Homeschool, here we come!

Wow, I realize I have always been one of those people that puts a LOT on themselves.  I'm not an idle person.  I'm a mover, a thinker, a creator...a mother, and I'm very active in all of those things.  So....most people thought I was a little bit crazy when I decided to open my own accessory line, Punk n Posh about three months after my last child was born.  Then, pretty much everybody thought I was crazy when I partnered with my good friend, Cindy and opened up yet another business about six months later.  So yes, in the first year of my fourth child's birth, I successfully launched two new businesses that keep me very busy.  Now...for those of you that still held on to the notion that I might not be crazy-I have decided to homeschool my older three children this year.  Yup, I'm certifiably crazy, I know.  But thank goodness for it, cause we are LOVING it!  While I know I haven't been the best blogger on the block, I decided this may give me another reason to post.  I've been pretty busy posting pics and blurbs to my Photography Business Blog, but have seriously been neglecting this one, I know.  So the random postings are about to return (I will try to post weekly, not a daily kind of person, sorry!)  I will try to post more about what we are doing, what the kids are learning, new photography tips and of course whenever I can get them from the hubs...geek tips as well!

We just got through our first week of homeschool and we really enjoyed it!  At this point we are eclectic homeschoolers as I like to be able to pick and choose the best spelling programs, websites, etc. for my kids and so on for each subject.  We will be practicing Waldorf teaching styles and methods into our daily learning.

So we started out our week setting up our classroom space, schedule, introduced curriculum, etc.  My husband brought up a large table for our classroom (I heard it was pretty important to have your own quiet space for class so the focus can be just that, class!) so I re-vamped what should be our formal dining room into a classroom.  Who needs a formal dining room anyway?  What a waste of good daily space that can be used so much more effectively!  :-)

DAY 1:  Desk & Laptops

Day 2: I woke up with the kids already up and waiting on the couch eagerly with their laptops on their laps!  I think they were pretty geared up from our first day and couldn't wait to get started!  I thought it was cute so i had to snap a few pics...even the baby was into it!! ;-D

We added our own in-boxes and hall passes (the kids insisted on the hall passes, go figure!) they made these during art/craft time with cereal boxes, wrapping paper, glitter, paint and any other art supplies they could get their hands on!  

  

They definitely added some color and organization of our folders and notebooks to our classroom desk/space. :-) 

So it turns out Gabe really likes spelling.  Okay, maybe he really likes www.spellingcity.com and it's super fun spelling games that help him with his spelling words for the week!  Love that little guy.  :-)

Another fun thing we learned about homeschooling is we can make lunch time learning time as well!  We decided to have a little challenge with our A-Z Spaghettio's to see how many spelling words they could spell with them.  Okay, it was a little messy, but everybody got their spelling words right on their test!  Hands on learning is the way to go!

Okay, so Gabe chose the easiest word on his list first..."GOT"...but he "GOT" better, I promise!  Logan's words were based on his Math unit that he started with, which was "Taxes"...so he had some pretty difficult words to be digging out of his Spaghettio bowl! LOL.  Look, I made them "Eat their words"  hahaha....Ah, what FUN! :-)

The last day of the week I saved a pretty fun art project for them...SAND ART!  Oh, did I forget to say "messy sand art??" ah, well, the joys I tell ya! ;-)  They had way too much fun for me to complain.  Here are some shots of their creations.  

Just in case you were wondering what my adorable little muchkin, Tori is doing when we are deep into instruction time?.........

FINGER PAINTING...WHAT ELSE?!?!? (With Chocolate Pudding, what could be better than that?)

And we ended the week with a celebratory trip to the Neighborhood Pool.  Pretty Darn good week.  I'll post something next week about how week 2 went!  Thanks for dialing in!  :-)

    

Let me just ask one question...do you think the kids had fun much at the pool?!? LOL, I just LOVE Logan's jump of the diving board here! :-D

I HEART FACES WEEKLY PHOTO CONTEST~TEENS

Okay, this is my first entry in a photo contest...I've been watching them for a while at http://iheartfaces.blogspot.com/ and I just couldn't resist this one as my VERY FIRST portrait model, Quinton, is a teenager and he just so happened to have given me the most awesome photo shoot ever!  What a model!! I had an extremely hard time picking one photo from his shoot because they all turned out so dynamic.  I finally settled on this one because it framed his face in tight and well, it is i <3 faces, right!? This kid is only 15 years old, just lost his father days before the shoot (an army soldier who just served in Iraq), is in two different rock bands (you can see a tiny peek of his accoustic in the lower left corner) and has one of the deepest minds you would ever meet. He is extremely loyal to his girlfriend; cherishes their true love...remember those days?!  He is way too grown for his age, but still maintains an innocence that is somewhat mysterious.  I was thrilled to get to know him that day and have never taken better images since.  I was surprised he was up for the shoot considering his tragic loss, but he thanked me later and told me how good it was for him to get out and focus on something else.  Everytime I look at this photo, I know what is going on behind those eyes and what that is happens to be way too deep for you or me to understand.  They say the eyes are the window to the soul.  I wish I didn't have to see the sadness in his.  But on the same note~ this kid is a survivor, is extremely talented and I am proud to call him my nephew.  Man, he set the bar extremely high for me because now everyone wants their picture to look as good as his.  What can I say...his unique style,  facial structure, eyes and soul made this shot.  I only captured it.  Love you, Q!

The Posh Puff!

I haven't really talked much about my other company....Punk n Posh. It's a hip accessory line with uber cute punk and posh pieces that kids, teens and adults can wear to express their inner star! The pieces also make great photography props (for all you photogs out there!). Which brings me to my point. :-D  I've just released a fab new item called "Posh Puffs" which are super glam adorable puff pieces that come in a variety of colors and can be clipped to headbands, hats, belts, hair and flip flops for various kinds of posh looks. I was so excited to release them once I took my girls pictures in them-they turned out so adorably *squishy* cute! I mean humbly speaking and all my girls are superbly gorgeous, ;-D (hehehe) but after a zillion pictures I have taken of them, I needed something to change their look as well as the look of the photo. The posh puffs did just that. The photos speak for themselves. The good news? They are a gorgeous photo prop that will only cost you $8...that's it. So you can afford to buy one in every color and be prepared at your next photo shoot you want to foof up the Poshiliciousness!  yes, that is a word...I created it! ;-D

Or ~you can try to get one for free from this blog ;-D !! That's right, I will be giving away one Free posh puff per week for one month. What do you have to do? Just leave a comment here telling me how u like the photos or the puffs (and which color(s) you would choose if you won and I will draw one per week. If u share my direct link to my webstore or facebook fan page to your blog or facebook status and comment here that u did I will give u another entry! One more for twitter!  Tweet about it!  It's that simple. Hope u love the posh puffs as much as I do! These photos truly warm a mothers heart~I know mine is melting now...

Continuous Motion....I GOT IT!!

Okay so I have to say I am sooooo excited for TWO reasons! 1) because being the slow blogger I am, I just realized I can update my blog from my iPhone (poolside baby, yeah!) and 2) because I was able to get an AWESOME continuous motion shot! I may be more excited than I should be but nonetheless I am, shall we say--"tickled pink"?!? So I have to start with the fact that I was inspired by Scott Kelby in book one of his digital photography series that I blogged about a few posts back (my eternal thanks, Scott-you truly have made me a better photographer ;-D). I have to say that when I read his page regarding continous motion I was fascinated with the idea (probably as excited as I got when I learned how to "paint with light" and shot a complete heart I drew with two light up swords my kids had at the local firework spectacular, Thunder over Louisville-I would totally blog about that if I didn't lose the photo to a BAD HARD DRIVE...total other story...I will recreate the photo and blog all about that another day!) and seriously wanted to rush out to the local outdoor extreme skate park (I still plan to go!) but in the meantime I had something much more important to attend to...Kindergarten graduation.

Yes, my little man was graduating Kindergarten and in his eyes that meant he wasn't a little kid anymore. Oops gotta take a break for food, (free cookout at the neighborhood pool- can't pass that up!) Needless to say he also made a point to tell mom and dad that he wanted a BIG present (since he was now a BIG kid of course!) and hinted that he wanted a new motorcycle (he doesn't ask for much, does he?!) Being that he already has a motorcycle (Fisher Price Harley Davidson), but the batteries that it takes have been dead for a year, I decided it was time to cough up the $80 to buy the kid new batteries and bring life to the dead Harley. Alright, I know--I am seriously getting to the point. So I went to the adorable boys graduation and brought him a small gift (and by small I mean in size-can't exactly haul a Harley jr in the school gymnasium!) and I was playing with my new lens (which I happen to have a love/hate relationship with) and managed to capture some super cute glimses of little mans excitement for his new game-the self titled "game boy" happens to LOVE Mario (who doesn't?). Dang, that boy can melt my heart with those baby blues...

Soooooo when we got home he found his beautiful piece of heavenly blue plastic waiting on the front porch, was he excited? Ummm, yeah...you could say so. It was while I was somewhere between happy dreamy bliss from beautiful images like these:

(beautiful to me because of the sharpness where I wanted it, the bokeh where I wanted it, the nice color that the lens translated to my LED, and the most beautiful subjects I could ask for in my humble opinion!)....


                      ...to complete frustration from blurry shots like these (see why I have a love/hate relationship...bad bokeh!?):

when I realized "I can take a continous motion shot of my little man riding his little heart away". So I pulled back into the files I store in my brain sorted under "Scott Kelby" and started adjusting my settings. I started clicking continuously when little man gave his sister a lift and prayed for a miracle. I got it!! Not only did I get it, but I really got it! I LOVE the expression of I intensity on his face, love that my little chicka was looking over at me, nailed the sharpness on my subject and the blurry motion suggesting their movement that I was looking for AND was able to keep plenty of room for the motorcycle to go, making for a much more interesting composition.

WOW. I did it. I'm so proud of myself! And I think I'll like this more than any race car, dirt bike or skate trick I'll catch like this in later days. I got my first continuous motion shot and it rocked because it is special to me, because it shows the free spirit, unbridled fun my babies were having. I love it and I am SO thrilled. As a mom. As a photographer.  This is one for the portfolio kids ;-).

Wanna know how I did it? Okay, here is the recipe (you did all this reading, you deserve to reap a benefit here I know!) slow down your shutter speed (something below 1/60th of a second or where you would usually need a tripod-the slower, the more motion you can show), click the shutter and pan (follow) your camera around the moving subject in the same direction and relativley same speed they are going. Be sure to be shooting on continuous and be sure your subject is in focus. That's it. Your goal is to have your subject in focus and the surrounding area to show a motion around it. I plan to do ALOT more of this. I can think of so many fun ideas with this besides the obvious ones I mentioned above (long run on the diving board, waterfights, races (kids, bikes, cars, horses..whatever!, even babies first steps!) This can be a super fun trick that only the pros know so I truly hope I can help some of u other newbs to find the joy I have with this great technique!

Till next time!  BTW: Working on the Kandy Pop Photography website now...should be up and running very soon! Thanks for all of your support!

Warmly,
Kass

Kandy Pop Photography?! WHAT IS THAT??

Alright...here it is...so my friend tells me she received such an overwhelming response to the family photos we took of her family (Davis Family) and people are inquiring about how/where to get them done.  I'm told they especially love the collages (thank you!).  So she and I decided to try to offer our services to the public for a small fee so we can support our "habit" (shall we say?)  We LOVE Photography of all types but at this time realize we better start charging a little something if we want to continue to grow in this field (as most of you know, it's an expensive habit! We want new lenses! LOL)  We will be working on a new website/blog to showcase our work there and I will let you know as soon as it's ready!  We decided to call it...are you ready?! Kandy Pop Photography cause if you "meld" our names together (Kassi-Cindy), you get "Kandy" and "Pop" cause we are ALWAYS "popping" off pictures!  You know we had to do it Hollywood style, cause that's how we roll! ;-) Okay, okay...So we'll never be "Brangelina", but we can definitley rock the "Kandy Pop" by being behind the camera rather than in front of it! Hey, who knows, maybe we will be shooting Brangelina one day!!  LOL (still, mayyyybeeee!) :-)  Plus we also think the name suggests bright, fun, friendly photos and that is what we are all about!  We LOVE color, kids, fashion and most importantly, we LOVE to have fun and this is going to be such a super FUN adventure!  We are now offering a special promotion as we launch this new business so get in while you can, because we are only offering this low price to the first FIVE takers in the Kentuckiana area:

$100 Opening Portrait Special:
1 hour
2 Photographers!
10 Fully Edited Digital Photos
2 Personalized Digital Collages (similar to the Davis collages on the previous post)
1 Entry to win a Global Entertainment Acting Scholarship complete with professional photos (includes makeup artist, hair stylist and photographer, acting lessons and the chance to meet agents who may be looking for someone like you or your child to be in their next film, commercial or print ad!

You can leave a comment here, message me on fb or mlm if you are interested, or if you have my digits, just call!  We hope you're interested in this truly FANTABULOUS offer as we guarantee we will capture your family, children or personal portraits in a dynamically unique and creative way! We can also supply bright and fun accessories from my Punk n Posh line if requested in advance. Tutus anyone?!

BTW:  We also have experience in shooting for actors/models so if you need shots for your portfolio or ZED or Comp  Cards, we can help you to create the many looks agents are looking for as well as create/design your cards!  More to come on that soon!

Photographing the Davis Family

I was very excited when my friend,~C~, approached me about taking her family pictures; not only do I think she has a beautiful family (her two girls also modeled for my Punk n Posh line!), but I worked out an amazing trade (don't you just love bartering?!) LOL! Okay, so this friend has been taking Photography classes right along with me at the local University--so guess who took my princesses FIRST birthday pics?! (I'll actually be posting a piece on that soon! FUN!) You guessed it~C~! It felt so nice to not be the one behind the camera that day...to be able to focus on my sweet baby girl and still know I would get all the important pictures I will forever cherish of her on that special day. I HIGHLY recommend this to all! Hire a photographer on your children's special day so you can focus on them and not be hidden behind a camera the entire time! It really took a lot of stress off me and allowed me to enjoy her super special day even more!



Okay, so back to the Davis Family shoot...my first FAMILY shoot. A family of 6. Talk about intimidating! Maybe I should have started with a family of 3 first to get my feet wet, he he! ;-) There are many challenges when shooting that many people...especially on the entire family portrait shots. Like getting them all to have their eyes open at the same time, all of them looking at you at the same time, trying to keep little ones who run out of the shot in the shot (wink wink), trying to keep them all natural and several more. But the benefits that come from these challenges fill my heart with a "warm fuzzy" that I have never felt before. To see and know that I captured their beautiful, fun, endearing family in so many memorable ways just fills me with such a joy! What a great gift to be able to give to people! This brings me back to last summer when I had my first realy family portraits taken. I say this because before having Tyson (Legend Photography) shoot us, we had only been captured with a quick flash in a studio at JC Penny or some other quick portrait photographer. It is so different to have an image of your family that speaks to you..literally. Something that really shows your family's true style, personality and love for one another. Something that will become an heirloom. Tyson, you melted our hearts with your work of our family and our little Tori and I hope to be able to give that gift to many others in my life. Pay it forward, pass it on.

I know I still have so much to learn in the Photography world, but I promise to do the best I can with what I have and what I know. I am quite pleased with the results. I hope the Davis family is too. They are so beautiful that it didn't take much to make a beautiful image out of them. But that super cool tough guy car of ~T'~s made it unique and brought their own style to the shoot. Those adorably fun kids brought so much flava I had a hard time keeping up with them (especially my auto focus!)!

What a special thanks I have for them to let me in on their lives in such a personal way and for them trusting me to capture a sliver of moment in time for them!

BTW:  Wanna know what got those vibrant colors? My new Polarizing filter...LOVE it! ;-)