keeping it real

Gloomy days…

Image | | mary e. johnson-mason artist

I’m not going to lie… I love gloomy fall days, to me there seems to be a bit of magic in the air, and living in a small house in the middle of a farm with nothing but homemade blankets and second hand, sometimes third hand furniture so everything matches by not matching, this house that I am renting has such a warm and welcoming feel to it. One where you are not worried about sitting on the sofa or taking off your boots before coming in, the wood floors are well worn and in need of some tlc, the walls are covered with both mine and the kids art work, so when you first walk in it’s a lot to take in especially if it is your first time seeing everything, but all of this adds to the welcoming feel.

I’m still feeling “peace” while washing dishes… dinner is in the oven… i have put on my pajamas, and the light from the gloomy day brings in this quite hue that is asking you to light a candle, to turn on one lamp, because sometimes that light you see in the fog can be the most restful, beautiful and welcoming light of all, there is no harshness to it.

Normally I would have made myself a nice pot of tea cuddled up under one of my many handmade blankets to read a book, finish a project, watch a movie, or just watch the rain and listen to the crackle of the wood burning in the stove. Today I find myself opening a beer and washing dishes while the kids scream, the dogs fight and I try to find a bit of peace watching the chickens in the yard looking for their dinner, heck it’s not even a good beer, but it’s a cold one and my nerves are very much on edge.

In the short time that I put dinner in the oven (and it was a frozen dinner) washed a few dishes from this morning the house has been torn apart. My two youngest have taken all my blankets and pillows off my bed and moved them to the living room, they have also emptied the clean clothes that I was going to fold after dinner, the sofa is taken apart… I could go on and on. I am cold because there is no fire in the wood stove, my husband has yet to pull it out from the wall to clean, I would do it, but it is too big of a job for me to do alone with the kids running around crazy, the dogs fighting and heck the size and weight of the stove, it is just a job that I can not do on my own.

I am trying to find the joy in all of this, we have a roof over our heads, and dinner is cooling, there will be clean clothes to wear tomorrow and my van has a full tank of gas, but oh is it hard. The kids have decided that they don’t like dinner without trying it, and the fighting and crying just keeps going on and on.

I may have some wine after the kids go to bed and finally sit down to enjoy the gloomy day with my book, but for now I need to be the solo mom living on the homestead that is full of living things that very much depend on me for life.

But lets be real, I’m most likely just going to cuddle up under my big blanket and fall asleep to do it all over again tomorrow…

~mary e.J mason

Welcome to… “The Your Name here” est. ????

Image | | mary e. johnson-mason artist
https://etsy.me/3jcpBCC

Custom made embroidery, welcome home gift with couples new last name and the year they became a family.

This is the perfect wedding gift or anniversary gift for that special couple in your life who seems to have everything!!!

Please specify up to 2 thread colors and 2 letters.

I use DMC so if you have numbers please let me know.
If you do not have DMC colors please list the colors you would like, a sketch and color palette will be sent to you before stitching

Letters will be in brown or black unless another color is asked for, flowers and leaves you can chose colors please let me know in the comments. See above info⬆️

Since this is made to order please allow 1-2 weeks for the finished project once you approve your colors

Product is backed with felt and signed and dated, and ready to hang on the wall.

Finished product will be mailed in bubble wrap and a padded mailer, please remember that this is hand embroidery so there may be some minor imperfections, and the finished art work will not be identical to the one that is pictured.

Since this is a custom order, I am unable to accept returns
Spot clean ONLY

I live on a little homestead with lots of rabbits and chickens as well as an animal friendly home, with dogs, cats, hamsters, chickens, goats, ducks & guinea pigs & a rabbit

every purchase helps me feed them as well as my three growing children
💜💜💙

Kid life
4H life
Mom life

~mary e. J.mason

Photography; a long lost love…

Image | | mary e. johnson-mason artist

Oh how i miss photography!!! I miss the not knowing, i miss the smell, i miss seeing the image “magically” appear when i put the paper into developer, i miss having to look a negatives with a light table and loupe, i miss the red light, i miss not being able to see when you push open that heavy door, i miss the total darkness.

I used to hide away for HOURS working at my favorite enlarger in the back of the darkroom… it was the only one that did medium format, and I had a holga that i was in LOVE with… in college i always had a smell to me it was a mix of sweat from working out at the gym, the smell of the darkroom from my hours spent there and the painting studio…I must say my roommates loved me 😷😉

I still shoot with film, I still love my holga and my roily, I shoot with digital also, I LOVE my Fuji cameras, I think it’s because they let you choose a film type to shoot with, it’s not quite the same but it’s much closer than the other cameras. My Fuji cameras also have a feel and look of old film cameras you know like the canon ae-1 or the canon FT-b. My dad turned me onto photography, that turned me onto my first job working in a photo lab right out of high school, and into the darkroom in college. He also turned me onto Fuji cameras.

I noticed that my love or my want to create with photography has slowly been put on the back burner for the past 3 years, the same amount of time that my dad has been gone…

Did I put photography aside as a way of mourning for my dad? I no longer had anyone to talk cameras with, no one to share my excitement with when I discovered a new way to do something. Did I put it aside because he was the one who funded me with my love for photography, I never really had the money to buy the equipment that was needed. Maybe I was or still am scared to enjoy something that was ours to enjoy together, maybe there is a little bit of guilt where there should not be. He would love the fact that I am doing embroidery and quilting now, something that I did not do when he was still with me. But I’m also pretty sure that he would want me to go on with fine art photography, I’m pretty sure he would be sad that I have put it aside and my cameras and they are gathering dust. So here it goes, I am going to open my heart back up to taking photographs.

I’m going to try and start sharing my work a day at a time, maybe than I will post more often, maybe than I will fall back in love with photography, maybe than I will get my third eye back, I used to always have a camera at my hip, right now I normally have a child at my hip, but the child is 3 years, it’s time to have him walk and time for me to put the camera back where it belongs.

~mary e.J mason

New Christmas Ornament Embroidery $$$

Image | | mary e. johnson-mason artist
https://www.etsy.com/listing/872355100/hand-embroidery-3-1st-christmas-wooden?ref=shop_home_active_1

3” wooden hoop Christmas Ornament

“1st Christmas”. (free hand embroidery)

The perfect ornament for those of you who love hand made things! I get a new ornament for my kids every year, and one for myself, start your Christmas ornament tradition today with this one!

It’s never to early (or late) to start getting ready for Christmas 🎄 and with handmade items the earlier the better!

Custom orders on this are more than welcome! Instead of 1st Christmas I can put the year in, these will take a few days longer to mail.

Product is backed with felt and signed and dated, and ready to hang on the tree or wall with string.

This ornament is done free hand so yours may look a little different than the one pictured.

Finished product will be mailed in bubble wrap and a padded mailer, please remember that this is hand embroidery so there may be some minor imperfections, and the finished art work may not be identical to the one that is pictured due to computers and the fact that items are handmade.

Will mail 1-3 days from order date
All sales are finial!!
Spot clean ONLY

I live on a little homestead with lots of rabbits and chickens as well as an animal friendly home, with dogs, cats, hamsters, chickens, goats, ducks & guinea pigs & a rabbit

every purchase helps me feed them as well as my three growing children
💜💜💙

Kid life
4H life
Mom life

Picture perfect weather 6’ apart

Image | | mary e. johnson-mason artist

This is a family session from last November that I guess I forgot to post, I remember the day after I got really sick so maybe that is why, I was late in getting them their edited photographs but THANKFULLY they were super understanding.
This session was all laughs and love, and I can’t wait to photograph them again! Also what an amazing day and location, the weather was calling for rain but we had nothing but cloudy skies (a photographers dream).

Right now is a perfect time to update your family photos because it’s not HOT outside, so if you are local in the NOVA area than drop me a line, and with photography you are able to practice social distancing, now is a funny time to rebuild my photography business, but for some reason I feel that the time is right 🤦🏼‍♀️🤷🏼‍♀️😜😷

Now is also a good time to start thinking about all those greeting cards you will be sending out for Christmas! I’m sure and hope that there will be a lot more than normal.

~mary e.J mason

L.G.T. Newborn session… May 2020

Image | | mary e. johnson-mason artist

This little big guy was born when everything first started shutting down from COVID-19 so I wasn’t able to photograph him as a newborn, most of my props didn’t work, and he was awake for the whole session. Such a sweet little guy, can’t wait to watch him grow for many years to come. I love it when I get phone calls from past brides letting me know that their family is growing and they want me to be a part of the memories.

~mary e.J mason

P.S. I can’t believe that I forgot to post a few of my favorites from the session that was all the way back in MAY 🤦🏼‍♀️😜

6.10.06 – 7.27.20 you are so loved, you will so be missed

Image | | mary e. johnson-mason artist

We set ourselves up for it don’t we. We give our hearts over to heartbreak. We know it’s going to happen, we know that in the next 10 years or so if we are lucky your heart will be broken with a love that you can never understand a love that you can never explain. A love that truly had no drama involved, no trust issues, no hurt, no anger, just straight out LOVE. The worst part? Most likely you are the one who has to make the choice… that is the most heartbreaking part of it all, you are the one who has to see the pain and decide that they can no longer live with it, you are the one that has to pull the trigger. And yet I would do it all over again knowing how much it will hurt, knowing that in a month I will most likely be expected to no longer morn her, so I will have to hide the sorrow, hide the pain.

14 years ago I made my first big adult decision I brought home the sweetest little puppy, a jack russell beagle mix. It’s a pretty big deal to bring a puppy home, after having babies I can say that raising a puppy is almost like having a newborn at home, you are up every few hours to put them outside, you have your choice of listening to them cry because you are kennel training them at night, or you let them come and sleep with you, I picked sleeping with me, her little whimpers got me every time.

Oh sweet girl how you will be missed! Not only by me but by your best friend, how do I explain to him that you aren’t coming back, how do I tell him to stop looking for her…

I will take a drink for you tonight, I will post random photos of you as I come across them because I have way to many to share, I don’t want to share any of you as an older dog, your pain is not how I want to remember you, I want to remember you as the hyper puppy who always wanted to chase the squirrel and catch the ball. I will remember when you growled at my pregnant tummy the first time the baby moved. How you would always get so excited when my parents came to visit, how you smiled when you where super excited, and yes she really did smile. So many memories are flooding in my mind right now, so much love,

So run sweet girl, run through the fields, sit on my daddy’s lap and kiss him nonstop like you did whenever he came to visit. I will always remember you, you are my “first born” my first “baby” you thought me to love more so than the dogs of my childhood because you where 100% mine, you picked me when you where 6 weeks old, i saw you the day you where born.

So run sweet girl run, you are free, you are loved, you are missed…

One last thing sweet girl… “SQUIRREL”

1 3/4 hours later

Image | | mary e. johnson-mason artist

H (my 2 year old) is finally asleep, well not finally maybe in his eyes he is finally asleep, we or I am working on cutting out his afternoon nap in hopes he will sleep though the night, so really its 6:30 the earliest I will let him go to sleep. My husband just started a movie with my 9 & 5 year old so naturally I tell him I’m going to bed after I do all my chores with the animals (it was my idea to have them so I am the one who gets to take care of them). We finally had a storm today with a really good downpour, and I’m so happy because, well that is one less thing on my to-do list before going to bed, I no longer have to water the garden. So i feed the rabbits make sure they have enough water and make sure all the kits made it though the day (they did THANK GOD). Next put up the chickens, it’s a little early so I have to convince them with a little bit of food, not to hard, chickens are put up for the night…

I shouldn’t have looked at the garden I should have averted my eyes and just gone inside to go to sleep…

THE WEEDS oh my goodness the weeds where taking over and look at all the fresh veggies that need to be harvested! There is a nice bit of rain happening, enough to keep the heat and the bugs away, and the ground is ripe for the picking, so of course that is what I do, I start to weed and pick all the vegetables both of them could have waited for the morning, but hey why put of what you are able to do, and now in the morning I can enjoy my coffee just a little bit longer… I hope… that all depends on when the kids wake up.

So after the weeding and the harvesting I’m covered in mud so i take a quick sponge bath, I should really take a shower but… I really do want to go to sleep, and than I see all the things that still need to be done inside, I opt to just take care of the animals, yes more animals. 3 rabbits, 7 kits, 3 dogs, 1 cat 2 guinea pigs, and a hamster I feel like I’m forgetting something I hope not, maybe it’s the kids. So everyone is feed i hope and I know that my girls are going to wake me to tell me they are hungry because they didn’t eat dinner and I will give in because I JUST REALLY WANT TO SLEEP. So as I’m doing my last “chore” my 5 year old looks at me and says “mommy I thought you where going to bed” oh sweet girl I am you just have no idea what all comes with going to bed when you take care of the household…

So fingers crossed that my husband can do it, and fingers crossed that my little man sleeps though the night, fingers crossed that the new puppy doesn’t poop in the kids room like he loves to do in the middle of the night, we have no night terrors, and no wetting the bed… the house is still a mess even though I cleaned it about 10 times today, the hamper is still over flowing, and the kids are finally getting along, maybe because they are in front of the tv for the first time today…

Here’s to tomorrow, where we get to do just about the same thing all over again…

~mary e. J. mason