Trash-the-dress

Trash-the-dress, according to Wikipedia:
Trash the dress, also known as fearless bridal or rock the frock, is a style of wedding photography that contrasts elegant clothing with an environment in which it is out of place. It is generally shot in the style of fashion and glamour photography. "Trash the dress" is the art of destruction or deconstruction of a bride's wedding dress to create a new "artwork" that the bride would be proud to display on their wall. This new "masterpiece" is formed in the creative destruction of the dress. This will normally be portrayed in a sequence of images or simply a single image

Tuesday night, a fellow homeschooling mom and I met at Josh's family's house. She was rewarding herself for fitting back into her wedding dress, and I was able to cross one more thing off my 101 in 1001 list!

I'll just post a couple pictures here. To see the rest, you can go here.

It was such a fun experience! I'm so glad she wanted to do this and let me be the photographer for it!! :D

Meadville

Last weekend, we made a day-trip to Meadville, PA, where my grandma grew up. It was a great test run for when we make the big trek to our new home, and just an overall amazing experience.
I met a woman who was one of my great-grandmother's foster children. She knew the Charlene who inspired Dad to give me this name. I think that's SO cool!! (Charlene was another of g-gma's foster children).
And I got pictures. Here's my favorite: the little red schoolhouse down the street from their house, where Grandma and her two sisters went to school.

We went to the farmers' market in Franklin, where my great-grandfather sold produce and flowers for years and years. We got a yummy lunch from there, and ate in the crisp fall air.

The kids enjoyed the day, we all enjoyed time on Sunday to relax and refresh before the week started, and it gave me confidence that the drive to our new home won't be such a huge ordeal.

Friday

The sun forgot to show up today. I miss it.

Last night, Jasmine and I hit the Kohl's clearance racks. Came home with new summery clothes for 60-80% off. Got depressed to see displays of winter clothes. Got shocked by the car door. So not ready for cold weather.

Then we went for ice cream. She said it was the "best night ever." I loved having time with her.

(she's the one with longer hair)
The other two went to see a "live" How To Train A Dragon show with Josh and his sister. They had a great night too.

We're all pretty tired today.

But it's Friday!

Without Further Ado...

My wabisabi...came in second place

My quarters came in second, too. I have a cute son :)

My food picture (which isn't food, but a drink, but people decided that was okay) came in first!

My black-and-white took first, too!!!

So after that, the 4 first-place winning photos went up against each other for "best picture." And my black-and-white took the prize!!

I knew she was a cutie, but I had no idea I'd take the main prize!! :D I'm SO excited and shocked and happy!!

Pictures!

On Saturday, we all went out to a park halfway between our house and my brother Phillip's place. Originally it was just to play and catch up (and to give them the last sleeve of diapers, because we are a diaperless household!!), but his wife Elizabeth and I decided to do a photo shoot as well.

So jealous that they got a redhead!!

...but I like this kid. I'll take my three little blondies!

Those eyes...those cheeks... that smile...

...those cheeks...

My kids just hangin' around...

There are a few more pictures here: http://www.charlaarts.com/pictures/portfolio/phillips-family/

Friday thoughts

I'm a walking contradiction.
I've been trying to convince Charity to join Facebook...I even made her a timeline header out of the templates I made (and pictures I took):

...and then I've taken most of this week off of Facebook.

I'm enjoying the time away. It's making me realize just how often I get on to post things about my thoughts...that no one really cares if they read, though they kindly "like" them a lot of the time.


Mostly, we're just hanging out, doing school, enjoying the still-warm weather (which seems to have disappeared overnight, literally), potty-training Hudson (I just discovered the difference between training them at 2 and at 3 1/2. Later is SO much less stressful, ohmyGOODNESS)! I'm continuing to create things for my store and I'm working on a book for the ministry (typesetting it, not writing it).

...and now you know why I haven't blogged in  awhile. 

Oh! I can't forget this! I have a huge honor to write about!! Pioneer Woman, my favorite blog to follow, has occasional photo challenges on her site. She's doing one now where she had us edit one of her pictures. I used Michelle's and my Charmstagram and turned this:

into this:

And then, something exciting happened. She chose it as one of her favorites!! She said, and I quote:

 I love this one! Great processing, and I love the border.

I was completely over the moon all day!! :D And what an awesome promotion for my Charm Box stuff :D

Happy Friday!

Second Grader

Even though we started school in the beginning of May, we always do our school pictures in early September.
Probably because it doesn't occur to me until I see others posting pictures of their kids in their new clothes and backpacks, waiting for the bus.

Thankfully, Jasmine doesn't have to wait for the bus. My night owl is thankful daily that she doesn't have to do the early-morning scramble. She's not usually up before the bus has flown past our house (and I seriously mean "flown." That driver thinks it's a race track down our little tiny street. I wouldn't want my kids on that bus!!)

Sorry for the tangent. It's what I do ;)

Here's my beautiful second grader. (my kindergartener needs her own photo shoot. I kinda forgot that she needed pictures too, since I don't record her work like I do Jasmine's. But she's doing her school, and doing beautifully, and I started pictures 2 years ago for Jasmine, so I need to for Boo too!)

Favorites:

Kindergarten....first grade...second grade:

Second grade is off to a good start. Not perfect, but good. We took a chunk of time off in June while we were getting the house on the market, and since most of her craft stuff is packed, it's less exciting stuff she's working on. But she's decided she actually enjoys reading and I usually see her with a book. Her favorites are science-related, though she enjoys beginning chapter books as well. 

She's a blossoming artist. She loves to draw and is very good at it. All of her self-dubbed "masterpieces" are completely different and creative...they all have all five of us in them and we're all doing different things. I'll have to see if I can find some and get them posted here, but here's her very first masterpiece. This one took her three days (tenacity!) but usually they take 20-30 minutes these days. 

(we're at a farm. I don't remember now which is which of us, but there's a sheep, a rooster crowing, birds in the sky, and the sun rising. Thus the orange sky)