New Blog

  For quite some time now, I have been shooting portraits under the name Giggle Box Photography. When I discovered Etsy, I opened a shop called Studio Number 7 for my fine art photography. Trying to blog and post on Facebook, Flickr, etc. with two names has been a challenge! Rather than continuing with two separate names, I recently decided to simplify and keep everything under Studio Number 7.
 
  I still plan to continue to blog about photography, family, travel and other (hopefully interesting) stuff. My NEW photography blog is: studionumber7.blogspot.com. I hope you will come visit me there!

Thanks so much!

Lori

Photo Wall Displays

   After months of saying that I was going to switch out some framed photos in my stairway, I finally did it. I wanted to display various coastal pictures I have taken. Most are in my Etsy shop but I have not put many up in my home yet. It is amazing how much framing adds to photos. I can spend an hour looking through framed art wall displays on Pinterest. I also love large scale images and posters.
   Most everyone can take pictures with their cell phone these days, so I think there is more of a tendency to keep digital files and never print them. We often have good intentions but never get around to it. I did not do the most fabulous job hanging my pictures up, but I'm happy with my display! I couldn't get a good shot of my pictures on the wall because the weird angle, but here are a few of my coastal pics:

These are some photography wall displays on Pinterest that I really like:

Summer of Sharks

   Our beach trip this summer was a little weird because we went in the midst of all the shark attacks on the southern east coast. I'm not one to get out in the water much anyway- I'd rather just sit and gaze at it or look for shells. We did notice that there were a lot less people in the water than there usually is, but still plenty on the beach. The ocean is vast and beautiful, but unfortunately it's dangerous too. Hopefully scientists will devise a way to deter sharks from coming close to shore. They are already experimenting with keeping them away from divers.
  Despite steering clear of the water we still had a great time. We hated coming back home, though I missed by babies. We have a lot of fun and really enjoy each other, but Jeremy is 15 and he is not as thrilled about vacationing with his "old" mom and dad anymore. It is tough being an only child sometimes and not having a kid to hang with. It didn't work out this year, but we are planning next summer for him to bring a friend along.
  Every time we go to the beach we always get ice cream at Painters. It's like our family tradition. Back in 2012 I took a picture of Jeremy with the Painters sign behind him, so I wanted to do it again this year to show how much he has changed. Painters had to go and change their sign to a bright neon one - so that was disappointing. But it is still cool to compare. Below are the photos (excuse the quality) from 2012 and 2015. I know I'm partial, but I think he is becoming a handsome young man.

I knew I couldn't get him to pose the same way with ice cream in his hand, so I didn't even try.

Jeremy found these teeth in the water. A shark or barracudas teeth, maybe?

Teenage Sweethearts

It seems like Jeremy changes and grows taller and more mature by the day so I wanted to take him somewhere around town and get some pictures of him. My sweet boy is growing up! I can't believe he is 15 already. Lucky for me he doesn't mind having his picture made… at least most of the time.

We took his girlfriend Camille along because I figured that would make it more fun for him and I would also get some pics of her. They are both so easy-going and fun to be around. We were able to find some good backgrounds for my shots- like a purple building and moving train!

Before the train….

With the train!  They didn't even flinch, which was hard because the train was so loud.

Spring Portraits

   My friend Crystal asked me to take some spring pictures of her girls recently. We had actually
been to the beach in October and I took some mother/daughter pictures there. Now her daughter
Lillie Kate is turning 10 and some of these pictures will be used in a slide show for her birthday party.
We went to the Memorial Garden in Concord, NC that is tucked away in the Historic Downtown area.
It is a beautiful garden with lots of tulips, azaleas and huge magnolia trees. The colorful flowers and trees were the perfect backdrop for photographing these sweet girls. And, they treated me to lunch afterwards so that made the day extra-nice!

Happy 10th Lillie Kate! 

The Beach in Autumn

   October is one of my favorite months of the year. I love to see the leaves changing and the air feels so crisp. Last October I was fortunate to go to the beach with my friend Crystal and her daughters for a girl's weekend. I had never been at that time of year before and it was awesome. Most of the time I'm there in the summer and our family trips in the fall are usually to the mountains. But it was so nice, I think I would take an October trip to the beach again.
    Of course the humidity was low, which was nice, but the sunlight seemed different too. The sand dunes were covered in yellow wild flowers, and I saw a lot more Egrets around than I usually do. We had one beautiful sunny day and one cloudy day. I was surprised how many people were sunbathing and getting the the ocean. That water was way to cold for my taste!

See anything in the water in this shot. A fin, maybe?