10 on 10 | July edition

Every single time I sit down to write this monthly post, my 10 on 10, I feel like a broken record.  "There's no way it has been a month already."  "Man, time flies."  "The days are long, but the years so very short."  "I'm thankful for this reminder of a month already past."  But dude.  Those statements couldn't possibly be more true.

Little Buddy starts school in just a hair over a month.  Kindergarten.  KINDERGARTEN.  I've read these sentimental weepy posts from others over the years.  I haven't rolled my eyes, but I haven't really understood either.  I believe I've had sympathy, but not empathy.  Now we've delved into the realm of empathy.  I'm becoming a sentimental mess.  He's growing so fast.  He's so amazing and I love him so much.  I even got an extra year with him here with me, since he has a late October birthday.  He will be six in four months.  But still, I want to grab him and hold on and never let go.  He's turned into this awesome little guy.  He's so much like me and it makes my heart want to burst.

"They've" always chastised to "just love 'em.  enjoy 'em."  And I haven't.  For starters, the lack of discipline - aka  just loving them - has dire consequences for both me and the kid.  But that's a conversation for another day. For second, the baby/toddler/preschooler phase still requires so much work and that takes away from the enjoyment for ME.  But we've hit this amazing sweet spot now and he's just pure enjoyment.  I truly, truly want to freeze time.  I'm wrestling so heavy with the decision to have more children or not, because I don't want to miss out one tiny moment with Little Buddy.  I want to relish in everything with him, and with the Lady.

At any rate, we are here today for the 10 on 10.  Rule follower me is a little torn on the inside today.  I just really like following the rules, and for my final product of a year of this project I wanted 12 documentations of entire days in our lives.  But again for this month, I couldn't.  I am

always

photographing what is happening with my family, especially in the summer when we are outside so much.  

Always

.  So with my normal photographing, plus the Finding the Light Workshop images I've taken over the last month, there was just tooooooo much.  I couldn't possibly fit in another day of shooting, like I prefer to do for the 10 on 10, much less handle 500 more images for the month.  I am probably two years behind in my family photos.  So many amazing and wonderful images that I've never processed, never posted.  I decided to do my 10 on 10 this time, with some images that would have been stuck in the 'never seen the light of day' folder.

This particular evening Shawn and Little Buddy were playing basketball.  Little Buddy wore the 3D glasses for about two weeks, constantly.  I'm so glad I have these images to remind me of that.  Wore them all day long, every day, wherever we went.  I loved it.  He claimed here that they helped him play basketball better.  I just love the little athlete he's turned out to be.  I cannot express how much I adore watching the two of them play basketball.  My 10 on 10 is about an hour of a summer evening.  A moment in time I never, ever want to forget.

[My 10 on 10 is a group project with photographers all around the country.  After you view my version of 10 on 10, stroll through the group and see how they spent their days.  Next up is my sweet friend

Jayme Franklin

.  I'd bet my next starbucks that she shot hers on film!]

[My 10 on 10 is a group project with photographers all around the country.  After you view my version of 10 on 10, stroll through the group and see how they spent their days.  Next up is

Jayme Franklin

.]

I shot these with my

D90

Nikon 85mm f1.8

10 on 10 | June Edition

Compromise.  I've never been very good at that... but I'm in the midst of teaching Little Buddy and Little Lady all about it.  And I suppose that means I could use a good adult dose of it as well.  Today, June 1, as I'm preparing this post for the 10th, I've had to compromise.  The general household, packing for our annual beach vacation, end of the school year May activities, Karate, Tball, my running, The project 26, The Food Styling Challenge, this 10 on 10, and then lastly, add on the amazing Finding the Light workshop.  Something Had to Give!  Compromise.

I shot 2, 250 images in May.  That is not a typo.  More than two thousand images.  No special trips.  No new equipment.  Just two thousand images.  And I didn't shoot purposely for the 10 on 10, which typically yields me 500 images.

So...

I didn't have time to manage shooting a 10 on 10 day this month.  I scheduled it twice, but it got ran over. So I decided to give you an early May weekend afternoon instead.  Way  more than ten images.  Way more than ten collages.  But that's me for you.  I loved them all, and honestly, it took less time to include them than it would have for me to try to choose my favorite favorites.

Don't forget to keep going and see what my friend,

Jayme Franklin

, has in store for her 10 on 10.  For now, enjoy an afternoon with us.

Don't forget to keep going on the circle to view my wonderful friend

Jayme Franklin's amazing work

.  I love how she documents her children.

I shot these with my

D90

Nikon 85mm f1.8

10 on 10 | May Edition

Another month, another day 10, another of my favorite photography project -- the 10 on 10.  I'm always, always photographing my family and the things we do... but this project makes me capture the fullness of our day.  The entirety.  Not just the middle, but the beginning and the end.  I just love that.  I love that I've captured what an entire day looked like through the last almost year.

[The 10on10 is a creative project I'm working on this year along with 10 other photographers around the country.  On the 10th of each month, we post 10 images and link to each other to create a blog-circle.  Our contribution can be 10 photos over the course of one day (as I do it), 10 over the month, 10 favorites, whatever.  Just 10 images that will help us remember these times.  Not perfection photographically, but perfection for our memories.  The goal is to purposely capture our days.]

This month I shot on Wednesday, April 18th, 2012.  An ordinary, yet rainy morning.  This was the view out of my bedroom window.

Very, very, very out of character for the lady, she slept until 8am.  When she awoke, we went to wake the Buddy.

It has not rained much this year during preschool drop off and pickup.  They are always so excited to use their umbrellas.

I had to file my sales tax for my photography business this morning, for the first quarter of 2012.

We've been watching our tadpoles develop and the Little Buddy has been so fascinated by it.  I also pulled out "Purple Pincher" to get a few shots of him.  We've had him since Hilton Head in September and we are planning to take him to Topsail Island in June to let him go free.  He's a huge hermit crab, and he's very friendly.

Again I handed the camera to Little Buddy and let him shoot to his heart's content.  He did pretty good, no??

I am so happy to have a little guy who isn't afraid of nature.  Who isn't afraid to handle creatures and bugs, even if "I", myself, cannot.

On the way to Karate... in the van.  He's suddenly developed an interest in drawing and I LOVE it.

He's moved up to the next Karate class and it's quite a bit more challenging.  Now he gets to wear all of his sparring gear for most classes, and MAN, does he get sweaty!

This is the first time this has happened since I've begun this project last August.  I missed an hour in the morning while the kids were at school... and then in the rush to get home from Karate, get dinner finished, eaten, cleaned up, and ready for bed... I TOTALLY forgot it was 10 on 10 day.  Totally.  Since I shot these three weeks ago... I honestly cannot remember what the reason was now... We did bedtime really late that day, and I can't remember why. I miss my brain.  I know part of it was not getting back home until 6:30pm or so and having to finish up dinner prep... and part of it was that the kids slept so late that day.... At any rate, as we were finally heading up to bed, I realized it was 10 on 10 day... and I had majorly dropped the ball.

I asked Shawn if he'd shoot me reading to the Little Lady... Nine times out of ten, Shawn puts her to bed.  We've done this for bonding reasons for her, since she spent so much of her life less than thrilled with Shawn, for no apparent reason.  Now that she's past that, we still stick to this routine.  It's special daddy-daughter time.  But every once in a while, I like to get to put her to bed, too.  That, and I LOVE reading the book she insists on getting read each and every single night:  

Yertle the Turtle

.

Little Buddy can keep himself awake as long as he needs to, if there is a book or video going.. but the Lady cannot.  She simply turns off.

And then it was Little Buddy's turn for bedtime.  He prefers animal encyclopedia type books to stories these days.... though sometimes I beg to read a story.  But Daddy was putting him to bed this night and I got to shoot.

Thanks for looking through my day.  Keep the circle going and check out  my west coast kindred photographer spirit 

San Francisco Family Lifestyle Photographer | Jayme Franklin. 

I shot these with my

D90

Sigma 30mm f1.4

Nikon 85mm f1.8

Nikon 50mm 1.4D