Karen's Photo Journal

iPhone pic: Zuma

One of the iconic images that reminds me the most of spending every day as a kid at the the same beach that my kids now hang at.

Victory

This past Sunday, my family joined our good friends for their annual family picnic. I have been partaking in this ritual on and off for the last twenty years or so. Close friends are family with these guys; that's just the way they roll. 

They start cooking the day before and get to the park early to hold our spot. Needless to say the food is awesome and catching up with everyone is great. It's kinda strange watching the kids grow and change as I don't see some of them except on this yearly occasion.

The part we all look forward to are the games. Egg toss (my hubby and I were champs two years in a row!), tug-of-war, pie eating contest, passing-the-apple (is there a real name for this game?) and, of course the annual softball game.

While I am not a competitive person by nature, I must say victory is sweet. I really must want to gloat if I'm posting this very unflattering photo of myself after winning three rounds of the apple-passing game.  People, this is what victory looks like!!!

 

My daughter rocks the hula hoop!

This one cracks me up... aftermath of the pie eating contest. She didn't win.

My daughter and I challenged hubby and son in the egg toss.  We got out after a short while but they came in third.

I took this just a millisecond after the rope broke.  Man, I wish I had my real camera to capture all of this.  The delay on point and shoots is still annoying.

"A" about to hit it out of the park... in flip-flops!

iPhone pics: Hollywood

The Firefighter and I went out last night; a rear treat. We took the Metro into Hollywood, ate at some hole in the wall pizza place, took some photos in the Lucky Strike photo booth and saw a play at the Pantages. I squinted my eyes, left reality for a few hours and pretended I was in New York! I had no intensions of taking photos, but, since I can't control myself the iPhone camera came out for a few snap shots. I added some 'noise' to duplicate my favorite old school film grain.

 

My fav of the night...

Bangs...

... it is the question all women go through at some point in their lives. Should I?  Shouldn't I? Ladies, you know what I'm talkin' about! Well, my nine year old decided a few days back that she wanted to cut her hair and get bangs. Just like that. Just blurted it out. "Mom, can we go get my haircut? Right this minute? Now? Pleeeeeeeeeaaassssssse???" Ummmm.... okay.  

Maybe that's the way to do the bang thing. Spontaneously. With no drawn out dialog or concern. Because when you do it that way, look how cute it turns out! And those eyes...

Family Portrait - Malibu State Creek Park

Last week I had the opportunity to do a photo shoot for this fun family. They were the winning bid at a silent auction for this event here. And it turns out we live three minutes from each other. And it turns out that we know some of the same people! Love small worlds! 

After a consultation we decided that something with some local mountains in the distance sounded good. We ended up in the Santa Monica Mountains and endured a bit of heat and some pesky flies to get some some fab late afternoon shots. These guys were so great and playful with each other. Thank you!

A few of my artsy favorites... I think this pano would look awesome over their couch!

 

Fourth of July Sweetness

Ya know those soft sugar cookies the grocery store bakery sells? The kind with the yummy, sugary frosting with different seasonal themes? Well, I decided it would be great to make my own from scratch for our fourth of July weekend. I found a recipe online that said it would taste just like those. Soooo, my daughter and I set out to make these yummy treats. However... that recipe lied!  Our cookies are the blandest things I've ever made! And the edges are all dry... boo. LOL They look cute however:

Does anyone have a recipe that really does taste like those cookies in the store? One that you have made and tried and confirmed to be soft, sugary heaven? Let me know! Oh, and Happy Fourth!

Things I Love!

Baby portraits - Isn't she scrumptious?

My BFF from when I was 13 showed me some baby photos of her friend Ann Marie's newborn, only hours old. The gorgeous creature had a full head of reddish hair and the face of an angel. Fast forward four months and here she was calling me to do Baby "O"'s first official photos! I was so excited and couldn't wait to get the darling to myself. Baby O was just up from her nap and we had so much fun playing in her room, especially when their dog Sierra wanted in on some camera lovin'. I usually have a hard time narrowing down blog photos and this one was really hard:

 

This little chair used to belong to her big brother...

Sierra getting in on the action...

 

Big brother love...

The whole fabulous family...

And of course Sierra's close up!