Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Blog about: Photog.


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I'm going to give this February photo a day thing on Instagram a shot.

By the end of the month I will have a nice little compilation of 29 (leap year!) images to show for it. That is, if I do my homework. Oh well I'll cheat if I have to. I love photography. Looking at it, doing it, all that junk. I would love to do more but I don't really have the skills or resources to complete my visions. I am crazy for really crazy grandiose art and fashion photography. (To get a taste of MY taste in art and photography, you may check out my fairly out of date but probably still relevant Favorites page on deviantart.com: http://madison0922.deviantart.com/favourites/ . No wait, I just checked and it's not really relavent. Still some cool stuff though, if you're bored. And then if you're still bored you can go look at my gallery! Lots of old stuff in there. Yikes. That’s how I met Randy, I'll share that story another day.) Anything avant-garde and BIG usually grabs my attention. Bright colours or bold contrast or stark monotones. As for subject matter I am a fan of people and portraits, but that is not to say other things don't catch my eye. It's a wide range of taste, I'm ok with that. I did do some photography in school but since they were not really focused on the technical aspects of photography, as I said, I do not have the skills necessary to bring my creative visions to life (or the time, equipment, models, props, locations and all the other wonderful things that come together to make a really amazing photograph).

I do however; carry an iPhone with me 99% of the time so I have access to photographing every moment of my life. This comes in handy with children. I thought with having the second I would take less photos, be too busy. Turns out newborns sit around doing nothing but look cute a lot of the time while their older siblings run around doing hilarious things only to take breaks to pose lovingly with their new siblings.


So I have a lot of photos of that. I also have a decent digital SLR (Nikon D90) that I take with me when I can, but mostly use around the house, trying to increase the quality of those moments when Wyatt bends down to kiss Otis' sweet head. I also take pictures of the food I make. I was sooo busy baking tonight, I will be doing a post tomorrow about that.
Here are some of those captive moments from the last couple weeks:
Craining to see Dad.

Juggling trains.  Hilarious.

Punched!



Ninja baby.

Starting bad habits but making the best memories of my life.

Monday, January 30, 2012

Blog about: Awkward encounters

So today Randy was home from work with a bad cold. I am recovering from the same illness, feeling somewhat better today so I could take care of my man with the man-cold (man-cold reference here:Man Stroke Woman). After a morning of hanging out with the family, (which now also includes two house guests, Tom and Ben, kitties we are watching for friends) pancakes, tea, organizing the boys clothes and my clothes (two garbage bags worth of donations, yippee!), vegan grilled cheese and chilli for lunch, some It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and more tea served alongside homemade blueberry pie I felt up to an outing.

This is Tom. Ben is camera shy so far but he is beautiful, so I hope to get some photos of him soon.
Mmm.
I have only been out of the house once without Otis, which was Saturday, when I went to get a few groceries and was gone about an hour total, maybe. Granted, he is only 3 weeks old so that is pretty good. Today the plan was to go to Michael’s to get the supplies to convert my BumGenius 3.0 diapers to snaps. Unfortunately Michael’s supplies were unsatisfactory to my needs, so I will have to order them online or something. I was feeling good so I decided to get the rest of the groceries that I was unable to procure at Foodland on my aforementioned baby-less adventure. Got lots of fun stuff, olive oil cooking spray, jalapeƱos, Italian seasoning, etc... Exciting, grown up stuff. Decided to stop at the Wine Rack on my way out. Yes, I am sick with a cough so maybe not for tonight. But later this week it might come in handy.

Here is where the awkward encounter took place.

The single employee working at the small store was busy so I carefully chose my random bottle of Jackson Trigg’s and waited at the register. After a short wait the other customer left (without buying anything?) and the guy came to the counter. Looked at my in the eyes for a little too long before greeting me like a normal customer service representative. I am sensitive to weird eye contact, I hate it. Who likes it though, really? Perhaps pausing to judge whether I was of age, which I get. No makeup and hair pulled back, I look a little young. Then asked me what happened to my ears. I was taken aback. I have had questions asked about my earrings etc before, but not in such a confrontational and rude weird way. My eyes widened and I said, after several moments of silence, "Nothing?" And some mumblings that escape my memory, from both of us. Then he asked for my ID. Half thought he was going to ask me for a second (that used to happen all the time when I was in University, my hair changed a lot) but nope, got my mom-wine in my mom-cart that was loaded with 10kg of flour and several packages of the discount toilet paper and I was good to go load up my mom-wagon. Couldn't he have asked me about wine instead of my jewelry?

OK so maybe I am overreacting a little, but this guy made me really uncomfortable. Was I asking for it? You know, having body modifications and facial piercings and tattoos. It's a personal choice, and I choose it because I like it. Not because I want to talk about it with strangers. Especially strangers who have no actual interest in actually learning about it, but rather use it as an invitation to mock me. I hereby revoke that invitation. I am generally a reserved and shy-ish person so confrontation isn't something I am used to. I am also apparently not quick and clever with come backs, as I think this would help me to let go when things like this happen. "The jerk store called, they're running out of you!" Obviously it is any persons right to say whatever they want to me or anyone else. Doesn't make it any less rude.

Anywho, I got home and vented to my wondrous husband and beautiful bouncing babies and really couldn't care less about what anyone thinks about me other than these guys, there are so many more important things to worry about! It does make me think about the things that other people get "picked on" about, that, and all the times I have accidentally been rude to someone, friends or acquaintances or strangers (and these memories make me feel sooo awkward). There’s lots of things that people choose, and lots of things that people cannot choose, any combination of which they might be completely happy with or self conscious about (and for that they probably thank you not to call attention to it thankyouverymuch), that's their business. These differences can be a part of what makes the world interesting in so many ways, there are so many experiences to learn from. Next time I hope I can keep my cool and say "Is that a serious question?"

The important things:
Randy and Otis and of course,
Wyatt, hipsterbaby.

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Fresh Start January 2012

Hello Blog Readers!
I only posted ONE recipe last year, and it was in December. I am hoping to start writing more here, including some recipes but more personal posts as well.
We recently welcomed our second son Otis into the world, so there will be plenty of cute baby pictures to supplement the cute toddler photos of Wyatt (he turned 2 in November) and of course the FOOD!



So here is a list of places to find me. There are a lot of places. Some more interesting than others:
madison0922.deviantart.com
www.facebook.com/pages/Paintings-by-Madison-Conlin/154741417896688
twitter.com/madisonconlin
www.flickr.com/people/30605854@N03/
madisonconlin.tumblr.com/
www.youtube.com/user/madisonconlin/videos/
instagram for iPhone: madisonconlin

I will be back again very soon.