a day in the life

How to Plan Outfits for Family Photos

a day in the life, family photos, on my heart, photoshoots, words

We recently got our family photos done by the sweet photographer who captured my maternity photos and our baby’s birth earlier this year. You can see her work at lcbirthstories.com!

Working with her multiple times was really nice for our family because our toddlers got more familiar and comfortable with her. At the maternity shoot in April, my son was literally just running away when we were trying to pose. Hahah but not.

As we planned our family photos this fall, Lauren was amazing in helping plan what colors would be best for our family and skin tones, and she helped get me started in ideas for outfits for the whole family.

Getting familiar with your best colors is a good place to start when planning family photos! The Color Key is a great resource for learning more about this.

These are the main colors we worked with for our family session: warm creams and browns, some forest green on me and more of a faded green on my son, a rusty orange for my daughter’s dress, and some blues.

I’d recommend to start with planning Mom’s outfit first. This will be the anchor that you’ll coordinate all the other outfits to.

From there, choose where to incorporate any patterns and the other coordinating colors for the rest of the family members’ outfits.

Just one person should be wearing a pattern, and you can incorporate more textures and layers for adding visual interest, like lace, or a chunky knit sweater. These add more to the overall look, but won’t be overwhelming or conflicting like another pattern would be.

I had my daughter wear a cute floral patterned dress, and I took up the hem to hit right above her knee. Having the right hem length on a knee length dress makes such a difference!

Our son wore his favorite green pants (leftover from the maternity shoot outfits) and a cable knit sweater. I was torn between a cream colored Henley shirt but I’m glad I went with the sweater.

On a trip to Washington, I found some amazing leather soft-sole moccasins that I had the twins wear again.

I wanted baby boy in overalls, but needed to tie in the blue that I was having Dad wear, so I got a blue top from another outfit for him.

Being the busy mom that I am, I ended up having to last minute shop on Amazon Prime for a few pieces to complete our look (along with some items we already had in our closets!)

I put together a moodboard with shoppable links, in case you’re needing some inspiration for your own family photos!

I’m thankful that Amazon Prime came through for us and we got everything in time. And I’m so happy with how everything came together!

Shop Our Look (or similar), all found on Prime!

For any of my photography clients, creating a moodboard and planning outfits, colors, poses and location is all part of the process I’ll help you with!

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Christ’s Love Compels Me

a day in the life, on my heart, thoughts, words

Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life. Apart from me, no one comes to the Father.”

In Jesus alone is the gift of eternal life, given to us freely but purchased by His own blood on the cross.

When we put our trust in Him, we are redeemed, we are set free, and we are adopted into the family of God!

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Mom and I have been talking about the beautiful thing it is to be part of the family of God. Even when we meet complete strangers who also love Jesus, you can sense that we share the Spirit of God in us. (And my Mom and I experienced that this very morning… at the IRS office! God works in amazing ways.)

There is such joy in knowing the Lord and walking with Him. And it is His love in me that compels me to love the world like He does.

“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him.” – John 3:16-17

When I glimpse the incredible love that God has for the world – and I understand how many people have yet to hear the name of Jesus – my heart breaks.

More than 2.7 billion people in the world today (about one out of five) have never heard of Jesus. They’re without salvation and hope, for both this life and the next. And that means that they are on their way to hell.

It is chillingly clear in Scripture that those who do not choose Christ will not inherit eternal life.

I was struck by the analogy that I recently heard about this. If you are planning a trip to Disney world, and you’re packing, planning your road trip, and start driving there, you’re on your way. A few things might come up that deter you for a minute, but you are still on your way.

If it is true that those without Christ are on their way to hell, like the Scriptures say, how does that impact how I live today?

This is a sobering and challenging thought that the Lord is teaching me through right now.

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I’ll close with some lines from a song that has been playing in my head, ‘O Come to the Altar’ by Essential Worship:

Are you hurting and broken within,
Overwhelmed by the weight of the sin,
Jesus is calling.
Have you come to the end of yourself,
Do you thirst for a drink from the well,
Jesus is calling.

O come to the altar,
The Father’s arms are open wide,
Forgiveness was bought with,
The precious blood of Jesus Christ.

Leave behind your regrets and mistakes,
Come today there’s no reason to wait,
Jesus is calling.
Bring your sorrows and trade them for joy,
From the ashes a new life is born,
Jesus is calling.

Oh what a Savior,
Isn’t He wonderful,
Sing hallelujah Christ is risen,
Bow down before Him,
For He is lord of all,
Sing hallelujah Christ is risen.

Read more: Elevation Worship – O Come To The Altar Lyrics | MetroLyrics

Sunday Night Live Update

a day in the life

red circle leaves

The fall colour has passed. But isn’t it nice to look back at the glorious reds and oranges of autumn? So here’s a pretty picture from my favourite tree behind the GFA Canada office. Praise the Lord for His creation. And His faithfulness. There is calm in the midst of the storm, and peace in the midst of a whirlwind.

And now, here’s a little live update from my life right now:

Tonight I have a zillion things to do… it’s 6 days until I graduate from the School of Discipleship. Maybe 5. Yeah, just FIVE days. It’s pretty crazy, and the time flies. It’s hard to find time to write personally, but I think it’s important.

So here’s just a snippet. 

Tonight I was blessed by rereading this post from my sister Clara: Peace in the Midst of a Whirlwind. Go read it.

Also, the Lord has blessed me so much as I read through the story of Jesus’ birth – the Christmas story – in the first few chapters of Luke. 

One verse about God’s faithfulness stood out to me:

“For no word from God will ever fail.” – Luke 1:37

 

This is a mixed up jar of ramblings. Life is crazy busy, and I’m trusting the Lord.

 

PS: It’s snowing now! See a couple pictures over at http://instagram.com/eliciamoose. Also, read my newest newsletter. It’s pretty cool and there’s some announcement news: https://eliciamoose.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/elicias-december-newsletter.pdf

developing a roll of film

a day in the life, photos, words

Learning to develop black and white film was one of the best things that’s happened to me. I love shooting film, and have loved it for a while. Learning to develop it on my own made it so much more awesome.

Last semester I took Daniel Rodrigue’s News Photography I at Brookhaven College. I had cool assignments that weren’t really work, because taking photos is awesome and fun. My kind of class, for sure. I made a camera out of a can, I shot with instant film, and spent hours in the school darkroom. Brookhaven has a black and white photo lab, and all of the equipment and space you need for rolling film onto reels, pouring in the chemistry to develop the film, and making enlargements and prints of your photos.

One Thursday I was at the photo lab at Brookhaven, developing film. (Standing at a sink for an hour and shaking a film tank intermittently is not the most interesting thing it the world. It’s a little boring [except that you know that what you’re doing is making photos, so it’s worth it.] I have small hands, so my fingers cramp up from holding onto the film tank. Then there are chemicals spilling, and dripping onto your hands, and then drying just enough to make it uncomfortable. [I’m making this sound horrible. It’s not really this bad.])

So I was at the lab, developing film. I decided that I would instagram the different steps of developing film, just for fun, and for something to do while I wait. I decided that I would hashtag it all #photolabthursday to group all of the photos and tweets together.

And, now I’m going to share the film developing process with you, via my instagram posts. Just a fraction of all the photos that I posted though!

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golden hour portraits

a day in the life, photos, photoshoots, stories

Of my sister Clara.

golden hour 01

golden hour 02

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These photos just happened, really. We were outdoors on a late afternoon, in the backyard, just talking. Then it was like “the light is beautiful… your eyes are beautiful… wait, let me grab my camera.” I had some expired Fujichrome film loaded in my 35mm SLR, so that’s what I shot with.