Coming Up

While I'm waiting to share images from the wedding I shot at the end of May, I am also waiting to shoot another wedding this weekend. (I just found out about it yesterday!)

Also, a very dear friend of mine is pregnant (!) and expecting her second child on Christmas Day this year. Three weeks into her pregnancy, she announced that she was expecting and due "between December 17 and December 26;" I placed money on her having the baby on Christmas. While she's still baking that bun, it turns out that science agrees with me: the doc confirmed that she was due on December 25. (This is fitting: she's surrounded by holidays. It's the reason I claimed that she'd have the baby on Christmas. She was born on St. Patty's Day, and her eldest child was born the day before Thanksgiving.) I can't wait to shoot her maternity & family pictures this fall.

Two more couples I know are currently trying to get pregnant, and they are penciled in my calendar for shoots whenever they confirm that they are expecting.

I am also awaiting two lovey-snuggle sessions this summer, one of them with a married couple and one of them with a dating couple. The wife also said she'd be interested in posing for a rock-the-dress sesh, and I'm excited to see what comes from that!

In addition, I am formulating plans for a few model sessions. One of them is going to be formed around the signs of the zodiac (Taurus the Bull, Gemini the Twins, etc.) and the other is going to be formed around food & drinks (IE: what a margarita would look like if someone were to wear it). The playlist for my song-inspired model session is ever-growing, too. (In fact, the married couple that I mentioned in the previous paragraph is going to be a part of it!) 

The temperatures are rising here in Northern Colorado, and so is my workload! (The temperatures I will complain about -- the workload: never!) 

The beauty myth

The beauty myth is always actually prescribing behaviour and not appearance., a photo by speckled_beckle on Flickr.

Just an image that occurred by happenstance that epitomizes the issues I've been having with my self-image.

Happy Girl ~ Bailey

Happy Girl, a photo by speckled_beckle on Flickr.

I love watching my little furry girl grow up.

She has learned so much already in three months; most recently how to bark at the door. (She turns and runs away right after though!)

I keep hoping that I won't do anything to irrevocably mess her up for the long haul; she's right at that age where anything that scares her has the potential to scare her for the rest of her life.

Via Flickr:
My boyfriend came to visit me for my birthday. While he was here, I put him in charge of taking Bailey for a short walk (or two) so I could get some good photos of her. This is one of my favorites. <3

Country Girl *Edited*

Country Girl, a photo by speckled_beckle on Flickr.

This blog has been edited in the following ways from the original: the loose ends of thought strung along have been tied together in three final paragraphs. I apologize for any confusion that any previous editions might have caused. 

This is the view that I see every day when I'm out walking Bailey and we turn away from the road and head home. How great of a view is this?

Last month, when I spent a week in Denver, I wholeheartedly realized something: I love living in the country.

I also loved being minutes from anywhere in the big city. Restaurants, stores, and other places that we do not have ready access to up north are only a few miles away in the metro area.

When I was in the car going somewhere, however, I was not a fan of the traffic.
Denver traffic is not bad, comparatively, and I have not had any serious issues when driving in Denver in the past; however, I was not (and am not) sure that I could trust myself driving on the cities and streets. The thoroughfares and main veins are fine, but it's the side streets and connecting points that were ultimately my undoing.
I'm not saying I'm chicken to drive there; it would just take some serious adjustments.

Then, when I got home, I was discouraged by the amount of traffic that was passing up and down my road. I wanted my quiet country retreat back. It used to be that I could sit outside in the mornings with a cup of tea and listen to nature waking up, as if the sun was playing a symphony with her dancing rays. But now, there is increased automobile and airplane interference.
I realize by living in a society which so values globalization that such noise is nearly unavoidable, but new residential developments and oil rig production has brought more automobile traffic to my once more-peaceful road. The increase in airplane traffic has been caused by construction on a small neighboring airport, which has rerouted the inconvenienced flights to the municipal airport in my area.
But, my area is still quieter than Denver was.

Summertime has always been my favorite season in the country. I love the light, the shadows, the life that happens all around me. (Except, of course, for the spiders.) This year, however, has been wrought with wind and heat. I cannot go outside and enjoy the season; it's either blustery or oppressive.
I have been grateful for Bailey's need to go out during the mornings and evenings, though; those are usually the best times for light and temperature.

Since February, the plan has been for me to join my boyfriend in Denver once he has secured a job enough to afford an apartment for the two of us. (I could be looking for work down there at the moment, but I would have no place to stay while working should employment find me.)
The Denver trip did nothing to damper these intentions.
So what, then, was the point of this entire blog, in which I praised country living and seemingly occluded any desire to live in the big city?

It was nothing more than a reaffirmation that I love where I live.
The lives of people who live in the city are different from the lives of people who live in the country. The pace at which one lives, the self-sustainability, the dangers, the views, the noise...all different. I appreciate where I grew up.
And I love the bittersweet thought that, someday sooner than I want to process and think about, these 3+ acres in the country will be mine.