Happy New Year 2010

I woke up yesterday and decided I wanted to do some stop-motion project. I absolutely love the jerkiness effect. I had a ton of ideas but I know I wanted to try something small first and did not want to commit days doing this. So here's my first production of 1-minute and 16-second video. I am so proud of it and I would do it again in a HEART BEAT! My 5-year old Treyton helped me with gathering the lego pieces and snapping the pictures. He was a great help and even said "This is so much fun!"

It took me approximately 3.5 hours from assembling the legos (finding the pieces that would look good and proportionate), to snapping the pictures (200 of them), importing, color correcting, importing again, and finally touch up on timeline and adding the soundtrack (could've done better with the soundtrack but all of my good songs are not on my Mac, they're on my Windows).

Overall, I had A TON of fun and I can't wait to do more of these. Happy New Year to you all!

Icicles, Icicles Everywhere

If you fancy icicles as much as I do perhaps you would enjoy these images I took off my roof.

Deck The Basement

The basement is where the magic happens during this time of year. This year, we painted the dark and textured wood panels white. This was not the original paint color, we had baby bluish tone and hated it. The first couple of years of living in this first purchased house, the basement was nothing but a place to do your laundry. As we made little improvements here and there, the basement is now a family room where we watch movies and play games.

The bar on the corner is our next project. We plan to turn it into a tiki hut. Once that's completed (I'm hopeful it'll be next Summer) you damn right we're going to throw a Hawaiian party there.

Every year Jeff is in charge to decorate the basement and put the tree up. Treyton and I are in charge of putting the ornaments up. As for many kids, Treyton absolutely LOVES putting up ornaments.

Here are some snap shots I took of our decked out basement. Enjoy and hope your Christmas is Merry!

Here's the newly purchased star. Yes, we're a star folks, not an angel folk

Oomph Your Gift Wraps

It was two days before Christmas Eve and I have yet to start wrapping my presents; not a single one! Thank goodness I took the day off to dedicate myself to gift wrapping. I got out the folding table and set my my gift wrapping station right on the corner of my dining room as the dining table is piled hight with presents waiting to be wrapped.

I find gift wrapping quite relaxing, it's almost like scrap booking. The key is to know when to stop. Here are some ideas to give your gift the ooohs and aaaahhhs wow factor.

If I were Gingy's Exterior Designer

Since we're literally snowed in, about a foot and half of snow and still counting, Treyton said we should make Gingy's house to kill time. There were 3 different designs that we could choose but since we couldn't decided we decided to forget the design and just decorate it however we wanted it.

The skittles were not included but Treyton was adamant to add some to the house.

I was pretty happy with the results especially since this is the first time I assembled a gingerbread house. This took me about 2.5 hours to assemble and I would do it again. To my surprise this was pretty relaxing and fun!

Putting green skittles on the window

Charlie and Panta Claus

This is Charlie. Charlie is a 6-year old very imaginative boy. When I arrived at their house he was fishing for ghosts! I had a good time shooting this family. Charlie told he one of his favorite books was Aliens Loves Panta Clause. Aimee, Charlie's mom, is a friend of mine and is an excellent dancer, especially traditional Indonesian dance. She has been dancing for Sumunar for lord knows how long. I love how she embraces the Indonesian culture as much as she does. Before I left I was given a great big bear hug from Charlie as well as a gem stone that he said I could have. What a sweetie! Here are some of the pictures I took.

Meet Jaden Jaka

Meet my nephew Jaden Jaka. For those of you who are curious, his middle name Jaka is an Indonesian name meaning "a young man" and we often call him by this name. Jaka is now eight months old and these pictures were taken when he was 6 months old.

This boy was procreated by combining the Indonesian chromosomes of my beautiful sister Ade and her go-getter husband Jenson who is a Bahamian. Jaka is blessed with this fabulously mixed complexion.