Pacifiers and Photography : 2015 A New Year, a New Challenge

I sat down and pulled up Google, something I do for literally EVERYTHING, trying to find a new challenge for this year. I found a couple I kind of liked but realized I was going through the list of each one and deliberately finding which themes I didn't like. One of the things I didn't like about last year's challenge was that sometimes, I took pictures I really didn't like but ended up using them because they "fit the theme". While it pushed me to think outside of the box and try and come up with a different way to interpret the theme... I found out that I kind of just didn't want to do that haha! I like the box that I normally think in :) Another thing I learned this past year is that my favorite pictures, of Avery and of other people, are ones that aren't posed... that are spontaneous and tell a story. I LOVE lifestyle photography. Plus, what good is trying to force a 16 month old into a pose.. it just doesn't make sense!!. Most of my favorite pictures from last year are ones where I just let Avery do her thang and I snapped away in the process. ERGO, my friends, I here-on-out challenge myself to take a photo a week of my tiny tot doing things that she wants to do, being herself, playing with the pup, playing in the snow, smelling some flowers... whatever the hell we want to do!!!! This is just another way that I can document what her little stinker self is up to. Some big things are happening this year... so why not set myself up to win and say I'm gonna take pictures of it all? Seems pretty smart if I may say so myself. It also forces me to REALLY take my camera everywhere I go... who knows when she is going to do something awesome and I will need to take a pictures of it! So, here we go, Week 1 of 2015!!

This weekend I rented a lens for a shoot I did and I figured I would try and snap a picture before I had to take it back. I took my camera out of the bag, threw my lens on, and Avery immediately started running around. Why be cooperative when she can sprint around the room? I then decided I would throw Fern Gully on the TV.. that's right, it's on Netflix. Big Batty fan over here. The only downside... now all Avery wanted to do was watch the movie. Good thing she has recently decided she is a monkey! I opened the shades to get some good light and she immediately climbed up onto the couch so she could look outside in the backyard. She likes to climb up to the very top of the couch and sit on the ledge and just look outside. I sometimes love it.. sometimes it makes me feel like she is longingly looking outside, dreaming about being outside .. like we never take her out there or something. I swear we do! She then jumped down and ran over to our patio sliding door and stuck her face to it, too! Outside is soooo cool! And I'm sure any of you moms out there can relate, or even anyone with a dog... my glass windows that are reachable by my tiny monsters, are NEVER clean. So, you will have to excuse the messy window, but at least I put evidence as to why it is the way it is. Here are some silly pictures from our day inside watching Fern Gully because of the wind and cold.