the winner is...

congrats
45 & aspiring!!!!

(please send your mailing address)

I want to thank everyone for all their thoughts on the images, I was amazed how all of you truely see...thank you.
For all of you that participated I would like to offer the (sepia blooms prints) 50% off at my etsy shop. have a most wonderful weekend!

happy ... friday....

what a fun day...my neice was dropped off at 8:30 am,
and off we went...she ran errands with me...i must say it's more fun with a 5 year old mind, seeing the world just alittle different than her auntie B's mind, not that much different..
this afternoon, after P&J sandwiches and pickles, we did a little relaxing painting...
have a great weekend...

waist

there is no greater waste than to live an ordinary life...
there is nothing more tragic than a person who has lost their magic!!
-mark eberra

its snowing again, just slightly, well maybe not...it looks like hail, my Lacy just got into a match box and so I just finished picking up about 200 matches on the kitchen floor..hey!
my mind has been on the left side...Taxes...after living on my studio floor with a thousand receipt's and a calulator...the process is over and the Taxes are done....now back to some real work.

D.H. Lawrence by Anais Nin

I am loving this book..first chapter(the approach to D.H. Lawrence's World) must quote..
"If a man loves life, and feels the sacredness and mystery of life, than he knows that life is full of
strange and subtle and even conflicting imperatives. And a wise man learns to recognize the imperatives as they arise--- or nearly so--- and to obey. But most men bruise themselves to death trying to fight and overcome their own, new, life-born needs, life's ever strange imperatives. The secret of all life is obedience: obedience to the urge that arises in the soul, the urge that is life itself, urging us to new gestures, new embraces, new emotions, new combinations, new creations."

these are some old photo's, from when I lived in Denver...I loved shooting into windows.

open communication

About a week ago, I was asked to give a presentation at an photo expo in May, not so much into this...but know it would be a great experience teaching others about photography... so I have decided to {show and tell} about how to capture children as they are, with open communication.
These photo's are of little Will, been shooting him since he was 8 months old..love him.

DayRains Designs

this just a small sampling of Joni Rains jewelry, I am in the process of shooting, than creating a new website for her. I love her art! I will let you know when her site is up and going.

the way...

to know the way,
we go the way,
we do the way
the way we do
the things we do.
it's all there in front of you,
but if you try to hard to see it,
you'll only become confused.

i am me
and you are you,
as you can see;
but when you do
the things that you can do,
you will find the way,
and the way will follow you...

Non-judgmental behavior

I must say I am having a lovely Monday, just enjoying each moment as it comes, I was shooting some old photographs, for some clients that want retouching, for larger prints, must say I love old photos... long story short I decided since I had the whole production setup I would do some of my own, well this image is of Ruby ( my beagle/bassett hound mix) and me, way back when.
Ok, this is how I feel..the more present to the moment I remain, the less judgmental I become, in my own actions as well as others...

"time"

first it was an idea,
it has evolved into a dream
now it is exciting to just think about
now it is more comfortable;
a job to do
a new skill to practice
a place to be alone
it is a way of centering
an hour
a week
a month
are unimportant here
the only matter of importance
is the task at hand
all the time is present time...

inspiration

inspiration isn't man made, it's a gift from nature.
and when it comes, it creates something original and beautiful....

Mushrooms...the new meat

Just some interesting information out of the Spirituality-Health magazine, pg.31 Jan/Feb issue.
Substituting a four- ounce grilled Portabella mushroom for a four-ounce grilled hamburger over the course of a year saves more than 18,000 calories and nearly 3,000 grams of fat, the equivalent of 30 sticks of butter. Waistlines will benefit-and the environment will, too.

sepia bloom giveaway

• 

Please select your favorite two images, than leave me a comment about why you like them. I will put your name in a bucket and have Sydney(my sweet daughter) close her eyes and pick....
The winner will receive both images,signed, 5x7....I will announce the winner January 30Th.

Intersections

Life is full of so many great things....opportinitys, or should I say intersections, having a choice in the direction we want to go, but not knowing the result, the uncertain result is what makes it so great!!
I have finished my health and wellness books, from the library of my naturopathic doc's office, and needed to start something new. Back to my favorite Anais Nin....In favor of the sensitive man and other essays. I read On Truth and Reality last night.
I must quote

{As a women I was fully aware that it was my personal world which was the source of my strength and my psychic energy. The creation of a perfect personal world was the root of my inspiration. So women is concerned with not losing this center, which she knows the value of. Just as the deep-sea diver carries a tank of oxygen, we have to carry the kernel of our individual growth with us into the world in order to withstand the pressures, the shattering pressures of outer experiences. But I never lost sight of their interdependence, and now I find in Dr. Rank the following statement: "Whatever we achieve inwardly will change outer reality."}

new eyes

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking
new landscapes, but in having new eyes.

Marcel Proust

The camera is my tool. Through it I give a reason to everything around me

-Andre Kertesz

I must recommend one of my all time favorite Books............ On Photography by Susan Sontag

Three lady's and their dogs....

first of all the line up..from left to right...Me & Lacy...Nelle(my sis) & Cinch....Carol(my mom) & Pepper..aka...bar bitch..my mom rescued her from a bar, in northern Montana.
I love this photo, mostly because I love these people so much...oh and their creatures of comfort.

Imagination

Einstein said: Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution.

My very first interview, done by Willow Manor

1. Your photos are fabulous. How did you get your start in photography and what kind of camera do you use?

Thanks for the compliment...I was ten years old when I got my first camera, we lived in the country, so nature surrounded me. So I photographed everything from closeups of leaves to my brother and sisters. From that point I knew I was a visual artist, and my tool would be a camera. After high school, I went to art collage to study commercial photography, I tended to break a lot of rules, but I had been doing that my whole life. I have used many different styles of cameras, before digital, my favorite was a Hasselblad, which I adore, but my work horses now are Nikon's, in our new world of digital.

2. What do you consider your greatest achievement?

Wow! What a question...I am only 41 years,I guess to use the gifts I was given, to make the world better, in just a small way.

3. Other than your loved ones, what is your most treasured possession?
I feel I don't posse anything, things are things....but i truly adore the gardens that surround my home, for they have been my best teachers in life.

4. Which living person do you most admire and why?
My sweet mother, for she showed me through her life, all you have to be is you.

5. Before blogging, what, if any, was your main mode of personal expression?

I have been journeying for the last twenty years, and of course through my photography, the greatest part about blogging is I get to combine my feeling, and expressions together and share creatively.

Here's the directions:

1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me."

2. I will respond by emailing you five questions. (I get to pick the

questions).

3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions.

4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview

someone else in the same post.

5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask
them five questions.

contentment

contentment is a state of grace, a state of peace and happiness, appreciation and enjoyment for what is, right now. Desires, in contrast,can never be satisfied. Once we get what we crave, we soon find it less satisfying than we expected, so we strive for something else. The only escape from this perpetual wheel of want is to discover the contentment and perfection we already have.

Nature shows us the way...

In the winter months, there is a room upstairs that gets the western light, soft and perfect for keeping my tropics alive, and also where my bulb collection grows...slowly, for there is growth everyday, I have found that this growth has become as beautiful as the flower at the end.

stop...and experience the light

"the beautiful is everywhere: perhaps more in the arrangement of your saucepans on the white walls of your kitchen than in your eighteenth-century living room or in the official museums."
Fernand Leger, painter

today I will share my daily reasons for true joy in my life

• good health
• loving relationships
• Sydney(my sweet daughter)
• to be intouch with nature
  
• the support of my family
• a satisfying career
• an adequate income when many people have none
• Change- to keep me in check with my mind and soul
• a warm and secure place to live
• the comfort and loyalty of pets
• good neighbors
• freedom- truly to be of my true nature, inward and out.
  

working on my lovely list of creative ventures for the month of January....OK to be honest I am still finishing up jobs from last week...I tell myself when the bread & butter is done than I get to channel my self to whimsical creative conscience....no worries, no fear, no pain, just that bliss state that allows me to just be... to all my creative humans...may you find time to just be...

holiday wedding ...

this was the wedding I shot in Red Lodge a couple weeks ago and it was -7 degrees ... it was quite beautiful and the kids were troopers...they only stayed out a couple seconds to get some frames of the whole family.

welcome to the new year....

"a mode of conduct,
a standard of courage,
discipline, fortitude, and
integrity can do a great
deal to make a women
beautiful."