sept twelve

50mm    ISO500     f/2.8     1/200     9:02PM     9/12/17

This is my sweet Dad.  His whole summer has been working to support our family during the day and working in the shop at night to make this bed for he and my Mom.  He's designed the whole thing and is just finishing the last drawer tonight.  Sometimes engineers get laughed at for not being "creative," but I think it's just a different kind of creativity.  He is precise, yes, but he's also added so many little details and flourishes.  He routinely says, "happiness is a perfectly cut dovetail."  I so admire his creativity and skill in the workshop and love all the hours I've spent learning from him there.  I'm so proud of my Papa!

sept four

50mm     ISO4000     f2.0     1/80     9:04PM     9/4/17

 In which my boyfriend helps my little sister cream me in Jaipur.  And Timothy is normal.  :)

I had some stressful moments today.  I had some sad moments today.  I also had some amazingly right moments today.  It's important to acknowledge and grow from struggles, but (since I struggle with being a pessimist) I must choose to curate my memories toward those where the glass is half-full, not those where it's half-empty.  When you shoot, you are telling the story and creating the memory.  Shoot even the sad things in a way that brings hope and beauty

#curate

Daddy Graduates // A Family Day

We got in the car late.  Again.  But we always do, you see, so we always leave 30 minutes early on longish trips.  Showers, bagels, hair-dos, and pumping tires were on the agenda before heading into Chicago this time.  We were going to Dad's graduation ceremony from Moody Theological Seminary.

What normally is a 1.5 hour ride is over 2 hours on Saturday mornings such as this.  Nathanael pulled up a book on following God on his computer, Hudson started his book of poems -- an especially profound one he shared with me -- I studied the Korean alphabet (Hangul), and before I fell asleep I heard discussion of hermeneutics drifting back from Mom and Dad in the front seat.  Emily contented herself with watching planes fly overhead.  I love our family.  The more we grow up and start to leave, to more I want us to stay together.

We're all nerds in our own way, and we have Mom and Dad's value of learning to thank for that.  Dad has spent the last 7 years not only working full time, being a great dad, keeping up with house chores, and being involved in our church and family ministries, but also pursuing his Master's degree.  This endeavor has been hard at times, but it is so worth it.  Walking with the class and getting a hood is cool, but the knowledge and experience he has gained and been able to pass on to us throughout these years is priceless.  I'm so proud of his dedication and good example to us.

Check out those three cords!  Summa cum laude, baby!  (3.9-4.0 GPA, for those who don't know)

Along with a diploma, graduates receive a special alumni Bible and a towel to represent them going out into the world like Christ -- not to be served, but to serve.

Hudson, Nathanael, Emily, Mom, Dad, Moi

Sidenote: I recognized one of the graduates and their families talking in Korean (thank you KDramas and Taekwondo!) and offered to take their pictures for them.  I was able to use just about all the words I know so far (Hana, duo, set!) and they were duly impressed. :)  

Also, Hudson is back from College for the summer and this is what he likes to do with my camera.

 And 'cause he's not camera shy, we use downtime in the parking garage to take portraits.  Fitted suits are the bomb.com

Nathanael - Not as big of a fan of the limelight, but just as handsome. 

Emm looks like she just saw a dinosaur.

DONE!!

We didn't get a picture on Mother's day, so this was our "girls" picture to make up for it.

   We rounded out the evening with dinner at Gino's East for some real Chi-style deep dish pizza.  'Twas sublime.  Just wishing big bro Jamie could have joined us.  It really was a wonderful day.

Bonding with Brothers

Hud gave me an odd compliment the other day.  At least I think it was a compliment.  You tell me.

"Jo!  Why are your hands always so soft?!"  The end.  Haha.  Gotta love it.

Anyone else live with one or more brothers?  They're an interesting thing.  Sometimes you can't live with them, but you certainly couldn't live without them.

See this brother?  This is Hudson.  People used to think we were twins.  I'm starting to understand that, looking at these pictures from last night. :-)  He's rather obtuse, but he teaches me grace.

We were best-buds through middle school.  We played house and make-believe everyday.  One Christmas we were jointly given the Bitty Twins.  Don't know what the Bitty Twins are?  They're baby dolls made by American Girl.  Yes, my dear brother here got a baby doll for Christmas and was just as psyched as I was!  The moment I grew out of dolls we started to drift apart.  I guess when you're used to playing with each other for 12 hours every day stopping is a drastic change.  I became obsessed with books and schoolwork and we didn't talk.  We weren't giving each other the silent treatment, we are just both introverts and don't especially like to be the first to start talking.

Now we've both grown so much.  We're SO different now.  We're adults.  We're broken humans. It's plain hard to connect sometimes.  But I've been thinking.  No matter how hard it is to put yourself out there, isn't it worth it?

Isn't HE worth the effort?  How far are you willing to go for your family?  Will you fight for them?  

Each of my brothers has different love languages, and I'm trying to learn to speak them.  Because honestly, saying "I love you" in house doesn't go very far.  We're not a touchy-feely family physically and we don't really say touchy-feely stuff either.  Yeah, I guess we're sorta dysfunctional like that.  It is uncomfortable to show affection, but I'm learning that this really isn't a negotiable point.  I need to learn to show affection.

Maybe this sounds totally weird to you.  "What, she doesn't know how to show affection?!" But yeah, it's true.  Don't get me wrong.  I'm super emotional (which may be part of the problem.  I hide it by not showing anything) and I feel things almost too deeply.  How to show this in the right way though?  That's something I'm working through, and I'm starting with Hudson.

So we're going to start painting together.

Just missing Jamie!

Dad: "I love this quote by Cicero, 'If you have a garden and a library you have everything you need.'"

Emmy: "But if you don't have a kitchen. . ."

Obviously we girls have our priorities straight. :-)

Oh, and I love my family.  As broken as we are (which you don't really get to see over the inter webs...), we are beautiful and we are redeemed.

For My Mom

Dear Mom,

For all the late nights, tears, headaches, aches, & pains;

I thank you.

For all the songs, stories, rhythms, encouragements & books read aloud;

I thank you.

For all the dances, hugs, back-rubs, massages, ring-around-the-rosies, tickles, & tumbles;

I thank you.

For all the homework helps, smiley faces, challenges, successes & book-learning;

I thank you.

For all the favorite meals, snacks, & bandaids on my boo-boos (or stitches my face);

I thank you.

For all the craft skills, tea parties & dress-up clothes;

I thank you.

For your honesty and openness, not only of your home but of your heart; for loving my Daddy and showing my what a godly marriage looks like; for your quickness to forgive and ask forgiveness, for your spontaneity; for your grace; for your passion; for being a doer; for being a try-er; for falling down and picking yourself right back up; for always believing in me;

Mom, you're the best

No, seriously.  You're the coolest Mom in the history of moms.

Even when you fail at using pop slang the right way or sing at the top of your lungs in the middle of the grocery store parking lot.

Even though I haven't told you everyday or even every week or month I can start now:

I love you!

I love you mum, and I hope one day I can be as awesome of a mom as you are.

Thank you for not giving up.

Thanks for being mine.

FIRE Basketball

Our family tried something new this past year.  Being a sports family...sorta.  Nathanael joined the Rockford FIRE basketball team!

Many of the kids and coaches go to and have kids in our homeschool co-op.  It is a Christian homeschool team and they're pretty awesome.

Nathanael plays on the 14U (That means '14 and under' for those of you who are as sports illiterate as I) team.  FIRE also has a 12U, JV, and Varsity teams.  We've gone to couple games and I think it is safe to say I'm hooked.

The first few games/practices I brought like 3 books along thinking I could read when it got slow.  It turns out that it isn't much good because you keep losing your page when you have to clap every couple seconds.  So I gave it up and dedicated myself to sitting in the back row looking very austere and clapping formally.

Not so any longer.  I yelled and cheered for the first time last Monday and I was (yikes!) in the front row.  This is dangerous folks.  There is so much momentum in both the basketballs and the kids that if something goes wrong you're pretty much toast.

One of the Mom's got sacked at an away game we went to and a couple people have had to react with gazelle like speed to catch a ball that was headed straight for the top knot of their grandmas.

It has been a good experience and I'm glad Than likes it.  His team won 20 of their 22 games and their regional championship and are now wrapping up the season now with a week at Nationals.  Go FIRE!

My brother is number 53, if you couldn't tell. :-)

And, if you haven't already seen this movie that has been circulating because of its uniqueness, check it out.  A player from the opposing team gives the ball to a player from the other team so he can make his first point ever.  It means a lot more to me having a brother in basketball now.

Perspective ❘ Personal

Does life seem to run circles around you sometimes?  I feel like the world wants me to spin in circles and perform; to always look toward the next thing or even better, look to something that isn't real.  Our culture is so music, movies, TV, work, image, driven that it doesn't realize what it's missing.  Then one day they wake up and realize that they don't have any time left to do the things that really matter.

But It Was Summer I Wanted - by a 14 year old girl

"It was spring but it was summer I wanted

the warm days and the great outdoors,

It was summer but it was fall I wanted;

the colorful leaves and the cool dry air.

It was fall but it was winter I wanted;

the beautiful snow and the joy of the holiday season.

It was now winter but it was spring I wanted;

the warmth and the blossoming of nature.

I was a child but it was adulthood I wanted;

the freedom and respect.

I was twenty but it was thirty I wanted;

to be mature and sophisticated.

I was middle-aged but it was twenty I wanted;

the youth and the free spirit.

I was retired but it was middle-age I wanted;

the presence of mind without limitations.

My life was over but I never got 

what I wanted."

As a high school senior I have been doing a lot of thinking about what happens next.  Do I know what I want?  Maybe a better question would be that of "Do I know what the Lord wants me to do?"  People tell me I'm talented all the time and they expect me to go places.  What place am I trying to reach though?  Over the last 17 years of my life I have learned to love to learn.  School was FUN.  I can't tell you how much that helped me throughout highschool.  Even in the longest driest assignments I could find a little some that was interesting and all I had to do was follow my curiosity to enjoyment.  

Since I loved school I did well.  The more curious I was + how competitive I was feeling that day = my grade on the assignment.  I've gotten As for as long as I can remember...until the second semester last year.  I was taking British Literature with the hardest teacher at our homeschool co-op and it was definitely a college prep course.  Lots of reading, outlines, papers, vocabulary, and worksheets due every week.  Last year was the year I learned that that thing called discipline actually was important and that procrastination was your worst enemy.  That doesn't mean I was diligent or didn't procrastinate. It means I learned some things the hard way.  I got a B in the class and was pretty beat up over it.  (I've got a pride issue with that you see).  Anyways, that was the most stressful semester of my life so far.  Why?  No it wasn't the enormous amount of school work, or lack of sleep.  

It was the expectations.

I learned to love to learn, so when I did my school I was doing it to learn, do you follow?  I did it because I wanted to, I was curious and the grades didn't matter (especially because I am homeschooled).  Now I had performed so well that people thought I was this really smart kid and I could feel little kids and parents looking up at me.  Teachers looking straight at me and most peers looking down at me.  They were expecting the best, which is good because I would give my best then. But the grades started scaring me.  

     What it I didn't get and A?  I started performing and it was terrible.  Instead of enjoying a book and writing what I thought I would freak out and tell myself "I don't have any opinions!  How can I write this?"  It took all the fun out of school.  It became routine instead of a new body of knowledge. I missed a lot because of my perspective.  I didn't retain nearly as much information and you know what that means, having to study a lot for tests instead of just writing in the answers because this is what you taught and you remembered it because you truly learned it.  Uggh.  Anyway...

     The reason I got into all of this is because it relates to my perspective on photos recently.  I love photography.  Not so much the mechanics, but the end product.  When you see a good image it makes you feel something, it tells a story, and it makes you remember.  When I first picked up a camera it was "Oh cool!  Take pictures! then I started to fall in love with certain images because the colors and/or focus just made me happy or the thing the picture was of made me happy.  Then I took classes and got all technical.  I would see and image and think "Wow.  That composition is perfect; the white balance is stunning.  Look at that pose!"  Then my eye grew and my heart grew and I started to see that a perfect picture of a pair of shoes just wasn't cutting it.  Those images that really made you laugh and dance and cry were the good images.  Pictures were no longer photos of things but images that captured emotions and let them go inside the person who saw the photo.  That is what I wanted to do.

     Then I started shooting people for tips.  Don't get me wrong it is still great, I love the practice.  I'm still getting "As" as it were, but my perspective got whacked out.  I'm charging these people anything, but I felt like if I messed up at all I wasn't even worth tips and that I'd be letting them down.  Well, the pressure didn't help my performance at all.  To this day, the photos I took on those shoots where I had the spur-of-the-moment idea and had fun setting it up are still my favorite and probably best executed shots.  Sometimes I would get home and just flop on the couch and *hope* I got something I could give the client.  Come on already, I took at least 30 amazing photos and probably 60 good ones.  Even so, I would get them in lightroom and say to myself "at least the eyes are sharp."  All around the shoots were fun but they were stressful and I was SO worried about what others thought that I would put the camera down when I got home and not use it for probably a week.  I got so wrapped up in taking the "perfect" photo that I wouldn't even try when there was a possibility that they would be "normal."

     So much for practice.  Recently I have been going through all our old photos to make a board of my life so far for graduation and the lousiest photos of my siblings and I make me happier than all the photos I had taken in the past couple months.  There is a problem with that. I didn't have any pictures of our life.  I'd lost my resolve to capture those moments and emotions, especially in my own family!  How are we going to remember this time?  The year Emily learned to read?  The first time Hudson was hired to play his cello?  Jamie turns 20? My Mom starts her pilates business? Nope.  We're going to see photos of some kids in my graduating class. 

     I can just see us in  20 years.  "Hey!  Remember when we etched our glasses with the Hebrew Alphabet so we wouldn't keep confusing them and use like 20 glasses a day?  Oh yeah, I forgot about that! I think I have a picture somewhere....um, no, but I see this kid.  Do you know this kid?  Oh yeah, wasn't that a friend of Joanna's?"

Have no worries, I've photographed the glasses. :-)

I'm not going to wait till school is over to do what means something now.  I'm not going to procrastinate my life away and succeed at the things that don't really matter.  I want to live my life to God's glory and in his will.  I'm changing my perspective tonight.  I'm going to start being curious again.  I have been so inspired by Becky Earl.  She has such touching posts and photos about her family.  Or Annette Wilson.  Both of these ladies shoot film and shoot their everyday lives.  

I love Digital Photography, but I think it would be totally worth it to learn to shoot film.  There is more work involved and you are forced to shoot with purpose.  I also love Madey and Anntonette's blogs.  They shoot everyday life and turn the most mundane things into art as well as shoot the meaningful things beautiful.  

If all you have to show for a career in photography is a portfolio full of photoshopped people you don't even know I think there is a problem and that is not the kind of photographer I want to be.  In honor of all you amazing film photographers who get real with life, here is a shoot set of pictures I grabbed of my little sister zonked out on my parents bed just before dinner.  It was SO dark.  So I shot at ISO 3200 and embraced the grain.  These images are straight out of the Camera (SOOC).

Grandma like "Woah!"

So, my sibs and I pretty much have the best grandparents ever.  One in particular, Grandma Judy, is extreme.  Have you guys seen the first Hoodwinked?  (I haven't seen the second one so I can't recommend it)  It is pretty neat and one of the main characters is "Granny,"  or "GGG," as you find out later.  BTW, you say that "Triple G."  :-)  For a while my older brother has been calling my maternal grandmother "GGG" because she is so cool and it just stuck.  Recently, my brothers showed this Julian Smith video to my grandma and she kinda took a liking to it.



Julian takes some getting used to and his humor style isn't my thing, but he does have some funny videos. Check out "Handbag" and "With Child" for some laughs.  Anyway, she bought the guys gansta hoodies for Christmas, so we had to take a picture. :-)  Grandma is being "righteous" and reading her Bible. :-)

Family Pictures on Thanksgiving

Hello all!  I just wanted to share a few of OUR family pictures we took of Thanksgiving Day.  Jamie was home, so we snagged the opportunity and the tripod and ran outside.  It had rained earlier, but then wetness went away and left us with a whole sky of softbox. :-)

All photos were edited in Lightroom 3.

We have fun. :-)

The Guys.  <3

Hud, Daddy, J✭, Than

The Girls

Mommy, Emmy, Moi

Webber Ninjas.

This may take a little explaining.  The "Big Kids," meaning the four oldest have our own secret gang.  Complete with an exclusive facebook group.  Yeah, we're cool like that. :-)  Jamie decided on a whim to call it Webber Ninjas.  It is a nice way for us all to keep up, especially as Jamie is away at College now and I'll be leaving next summer as well.  What do we talk about?  I guess you'll never know...;-)

The Ninja photos were taken by my Dad, as well as the picture of us girls.

Enjoy!