Life Archives - Page 5 of 6

A Birthday in Quarantine

Savannah’s 14 birthday fell during our epic “Stay at Home” quarantine Spring of 2020. We all enjoyed good health, beautiful weather, but had to be creative in how we chose to celebrate with family and friends.

My sister dropped by with her kids to surprise Savannah for her birthday and Savannah was able to bake cupcakes with her cousin. She wanted to deliver a boxed cupcake to a group of local friends and then all join up that evening on a Zoom call to all eat their pineapple dole whip cupcakes together.

Here is a little video of her special day.

14 star balloons for 14 years of fun!

Savannah I hope you are able to look back on your 14th birthday and smile for the unique period of time in which you have been able to live and grow through. A birthday in which we were able to completely stop time and be fully present to make memories together with your family and friends.

I know you are missing the structure of school, your friends, and the band trip to Orlando you should be leaving for this week.

I pray we are able to successfully help you bridge the gap between middle school and high school in the coming months and your generation will be a step ahead of the previous generation in your abilities to empathize, create, innovate, and see the good in all circumstances.

I am thankful we were able to grab a few spring portraits at the beginning of our quarantine with our quick trip to Gibbs Gardens.

Do you have any loved ones who have celebrated a birthday during the Spring 2020 quarantine? How did you choose to make their day special?

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Categories: Life

High Five Friday – Lush Life

I want you all to meet my dear friend, Jennifer Pink Gumbert. She owns and operates the most amazing Art Gallery and Event Space called 🌱Lush Life 🌱 in Cumming, GA.

She took a dream and made it reality by merging all her passions into one space. For over 20 years she has represented local Atlanta artists and is now able to house their work in a gallery format. Her husband is a chef and their family has worked many years at catering local events and they know the need for a local space that can be rented out for a reasonable rate for small gatherings. The past 6 years Jennifer has been teaching and sharing her passion for chemical free living with Young Living Essential Oils products, and hosts regular hands-on classes at this space.

The Lush Life Event space has been open for 1.5 years and has been used to host events and gatherings that include local chamber meetings, birthday parties, baby and bridal showers, potlucks, business meetings, photography studio, tea parties, and informational events.

Jennifer’s daughter, Grace Gumbert, is a regular presenter at classes at Lush Life. I was recently able to work with Grace for her senior portraits and she wanted to use some of her favorite paintings at Lush Life as backgrounds. Grace is a naturally beautiful young woman, but I was pleased with how the rich colors of the artwork complemented her youth and vitality.

I would like to give a High Five to Lush Life for staying the course during this difficult Spring season. In a time when all public gatherings have been temporarily halted, I know the burden this places on ALL small business owners. When gatherings begin to resume, I would encourage you to reach out to Jennifer about hosting your next gathering at Lush Life if you live in the Cumming or Northern Atlanta area.

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Categories: Family, Life, Photography, Spoiled Rotten Photography

Picture Project

The past 9 days I helped Spoiled Rotten Photography host the #SRPpicturePROJECT. This was a fun project we put together to share with the preschools and parents that we work with as well as our friends and anyone who wanted to join. The purpose of the project was to take one picture each day to represent what you were doing, sensing, and feeling throughout your QuaranTIME. Our generation has never experienced so much TIME spent at home with limited disruptions and obligations. Each of 9 photographs were to be placed into a grid that could be shared, printed out, and saved as a memory to this special time.

We partnered with some other AMAZING local small businesses who sponsored each day, giving away some very cool prizes! We are giving everyone until Monday, April 13 to submit their completed 9 grid to be eligible to win prizes, so you can still jump in this week and participate if you missed out last week!

I shared some of these pictures along the way on my social media, but here is the full story behind each picture.

Day 1 – Photograph something PURPLE

I love watching the purple wisteria vines pop up in the most unusual places during the month of March! We found a hidden patch to photograph the girls while it was at its peak.

Day 2 – Photograph something I SEE

I had begun seeing many women, including my mother, sewing face masks for the frontline health care workers, and had a vision for this portrait that I wanted to photograph my mother for. We Can Sew It!

Day 3 – Photograph something I SMELL

The girls and I got up early one morning to drive to a local strawberry field to buy a bunch of strawberry baskets to deliver to friends and family. I love the smell of fresh strawberries in the spring!

Day 4 – Photograph something I HEAR

Daily I hear the sound of my feet hitting the pavement in the 2 mile loop in my neighborhood. I have a favorite Pandora station that inspires my thoughts and it is this time alone with God that prompts me to take my next step.

Day 5 – Photograph something I TASTE

I recently picked up some sourdough starter from my sister and we baked our first batch of homemade sourdough bread this week. It tastes so good, and is so easy to make.

Day 6 – Photograph something I FEEL

I had all the feels as this 24×30 metallic canvas arrived on my doorstep! I took this silhouette portrait featuring my girl’s interests… clarinet and guinea pig, last summer shortly after we moved into our new house and learned of the beautiful sunsets from atop the mountain. This was a project the girls and I envisioned together and they were just as excited about the process and having this canvas printed to hang on our walls as I was.

Day 7 – Photograph something I PLAY

We have been inspired by all the sidewalk chalk drawings and messages that have flooded our newsfeed and were able to find the last box of Crayola chalk at Michaels. After creating chalk mosaics in our driveway, we got permission to leave sidewalk chalk drawings and messages on the sidewalk outside our Grandmother’s retirement apartment since they have been more isolated during this time of sheltering in place.

Day 8 – Photograph something I READ

I have been digging deeper in to my Bible to find peace, hope and direction for the here and now and what is to come.

Day 9 – Photograph something I GROW

Our time of staying home was kicked off by Sarah Beth’s garden party and we have since planted some herbs, flowers, and vegetables to watch sprout and grow and hopefully be able to enjoy the produce of in the months to come.

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Categories: Faith, Family, Life

National Rainbow Day

Did you know that April 3 is observed as National Rainbow Day? This morning when I learned that Friday, April 3, 2020 was National Rainbow Day, I couldn’t help but think of a better symbol of hope our nation currently needs after 3 weeks of many families practicing “social distancing” and staying home to help contain the spread of COVID-19.

Rainbows are caused when rays of light from the sun hit water droplets which reflect some of the light back towards an observer. The water droplets are usually rain drops, but could also be spray from a waterfall, a fountain, or even fog. To see a rainbow, you must have the sun shining behind you and the water droplets in front of you.

Throughout time rainbows have been seen as a sign of beauty, hope, and promise.

In a time period where we are fearful of a virus contained in human water droplets, let’s not forget how we can reflect the Son’s (Jesus’) rays of light that are shining through us to create a beautiful portrait of hope and promise that is bigger than any virus and assurance that we will make it through this period of uncertainty.

The sun may be shining where you live today so hunting down a rainbow is out of the picture, but there are many ways you can create a rainbow to spread hope in your home or local community.

A list of 20 Rainbow themed activities you can use to spread BEAUTY, HOPE, and PROMISE today.

Tie-dye t-shirts
Draw rainbow chalk drawings on sidewalks
Bake a rainbow cake
Paint rainbows on the windows of your home
Skittle Rainbow Experiment
Dye hard boiled eggs for Easter
Rainbow Shaving Cream Marbled Art
Torn paper rainbows for preschoolers
Make Fruit Loop cereal rainbows
Rainbow handprint rainbow for toddlers
Coffee filter rainbow craft
Make rainbow fruit kabobs
Paint rainbows and messages on rocks and leave on neighbor’s front steps.
Read classic children’s books like The Rainbow Fish, Elmer the Elephant
Make rainbow slime
Rainbow yarn art
Make recycled rainbow crayons from melting crayon pieces
Make rainbow juice popsicles
Go on a color hunt throughout your house photographing single color items and merge them together for a rainbow collage.
Write message of hope and encouragement on colored post-it notes and stick on friends and neighbor’s front doors.

Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.

Somewhere over the rainbow skies are blue and the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true.

Make sure to share your rainbow activities on social media and incorporate the following hashtags to inspire and encourage others.

#NationalFindARainbowDay
#FINDaRainbow
#MAKEaRainbow
#BEaRainbow
#CreateLightInTheShadow
#TheWayHomeLife

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Categories: Life, Photography

We Can Sew It!

We Can Sew It! After seeing so many women starting to gather their own personal resources and skills to sew face masks to fill the need in our current healthcare crisis, it made me think of the iconic Rosie the Riveter portrait that represented so many women entering the workforce to fill a need during WWII.

We are currently fighting a different type of war, but the combined efforts of women joining forces through social media are seen and appreciated.

My mother, Vanessa Sauter, was one of the first women I saw talking about taking on this project to provide sewn face masks to her friends in the healthcare fields. My mother allowed me to doll her up for a photoshoot of an image I had envisioned to create with the face mask project 😷, that she and so many others have been working on.

I hope this image represents in a small way the efforts millions are putting forth to help their fellow neighbor. I hope we are all able to use our gifts and talents to create light in the current shadow in front of us!

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Categories: Family, Life

Star Girl

Do you ever judge a book by its cover? Raising my hand high over here! During our extended staycation due to the Coronavirus, I sat down to watch the new Disney+ original movie, Star Girl. The picture for the film recently caught my eye when it popped up as a new movie offering and I wanted to make sure watch it with my girls. I knew nothing about the story line and was judging based on the picture, it would be worth watching.

The movie takes place in small town USA. Without giving away too much of the plot line it contains a powerful message to tweens and teens to stand out from the crowd with all their quirks and the positive power and energy one person can bring to a community and school by not being afraid of who they were made to be.

As we were watching the credits roll, I noticed the movie was based on a book called Star Girl by Jerry Spinelli. As a former 5th grade teacher, I had an instant flashback to remembering the cover of this book. I could visually remember a simple cover with yellow and blue. We looked up the book online and discovered it was published in 2000 and sure enough it was a simple teal cover with a hand drawn green girl and yellow star. We looked among the chapter books lining our book shelf, but couldn’t find it. No doubt I ordered this book through the Scholastic Book Club as I was building my own classroom library from 2002 – 2006 when I was teaching 4th & 5th grade. After moving boxes and boxes of classroom books at least 5 times, I finally sold and let go of 100s of children’s books this past year. I imagine I looked at the cover of this book, having never read it, and tossed it aside because I didn’t think I needed it or my girls would never pick it up to read on their own.

How many times do we miss out on great books and powerful messages because we simply don’t look past the packaging/front cover. Even worse, how quick are we to judge someone based on their appearance that we miss out on the value they could add to our life?

“She was bendable light: she shone around every corner of my day.”
― Jerry Spinelli, Stargirl

While you are enjoying your own Corona staycation this Spring, I highly recommend watching Star Girl on Disney+ with your family or even better order the Star Girl book for your 5th grade+ student to read on their own first and then watch the movie.

I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments after you read Star Girl or watch Star Girl on Disney+!

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Categories: Family, Life, Wellness

Misfits Market

Are you looking to keep fresh, organic produce on hand while you are home with limited access to the grocery store? There has never been a better time to look into home delivery boxes. For several months now our family has enjoyed the benefits of having fresh fruits and vegetables delivered to our doorstep every 2 weeks from Misfits Market.

If you use my referral code: COOKWME-RA9UPK you can save 50% off your first “Madness” box until 3/18/20. Make sure you choose the larger box. You can change the size box and frequency at any time.

We have our Misfits Market box set to arrive every other Thursday. You can pick the day of the week you want it delivered and choose between every week or every other week. My girls love getting to unpack the cold-packed box and see what colorful goodies we received each week.

I love the flexibility of this produce program, because you can change the size and frequency of when you want your box delivered. You can choose to skip a shipment if you will be traveling or don’t need it one week. Also after your first shipment you are given the option to customize and choose which items you would like from the available seasonal options.

We love the opportunity to try new vegetables and experiment with different recipes for using fruits and vegetables. Some of our favorite ways to use the produce have been:

• Cabbage burgers – Slice cabbage into rounds, sprinkle olive oil, salt and pepper, and roast in oven.

• Cut up roasted vegetables.

• Juices and smoothies – Great way to use celery and kale!

• Apple Pie – We had a surplus of apples that needed to be used before going bad.

• Carrot top pesto

Let me know in the comments. Are you already a member of Misfits Market? Do you subscribe to another food box program that you love?

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Categories: Family, Life

Garden Party

We recently hosted a garden party Birthday for my youngest daughter’s 11th birthday. Luckily we were able to continue with the planned party before the mandated “social distancing” went into affect due to the Coronavirus threat in March.

The table is set and ready for friends to arrive. Continue reading to discover why the door is closed to the party.

If you are going to have a Garden Party, you need to serve pretzel “sticks,” cucumber sandwiches, and pretty fruit.

I found the small floral cups at Trader Joe’s and they were the perfect pop of color to plant in the white painted personalized tin cans.

Chocolate dirt cupcake jars

We found an assortment of tea cups and saucers at the thrift store to use as planters for succulent plants. The girls could pick which green succulent they wanted to plant in their tea cup. We ordered an assortment of 20 succulents from Amazon that allowed the girls to decide what plant personality they wanted to plant in their cup.

The morning of her party, Sarah Beth came running in my room saying, “I have the best idea! I want to make an escape room with clues to let everyone into the party room.” I didn’t quite understand what she had in mind, so she ran with it and hide clues around the room with a number. The girls had to line up the clues in order and tell Sarah Beth the number sequence to unlock the door. I’ve got to give her credit, it was a great idea and fun to watch the girls working together to crack the code!

In true character, Sarah Beth began planning the decor weeks ago. She gathered all my fake flowers and arranged everything just the way she wanted, complete with a garden doll canopy/tent.

Have you ever hosted a garden theme birthday party? I would love to see pictures from your party, or feel free to take and use what we pulled together for your next garden party.

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Categories: Life, Photography, Spoiled Rotten Photography

High Five Friday – Kara Kellner

Meet my friend and business associate, Kara Kellner. I got to watch her adorable son, grow up in front of my camera lens at Primrose Meadowbrook. Little did Kara know when she sent her little boy to preschool in 2016, that his cap and gown portraits would tug at her heart so much that she would begin inquiring and dreaming about the opportunity to own her own piece of Spoiled Rotten Photography and be able to reproduce those same memories for families in Birmingham.

Kara and her family joined the Spoiled Rotten Photography family in 2017 and I have watched her work relentlessly to build a sustainable business for her family. That little brown-eyed, brown-headed little boy has become the #1 cheerleader and advocate for their family’s business.

At our Spoiled Rotten Photography conference in January, Kara was awarded the Purple Crown Award. The Purple Crown is awarded to the franchise owner who excels in all the SRP core values from the previous year.

Since my family moved back to Birmingham in 2019 and selling my Alpharetta SRP franchise in 2020, I have been between roles and careers. Back in December, Kara called me distraught knowing that she would need an additional photographer to make it through her Spring season, so I gladly stepped in to fill in the gaps for her wherever she needed help. It has been a pleasure working with Kara this Spring to provide beautiful portraits for the Birmingham preschool families.

Kara has built a nurturing and loving relationship with all the schools she works with locally and it is evident when I have walked into the schools and I hear the owners, directors, teachers, and parents raving about the quality she provides.

If you know of any daycares, mother’s day out programs, or preschools in the Birmingham area that aren’t currently using Spoiled Rotten Photography for their Spring and Fall Portraits, you can send me those names and referrals or reach out to Kara directly at kellners@spoiledrottenphotography.com. Kara has a goal of adding at least 3 new partner schools to her Fall schedule and I am confident she will connect with the right schools who will be blessed with amazing school pictures

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Categories: Life, Photography, Spoiled Rotten Photography

High Five Friday – Vinehouse Nursery

For today’s High Five Friday, I would like to give a shout out to Vinehouse Nursery in Alabaster, Alabama.

I had the privilege of being able to fill in as the Spoiled Rotten Photography photographer for their Spring Portraits this week.

Vinehouse Nursery is only a few years old and has organically grown each year as they add a classroom to meet the needs of their growing family of children. Depending on the age of the enrolled child, they move through 4 “Vine” themed programs – Seedlings, Sprouts, Stems, and Sunflowers. The classrooms and decor have a beautiful modern flair to reflect each of these growth stages.

From the minute I walked in the door, the owner Khiari Mcalpin, and all her staff were so friendly and super helpful. I felt like an honored guest being in their school. You could tell the children were all very well adjusted to their environment, their teachers, and other students.

Kaitlyn Mackey and I had the best time playing with all the children and capturing beautiful Spring Portraits on the new Daydream set. There should be a lot of proud parents as they receive their online galleries for viewing and ordering!

If you are looking for a clean, safe, calm, and nurturing environment for your babies in the Alabaster area, I highly recommend checking out Vinehouse Nursery! Or if you have a heart for working with children, I do believe they may be looking to hire an additional part time or full time employee.

Do you have a local business that you believe I should feature on a future High Five Friday? Send me a message and let’s chat!

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