june.

LOVING the fact that i just uploaded that collage full size to flickr. so it's june, school's still not out, and i's still not hot. welcome to new england. but there are birthdays and daisies and peonies and puppies. it's june and i'm happy.

so then i bought a canon

i hope it wasn't a mid life crisis, but i sold everything i owned and bought a canon. there were multiple reasons for it but i don't regret my decision whatsoever. so now i've been taking what one of my photographer friends called "yard photos" (you know, those pictures that you feel like you need to take when you have a new camera but the only place you go is the backyard). the top photos are from a boston strong walk that my school hosted (amazing), and the rest are just life lately. i'm in love with this camera. it also takes video. yeah, i'm in love.

 

a post about photos, the present, and the future

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can you say photo-heavy? sorry about that. last week was my whirlwind college visit trip to baltimore, washington d.c., and new york city. i loved the traveling and seeing new places (okay, only baltimore was new) and the food, and yeah, the colleges. 

the most poignant picture in this post though, has nothing to do with colleges. it's that one from washington with the flags at half mast. for my city. for boston. i was born and raised here- seeing those flags lowered not only in my own town common but almost 450 miles away was something else. like it was really real once i saw that. it's been two weeks and i'm talking about it now because a) i just hadn't gotten around to it before and b) it still feels so surreal and i don't even know what to say. so that's now and that's the front page of my newspaper everyday and the hushed talk everywhere, even two weeks later.

on a much brighter note, in new york we saw annie on broadway and ate incredible italian pastries from cake boss cafe. oh, and b&h photo- i have no words. it has to be the actual north pole, right? 70,000 square feet of cameras and lenses and conveyor belts and $6 viewfinder cushion things (unfortunately that was all i needed there).

also, art schools are really cool. they have dark rooms and mac suites and camera equipment libraries and book libraries designed by tiffany & co. one more year and that's the future, which is scary and ridiculously exciting and intimidating all at the exact same time.

victor.

i just got back from a whirlwind week of college visits and until i share more pictures, meet victor. i met him on the g train from brooklyn yesterday and he was infinitely interesting.

a portrait of wednesday.

"she wanted to crawl into his pocket and be safe forever." -f. scott fitzgerald

i actually had to double check that today was indeed wednesday when i made the post title. wednesday looks like spring sunsets even though the ground is still blanketed in snow. wednesday looks like unfinished instagram walls. wednesday looks like acoustic taylor swift. wednesday looks like sitting in my bedroom with only one lamp on to enjoy all of the above.

longing for summer | reminscing on an adventure [part three]

"We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch - we are going back from whence we came." -John F. Kennedy

there were two days left of summer and we wanted to go sailing. so we did. we ventured to newport, rhode island for the day and rented a sailboat. it was the perfect day for it, too. we cruised past the mansions on the cliffs and pretended that we were about to dock at one of them. afterwards we wandered the cute downtown area and indulged on peanut butter cupcakes.

i like to reminisce because reminiscing is warm and january in new england is not. happy monday.

(ps: should part four be a big giant london post? should there even be a part four?)

longing for summer | reminscing on an adventure [part two]

 

“The cure for anything is salt water - sweat, tears, or the sea”-Isak Dinesen

the entire island was underwater following hurricane sandy. thankfully, i spent a few days with my best friends on long beach island in new jersey this summer. it was the jersey shore; it was tacky and hot and expensive. but the sunsets were perfect. the salty water was never too cold. the sand was soft and the soft serve was delicious. we rented beach cruiser bikes and rode five miles to the end of the island and we parasailed and we went to this ice cream place where we had to sing to be served. i'm no snooki, but looking back on it, i could get used to the jersey shore.

(these are all from my point and shoot because apparently i just didn't want to bring my dslr?)

the swedish dj.

two words: vsco film. i've been going back looking at/editing photos from london and i came across the swedish dj. we met her on portobello road and i had to have her portrait. she knew she could and so she did.

newbury street.

we thought it would be warm for a photoshoot today. it wasn't.

london: faces.

oh, hey there! i'm back from london (and have been for a while) and have finally put a post together. my photography workshop was incredible, and i took over 3,000 photos. i struggled with thinking of a way to post my favorite on here, so i'm starting with portraits. i wasn't at all comfortable with portraits at the beginning of the trip, but i learned so much and by the end i was even asking strangers to take their portrait! enjoy these faces of london, and the last few days of summer.

sunday breakfast.

 edited these with vsco cam on the ipad. i'm blown away. side note: riley looks sad because the of the lack of bacon going into her dish. enjoy your sunday!

the burning house.

what would you grab if your house was on fire and you needed to get out, quick? that's the question being asked by the burning house project on tumblr. fernweh posted about it here and you can find the original burning house blog here. it's a genius idea, really. do you go the nostalgic route or the practical route? 

it's a little bit of both for me. i'd grab riley because she's my best friend, plain and simple. next, because i always picture darting out of my house during a fire, i'd grab my teddy bear because it would be somewhere amidst my tangled sheets anyway. then i'd go for my cell phone and laptop, the first because i'm a teenager, i love my phone, and the second because it contains my pictures, my music, everything, it's all on my laptop. on the way out of my bedroom door, i'd take my mom's nikon 35mm camera, because it holds undeveloped film. the last few things include my autographed one direction album and john green book because i adore them, and my toms because they're my favorite and i'd probably forget to put shoes on. i'd also take my dslr, but of course, it was needed to take the photos.

is it realistic? more than likely not. i know i'd be frazzled and i'd probably only be able to get riley out the door (mostly because she'll always be willing to go play outside), along with a few items grabbed in the mad dash. but it makes you think. what are the things in life that are most important to you? 

after i uploaded these photos, i thought that maybe i'd retry and add a few of my favorite photos and momentos. then it hit me. if this was all i could think of the first time around for just a photo, then this is what's really important. and if i can't remember it for a photo, i'd never remember it in a real fire.

jeremiah was a bullfrog.

so, today i visited a nature place to observe for a biology project that i'm working on, and we're not allowed to use any pictures on the project that aren't our own so it was right up my alley! it turned out to be a gorgeous day and i got some great shots. also-- the header's back! yay! it was a hosting difficulty. also, i figured out how to make each photoset the same width! needless to say, i'm going to bed happy tonight. happy mother's day, and good luck on surviving your monday tomorrow.

p.s. yay or nay on the photosets? i've been using them because my blog storage is full but it'll usually let me upload 3 or 4 photos and pasting the codes from somewhere else is just a pain. thoughts?

the traveling nikon.

so here are a few things i just don't get. one-- why my header went missing. where does a header go? can you see it by chance? two-- how, when i make both of these photosets the same exact width in photoshop, the top one is wider. why? seriously though about the header, it just disappeared. weird. i'll give it some time to find it's way back. mainly because i'm too lazy to recode it right now.

basically, i have nothing much else to say, except that i survived ap us history (!!!) and it's such a beautiful day right now. as much as i like being curled up with the window open and my laptop and coldplay on, i've got to go find something to do. have a great weekend!

p.s. these are my favorite pictures in a while.

sunday afternoon.

thankyouthankyouthankyou.

just got home to find that my zebra picture was an angie and amy pick on i heart faces! ahhhhh i seriously am so excited. i called up my best friend and didn't even say hi, it was just a GUESS WHAT! crossing this off my bucket list. thankyouthankyouthankyou.

south africa: the lost files.

ever since june, i've been longing for the photos i could see in my head. photos that i knew i took, but couldn't find anywhere. i figured they were on the card that was in my point and shoot when it was stolen. it was a shame because i wanted to see those pictures so darn bad! enter november 11, 2011. 5 months later. the photos are long forgotten. i go to take some pictures of the gorgeous tree down the street and pop in the only memory card i can find. on going through the (really bad) pictures i did take that of that tree, i found these.

i am so incredibly happy right now.

why, hello there.

  oh hey there october. i really love you. you know why? because you're perfect. and they say nothing's perfect but i really truly think that you are. because i can wear riding boots and cardigans every day. and you smell like crisp air, cinnamon, pumpkins, and rain.

 and you're beautiful. your true colors really shine. i suppose the leaves' chlorophyll is leaving, and i know that maybe that makes the leaves sad, but it makes me really happy. plus, the countdown to my birthday starts and it rains at night which is the most calming sound in the world.

i really missed you october. twelve months without you is a long time. so i'm just really really glad you're back.

september.

Did you know September is pediatric cancer awareness month? And did you know that yellow is the color for pediatric cancer awareness? Childhood cancer isn't 'marketed' like breast cancer or Alzheimer's or anything else. It flies under the radar, yet, thousands of children are diagnosed every year. Two weeks ago, I attended a funeral for Nicole, a family friend who passed away at only 9 years old. Today, I was the official photographer at the Kids PMC (Pan Mass Challenge) where in the past 6 years, over $20,000 has been raised to try to find a cure for some of the many types of pediatric cancer.

At this event, coordinated by my friends (amazing job guys!), I met Jackie. She's a 4 year old little girl who is currently in remission after battling a brain tumor. Had I known nothing about her, all I could tell you is that she's turning 5 tomorrow, and she's super excited, she loves Victorious, as well as all things pink and sparkly. You would never know she's so bravely fought cancer.

So, for the rest of September, wear yellow once or twice, read Notes Left Behind (the incredible story of Elena Desserich, I'd recommend it to anybody), and please, don't forget about pediatric cancer.

crazier.