WPPI in Las Vegas

I just got back home from traveling (yet again!) This time I was in crazy Las Vegas at the WPPI convention and trade show. (Wedding & Portrait Photographers International) It was a whirlwind (and sleep deprived) trip full of amazing photographers, fabulous parties, new friends and brilliant speakers. I had such a great time rooming with my great friend Nicole and my head is just spinning with all the new ideas and inspiration that I have buzzing around up there.

I didn't take many photos throughout the convention but I do have these fun photo booth photos from Becker's party.

First up Nicole and I

The party was hosted by the super talented wedding photographer, Becker. Check out his website for some drool worthy photos.
Anne Ruthmann is Nicole's mentor and a new friend. She is a brilliant photographer and a beautiful person willing to share so much of her knowledge and time to other photographers.
We had way too much fun in the photo booth.

Next up is Carmen, Nicole, me and Anne.
On our last day in Vegas, Nicole and I rented a car and drove into the desert to take some photos of each other. Here are a few of my favorites that I captured of the lovely Nicole.

I played around with the next photo so I showed it before and after.

Hailey

While Hailey was job shadowing me, we walked around downtown Annapolis and I had Hailey check out what it's like to be on the other side of the camera. She's so adorable so it was really easy to get some great photos.

I can't believe that this is the same Hailey that use to follow me around at 8yrs old.

Future Photographer Hailey!

Yesterday I spent the day with Hailey (a 9th grader at Broadneck High School) who was job shadowing me for her English class. She wants to be a photographer so she followed me around for the day to see how it's done (at least according to me :)
Hailey and I go way back and I have been very close friends with her family for many years so it was an especially fun day for me.
First up, Hailey and I when I picked her up.

We spent some time in downtown Annapolis doing some great photos of Hailey which I will post tomorrow and then we headed over to Severn for our photo shoot with baby Emily. I showed Hailey a few things and then she took control, doing the majority of the shooting. The first 2 photos are mine and the rest are all Hailey's. I was very impressed with her photos.

Before I took Hailey home she wanted to do some more photos so she did a mini photoshoot of me. It's always fun to be on the other side of the camera from time to time. Hailey did a great job.. I just added a little bit of a vintage feel to them in photoshop.

While we were taking photos these dogs came up to act as a prop. I added some texture to this one. What do you think?
Stay tuned for photos from Hailey's photo shoot.

{Re}Create ~ Open for Business!

My friend Danielle introduced me to this fantastic website http://www.etsy.com/ where you can buy and sell all things homemade. Since I've been craftin it up so much lately I decided I wanted to make my own etsy store. I want my store to feature mainly repurposed items, mainly stuff made out of other stuff. I just set it up today and started getting items uploaded to my store and although it still needs lots of work it is officially open for business. In fact I was in the process of uploading my first few items when I had my first sale. How cool is that?!

Anywho.. check me out at.

http://www.steviegrace.etsy.com/

sidenote - my awesome banner was made by my genius friend Danielle

And because no post is complete without a photo here is one of a few new bracelets I made out of old bottles. To see more you have to go to my store...

Cereal Bar Intervention

Is there a support group for people addicted to cereal bars? Because my family has a bit of a problem.

Craftastic!!

While I'm waiting out the last few weeks of my winter hibernation I have decided to try out a few new art projects.
First up is my favorite, soldered glass pendants. They are 1"x1" photos sandwiched in between 2 pieces of glass and soldered together. Then they are wrapped in wire to create the pendant. I will also have custom pendants available with your photos in them.
This is the front and back of the pendant.

Next up I took a bamboo tile placemat apart and painted them and collaged them and made them into a few necklaces.

Keeping in my current theme of recycled art I made some wallets out of newspaper and old magazines. I have been using mine as a business card holder.


Another recycled art medium I like is old sweaters. If you wash a sweater in hot water and put it in the dryer it shrinks up and then you can cut it apart and create with it without it unraveling. You can make so many things out of old sweaters but to start out with I took a bunch of sweaters and cut them up into squares and then made a funky scarf.

I took small pieces of sweaters and made little wallets too.

Then I decided to get a little ambitious. It still has some finishing touches to make before it can be posted but what do you think I'm attempting to make out of this pile of sweaters??