Best Spring Break Ever

This year marks the best spring break I've ever had, and I didn't even leave Texas. This one goes in the history books. I left Friday night and got a little time with Alayna in Dallas. The next morning, on to the 'rents house in Winnsboro for a little country rest. Had a GREAT time with mi Mama! We got to catch up, walk in the woods, get our nails done, and watch our stories. They were even great sports about letting me shovel a veggie smoothie into their systems.

Wednesday rolled around and the Orthodontist did NOT give me the 100% certainty that my braces would be off in April, which is going back on his pinky promise, but I'm going to start doubling up on my rubber bands every moment I'm not at school to ENSURE these puppies are off before school gets out. Want. These. Off.

Back to Austin  late Wednesday afternoon and had no idea just how much fun awaited me. Three guests came to stay with us Wednesday night; Terry, Ginny, and Ashley. Terry rented a convertible for a few days and was sweet enough to take us around town!

Here is my terrible motion shot with the ole 3G...

We met Randy, Alex, and TM at the Luster Pearl to see Local Natives!!

The next morning we took Ashley to her first paddle board on Town Lake....

My country girls love their BBQ so we went to the Salt Lick...

And here's a picture with Ter-Bear, we made sure to not get ANY pictures together on this trip. At all. None.

We got to see Thao with the Get Down Stay Down at Antones!! This was probably my favorite show, I just love her....she broke out into Ludacris halfway through one of her songs...Terry knew every word...(faint)...

Another favorite was Gregory Alan Isakov at Maggie Mae's Gibson room. We got comfy chairs for this one, and Darby made besties with the violin player. Some song about "I'll feed your horses".... so good. I need to buy that tonight.

Terry found CAMEL RIDES FOR FIVE DOLLARS. It was the most brilliant idea he could have had. Wajiha was coming back from visiting Pakistan, you know, the middle east...and we decided to ease her back into western culture with a camel ride when we picked her up from the airport. HAHA. And it cracked me up because Wajiha got on and the camel posed proudly, I got on the camel didn't do anything, Terry gets on...and the camel lets out the roar of a dying lamb. Hilarious.

My biggest regret ever in life to date is not getting more pictures this week. I'm a wanna-be photographer for Pete's sake! We had so many more fun memories to capture too. Kayaking where we lost and found masks and gopros and turtles, sxsw shows, dinners with friends, Saxi Taxi the smoothest ride in town, snow cone talks, Unicycle Football, Jumpoline Park backflips and races, dirty swimming pool jumps, wine and cheese at Alex's til 4am, 2.5hr taxes, disc-golf consistency, living room dance lessons, T-Love raps. Just a gorgeous, and wonderful week.

It's been a long December, and there's reason to believe maybe this year will be better than the last.

Spring is here.

I leave you with a gem we found at sxsw:

http://youtu.be/BZYAyr3-B38

SWPJC

He asked for volunteers, I raised my hand, and he picked me from all the way in the back!! I got to assist Dave Black in "light painting" the tuba picture below. It's this crazy technique thats shot in complete darkness, with a long shutter, and "painting" with light from a flashlight. It's brilliant. Especially his nightscape stuff. I can't wait to roll around in this. AND star trails! Glorious.

Tonight is my last night at the Southwestern Photojournalism Conference. What a great introduction to photography conferences! This make me want to go to many more. My brain is overflowing with ideas. Over. Flowing. Like, I'm gonna have to go to bed in a few minutes because I cannot think anymore today. No. More. I'm so in love with this. I'm so in love with the idea of storytelling through visual media. I think this has sort have been an unknowing hobby of mine for a while. Ever since I went to Haiti for the first time, caught the travel bug, and came home and scrapbooked/wrote a report on the trip. I took this hobby to the next level when I moved to Australia and started a blog. I only started this blog so there could be one central place to upload photos and share stories for my friends and personal training clients to make sure I was alive. But now I realize a lot of people travel...and DON'T do that. Then I started creating photo albums for facebook anytime I got my camera out. Decided that was an out-of-control number of photo albums on face book. Switched to yearly photo albums. Still post pics often. I love stories. I love creating them. I love telling them.

Now I'm inspired with the idea of "2 minute shows". Here at the conference, ANYONE can create a "2 minute show"...in other words, 2 minutes of a photo slide show, or video, or a combination of both. And you can put these images to music, or to voice, or any audio you want. Did you see the "God Made a Farmer" commercial during the Superbowl? I could totally DO this!






And given my obsession with music and book quotes, I think these could actually be interesting. Maybe even get my own youtube channel and turn it into a thing? Okay, okay, maybe we are getting crazy. Either way. It feels good to be inspired. Feels good to feel creative. Feels good to love something. I need some equipment and time. Maybe God didn't let me make skateboard videos in high school for nothing afterall.