This session seems like forever ago, but it was only at the beginning of the month! So here is a few of my favorite photographs from this sweet baby girls session! I had the joy of photographing her parents wedding, her big sister’s newborn photos and the wedding of her Aunt and Uncle, I love this family and I’m so glad that they have asked me to be apart of it with my photography!
I have been wanting to get behind the camera again, I miss seeing things through the lens, I have missed sharing the world as I see it, I have missed seeing my life in black & white. So I am working on an ongoing photography project documenting our homeschool days. Some photographs will be posted with my blog posts but more will be posted in my projects
There are two people from my past that I have to thank for telling me it’s ok to start back into looking behind the camera with the things that are going on in my everyday.
I am now an official homeschool mom, and it’s tough, if you cut me i think it would just be coffee and wine instead of blood to flow out of my veins, did I tell you my 3 year old is potty training… it has been a very long 2 weeks.
It has been worth every minute. My 5 year old is no longer chewing on her hair, something that stated with this school year, my 9 year old isn’t talking back to me as much as she was before, my 3 year old has someone to play with all day. I’m finding i don’t need an escape from my littles like I have in the past…
School is very hands on a perfect way for little ones to learn they get to see, touch, and hear what they are learning, they are no longer sitting in front of a screen all day.
I am starting a photo project, about homeschooling, lets see where it takes me, lets see what my children will teach me, lets see where more inspiration will come from.
~mary E. J. mason
So I entered my first show in what feels like forever, I’m sure if I looked back at my last one it would only be a few months. Three photographs where entered and one got in here is the link to that post “Chicken Wire” Fine Art Photography. These two are the photographs that did not get in the show, I am rather happy with them so I am sharing them with you.
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
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
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
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
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
