moving!

I promise I haven’t forgotten to update my blog, but we’ve been going through some little changes 🙂 

My space upgrade was running out on this site, and I knew I didn’t want to put more money into keeping it, because it doesn’t represent me very well. I struggled on what I should do, but finally decided that my “website” wasn’t being used as much as my blog. So I decided just to keep a blogsite, instead of having  two seperate sites. So, after this post, I’ll be posting soley on the new blog – www.mallorydawnphotography.com  🙂

To all my readers who have been on this blog from the beginning, thank you so much. And to all of my readers who have dropped in along the way, or just stop by on occasion to get caught up, or the ones that are visiting right now for the first time, thank you.

Two years ago I never would have imagined myself going anywhere in photography. I was just doing it because I loved it. Now I’m still doing it because I love it, I have dreams, and I have so incredibly far to go. I have so much to learn, I feel like every single day I learn something new, and I know that part will never change. I also know that 2 years from now I look at the pictures on this site and be somewhat embarrassed that I put myself out there like I did, haha, in fact, I already get embarrased by some of the stuff/pictures I post on here because I just know, I have so far to go.  But YOU have encouraged me beyond anything I would have imagined, and I thank you, so much for that.

So change your Google Reader or whatever reader you use, and put the new site in! www.mallorydawnphotography.com 🙂 I hope to see you there!

title unknown.

Growing up my cousins, siblings and I spent a good portion of our time at our grandparents house – Mum & Pop’s. Not because our parents weren’t around, but because if one of the cousins was there, that meant we all should be. It was like, an unspoken rule. And if you ask us, we had the best childhood ever. Sometimes we get on a role of reminising, and we all  end up laughing until our stomachs hurt.

We had the coolest clubhouses ever. Well, to us they were anyway. Really it was only a cluster of 3-4 tree’s, then we would make our little safe haven in the middle of them. The boys had one, and the girls had one. What made one clubhouse better than the other was determined by the amount of junk one had verses the other. Literally, I mean junk. There was a junkyard back in the middle of the woods. Back then it felt like it took us forever to walk back there; in reality it is embarrassing how short the distance was. You got the squealing-fuzzy-tummy feeling once you saw the opening in the trees, and the light gleaming down; you knew you had made it to the junkyard. Glass jars were the main finds, if you found one that wasn’t broken it was of much higher value. And then we found a rusted old bike, and the boys found a toilet. Seriously. They carried that toilet back, and they probably used it knowing them. We had so much STUFF from that old junkyard. And for any holiday, our clubhouse would be decorated for the occasion too.  Ah, those were the days.

While watching my younger cousins play at Mum & Pop’s house a couple of months ago, I thought about how many memories they were making without even realizing it. And while it seems so normal to them to go to Mum & Pop’s right now, one day they too will think back and know; those, were the best day’s of my life.

it’s personal.

{My brother Brett, and my Dad}

Growing up my dad was always a volunteer firefighter. Always. And I went through spells of hating it, embarrassed by it, and envious of it. Hating it because he would bolt out of the house during supper or birthday parties. Embarrassed by it because, well, they’re rednecks and proud of it. J and envious of it because for the most part they have a ‘brotherhood’ that makes most that know them a little jealous.

As you probably know, I’m the oldest of 7 kids, there were 3 boys born after me, and then my 3 sisters. So I was 10 before my first sister was born. And since the majority of my childhood at that point consisted of fishing, cowboys & Indians, and shooting BB guns; well it’s safe to say I was a little on the tomboy side.

I spent most of my childhood day’s trying to keep up with my brothers, since they had hatchet’s to randomly smack at tree’s, I felt it necessary to have a hachet for that too. And since Colton learned to ride the bike first, I thought he would be the perfect person to teach me how to ride a bike, until he told me to jump the ramp. (He could have warned me bad things happen once the first tire gets over the edge of the ramp and you are going super slow.) Since they thought things were fun, they had to be, right?

Me chasing my brothers ambitions spilled over into my teenage years. They all wanted to be firefighters just like dad. So I tagged along to the fire shows, and hung out at the station with dad when I could. When I turned 16 I knew I would never be able to actually be a firefighter. I’m too much of a baby. I can’t even control a bonfire, let alone a house fire. SO, get this, I decided I would be the “fire station photographer”; this was WAY before I actually developed dreams of owning a photography business, it was more of a lazy way of getting to stay around the station with my dad and brothers. At this time Colton was 15, and like I said I was 16, so I had my license, and he didn’t J we were hanging out at the station, and a fire was dispatched. “OKAY, here’s my chance! Let’s go take pictures!” Colton’s dream was firefighting. He was PUMPED that we were going to this fire call. We jumped in my little burgundy Honda and started towards our destination. He say’s “Mallory you have to turn on your hazard lights, and drive fast!” Wellllll, if you know me, you know that I drive like a grandma. For real. Hands at 10 & 2, and usually maybe 1 mile over the speed limit. I ended up buckling under pressure and pulled over for the other volunteer firefighters with their strobe lights on, pass me. I thought Colton was going to die. Be bent over in my front passenger seat with his elbows on his knees, and his face in his hands saying “this is the most embarrassing day of my life” over and over. That was the day, I quit chasing my brother’s dreams.

those boys.

dear boys: never grow up.

Of course – jumping the picnic table was a total necessity.

My favorite, favoriteeee of the day 🙂

Mister so-fis-ti-cated

making it :)

Last week was one of those weeks. Ya know,  the kind that makes you feel like you need to step back, take out your brain, and play with it for a little bit?

Right now I’m in a little rut; I’m struggling. My health is in total control of my life right now. Quite honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever felt so physically (and mentally) miserable in my entire life. You know that saying Make It or Break It? That saying is how I would title my life right now. Writing this on my blog; yeah, it’s embarrassing. And yes, I struggled on whether or not I should even post this – but I feel defeated. I know that potiental future clients may read this with disgust. But those of you who already read my blog, know that my health is my struggle.. my trial in life. It is, my life. It is me.

I went to the doctor nearly two months ago, my feet had been swelling up the size of balloons. I’m talking serious elephant kankles. The doctor took my blood pressure and said “your a walking stroke at 23 years old”. Saweet.

As he wrote on my prescription on that little white paper tablet; I tried to bite back my sobs, the last thing I wanted was blood pressure medicine at 23 years old. But one tear turned into 2, and then the levee’s broke. I cried like a 5 year old. Uncontrollable sniffs and snubbs. He had just told me I really need to consider gastric bypass surgery. That, hurt my feelings.

But now, I’ve thought about it more over the last 2 months, cried about it, and prayed about it. and in 2 days I’m going to visit one more option and explore that for a while, if it doesn’t work, i’ll be visiting doctors about the lap band surgery.

So since I missed blogging last week, I felt like you should know that I just needed a little blogging break, a blog-vaca, a blogcation? Blogcation sounds cooler, so thats what I’ll call it 🙂

Oh, and becauseeeee pictures make everything better, here’s an engagement shoot I’m working on – LOVE!

giveaway friday!

I’ve decided to post a giveaway 🙂 wanna know what it’s for?

It’s for —–> $150 off a session!

So what does this mean for you?

It means – you will get a FREE session if you book engagement, senior, just because, maternity or newborn shoots. (and with families up to 4 people; add $10 to every person after 4)

TO ENTER:

All you have to do is invite all of your friends to my business page, and tell them to leave a comment with YOUR name in it. The winner will be chosen at random on Saturday May 14th.

For Extra Entries:

The more people that leave your name, the more times you will be entered in the drawing. So if John and Joe both leave comments with your name in them – you will be entered twice 🙂

I rarely EVER do this – so.. you better take advantage while you can 😉

*every single time I do a contest, so many people email me and say “well I wanted to enter but I wasn’t sure I would qualify”– YES! You qualify – So enter! Mainly so I don’t feel like an idiot and never do this again, mmk? :)**

 click here to find me on facebook 🙂

oh… and the contest starts NOW! YAY!

and if you are just seeing this on like… Friday? You can still enter, because the contest doesn’t end untilllll Saturday May 14th 🙂

Sweet Easter :)

I tried to think of quirky words to say, and I think the pictures can just speak for themselves . There was lots of chocolate, dyed eggs, food, 2 birthdays, and some moronic family love on our Easter Sunday 😉 ; and really the family part is what makes it so perfect. My heart is full.

In this post you will find lots of randomness – oh, and mostly Karlin 🙂 she’s a good little model; I can’t resist! I hope your Easter was amazing too!

chronicles of embarrassment: those…grecians.

I graduated homeschool when I was 15, almost 16; so I got a full-time job when I turned 16. And it just so happened, that 3 other girls I grew up with, also graduated around the same time, and we all worked within 10 minutes of each other. So naturally, we went to lunch together like 4 out of 5 days every week. And probably 50% of the time was at one resturant – Showmar’s. At first it was because it was really the only good place around, but then, it was more like because we had made little friends there. It was a locally owned, greek inspired “Casual dining…fast!” place to eat.

Everyone in Showmar’s knew who we were, what we were going to eat, and knew all the nitty-gritty about our dramatic teenage lives.

I like to blame the frequency of our visit’s to Showmar’s on the Grecian’s (is that a word? if not, let’s just go with it ’cause it sounds cool). All those Grecians with their dark flowy hair, and olive skin that tans perfectly, and their abilities to have the best of both worlds – living in the states and having a month long ‘vacation’ every year to visit family in Greece. (to my family: can you move to Greece? I promise I’ll come visit you EVERY year!)

Now, fast forward to now; I’m 23, and I limit myself to Showmar’s twice a month. I can’t help it. But, starting today, I’m doing an intervention on myself. You see, not only do the nice employee’s that work there recognize me, but they know me by name. They know what kind of car I drive, so when they see me pull up, they have my order on the front desk, with everything in the bag ready for me to swipe my debit card and go as soon as I walk in the door. This is all very sweet, but THEN, today, I called to place my order to-go, and they recognized my voice. This is a crisis. And this…. this, is just plain embarrassing.

we’ve got a winner! :)

Okay, so apparently me and 4 other people are the only ones that dreamed big as kids, because we are the only ones that told our stories, haha! Oh well, I’m pretty sure it was the funnest dreams ever 🙂

And because I don’t know anything about doing anything online besides the extreme basics, I’m not sure how people put up the score so fancy from random.org.

So here ya go, taken straight from my phone so you would know I’m not lying, haha! Don’t judge 😉

Amanda – you won! Yay! I’ll be sending you the $15 Starbucks giftcard, and if you want to share…. 😉

when i grow up {plus a little giveaway!}

When I was younger, I had an obsession with reading – when I was about 2’ish, I hated for my mom to read me bedtime stories, because I wanted to read them to her.

Mom and Dad would try to spell things out, so they could have their “secrets”; mom would ask dad what do you want for supper? and dad would say what about t-a-c-o-b-e-l-l?  They were trying to be slick, but I was too smart for that nonsense. I was bound and determined to figure out what they were saying. So I would go sit in the den and spell it out, sound it out, and try and make the decision for them. (really, I was only trying to help…) I felt like reading was a window into an unknown world. And Clark Kent made it look magical, nevermind his bionic superpowers.

Our public library had a ‘story time’ or ‘story hour’ or whatever it was, where a group of kids would go every week and listen to a couple of stories. And once a year they had a contest, whoever read the most books would win a prize. Yep, I won every year. And really, it wasn’t my fault that I was smarter than all the rest of the kids and teachers – if only they would have figured out that even though I read the book 2 years ago, I still remember all the words, so I counted it. I mean duh, at my level how was it humanly possible to read 150- 50 page books in 2 weeks? – um hello, I was 6.

That was about the time I just knew I would become a writer. Every week when we went to story time at the library, mom only allowed us to borrow a couple of books at a time, because naturally they would get lost in our house (thankssss to my brothers), so once I tried convincing her by pleading momma how can I everrrr win the contest win I can only borrow 3 books a week?! She said well since you just love books so much, why don’t you start writing your own?

Wait. You mean to tell me, that at 6 years old, I could write my very own book? I could be rich! I could be the next Dr. Seuss, Stan & Jan Berenstain, or even Walt.Disney! Eeek! My possiblilites were ENDLESS.

But then, I had stage fright – I couldn’t find anything to write about besides these indians:

So this makes me wonder, did you have something you just KNEW you were going be when you grew up? Obviously I had big dreams, they were so magificent to me at the time, am I the only crazy dreamer? 🙂 tell your story!

To enter the giveaway: 1. leave your story! 2.  if you have facebook or twitter – post a link to this blog and tell your friends to enter – and then let me know when you do 🙂

Since Starbucks is the perfect place to read a good book, I’m giving away a $15 giftcard to Starbucks! 🙂 The winner will be chosen Sunday at 12pm by using random.org

[ps – yes i know i’ve always been cursed with a double chin 🙂 the first two pictures above are of me and my brother Colton, and the 3rd one is Colton, Brett, and a family friend – Ethan}