Tuesday – January 2, 2018
As we glide into the new year of 2018, my mind wanders two years into the future when we eliminate “two thousand” from our current year and just say the year is “twenty twenty”. Mind blown.
Meanwhile, here in 2018, I’m taking a look back at 2017. As I put the photos together of the year, it definitely puts it into perspective. I was photographer for multiple babies and almost exclusively for a friend and up and coming eco fashion designer. I still continue to spend most of my free time with my fiance and my dog, but rarely get photos of the three of us together (or even just the two of us humans together). In fact, unless it’s for a shoot, I’m often forgetting to take photos of the people in my life and this is frustrating almost directly because of social media. I probably shouldn’t feel this way, but when I look back, most of the photos I take are of things and of my dog. And selfies. I used photography initially as a way to document where my mind wanders (color, light, shapes, cute things, nature, a way to make me feel good about myself) and gave me an out to be the dazed artist and not totally sociable. I still manage to be sociable and no one would know the difference, but often I feel lonely and lately – losing my creativity and whatever spark I used to have to bad self esteem and feeling out of place.
This is probably not where I should be a few months before I get married, but I am there. I have been there for a long time. I wouldn’t say the last year has been difficult really, like everyone out there keeps saying (“2017 was tough, leave that shit behind, blah blah blah”). It wasn’t bad and it was that great either, but only because of my own personal setbacks. I look forward to the new year just like everyone else, but I’m trying to be smarter about my approach to making healthier changes and just continue the baby steps to get there.
So on the second day of the year, I’m just going to take it one day at a time. With Minimal Enjoyable Actions (MEA – thanks to my Shine texts I now get daily). No goals, just forming tiny behaviors that will eventually contribute to an overall life habit.
Check out my last year below!
(January 2017)
So many baby’s first birthday parties and photo shoots in Santa Monica and Beverly Hills, shooting with Ellerali and her amazing eco fashion line, and a quick trip to Atascadero to visit friends for football and fun (and they have the most amazing house and location/views).
(February 2017)
February gets two columns because a lot happened. More shoots with Ellerali, my birthday (not pictured, and I can’t even remember what we did), a work colleague passed away and I organized his memorial in Burbank, we said good-bye to a faithful old ottoman that came from mine and Stacy’s old apartment couch set (bought from an old work friend and was Buffy’s bed), did an adorable shoot with a brother and sister and a red tutu (I die) and I organized another work event for the Oscar’s night. Phew!
March 2017
More… babies… All adorable, but wowza. An engagement party for a dear college friend (which I photographed), a trip to the Poppy fields when they were in full bloom, and got a rare dino shot (who have been unfortunately neglected by me last year).
April 2017
April also gets more photos because of all that went on. My mom came out to visit and we drove up to the Central Coast to look at wedding dresses (failed at one place, found the first attempt at a wedding dress which wasn’t really a wedding a dress), visited Montana de Oro – a gorgeous beach with fields and mountains and fog, etc, also visiting Morro Bay because I love it there, then back home to take more baby photos and party photos and selfies. Bam.
May 2017
Spring brought the Jacarandas (purple trees) and wind – which cancelled our balloon ride, but I hung out with Elle of Ellerali for more photos and adventures.
June 2017
More babies! And battleships. Eddie’s sister, Stacy (hugging the canon above), got married in October (more to come), and we got out and about to Huntington Beach and back to the good old Hiltscher Trail in Fullerton.
July 2017
More Ellerali and good food from a cool new mexican joint (that up and moved away already) and by Eddie – a delicious Italian pasta for the 4th of July (hehe), and – I took our own engagement photos for our Save the Dates!
August 2017
I head up to San Francisco to go to Stacy’s Bridal Shower (anchor themed!) and Bachelorette Party in the city, took more photos for Ellerali, then flew to Dallas, Texas to visit my mom and stepdad for a few days – leaving with a book from my mom – “The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck.” LOVE. Kept taking photos of quotes and there were SO many. Also not pictured – I organized a Film Fest contest for my work which was pretty awesome.
September 2017
I organized a Bring Your Kid to Work Day + Picnic for work this month (yeah, work has been super busy this whole time and things keep changing and so it might explain why I feel like I started to lose my creativity – I was putting it somewhere else). Meanwhile – more babies, but this time in bellies – twins! Too cute of a shoot with red converse. Also Eddie made this ridiculous breakfast sandwich one day with a baguette from Lee’s sandwich, maple sausages and over easy eggs and holy shit – now this is an egg slut sandwich. And me – the other egg slut. HA. (I love eggs.)
October 2017
Another double dose of photos for October because this month was a big one.. and I didn’t even include my Halloween costume! (I was Janis Joplin.) The big news here is that Eddie’s sister, Stacy, got married to her beau of 7 years – Mike (an old friend of mine – you could say I technically introduced them!). They wed on the USS Iowa in San Pedro and it was fucking awesome. Eddie and I were in the wedding party and had a blast. They both have amazing families who we got to know well, and what was more fun is that the party continued 26 miles out at sea in Catalina Island. Almost 30 people went to continue the celebrations for 2-3 days with the bride and groom and it was so fun! Bike riding, BBQing, day drinking, relaxing and all on a place that felt like a small tropical island. When we finally got home I continued a good photo run in a small moment of creative spark.
November 2017
In good timing (not being sarcastic), I got sick in November but worked my way through it in time to be healthy again for our roadtrip to the Bay Area for Thanksgiving at Eddie’s aunt’s house in Fremont. It was like the wedding all over again and great to see the family so often. We got randomly upgraded to a Mustang and it was the shit. Thanksgiving was amazing (Eddie’s family knows food, man) and no- that was not our real turkey!
December 2017
Another twofer! And December gets extra special because after a few months of not really using my real camera, I did pull it out for Christmas. In December we took off for Dallas, Texas (after this year I feel somewhat like a jet-setter!) so Eddie could see what it was like and we’d get to celebrate his birthday and our 8th dating anniversary (and see my parents of course!). We stayed in Deep Ellum for a couple nights in an Air BnB loft and explored bars and breweries and food, then went back to Lake Dallas where my parents live to recover and spend our final days there. We had amazing food, amazing BBQ at the Pecan Lodge and Braindead Brewery. Back in Orange County it was finally getting cold so we could put on our holiday sweaters and put up the tree. For Christmas Eve and Day we spent it in Echo Park with Eddie’s sister, her husband and their parents visiting from the Bay. Another amazing meal was had and Christmas Day was gorgeous.
I made it a point to get photos of everyone:
And the three of us 🙂
Cheers to 2018!
RAH SNAPSHOTS 