Life {Unscripted} Blog Circle: January Volume

Thank you for taking a look at Diana's blog at Find your Happiness, if you missed it click HERE to go back.

Welcome to the January Volume of our Life {Unscripted} Blog Circle. I am still so honored to be a part of this circle. 

It has been a good 5 months, we said goodbye to some photogs, and welcomed some new ones along the way, but wither we were saying goodbye or hello some great friendships have been made.

Remember to click on the link at the bottom to follow the blog circle around, and not miss out on what AnnMarie of One33 Photography has to share.

January for us brought lots of new changes. Including my youngest daughter getting glasses. 

It has been amazing to see her LOVE for reading come back now that

she can see a little better.

In honor of her new gear, she wanted to do a photo shoot, 

I am always up for that!!! 

The librarywas were she choose to go, 

and playing the role of the librarian was how she 

wanted to do it. This month's photos were a little on the planed side, but there are some unscripted shots that happen when 

you send an 8 year old out and 

follow her around.

Here is our January {Unscripted} 

Thank you to my beautiful Sunshine, for being an amazing model.

If you would like to share your unscripted memories with us join us 

HERE

 Follow the Blog Circle to AnnMarie from One33 Photogfraphy

HERE

Hour by Hour in a Day Challenge

This year I am trying to challenge myself in photography, and have

spent some time trying to pinpoint those things I 

would like to learn and grow at.

Seeing as this year I am doing another 365, I figured an 

hour by hour challenge might just be what I needed.

Well I can never do anything alone, so I challenge some of my fellow 

Life {Unscripted} photogs, to join in.

I had so much fun doing this, and can not believe all the photos in a day

I am missing out on capturing.

So here it is, taking a photo at the top of every hour,

Here is my 7am-9pm

7:00 - My morning cappuccino with a little FB time.

8:00- Kisses goodbye to sissy as she leaves for school.

9:00- Lazy cartoon time.

10:00- Snack time smiles.

11:00- can't believe how fast he has caught on to potty training.

12:00- Lunch time.

1:00- Today's bedtime toy was his care bear and a bottle,

2:00- while the kids are asleep, well so is the dog.

3:00- Tuesday routine, waiting in the window for the garbage truck to

come pick up all our garbage at the curb.

4:00- after school fun of doing homework.

5:00- Chore time. 

6:00- washing up for dinner time.

7:00- Quick run to the library to pick up our books on hold.

8:00- rub a dub, dub.

9:00- trying to squeeze past her tablet time over the 9pm mark.

Top 5 tips for doing the 365

YAY!!! Happy last day of 2014. I can not believe I have now finished my first 365. What a year, full of so many memories captured. Since I have just completed my first 365, I wanted to highlight some of the tips I learned along the way. Yes I could make this a top 25 list, but decided to narrow it done to 5. If you have not yet tried this journey, highly recommend it. It is amazing the level you can bring your photography too, just by picking up your camera everyday.


1. No rules.

Since last year was my first year, I choose to have no rules put on myself. I did try to focus on capturing my kids, but some days you see a leaf that catches your eye, and that ends up being your photo of the day. Embrace it, just take a photo a day of anything.

2. Do it for you.

This is one of the most important lessons I learned, and once I got it through my head, my photography improved. I had to take a step back about halfway through, to better understand my real goals for the 365. I was getting to focused on topping the yesterday's photo. I felt that every photo to everyone had to be the WOW factor. But I was not on this journey to pump out amazing work everyday. I did it to become more familiar with my camera, to capture those moments I might miss otherwise. They were all treasures to me, even if to you its just a photo of messy wet hair, to me it's the memory of how she always missed those stands while washing it.

3. Take the same photo.

365 days is a long time, and you only have so many rooms in your house and so many places to visit. Don't be afraid to take the same photo. For example we did a lot of sleeping & bath photos, but in the end it's worth it to see how your little ones have grown, and how your photography has grown from your first bath photo till your last bath photo.

4. Reuse old photos, a little cheat won't hurt.

I drove myself insane some days. It would be 10 pm at night, only to realize we were so busy I forgot to grab a shot. But yesterday we were around home and I got a nap photo, a bath photo, a playing photo. Well let me tell you, using one from yesterday won't matter to anybody. I think out of my whole 365 photos there might be 25 that I used from the day before. Now that I am at the end, I could not even point everyone of those out, I have even forgotten which ones.

5. Share your images with friends & family. 

 Post it some where you know you will have a following, like every day on  Facebook album, or once a week in a blog post. This helped me not to quit the journey. There were days I thought I would throw in the towel, but knowing I had friends following me, waiting for today's photo, keep me wanting to keep sharing them. If it were not for all my friends and family following along, I might of gave up. Nothing beats a support team and a cheer squad!

If you want to see more, you can view the full 365 album

HERE