Self Portrait

I won't lie, this week's prompt was painful for me. It strikes me odd that I find a self portrait so painful. I am able to bare my soul to the world in my poetry, but I am unable to to peer into the depths of myself through a photograph. Isn't it strange that I can be so secure and confident in so many other areas of my life. Generally I am not ashamed of how I look, just in photographs. I won't tell you the features that I critic about myself. I will tell you that it took me almost 100 photos and 5 poses before I came up with something that I felt comfortable sharing.

The photo below is the artistic turn I took on the subject of Self Portrait. It goes hand in hand with my poem this week over at Impassioned Versifier.

I was honored to have the opportunity to share a great meal with Chris from Photography139 and several other old friends last Friday night. Be sure to scoot over there to check out the rest of this week's submissions, I am hoping he has a big turnout for this one.

Out of Focus

This week's random photo project was "Out of Focus"


I don't usually encourage Bug to cross his eyes. In fact I usually scold him for doing that very thing. How could I turn down his request to pose for this week's subject though, when he was the one that came up with the clever idea?

The poem was a little harder for me this week, as I was in a great mood, but the words that came to mind seemed so lonely & lost. You can read this week's submission at Impassioned Versifier. I encourage you to also go take a peek at this week's interesting photo submissions over at Photography139.

Nervous Butterflies

Once I was a beautiful shell
Giving life to the creatures of the sea
Tides and time pounded on me, breaking me bit by bit

Then I was stuck nowhere to go...
The barnacles found a place to dwell
But Mother Ocean gave me a second chance

The tides washed me upon the shore
There I lay waiting in the sun, dull and chipped and ugly
Then, you came along and found me

The barnacles were picked, the sand washed off
You polished me up and brought out my luster...
I'm still chipped with imperfections
But you laid me out for everyone to see...
The beautiful colors inside me

Now I'm shiny with colors and gold
The tides have yet to see me grow old
With the tenderness and care you gave me
I am once again a beautiful shell

- Vannessa Thibodeau -

Adventure

This week's random photo challenge was "Adventure". I had really planned to take Bug outside and snap a few shots of him knee deep in the snow aiming his bow & arrow at the concrete deer that decorate our garden. With our hectic week and even busier weekend that didn't happen.

Instead I came up with this to somewhat compliment this week's poem, because love is an adventure after all, isn't it?




As always, you can read this week's challenge poem over at Impassioned Versifier. The rest of this week's photo submissions can be found at Photography139.

Happy Single's Awareness Day

So today is Valentine's Day. Funny how attitudes can change so drastically in a year. Last year, on this very night, I was enjoying my first date with an incredibly sweet gentleman. Flowers, a card, dinner, theatre, dancing.... Ahhh, I was pretty well swept off my feet that night. I felt like a princess. Sadly, life, baggage, and distance got in the way of that budding romance. I still think very favorably of him and haven't completely closed off any possibilities, I'm just aware that the "time" for us is not now.



This year Valentine's Day is completely different for me. I will be spending the afternoon with one of my oldest, dearest friends and two bottles of wine. You can bet that there will be a little men-bashing (sorry guys!) and a lot of celebration of our singlehood. I'm sure there will be both laughter and tears.


You see, my friend and I married cousins and divorced cousins. We will spend today celebrating our independence, no pity parties for us. We will remind each other how much stronger we are. We have a lot that we will touch on today. How neither of us has to constantly be aware of the family's hidden desire for infidelity, how we can go buy ourselves an outfit with out being made to feel terrible for not getting them one first, how we don't have to worry about mysterious charges on our credit cards, or money we had saved for vacation being used to buy a chainsaw. How we don't have to worry about passive-aggressive behavior because they were jealous of the attention we gave our own children. Oh, there are so many things to celebrate in our independence! My favorite is that I don't have to give up my life to serve him anymore...my life is mine. If I need to put off the dishes to attend my son's soccer game there is no one there to make me feel guilty for it. If I want to attend a musical I can without fear that I will be made fun of at a later time. If I want to be involved in activities outside of the house I don't have to worry about who will be sleeping in my bed while I'm out. Yes, I have many reasons to celebrate being single today.

And I'm not doing it in a bitter way.
Truthfully, I am very relieved and happy that I no longer have to deal with the twisted mind of a fantastic manipulator. That's not to say that I've lost my romantic notions though.




Awhile back I had a friend that sent me a message telling me my need to be a closet romantic saddened him. That struck a little bit of a chord, because really, that is what I've turned into. I had another friend tell me that it saddens him that I am losing my care-free spirit. I read with joy the famous love letters that one of those friends has posted this week in honor of Valentine's Day. There is still a romantic hidden in me. I do hope that someday some gentleman feels so moved as to write to me from his heart like that and that he has the ability to make my care-free, loving, romantic, and happy side return. The problem is that I'm so much more cautious now. I am not content to settle for a man just because of pretty words. I have a huge need to know that he is really interested in me and not just in any warm body. The majority of the men that I have dated this last year are so quick to say they love me without taking the time to know me at all. Maybe I'm not as trusting as I used to be, but I have a hard time believing that you can fall in love with someone after one date. In my book that is lust not love.

Despite my convictions about love I do harbor a secret romantic side. I hope that someday I can feel loved and express love that is deep from the heart. I am open to it. I will even admit that I harbor some unrequited romantic notions about a dear friend of mine. But shhh... I enjoy his friendship so much, that I will never reveal those feelings for fear of his going away.





Really???

Anyway, enough with my rant. I am off to enjoy the fact that I have standards and the ability to hold out for that special someone. I hope you enjoy the Ant-Valentine's graphics I have posted, and I hope they all post correctly. I wish a great day to you all whether you are celebrating Valentine's Day, Single Awareness Day, or Anti-Valentine's Day!

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Schadenfreude

What is it about human nature? I'll admit, I'm prone to feeling better when I see someone befall one of my previous misfortunes. It's not a quality I like to announce from the rooftops, but it's human nature. And well, I'm human.

I came across this clip tonight while playing on YouTube & I just lost it (perhaps because I've secretly been anticipating a sense of schadenfreude that is inevitable). I think the song is actually from Avenue Q (which I still haven't decided if I want to see or not), but the video obviously isn't.

Anyway, here's a mid-week chuckle for all of you.

Frame

This week's Random Photo Challenge was "Frame". Framing is a technique where the photographer frames one object with another. I had no problem coming up with my subjects or the frame as I have long wanted a picture of the kids framed by our entertainment center doors. The biggest issue I had was the glare on the glass from the placement of the entertainment center and the unmovable lighting in my house.

The kids seemed to have fun posing for me at first but as I struggled to overcome the lighting issue the started to lose interest. Still, I think we came up with a few good shots.

This was my favorite and the one that I entered as my submission.

Below are a few of the photos that we considered.

I started on the poem early in the week because I had a feeling it would be somewhat challenging. I was pleasantly surprised when it felt finished after two evenings of working on it.

How did I incorporate the word frame into a poem you may ask? I didn't just use the word, I built the entire poem around the subject. Some of you know that Psychology has long been an interest of mine and I have often considered returning to school to formally study it. There so happens to be an accepted social concept in the science called framing.

The simplest definition I could find comes from Wikipedia:

"A frame in social theory consists of a schema of interpretation — that is, a collection of anecdotes and stereotypes—that individuals rely on to understand and respond to events. In simpler terms, a person has, through his lifetime, built a series of mental emotional filters. They use these filters to make sense of the world. The choices they then make are influenced by their frame or emotional filters."

I had fun creating a poem explaining the definition and how it relates to the individual.

You can read the poem over at my poetry blog, Impassioned Versifier. Photography139 is in the process of moving his blog over to Wordpress, so please note the new link when you follow this link to view this week's photography submissions.

Building Beautiful Memories

Today was a very long but joyful day for me. Tonight was Sis's Winter Formal at school. As has become our tradition for this particular dance, I prepared a delicious meal and had all the parents over to take pictures before the kid's went off to dance the night away.

Sis is obviously growing up and took over a few of my "duties" this year. I didn't do her hair this time as she used the money she earns from babysitting to make a hair appointment. She made her wrist corsage, Ricky's boutonniere, and another friend's wrist corsage as well. this was a great time and money saver! She even helped with the housecleaning before everyone arrived today, freeing up my time to concentrate on cooking a warm filling meal for the whole group.

I actually had the meal prepared early this morning so that all I would have to do is warm it up when they were ready to eat. I made them a Cesar Salad, Tuscani, Bread sticks, and Brownie Cheesecake. I was lucky enough that they left me & Bug a small helping of each for dinner LOL.

Sis's corsage. I'm so proud of her new-found creativity.

Sis made this one for her friend as well.

A full house of starving teenagers.

Oh how I wish this photo didn't turn out so blurry.

What a great looking group of kids!

Ready for a fun night of dancing.

Bug loved helping me with the dinner & dance preparations. I love how these guys include him & take him under their wing.

Getting tired of posing now. I think it is funny how they fake smile the same.

Finally able to relax after the photo shoot.

And of course, one of mom & Sis. I can't believe how grown up my little girl is.

Intuition

Click Photo for Source

"Let your internal voice accompany and lead you"


It's funny how a subject can follow you from conversation to conversation. Lately the word intuition has been popping up all over the place for me. A mother's intuition, a single woman's intuition, intuition as an act of self-preservation, intuition towards positive things as well. The older I get, the more I realize that my intuition is usually pretty well right on.

I'll admit, when I was a young woman I rarely listened to my intuition at all. I remember my dear sweet mother once telling me that little nagging voice I heard was God speaking to me through my heart and I had better listen. Hindsight is 20/20 of course. Had I listened to her and that soft spoken internal voice, I probably would have saved myself a lot of heartache and trials through the years.

I think my biggest problem is that I have always trusted in the good in people before being wary of the bad. As we get older we start to lose our innocence and realize that not every person in our life is mindful of our feelings, wants, and needs. We start to pick up those little clues that something is amiss. Intuition (if we listen to it) can tell us that there is danger ahead; that someone is not to be trusted, that someone is playing games, that by following our current course we may be setting ourselves up for hurt, that there is some sort of looming danger ahead even if we don't know what it is.

Intuition can also let us know when something is a good opportunity for us, even if we don't fully know why. Intuition can motivate us because that nagging little voice is telling us it's time to get up and get moving.

My intuition has been trying to speak to me for several months now. Heck, it has probably been whispering for the last couple years. Now it's hammering at me. It's telling me to get up and get moving, that there's something better down the road.

It's been pretty easy for me to ignore it up until now. I have a good life right here, right now. I have two wonderful children, a house full of laughter and happiness, a roof over my head, food on the table, a fantastic group of co-workers, and fabulous friends just to mention a few of my blessings. That little voice keeps getting louder though, and it keeps telling me I need to make a big change in order to remain happy and blessed and to work towards whatever it is that I was set in this world to do or be part of.

My intuition rarely steers me wrong anymore. I listened to it over the summer when it told me that someone was attempting to take advantage of who I am as a person, it was right, that person did not have my interest in mind at all. I listened to it when I quietly prepared myself to be a solid rock for my children in the late fall. I realized it was right again as I cuddled and comforted my babies. My intuition has even helped me realize when to be a friend and when not to, prompting me to call and check on one friend I haven't heard from in awhile and refusing to talk to another when that voice told me they weren't being truthful with someone that cares about them. In both cases my intuition was correct and I feel I made the right decisions.

So my intuition tells me to get moving, what does that mean? Quite honestly, I can't tell you exactly. I still don't know what the big life changing event is, but I feel very strongly that with all my small little projects I am working towards it. Maybe mysterious intuition is telling me nothing more than I need to keep working towards my goals and not let life get stagnant. Maybe it's telling me there is something down the road I need to work to avoid. Perhaps it's telling me that there is something big and great waiting for me if I just keep working towards it.

I get you intuition... you're loud and want me to pay attention, now please tell me specifics.

What do you think of intuition? And what does yours say to you?

“Intuition is a combination of historical (empirical) data, deep and heightened observation, and an ability to cut through the thickness of surface reality. Intuition is like a slow motion machine that captures data instantaneously and hits you like a ton of bricks. Intuition is a knowing, a sensing that is beyond the conscious understanding — a gut feeling. Intuition is not pseudo-science.”

Abella Arthur


“I feel there are two people inside me - me and my intuition. If I go against her, she'll screw me every time, and if I follow her, we get along quite nicely.”

Kim Basinger


“You must train your intuition - you must trust the small voice inside you which tells you exactly what to say, what to decide”

Ingrid Bergman


"Closing time, you don’t have to go home
But you can’t stay here"

Matchbox 20

Plants

I had two submissions for this week's photo challenge. I ended up scrapping the first one.

I loved this picture after I got done editing it. I had the flowers so much more defined. Unfortunately I do not find the software very user friendly and couldn't get it to save the way that it looked on my screen.

This is my second submission. Same model, different pose.

Funny thing about "Bella" kitten, that you see posing as my sleepy model. It seems that "Bella" is actually a Belmond.

We have spent the last couple weeks trying to come up with a similar sounding name for the poor boy. The kids scrapped my first two suggestions of Belmond and Heeshee (he/she). He really doesn't have an "official" name yet, but the kids have taken to calling him either Bellers or Belzer. If you have any name suggestions go ahead and pass them along!

You can find this week's challenge poem here and be sure to check out the rest of this week's photo submissions here.