BAD Santa - Terror in Toyland

As a mom I know how going to get Santa pictures can be stressful. First off you have to find a cute outfit, then get them to wear it. You have to fight holiday traffic and crowds only to stand in line for god knows how long. You talk the little suckers up the whole time about how great it's going to be to see Santa, sit on his lap, tell him all the super cool things you want him to bring you. Finally you get to the hopefully decent looking Santa pay your bajillion dollars and cross your fingers that little Susie will at least look at the camera and if your really lucky the rugrat might flash a smile. Sounds like a great afternoon to me ;)

Now imagine your the kid, you sense your parents stress, mixed with that familiar hope that you will behave. You've been hearing all about this rockin santa guy that magically gives you all your hearts desires. Your stuck wearing this stupid tie or god forbid hat and expected to be patient in a line that's taking FOREVER. This better be good! After a million years it's your turn and you see this...

"He's huge and hairy and hulking. He dresses in strange furry clothing. He sneaks into people's homes at night.Who wouldn't be afraid of . . . Santa Claus?!? "

Your eyes are huge, your mom's repeatedly telling you to smile, you got some chick squeaking an Elmo at you while trying to tickle you with some weird dusty thing, Santa smells like cheese or even worse old spice and after 2 minutes of terror all you get is a stupid candy cane and the hope that Santa heard you when you said you wanted a red ryder BB gun (fingers crossed)!

I cry LAME and so do all these little punkin heads...

Poor Babies!

"Nothing says Christmas like innocent children shrieking with terror as a hulking red stranger drags them onto his lap."

Quotes from Harper Collins book "Scared of Santa, Scenes of Terror in Toyland"

"Now this time-honored rite of passage is celebrated with a hilarious collection of more than two hundred and fifty priceless photos of kids' traumatic trips to Santa's workshop. Scared of Santa offers a cornucopia of photographic funnies - from sixty-year-old family heirlooms to last year's howlers-along with delightful commentary on those unforgettable childhood visits to scary ol' Saint Nick."

Funny stuff... You can buy the book at Barnes and Noble or just skim through it next time your there. And either laugh hysterically or feel sorry for all the traumatized youths on the pages.

I'm sorry but something about this is hilarious to me!

Hope about you do you have any scared Santa pictures or stories?

One thing down, 523 things left to do!

Okay so maybe it's not really 523 things but man it seems like it! I am tired of being so busy lately, I have so much to do and a lot of cool things to share with you guys but I'm fighting to find time to do it all. Hopefully by this weekend I'll be all caught up. The one thing I did complete though is my Business Launch Party invites, Hooray!

My friend Cathy and I decided to do a joint party/open house since we have both been building our business's for the past year. I can not tell you how great it is to have someone to be on this journey with! It will be so exciting to have this launch together, be there to encourage each other further, bounce idea's back and forth and then eventually see us both with successful ventures.

I've spent the last 4 hours designing these babies and just sent them to the printer's. They are 5 X 7 double sided linen postcards once they get here and we spruce up the envelopes I'll take a picture and show you.

For now here is the...

Front

Back

How do you think they turned out?

It's kind of hard to read the words online but in print they will be nice. I'm pleased with them. I still have a lot of other marketing pieces to do, the list is never ending!

I have lot's of pictures to post in the next week including a really great family shoot so check back in ;)

She's back in the building!

I'm back... Did you miss me? We had great time on our griswald family road trip! Chase did amazing, he is such a good boy, I am blessed! I have so much to catch up on and tons of pictures to sort through. I still have posts to do from shoots I did before I left then i'll share some vaca pic's.

I'll leave you with this little gem from our first stop in Portland...

Yeah Baby! You gotta love Oregon!

See that bruise on his left check? Ouch ... poor guy must have fell off that big ol' bike a time or two ;)

WOW... Jack Davis!

Just got home from a evening seminar with Jack Davis. It was a jammed pack three hours full of some great photoshop tips and tricks! I kind of liked the shorter three hour set as oppose to the five hour bellies and babies and Captivated by light I went to earlier this year. The cheaper price didn't hurt either ;)

I felt like I got enough good information without sitting forever while my butt gets numb. Don't get me wrong I got great info out of the other two but this one just had a faster flow which I kind of dug. It helped having some lovely ladies to attend with, Sara Montgomery, Jenny Joy Heck, Dinea Norrell, Julie Watts and Julie's cool friend Laurie all were there to keep me company!

There were some awesome "mind bending" moments as Jack demo'd all the cool tricks and shortcuts you can take to enhance your images. Some were so easy I couldn't believe I hadn't figured that out before. His tips will really help me speed up my workflow and maybe make some "WOW" images of my own. He also briefly showed off some of the new feature's in Lightroom 2 that will be coming out soon. Looks really awesome I might just have to upgrade!

It's really fun learning photoshop even if there are certain elements I wouldn't use myself it's nice having the knowledge on how it's done. Especially when it comes to being able to recognize the processes others take in creating their final product. Looking at someones work and having an idea for how they #1 took the image but then how the achieved the final result through editing is a great way to learn.

I would definitely suggest attending this seminar with Jack if he comes to your area! I also here his books are pretty darn good, although I haven't had a chance to check them out myself. Can't wait till I can get some time to play around with the stuff I learned tonight!

Off to bed.. it's almost midnight!!!

I'm an addict...

I am totally addicted to the Open Photo Contest. This is a photo contest put on by Open Source Photo ( a totally awesome forum by David Jay) where you get to vote on your favorite picture out of a series or four images. Photographers can register and upload their images to be in one of the contests. Currently there are 6 running categories which included: Stellar Brides, Traveling, Engaging, Prepared, Family Time & OPC Beta Contest. Four images are displayed at a time and you vote for your favorite of that series then voila! a new set comes then an new one and a new one and well you can see how this can get addicting. The winning photographer's get some nice prizes and are featured on the right colum of the page. Thier are some amazing photo's sometimes it's hard to choose which one you like best. Try it out for yourself but be warned you may be sitting in front or your monitor for a loong time ;)

Disco Chase

Star in Your Own JibJab! It's Free!

Disco Chase

Star in Your Own JibJab! It's Free!

OMG this is too funny and so much fun! Make your own!

update: Something happened to this, I'll have to go in and recreate it.

It will be back up soon!