Boho Girl

Cedar is loving his time with Uncle Jon-Erik (aka Boho Brother). He wakes in the morning and runs around looking for him in all the corners of the house…but you can usually find him out on long walks come rain or shine. I love love love this image of Cedar running up towards his uncle’s open arms. We had been playing in puddles for a while and when his uncle surprised him up on the hill, Cedar went running. *sigh*

The brothers walked up to a sandy hill and were walking through the seagulls as they took flight. You can see the two of them in the background while Cedar explores new textures in the sand.

After washing off the sand at the beach shower, we put him in the warm shower at home…back into his comfy feetie pajamas and Boho Brother brought out his art box and paper to explore some art.

Mmmmmm…its been just me and the boys.

Until tonight…when Omi arrives (hopefully safely as a thunderstorm is coming in!).

Oh, and here is my weekly kissy photo except this time with five canker sores. Yes…you heard me…FIVE…all on the rim of my bottom lip. Have no idea what caused them but we are giving them tender loving care. Well, not the kissing kind because Boho Boy kissed me last night and his whiskers made them bleed. Ouch!

self portrait with hipstamatic on iPhone4

I took this today while wrapping gifties. Do I look done? ; )

Having WAY too much fun with my phone. Now that I am getting the hang of it, I will practice on other objects other than myself…I promise. ; )

The three things I am grateful for today that I wrote in my Gratitude Journal:

• How Cedar’s curls feel against my cheek
• Hearing Boho Boy peacefully sleeping upstairs while I wrap gifts down below
• Recording myself dancing in the kitchen for Sus on my iPhone and sending it to her (oh no, watch out friends!)

{ps. my head wrap is from Colour Bazaar.  love her stuff}

pixie campbell, canon 50d

I met Pixie years ago in my very first online community:  Sark’s Marvelous Message Board.  Both her and I moved on from that community to writing our own blogs and a few years later, her and I reconnected again in blogland.  In the beginning, I went by the name Bohemian Girl and in her comments, she addressed me as Boho.  It caught on and others started doing it as well.  I myself connected more with that sweet nickname and there you have it.  Pixie is the one who named me.  ; )

I received a very tantalizing email from her a few months ago wooing me out of my sabbatical to photograph her.  I told her that I feel rusty and that she would be the perfect person to stretch my photographer limbs and explore where I am at with this art of mine.  It had been a little over a year since I had a session.   When she told me how enormous this session would be for her at this time in her life and that she wanted no one else for the job, I felt honored, humbled…and more importantly, needed.   I had forgotten what it felt like to feel needed in a deep and spiritual way outside of these four walls of my home.  It gave me courage.

I told her I have a mushy mama brain.  She told me she does too.  So, we gathered our wits and our charms and wine and cheese and music and props and dress-up duds and hats and BRAVERY and we hiked up a weedy hill to see what would follow us in our surrender.

It started with sitting on a blanket, taking deep breaths and reminiscing about the journey of our relationship.  How when I was going through fertility stuff, she was having babies and how neither of us forced anything with one another at that time.  The mutual respect between Virgo sisters born just a few days apart has always lived between us.  There were a few tears.  Then we lightened up and tossed around dreams about our art.  Then we burned sage.  Then made a prayer to the heavens.  Then once the big black top hat went on her gorgeous head, the whole darn field was infused with magic.   I call it our Pleasure Field.   I felt a warmth surrounding us and our vulnerability gave way to some very raw and moving moments with one another, with ourselves, with Mother Earth and some singing coyotes.

The whole session shifted some things for both of us.  She wrote a bit about her thoughts on it here.  For me personally, it opened up a space in me that hasn’t been explored in some time.  Sessions to me go so far beyond just capturing moments for my client.  Every single one of my sessions so far has been rooted in some sort of transformation for the artist I am photographing.  It is emotional and freeing and opening.  Not only for them but for me.  It has always felt like an even exchange of love and adoration.  And it never just happens within the few hours of shooting.  The transformation begins with the emails exchanged beforehand and then perhaps a long phone call and then right before the session when there are hands being held and long gazes and spilling and tears and then afterward…the emails sharing  how they feel changed and how I feel changed and the photos shared and oh man…they feel beautiful and whole and seen and I feel seen.  Its such an intense process and it is why I am not able to do this all the time.  I am so lead by my heart on the timing of sessions and I honestly let go and don’t try to make any of this happen.  It is such a lesson in trust for me.  Its been hard to put into words for people why I don’t offer myself as a photographer full time.  I am not even sure if I knew why exactly…until now.

Pixie asked me where my heart was now with my art after having this session.  I told her it felt like a veil is lifting and I am beginning to see and feel more clearly where I want to journey with this art of mine.

A previous client of mine wrote this to me recently…

Denise, you have no idea no idea all that followed from that cracking open– I am so in my beauty.  My soul is so in me.  SO much is happening and it ALL. BEGAN. WITH. THAT. TRANSFORMATIVE. photo shoot.

I think I am learning that I may have a deeper purpose with my lens.  Its not easy for me to say that.  I am shyly putting it out to the world.  As most anyone who knows me intimately, knows I can be humble…to a fault.  Meaning, it is easier for me to let others shine than to allow my sparkles to glisten.  But after every session, I have received very similar sentiments and years into it, I am just now willing to embrace that there is something truly unique happening here and I promise you I am not at all thinking it is about me.  I feel strongly that it is a collaborative movement between spirits.  A movement that I want to tap more into to see where it can take me and other photographers.  Its a movement that isn’t just about the images but the process and the journey.

Look at the peaceful calm on Pixie’s face in those last few photos.  I look at those and cry every. single. time.  I want to bottle that cocoon of soft flowing self love and abandon and gently mist it all over our world and throughout the Universe.

We were one another’s nurturer that day.  Then we ended with wine and food and feeling tipsy and giggling.  You can’t end a day in a Pleasure Field without getting high.

pixie campbell, canon 50d

I feel surrounded in romance right now.

Freshly showered, I can hear the tiny drops of rain on our veranda behind me, up in our loft. The door is open and the crisp breeze comes whispering in and out of my wet dreads. My mug of yerba mate and its stream is drifting up, tickling my nose. I can hear the laughter of my boys downstairs.

And for the next few hours, I get to stare at her beautiful face…while I process the photos from our session last Saturday. I have so much to share about our time together. It transformed both of us in surprising and healing ways. I think you can see some of the healing emulating from Pixie in this image above. Just linger in that space with her, with me. Words are not enough.

She spilled some emotions about our time together here:

The Goddess of Calamity meets Venus

I will spill soon.

I’ve been so lazy about getting what we call my “big camera” out to take photos of Cedar. I’ve been snapping sometimes hundreds of photos a day of him with my Palm Pre phone and sending them to family and friends. Its easier. Its practical. Its faster.

Although, today I realized how much I miss my big camera. Deeply miss this integral part of who I am. Lately I’ve been more into writing than this other part of my creative spirit. Today, it spilled open when I captured my son. Seeing him through my lens made me realize he is no longer a baby, really…but a boy.

I feel like something cracked open in me.  Now I am beginning to look around me, again…and long to capture the romance that I see…in everything.  I feel more willing to add extra weight to my bag.  Now that my “boy” is more independent, there is more space to hold my other baby.  The big camera baby that I cherish so.

Today, after clicking away, I paused and observed him as a boy and not a baby.  I got a bit weepy.  He noticed something different about mommy’s eyes.  They had water in them.  I said “mommy is crying”…and he went over to the bookshelf and handed me this book.  He’s so connected.

Here are some Cedar-isms that are emerging lately…

• He likes to make ramps out of his books to let his cars loose on.
• He’s really into his Helicopter book.
• When classical music is playing, he closes his eyes and sways his head from side to side.
• He now loves to dramatically move his body on the floor with dance fingers and flips, just like the dancers on SYTYCD.
• He is not cool about daddy snuggling mommy unless he is part.
• When he sees someone new, he hands them the toy in his hand.
• He speaks his own language when flipping pages of a book.  It might be part Japanese.
• He loves to share his food.
• When he is coloring, he wants to make sure all sitting around him has a crayon too.
• He will only drink with a straw.
• When he sips water, he follows it up with “ahhhhh”.
• He thinks he is really funny and laughs at himself all.the.time.
• His favorite things to play with are airplanes, helicopters, balls, automobiles, books, drums, guitars and stuffed animals.
• He’s super clumsy because his feet and toes are HUGE.

jessamyn, canon 50d

I remember taking this photo. When she first sat down on my floor, we were concerned about the lighting. It was shining bright on one side of her face and the other was shadowed. I remember pulling the camera down and away from my face and looking into her eyes. I pressed my finger down and clicked while we were talking because I loved what I saw in our exchange. So, what you see in her gaze is real. When I showed it to her later that day, she said “that is how I see you. that is love in my eyes.”

So today, when I opened this image up, that is what I saw. Not the imperfect lighting…but the love in her eyes and the softness of her soul and the beauty of her being.

I might have missed this soulful exchange if the camera was covering my eyes and I was fiddling with settings to get it just right.

These are the moments that free me up as an artist and photographer. The moments that carry no rules and no limits but just soul and play and raw exchange.

Sort of like what we teach our children about art yet we forget. We forget how to create without boundaries.

Some professionals out there may pick apart this photo like mad. But others out there will see what I see and more importantly, feel what I feel.

And this my friends, is how I move and groove with my photography.