One of the organizations I so wholeheartedly support turns five this weekend. For five years, Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep has given countless gifts families with the ability to cherish and remember a child.

In celebration of the organization’s fifth anniversary, NILMDTS is kicking off a $5 donation drive. That’s it. One less Starbucks venti vanilla soy latte. (ahem.) One very small sacrifice can give one more family an enormous gift, completely beyond words.

I hope you’ll find it in your heart to share $5, and you may do so here. Additionally, $5 from all sessions booked during the month of April will be donated to help families heal their hearts from such unexpected and difficult loss.

Ummm…I even need to say why I love this like I do?

Behold ::

A little peek of what I’m working on from Ashley and Garin’s beautiful engagement session earlier this week :: breathtaking!

Are you going to be a high school senior, looking to have some great photographs taken for your graduating year? Our style is different. Authentic. Honest. You.

Cathy Mores Photography is on the search for 2011 Senior Reps! We’re looking for outgoing, high-energy ambassadors who are excited to tell their friends about Cathy Mores Photography.

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Details

Senior rep program lasts until December 31, 2010. Each representative signs a contract/model release with Cathy Mores Photography.
Senior or Student rep models will receive the following, once selected to work with Cathy Mores Photography (only two from each school) ::

• Complementary one hour session
• 5 complementary (watermarked) images to use on Facebook or other online applications
• Personalized referral cards to give out to friends :: has your name and image, and Cathy Mores Photography contact information
• $25 credit earned for every senior or student with each paid session (at the regular session fee) — so you can earn free wall portraits, wallets, or albums!
• Booking senior or student must return a referral card in order to receive credit.

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Being a representative means you can earn free products, and we get to meet your amazing friends! Interested? Let’s learn more about you ::

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The fine print ::

* All senior rep photo sessions must be completed by May 31, 2010.
* Parents/Legal Guardian must sign a model release, allowing us to use your images for advertising purposes.
* A valid Senior Rep Referral Card must be presented by a referred student in order to receive any credits toward prints.
* Credits will only be issued when a referred senior’s session is complete and all fees are paid in a timely manner by the referred senior.
* You agree to represent only Cathy Mores Photography for the 2010/2011 class year.

Just like a little pack of 100 calorie fudge-drizzled Chips Ahoy, I have a problem when it comes to anything Pantone. Color makes life prettier (although don’t ever be mistaken for a fabulous black and white image. Ever.)–and that little square and classic type just gets me. Every. Time. (Remember this? Yeah. Like I was saying.) So classic, so simple, and yet so fab.

Via Twig & Thistle

I posted a couple of weeks ago about choosing a great location for your session. But what I didn’t tell you about that day was the adventure that the Little Man and I went on. See, I hadn’t been to this location before. It may be old hat to others around here, or a place that you wouldn’t necessarily think of for portraits. And that’s exactly why it was perfect.

New places, especially with children, inspire such a raw and beautiful curiosity about them. There’s such a desire to seek out the cool parts of this new place. Discover what makes it interesting.

I didn’t tell Little Man where we were going that afternoon. Just that we were going for a drive and were going to end up at a big park :: that we were going on an adventure. He fell asleep on the drive, and when he opened his eyes, we were nearing our destination and had to cross the river. Literally, tires in the water. (It was shallow…promise, Mom.) Little Man’s eyes opened up REALLY wide and asked why we were in the water. With fear in his voice. I said it was OK and part of our adventure. He asked again. “Momma, are we getting out of here soon!?”

I convinced him after we parked that we weren’t in the water anymore. He got out of the car…and quickly stated, “you said we were going on an adventure. This is our adventure? Where’s the park?!” Oh. OK. Good luck selling him on this one.

He quickly warmed to the idea that there weren’t swings or a slide nearby. That we were going to create our own adventure. I taught him how to skip rocks. Make “Witches’ Brew” in the shallow pools of the creek bed by stirring up the dirt and rocks at the bottom. We climbed on the rocks. We listened to the rush of the water as it moved downstream. We saw little schools of tiny fish dart from one shaded area to another. Traced our fingers along the bare wood remnants of Box Elder bug trails.

And he talked about our adventure for days after. Asked when we were going on another one. Now…if the weather would just cooperate.

It was the summer before my sophomore year of high school.

My parents had just learned that the company that my dad worked for was transferring him. Uprooting us from our charming small-town Minnesota life :: packing up our possessions into stale cardboard boxes and a forest’s worth of packing paper. Men I had never seen before were loading my earthly life onto a cold, lifeless semi, bound for the suburbs of Chicago. Tearing us from our friends. Our (within an afternoon’s drive) families. Our charming 1930′s bungalow that my dad so lovingly put sweat and tears into making a comfortable home.

I struggled with the change at first. It was uncomfortable. Days before classes began, I walked into my first varsity practice as a sophomore (as my athletic reputation had already preceded me) and gasped. The other girls looked so much bigger. Stronger. More athletic. And the same went for my first weeks of classes. Everyone seemed smarter. Prettier. Had nicer friends. I was just the new girl from Minnesota who made everyone giggle when I said “about”.

Fast forward a few years. (okay. a LOT of years.) And all those feelings came rushing back to me when I entered my first WPPI class of over 1200 people. You read right. Twelve HUNDRED. It looked a little something like this ::

(Thanks, Doug…my iphone photos are terrible.)

But you know what? It wasn’t long and that seemingly enormous high school with a graduating class almost quadruple the size of my former, suddenly didn’t feel so big. I found I had a voice. Maybe it wasn’t the highest pitched voice, the loudest, or the most appropriate at times. (Hey, I’m keeping it real here.) But I found my place. A warm and open community. Fun people. Big, new opportunities. Amazing adventures.

That experience of so many years ago taught me that it’s OK to feel like the new kid. That, yes, while it can leave you a little shellshocked at times, it also opens up volumes of possibilities that I never even dreamed were possible. And last week, I felt like I was standing in that same place, all over again. That there, among that room of twelve HUNDRED other people, sat people who were maybe in the same place as me. Feeling like they’re a tiny fish in a sea of big fishes. I met some of those fish. They were beautiful. Vulnerable. Open. Willing to take the experience for everything it offered. I met some big fish too. Their beauty and honesty was no different than those of any other fish people I met.

And in those conversations, I had this realization :: You are what matters. And the fact that you are here, sitting in the seventy-second row on the left hand side, willing to be a part of something so much bigger than yourself is powerful. That you are here to commit to your dream of being a better photographer, a better person–that speaks more volumes than anything else.

That’s part of why WPPI was a great experience :: yes, the classes were amazing and the tradeshow was huge :: but I was reminded that I do have a voice.  And I will be back next year. With that same clear, proud voice, filled with grace and gusto, that I learned to speak with so many years ago.