See, I really, really, really love taking pictures. I envision that when I’m dead, Heaven will be me sitting somewhere taking pictures, drinking Perrier, and listening to the music I like with no one objecting. This could open a door to the story of how my Mother hates the new Arcade Fire album and I therefore came this close to excommunicating her, but that would be an unsavory topic for a friendly little blog like mine and it would lead to a bunch of people informing me that I really need to mellow out, so I won’t get into it. What was I saying? Right, I LOVE TAKING PICTURES. I should’ve just said that and then got onto the photos but it’s like I have this compulsion to talk. I can’t help it. My Dad was once told that having a conversation with him takes twice as long as it needs to, so I’m just going to run with the fact this is genetic. I’m Kristin and I’m a rambler. I also often go off the deep end when I’m taking or writing about something. I can start out knowing what I want to say, for example, I want to convey that I really love taking pictures, but by the end of it, I’m talking about Arcade Fire, my talking compulsion, and my ADD tendencies. Clearly, I have issues.

Onto the matter at hand… My friends and family are thoroughly sick of having their picture taken, so when I don’t have clients to photograph, I’ve now had to resort to making Maisy my primary subject. It’s a sad commentary, friends. But he sure is cute, isn’t he?

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I have a thing for Golden Girls. People make fun of me for watching a show about old ladies but I don’t care. I’ve been watching Golden Girls since I was about 5 years old. I have such fond memories of sitting in my Grandma’s room, she in her favorite pajamas, in her favorite chair playing Yahtzee and me curled up on her bed watching Golden Girls. When Estelle Getty  passed away in 2008, Nonny and I sat together and cried. It was as if a dear old friend had died. As I mentioned in a previous blog post (which you can read here), Nonny passed away about a year and half ago so she wasn’t here to cry with me when Bea Arthur died but I still cried. And now this morning, when I read that Rue Mclanahan had passed away, I grieved for a few minutes about Rue and then realized that I was crying because I wished Nonny were here to cry with me. Now as I watch Golden Girls and remember Estelle, Bea, Rue, and Nonny, I’m so thankful that I have this wonderful show to remind me of my wonderful Grandmother…I love you, Nonny.

I’m working on a new desk setup. I figure, I’m doing lots of other new things lately, I’ll revamp this too! If you follow me on Twitter, you’ll remember this tweet from yesterday where I shared a, albeit terribly drawn, sketch of what my new bedroom/office would look like. I’m really very excited about it! After that aforementioned tweet, I drew this sketch of the actual desk setup. Whattya think?

I’m hoping to work on this project this weekend and show you all my progress on Monday, so stay tuned for that!

My other project is going to be a big vision board to hang above my desk for inspiration. Problem is, I’m not quite sure what I’m supposed to put on a vision board…. I’m starting by going through these:

But obviously I need to figure out to be a bit more…visionary if I’m going to make a vision board. Anyone who’s actually made one have any pearls of wisdom for me?

I got home from vacation late Monday night and I’m just now getting photos ready for blogging. A total of 30 hours in a car takes a lot of you!

We (my parents + I) had a blast on this road trip though. I spent the trip in the backseat listening to The Smiths and they sat up front and argued about trivial things like who invented the lawn.

(For those who aren’t aware, that joke was in reference to an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond in which Marie + Frank argued over who invented the lawn)

Anyway, back to the trip. We drove from our home here in SoCal to my Uncle’s place in Central Oregon. I’ll be back in a few days with photos from the road but for this post, I’m gonna focus on how much I adore my family.

This is my Uncle Mark and his amazing girlfriend (who is a part of this crazy family now, whether she likes it or not.)

We stayed with them and though 5 people sharing one bathroom was a little tricky, I don’t think I have ever laughed so much in a 3 day period in my life!

Mark just moved to Oregon a year ago. When I was growing up, Mark was always there. To this day, he is like a 2nd father to me and I couldn’t be happier to have him as my Uncle and to see him so happy with Karen. And of course I also love taking pictures of him looking like a mental patient.

Speaking of Karen, there are few people in this world that are as FUN as this woman (I would say that my own Mom is the only one that rivals her in that department). She’s not only fun but also an incredibly warm, nice person as well. I again have to say WAY TO GO, MARK! He could not have found a girlfriend that fits in better with this family.

When I first met Karen (last year during a trip with my Dad that Mom unfortunately wasn’t able to join in on), she immediately reminded me of my Mom and I knew they would be fast friends. Let’s just say that by the time we left, they were referring to eachother as ‘Sister’.

So as you can see, my family is awesome. I don’t care what anyone says, my family, though sometimes totally insane, is the awesomest family out there.

-Kristin