New Fine Art Prints For Sale!

Since I just recently discovered this cool Facebook app that lets you put your Etsy shop on your business page (check mine out, the link is in the left hand column titled "Etsy Shop" under my profile pic), I decided to relist all my old items that had long ago expired.  It had been well over a year since I sold anything or even bothered to market any of it.  Just got burned out and bored I guess.

I didn't have a whole lot to relist, but I picked my favorite items and put them up.  Well yesterday morning I got an order for one of my fabric frames!  This one, which is one of my favorites:

Zebra Print Frame

So of course, once I got that sale coming through I got all excited and motivated.  So I spent yesterday morning searching through all my e-files and preparing new fine art prints to stock my shop with.  I stopped about halfway through all my pictures because I just got tired of it, but I got quite a few new prints up!  I want to get to the fabric store soon too so I can make some new frames! :)

Here's my Etsy shop link:

Avery James Photography on Etsy

And here's the new prints I just put up!  They're all 8x10 prints and sell for $24.00 each.  Please inquire about larger or smaller sizes. :) :)  crystal@averyjamesphotography.com

"Glory"

"Through the Woods"

"Splash of Purple"

"Beauty Blossoming"

"Nature's Splendor"

"Los Angeles At Dusk"

"Pretty in Pink"

And don't forget!!  I'm offering free advertising on my blog for a month!!  Details here.

Free Ad Space for 1 month!

Yup!  You heard right - free ad space for 1 month here on my Avery James Photography blog!

Interested??

Details:
120 x 90px size button

It'd be great to get photography related sponsors such as the following, but I am open to all advertisers at this point:

• Etsy shops that sell photo props, baby and children accessories and clothing, photo frames, graphic design, etc.
• Blogs with photography tips and tutorials
• Photography equipment suppliers
• Photo printers

Other types of advertisers (big and small) I'd love to support:

• Bloggers (crafters, artists, moms, couponers, giveaways, fashion, beauty, travel)
• Small businesses
• Children's boutiques
• Beauty
• Fashion
• Travel
• Music

Those are all my preferred advertisers, but again, I will consider all businesses, big and small.

Please email me your button (make it attractive!) and website link to: crystal@averyjamesphotography.com

Thank you!! :)

Oh, and a picture for today.  Another picture of my little boy from the pics I took for our Christmas cards. :) :)  How cute is he???  :) :)

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

::tears:: just got home from a great tearjerker movie:

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

It's got so many different emotional pieces going on throughout the movie that I think many people will find something they can relate to.  My heart definitely went out to the mother in the movie and I cried like a baby for the last 20 minutes as everything was coming to a head.

Basically the movie is based around a young boy whose father died in the World Trade Center on 9/11.  That part of the story alone is heartbreaking.  Then he has this journey to try and find a connection to his father through a mystery of sorts that he is trying to solve.

As he met so many people along his path, I was reminded at how each person that I meet in my life, if even for only a brief time, affects me in some way and the person that I am.  Or that I may affect many people along my path in ways that I may never even realize.  It's an outstanding realization when you sit and really think about it.

The mother in the story is struggling with so many things - her own grief at losing her husband in such a tragic way, and having to raise and console a son who clearly favored his father for the relationship that they had.  Watching your child fall apart and hurt so deeply and not being able to do anything to help ease their pain is heart wrenching to watch.  This is about the time I started bawling in the movie theater.

There are a few other characters who each have their own little shining light and struggles, and together they all created a great movie.  I could have done without the face full of tears, but that's when you know a movie is good - when it makes you feel emotions so strongly that you can't control them.

Check out the trailer. :)

Laura and Family

Another set of photos from pretty far back, I am posting completely out of order and scattered.  I'm just browsing through folders on my computer realizing how many shoots I haven't blogged yet...there's a LOT!  Probably half a year's worth.  Shame on me!

My favorite part of my job is being able to check back in with families year after year (sometimes multiple times a year) and seeing how the kids progress and grow each time.  It's an amazing perk of the world I live in. :) :)   I actually hadn't seen this family for 2 years before this shoot though.  It's honestly more crazy to me to think that I've been doing this photography thing for longer than that.  The twists and turns that life takes...it's an adventure every day. :)  What will tomorrow bring???

On with the smiles (and what great smiles this family has!!)

80's Party!

So here's one of those personal posts I was telling you about a few days ago.  Gonna try and squeeze lots more of these in this blog. :) :)

Last night my honey and I headed over to an 80's birthday party for two of my friends.  I'm really not a fan of dressing up whatsoever...and although I lived my childhood in the 80's, I really had nothing to show for it wardrobe wise.  The most I could get my hands on was a hair crimper and leg warmers from some friends.  Once my bf's mom and sister found out that we were going to an 80's party though, they both brought out their costume arsenal and dressed me up, and I had to admit, it was actually pretty cute.  The gloves were definitely my favorite part.  I had to pass on the giant Madonna-looking bow though...my hair was gonna be crimped and that was as far as I was going.

I did find out that I actually liked my crimpy, frizzy hair.  I'm used to my hair being pretty flat and straight all the time, so the body that the frizz gave to my hair was pretty awesome, lol. :) :)

What's your favorite 80's fashion piece??

Me and my love (don't mind the missing tooth...it's a long story)

My pretty, sparkly, rainbow-y eyes. :) :)

Us and the birthday boy and girl :) :)  She made her own Michael Jackson costume - how awesome is that??  And he's from the Smooth Criminal video.

Yana and Family

The little girl in this post was sooooo absolutely adorable!!!  She was so well behaved and happy just about the entire shoot, and it was a LONG shoot.  She just kept smiling and laughing and her personality was just so infectious, I couldn't help but smile back the entire time.  How cute is she???  I'd love to think I'll get to shoot with them again, but unfortunately they were just enjoying a vacation in the Palos Verdes, CA area (where I live) when they found my services on the internet.  But perhaps if they make it out this way again then I'll be able to capture more pictures of this little doll. :) :)

Getting to Know Me...

I'd really love to take this blog in a new direction...well, maybe not a NEW one, but perhaps a tiered one...if that makes any sense...it does to me at least. :)

This obviously is my photography blog, but I'd like it to be more than that.  I want to find a way to combine my photography with my life with my interests with my stories with all of you out there in the blog world and with me in general.

With that said, I may just post a little of this and a little of that randomness...because personally I love randomness.  For example, I always put my ipod on shuffle when I listen to it vs searching for my favorite songs...most of the time I don't even listen to my ipod because I'd prefer to listen to one of my many mixes on Pandora because I never know what song will come up next.  I also came across this Etsy shop app on Facebook that brings up a random shop everytime you refresh the page.  That stuff just tickles me. LoL. :)  I'm definitely not a Type A personality, that's for sure.

So my point is, that I hope to use this blog in a more personal way.  You'll get to know me as more than just a photographer...there's a real, live, breathing woman behind that camera and I've been known to have a lot to say from time to time.  Hopefully it'll interest you. :)

Look for more posts like this in between my client photos, but there shall always be at least one photo in a post.  This one is of my son that I took around Christmastime to use on our Christmas cards.  It's taken in Palos Verdes, CA where we live.  Absolute paradise in the city is what I think of this place. :)

Kathleen and Family

I'm back!  Two days in a row!  Go me! :)

Today I'm blogging pictures from another one of my regular client's recent shoots.  Love this family too!!  They are just so absolutely sweet and the kids are adorable.  The kids all kept running and tackling and hugging me and during the shoot which I thought was so cute.  I love being able to form relationships with the families that I see on a continued basis.  An extra perk to my job. :) :)

Also, after I blogged yesterday's post, I realized that I never blogged that same family's last shoot....but I think their pics are on a different hard drive that I need to get plugged in...and I also don't think I ever blogged this post's family's photos from last year either.  So I'll get both of those up in a future post. :) :)

On with this pics! :)

Aine and Family

Trying to play catch up and likely to be completely out of order.  Just wanted to post SOMETHING since it's been a couple months since my last post.  As usual, my goal is to get back on track with this blog, do something big with it, but as usual I've fallen behind.  But here we go again!! :)


This past holiday photo season really grabbed me by the toes and swung me around till I couldn't see straight, that's for sure.  Not a bad thing depending on how you look at it, but I'm sure glad it's over because I was nearing the end of my stress rope, lol.


These pictures below are of some of my regular clients that I took a little before the holiday season started, just didn't get to blog them yet.  Doesn't this family just make you smile??  They're SOOO easy to work with, my favorite type of client - laid back, let's me do my own thing, let's the kids relax and have fun, smiling, laughing, and lots of interaction with each other.  All of that really does produce a great photo environment. :) :)

I'll be back soon with more photos to blog!! :)