Category Archives: Photography

Volunteer to help with the Cal Poly Rose Float

30 Friday Dec 2011

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Yesterday we took Little T to Pasadena so he could watch the students at Cal Poly work on the Rose Float. Cal Poly has participated in the Pasadena Tournament of Roses Parade every year since 1949. In fact, my relationship with Big T blossomed as we worked on a project for the rose float together. Aw, mush!

For the students, building the Rose Float is an intense year long process, but the fun for the masses begins the week before the Rose Parade when Cal Poly asks volunteers to head over to Pasadena and help out!

The float theme this year (designed by Cal Poly SLO student Kelsey Christoffels) is “To The Rescue”, and features superheroes catching a train that has fallen off a track to help save the day.

The theme relates to Cal Poly students because they go to school to make their community a better place, whether it is through engineering, communication, teaching or landscape architecture. Their hope is to someday be superheroes to their community.

Volunteer Information: 

More than 1000 volunteers come together between Christmas and New Year’s to decorate the Cal Poly float. The program is run completely by student volunteers from both campuses and they’d love to see you and your family there!

  • Free Parking
  • 1 dollar to volunteer
  • Must commit to four hours of volunteer work

Fun Float Facts: 

  • The float will have a moving train, a breaking bridge, a waterfall, and a helicopter with smoke and a spinning rotor. Cool!
  • This will be one of Cal Poly’s tallest floats.
  • It’s the first time that Cal Poly will have a synchronized show.  
  • Approximately 2000 roses will be used the train and capital building.
  • Approximately 2000 mums will be used for the train station and capital building.
  • More than 20 pounds of rice will be used for the float.

If you can’t volunteer, you can still come and see the floats: 

  • Free parking
  • Cost is 10 dollars to visit all three locations
  • Suitable for all ages
  • Tours and Guides to answer all your rose float questions
  • They have pretzels and snack food for sale

Little T loved walking around and seeing the floats. Everyone showed us the flowers they were using and answered our questions. In one of the exhibit rooms, we walked across a scaffold and got to see everyone building from above. The room was full of colors and beautiful floats.

Here’s a few more pictures from the day, we can’t wait to see how the float turns out this year on the day of the parade.

I hope Santa feels like sharing….

23 Friday Dec 2011

Posted by in Photography, The Family

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We’re celebrating Christmas at my Mom’s house tonight. The whole clan is spending the night after spending the day making cookies for Santa.

Hopefully he doesn’t mind sharing a few, because Miss Piggy is looking pretty hungry.

Happy Holidays to all of you!

Love,

Momma J

For more bokeh pictures, give the link below a click:

And *edit for the winner of our flicker scooter* GypsyNicole (#34) is our winner from a random number generator! In her comment, she wrote: “Thank you for the giveaway opportunity and happy holidays!”

Holiday Happenings

23 Friday Dec 2011

Posted by in Photography, The Adventures of Little T, The Family

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A great big box of stocking stuffers from Viva La Vegan Grocery:

Playing outside in a big pile of leaves:

Making silly adjustments to PJ’s because Little T is sooooo tall:

Having time for pretty hairstyles:

Watching Coach at a basketball game:

Getting tickled during half time:

Eating lots and lots of crispy kale:

Drumming in pajamas that don’t match (clearly, we’ve had some pajama issues on this trip):

And enjoying the lights around the neighborhood:

The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree: the presence of a happy family all wrapped up in each other.

20 Tuesday Dec 2011

Posted by in Photography, The Family, The Travels

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~Burton Hillis

Chirstmas for us is a week long family extravaganza. We start the weekend before Christmas at my Dad’s, spend the rest of the week at my Mom’s, drive four hours to get home on Christmas Eve, have Christmas morning in our home, then have Christmas Day with Big T’s family. Not to mention lots of family activities in between. It’s a family gathering marathon.

I got exhausted just writing that!

It can get a little stressful, but we try to take it easy on ourselves when we don’t have time to bake or we have to do something last minute. It all works out in the end.

Here are a few pictures from our first Christmas event at my Dad’s house:

Priceless is seeing my older brother, getting excited over receiving the movie Conan.

My Dad and S-Mom are treating Big T and I to a date night for our Christmas gift, babysitting included! What more can parents ask for? Little T got a little play slide and a musical toy.

After we exchanged gifts, we took a basketball break. Little T wanted to make a basket, so Big T got out the ladder and helped him out a bit.

When basketball was done, we played Dance Revolution on the Wii.

Piggy spent the whole day in the kitchen. She has mastered the skill of looking like she hasn’t eaten in weeks, heh heh.

Speaking of eating, there were lots of tasty treats all around:

Later in the evening the babies went upstairs to play…except for B, she had important phone calls to make.

We had a great time catching up with everyone (and isn’t this the cutest smile ever?):

Meanwhile, the big kids played Oklahoma Monopoly downstairs. I tried to explain to Little T that he wasn’t old enough to play yet, but he just looked at me and said, “come on mom, Oklahoma Monopoly is for everyone”. I can’t argue with that.

ABC OC Trendsetters

15 Thursday Dec 2011

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Wow, I spent the whole day thinking it was Wednesday until Little T’s occupational therapist showed up at 2:30. That’s how crazy it’s been around here! What have I been up to, you ask?

The Disney Wedding team asked me to photograph the holiday trendsetter awards for the Association of Bridal Consultants in Orange County. I’d been planning to go because a few of my photos had been nominated, but was truly honored and thrilled to be asked to work the event.

Here are a few pictures of the table settings in the banquet hall, my jaw dropped when I walked in the room:

My job for the night was to take photos of the guests with Mickey, Minnie, Donald, and Daisy. It was so much fun!

Big T was in heaven because of the dinner menu, and nearly passed out when they opened up a crepe bar. It’s like they knew Big T was coming and planned the menu just for him. It was a great night!

And that’s pretty much what we’ve been up to. Editing photos, getting ready for Christmas, and taking care of Little T! I hope you’re all doing well and enjoying the season. 🙂

~Momma J

Michelle’s Proposal

13 Tuesday Dec 2011

Posted by in Photography, The Family

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I had the honor of photographing M’s engagement yesterday. I can’t even begin to explain how much I love this girl, so I was ecstatic to be able to take her photos. M works with Disney weddings, so the proposal was tricky. AJ wanted to propose at Disneyland because it’s a very special place for both of them, but where could he propose that M hadn’t seen before? This was going to take some special planning, so he asked M’s co-worker Traci if she had any ideas. Traci mentioned they were going to be doing some photos in the Dream Suite. She said she doubted she’d be able to sneak AJ in with a photographer, but she was going to see. AJ knew Michelle would love to have the wedding team there, and he knew it would be something different and special for M. It was tricky though, up until ten minutes before the proposal we still weren’t sure if we were going to be able to make it happen. Right before we were about to switch gears and propose in New Orleans instead, the stars aligned and everything worked out amazingly. It was only able to happen in the Dream Suite because of a number of things that came together, so we were really glad when it all worked out in the end.

P.S. She said yes. 😉

Picking up the flowers:

AJ was laughing because a man offered his daughters to him, in case Michelle said no. Yep, his daughters were mortified. 😉

Everyone wanted to know where he was going to propose and if they could watch:

Traci arrived and we all did a little happy dance.

Walking to New Orleans, it was SO WET!

Waiting to see if our plan would work:

Waiting some more in Club 33, because it was too wet to wait outside. Um, yeah. You don’t have to tell me twice (this is when I began to geek out).

At this point, we were not sure if he’d be able to propose in the Dream Suite, so we were getting ready to use Club 33 as our backup plan, but miraculously with a LOT of approval, pixie dust, and Disney Magic, it all came together. AJ hid in one room, I hid in another.

AJ waited anxiously for everyone to arrive:

The wedding team came into the suite for the event that had been previously planned, and suddenly, the clock struck 12:00 and “A Dream is A Wish Your Heart Makes” began to play.

That was our cue! I came out and snapped photos, and AJ came out to propose.

Michelle seeing AJ, she was very surprised:

Then she noticed I was there taking pictures:

We were all a crying mess:

Our work was done, and it was an amazing day. To make it even more special, our old manager from Fantasyland was there. We were told this probably would never be able to happen again, it was kind of crazy that we were able to get it to happen at all.

*sigh* I can’t believe my good friend is engaged! It couldn’t have happened to nicer people.

What looks like crazy on an ordinary day-

12 Monday Dec 2011

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-looks a lot like love if you catch it in the moonlight. ~Pearl Cleage

Singing their hearts out:

Taking a dinner break:

Fitting way more people at the table than it’s designed for, and having to use a piano bench as a chair:

Knowing who is most likely to drop food on the floor:

Making room for cookies (from Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romano’s Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar):

Dancing off the calories:

I Heart Faces {Furry Faces}

11 Sunday Dec 2011

Posted by in Photography

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*edit* Wow, this photo has sparked some debate over here in my neck of the woods. I love that people have been expressing their opinion about whether or not they love the processing. That’s the nature of art, isn’t it? 🙂

This week’s challenge on I Heart Faces is to take pictures of furry faces. You can find the story of this sweet kitten here.

For more IHeartFaces entries or to enter a photo yourself, follow the link below: