images from my most recent workshop trip soon.  She’s wearing my favorite coat for her this season…gotta love Mini Boden.

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This past week has been wild! October is always crazy for us, but this one has been more insane then usual. Damian burned his leg last week while trying to burn a brush pile. Don’t worry, he’ll be fine, but he’s had to take it easy.  Which he never does like he should…grrr…why are men so stubborn (you know I love you, D!). And there’s our teaching trip to Australia and New Zealand in just over a week. I can’t believe we leave so soon! Whew! I’m excited to meet all of the photographers we’ll be working with and to see everything out there. Ok…now I’m starting to think I need to wrap this post up and get back to work.

Here are a few photos of my cool little man, Garrett.

 Trying not to laugh as I made some pretty lame jokes.

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