This is the view of the TV in the Man Room. We called it the Man Room because it allows Donnie to finally have a nice TV watching setup and I left him in charge of picking out the furniture we needed in it since he let me do the sitting room. The couch tables are hand-me-downs from his parents but he picked out the couches and we both found the TV table. The bean bag is a Comfy Sack and before we got the couches it was the only thing to sit on in the room – which was FINE because I LOVE THAT THING. I actually slept on it several nights. All of the animals love it too and even though it weighs a trillion pounds and is impossible to move, it is probably the best couch I’ve ever sat on. LOVE IT.

We’re not close to having everything set up for the TV yet. We just hooked up the DVD player a few weeks ago and we have 47 game systems that were hooked up to the TV in the old house. BUT I HATED THAT. So, I’m not going to hook them up here. If someone wants to play one (which they rarely do as we’re all very busy) then we’ll hook it up. Until then? It stays in the blue box next to the TV. Which somehow makes me feel better.

Now…for the point of the entry…my GALLERY! Let me start by saying I had to attach the frame wire on these frames myself and that is NOT an exact science. Each one is just a hair different as I may have twisted it tighter, or the hooks may have been more loose, or something. So, the fact that they’re not perfect will be rectified as time goes on. I want to wait until the weight of the frames settle on the wires before I make any adjustments so I won’t have to RE-adjust later. But for now? You get the idea.

Disclaimer: Two of my regular-read bloggers often talk about home renovations or updates. When I post pictures of my small-scale improvements I feel a bit silly as it doesn’t compare to Kelly Rae’s gorgeous home rennovation or Heather’s office remodel (Which, I wasn’t planning on watching those videos because my ENVY is too great, but it was totally worth it as it cracked my ass UP.) – but it’s my new home and I should be PROUD. I just felt the need to point out that I am aware that my scale of upgrades is not as impressive as others. But still…GALLERY!

This is the shot from the upstairs hall. The wall on the other side of the window, I haven’t decided on yet. I wanted to get this wall up first. I don’t want the walls to match in layout, but I do want there to be similar photos in similar frames so the entire back wall is somewhat uniform. I’ll think about it for a week or so before I start laying something out.

Here’s a close-up:

Do you see what I did? I combined color AND black & white. I really like the look of it and kept stopping on Sunday going up the stairs to just stare at it. Look! My photo wall! My photos! Here’s what I said to my husband,

“Who needs art when your wife is a photographer?”
“What do you mean? That is art!”

2-points for saying the PERFECT THING. I’m quite proud of it. I’ll be even more proud when I get the wires on the back adjusted so they all line up perfectly, but for now? I’m happy with it.

As per my 4 Simple Goals, I carried my camera with me all day yesterday. Turns out? I don’t do a lot of exciting things and I don’t go to a lot of photographic settings. However, the challenge of just photographing the mundane turned out to be quite an exercise in and of itself. It was quite fun to see my daily activities become subjects of my own photography. These photos are all Straight Out Of the Camera (SOOC) and I think quite a fun look at my day.

Nikki deciding to carry this picture with her to school because…I have no clue. She just found it and decided she wanted to carry it around. It would be sweet except she kept saying, “I want it to remember you by.” And that totally creeped me out.

Breakfast table reading. He says, “Chicka Chicka 1 2 3!” whenever he “reads” this book.

Our morning ritual: Call the neighbor’s cat over and give him some love before taking everyone to school.

Waiting for E to get to the van.

After getting E to school and Nikki to Pre-K (halfday), Wes and I spent the morning running errands. When we got home it was time for my a.m. project (the project I try to complete before picking up Nikki from Pre-K) – putting together a collage frame for the kitchen. I got out the photos and the frame I had bought a while back and went to work. Here is the final product:

And here are a few pictures of the chaos Wes caused while I worked on this project. Keep in mind, the kitchen floor had nothing on it when I started this project. This is the plight of the SAHM…any single project to give you a sense of accomplishment for the day, creates more projects that you had no interest in dealing with. Like putting up the mess your kid made while you worked on your project. It took me 20 minutes to put together the frame, and 20 minutes to put up all of the stuff Wes got out while I put together the frame.

Then I had to meet LilZ before he went out of town for a concert and then pick up Nikki from school. Came home and put the kids down from their naps and did my best to find interesting things to photograph around my own home. Well…you can see how THAT went.

After naptime we had to go pick up a friend from the local middle school. We brought her back for some playroom time where I took a few more photos before calling it a day.

All in all it was a fun day. I think I’ll try to pick a day next week that has me in different places than my own home, which is where I already take 90% of my photos anyway. But, that was a challenge to do more than say, “Smile!” to my kids in my home to make a cute picture. It also turned out to be a neat way to document my day. What seems mundane when I talk about it looks kinda cool in photo form.

I think every person who manages a household has those things that are important to them, but are not consistent in every home. Some people put a lot of time and effort into keeping furniture clean and polished and in tip-top shape. Some people clean windows or spend loads of money on coverings and treatments for those windows. Some spend hundreds of dollars on baking dishes (Le Creuset…I’m looking at you) or mixers. Me? I’m a framer.

I keep an eye on the clearance frames at Target and buy ones I find too cute to resist. Once we knew we’d be moving I just kept them in a stack to put into use in the new house. In the old house we had one hallways that was lined with frames…black on one side and wooden on the other. I had specific collage frames for specific trips we’d taken. Framed photos hung everywhere. Mostly recent photos because I take so many that I’m constantly updating frames with newer photos.

Now that we’ve moved, I’ve got plenty of frames on shelves and tables, but still haven’t hung and of the photos of people on the walls yet. I wanted to take this move as a chance update photos and also allow for new family portraits as I think we’ll be making a trip to Portrait Innovations at the end of the summer. (If you have one in your town, you should check it out. You get 3 backgrounds and 2 outfit changes and the photo packages are all Wal-Mart/Target studio level affordable.) So…I’ve been spreading out frames on floors and trying to plan out what frames will hold new family portraits (We haven’t had any made with Wes yet.) and then put my own pictures of the kids in other frames.

I look at my workspace above when I’m working on several frames, which I was last night, and imagine it’s something like quilting. I have stacks of recent photos I have printed and several frames/slots in frames. I move pictures in and out of positions and look at the frames/wall as a whole before committing myself. I always want to make sure we have everyone in the family represented as close to equally as possible. (Although across the house NikkiZ wins the award for Most Pictures…she’s too photogenic for her own good.) I also like to make sure everyone likes the pictures I choose of them. I try to make sure we don’t duplicate outfits or settings too often, and I like to make sure to include plenty of candid/non-posed shots. (One day I’d like to have a whole wall dedicated to these photos.)

It’s a weird hobby/obsession…but I think it’s a way for me to turn my digital hobby into something solid that I can enjoy. I love taking pictures of my kids. I take anywhere from 2GB to 5GB of photos a month. Taking the time to frame them and decide where to place them around the house allows me an excuse to print the photos up and to spend time flipping through them while I decide what photos should/could go where.

What about you…do you take a lot of photos? What do you do with them? Are you anywhere near as deliberate about the framing process/choices as I am or am I totally OCD about this? Because that’s okay if I am. I don’t mind.

I am doing my best to unpack my office today. This is not going easily as I have no idea where everything should go. While we didn’t have an “office” in our old house, we spread out the “office” junk over plenty of space and now all of that has to be crammed into one 8 x 9 room. Yes. It’s seriously 8 x 9. It’s so small that when I stood on my desk and AGAINST THE WALL to hang a picture? The ceiling fan clipped the bun in my hair. Let me reiterate: I was flat against the wall and the ceiling fan clipped my bun almost decapitating me. This house is huge. This room? SMALL.

This has been a struggle too because I keep stumbling upon Dad’s stuff that I had packed with office stuff in the hopes that someday I’ll “go through it all” – which may or may not ever happen. Either way – it gets me distracted so what should have taken a few hours is now going to take a few years.

So…to give myself a break I’m showing you a few photos from this past weekend. All hail the digital age: None of these photos will ever have to be packed away and moved. Unlike the rest of the crap in my life. AND THERE IS SO MUCH CRAP.

Taken by MrZ. Love this photo.

Burrito Babies!

All about some guacamole.

She knows how to ride in style.

FRAMEWORTHY.

Not-so-frameworthy. I swear I was focused on AndyZ and not realizing my daughter was breaking her neck in the background.

LilZ took this while he was on the neighboring horse on the carousel. Nice effect.

I assure you he was more impressed with the Balloon Animals than this photo lets on.

One of my favorite places in my current home was this wall:

Since “they” (who are “they” anyway?) say to sell your home it’s best to remove personal photos, that wall now looks like this:

And you know what? I still really love it. Because that is MY photo.

Most of our walls were covered with photos I’ve taken of our family. For some reason, because my family is gorgeous, I was never insecure about those photos being on my walls. I call myself a photographer on this blog and on the bumper of my car (I have a bumper sticker that says, “Photographer: Frequent Stops For Photo Ops”) – but out loud? For real? I’m a bit too insecure to say that. I can easily write off the beautiful photos of my kids and not take credit because they’re the beautiful subjects. But my own artistic photography? With no kids with hypnotizing blue eyes or contagious smiles? I was never confident enough to feel like that deserved framing or spots on my walls. The last few weeks, however, I’ve had to come up with things to hang on the empty walls now that all of our personal photos are gone. What is cheap and easy? MY OWN PHOTOGRAPHY. And you know what? I’m a wee bit giddy over it.

Frames for the halls

Frames for our bedroom

We went back and forth with the owners of our Forever Home today and it’s official: We’ve got an offer in on a new home. If all goes well with inspections? We’ll own it on June 11th. Which means we’ll be able to sell our current home empty. No need for all of my framed photography. But you know what? I’ve enjoyed seeing it so much around my home this last week or two that I’m finally confident enough in it to make sure it ends up on the walls in our new home. I don’t know if it’s starting my Mondo Beyondo session, or what, but I’m owning my work now. It’s for ME to judge, and I love it. So today I said to my husband, “I want two gallery walls in our new house for my photography. One upstairs and one downstairs.” I didn’t ask. I didn’t add qualifiers like, “If you don’t mind.” I honestly saw my photos as something to be proud of and to display as art. And I can’t wait to add to the collections.