ASAD 2024

2024 brought me lots of good times with my friends (old and new), family, and my favorite animals (old and new). This year also gave me time to explore through good food and travel. 2024 also started me down a path of figuring out who I want to be, and what I want out of life.

This year’s traveling was off to a slower start than usual. I didn’t go out of town until May. In May, I went to Nashville for a wedding. We stayed at Opryland, went to the museums, and I knocked out another state from my list of riding a horse in every state. My next vacation was to my home, Ohio. I came in to help my best friend Sam, prep for her baby shower. It’s so fun for me to watch my people succeed and I love standing by them as they grow. I am now a very proud auntie to a baby Enzo. While I was in Ohio, I reconnected with some other friends I hadn’t seen a long time, and I am so grateful for my time spent in Ohio this year. In September, I went to Chicago, and while in Chicago I saw a broadway play, completely fan girled in museums, and of course, hung out at the bean. The last place I went this year, was to West Virginia for Chris’s grandfathers Funeral. Under the circumstances, it was nice to spend the with his family, and meet some new faces.

I also gained an orange cat, named Coyote. Chris was out on a run, and had a little kitten follow him. Coyote had a collar on, so he brought him home. A few days later, we took him to the vet to check for a chip. The good news is he had one, the bad news was that it was connected to our local animal shelter. Coyote was supposed to be in foster care. We were asked to bring him in the shelter for a neuter appointment the next day. So, I asked about him when we dropped him off and they called me back after his surgery to tell me the foster parents surrendered him, and I went to pick him up the next day! He is a very sweet, playful, crazy boy and I am lucky to have him. I also have been feeding a few stray cats in the neighborhood, trying to get them acclimated to people, So that I can re-home or send them to our local shelter to be adopted.

I’d like to give a special shoutout to my horse family and trainers at the Equestrian Center. They help me everyday to be a better rider, and a better, stronger version of myself. My buddy Brigand is getting older and more injury prone. This summer while riding, he became lame and unfortunately hasn’t fully recovered. He has lots of good days, and a few days that hurt my heart. Im grateful to be riding with him on all of the days he is feeling well enough. However, I am now riding multiple horses more often, and learning to like different things about each of them, which is pretty cool. I still make sure Brigand gets the attention he deserves, and a big bucket of banana mash when I am done.

I hope you enjoy watching a glimpse of my year. If you want to see more, below you can watch this years video. The links to my other ASAD videos and the blogs to go along with it. Be on the look out next year for 2025!

If you cannot see the video this blog, click here.

Links to other blogs in yearly order are here!

2023
2022
2021
2020
2019

ASAD 2023

Every year I try to fill my days with friends, family, travel, laughter, and good food. 2023 brought me these, and new growth opportunities for myself, and my art.

At the beginning of the year, I was in the process of moving to a nicer apartment, closer to my work. I would like to extend a special thank you to my friends that helped get me here! It was a long and stressful two months made much easier by Mikaela and Vincie.

This year’s traveling started in the beginning of the year with a mini vacation about an hour a way with my family in a town called Alys Beach. This was not my first time coming here, but it was nice to get a little ways out of town to relax after moving. Then in May, I went to my friends’ wedding in Denver. I am on a mission to ride a horse in every state, so of course I did that, as well as going to museums, such as Meow Wolf, I also make sure I go to a zoo or aquarium on my vacations. In October, I went to Phoenix, and in December, I traveled to Raleigh for a family wedding, and then Greenville to visit my parents.

I typically use the phrase “he's a dream” when I talk about my buddy, Brigand. He pushes me to be better, work harder, and also to expect the unexpected. I am truly grateful for my trainer and friend, Janet, and the entire equestrian center. They help me everyday to be a better rider, and a better, stronger version of myself.

I hope you enjoy watching a glimpse of my year, below are links to my other ASAD videos and their perspective blogs in order, as well as this 2023’s! Be on the look out next year for 2024!

If you cannot see the video this blog, click here.

Links to other blogs in yearly order are here!

2022
2021
2020
2019

Fruit And Products Part 1: Lemons

Lately I have been trying to expand my product and commercial side of my website since I have less images inside that book on my website.

What better way to start a new project than by using my favorite color as a base?! In this series of fruit and products, I really experimented with duo color backgrounds, which is something new to me.

I genuinely had fun doing these, and I hope you enjoy them. Let me know what you think!

ASAD 2022

The year 2022 was filled with so many highs, and some very low, lows. 2022 brought travel, and weddings, animal snuggles. new friends, and family get togethers. Although some unexpected, I’m grateful to have seen them. 2022 also brought me lots of laughter, and new opportunities for growth in myself, and my art.

As some of you know, the year 2022 started out rough for me. New Years day, I was on a plane heading to my grandpa’s funeral. Although the circumstances were not ideal, I enjoyed seeing family that I have not seen in many years. I loved playing games and reminiscing with them about their childhoods and mine. My grandma is my only remaining grandparent, and I will forever cherish our conversations from this week. I am thankful that she sees me as someone she could talk to, and help her through her grief.

With the United States opening back up from covid, this brought on more travel. Not long after we got home from being in Ohio, my parents came to see me. I also traveled back to Ohio two other times this year. I flew in for my life long best friend’s bridal shower and bachelorette weekend, and then again for her wedding. I also traveled to New York City. I have been there five times, and I do not think I will ever stop being surprised by its beauty and culture.

Everyone that has ever met me knows that I have a love of animals, my favorite being a horse. Growing up in a suburb of Cleveland, its definitely not a typical favorite animal. My bedroom growing up was always covered in horse statues, pictures, toys, etc. After the loss of Molly, I decided it was time to become formally trained. This year, I started my journey towards horsemanship, and hopefully lead to hunter jumper. Bailey was the first horse I felt a bond with at The Equestrian Center. She was very patient with me and helped me through the beginning challenges. The center lost Bailey unexpectedly, and it broke my heart. After riding a few horses, who were all wonderful I found Brigand. I typically use the the phrase “he's a dream” when I talk about him. He pushes me to be better, work harder, and also to expect the unexpected. I am truly grateful for my trainer and friend, Janet, and the entire equestrian center. This is the first time in my life, I have had friends that are also horse people.

I always talk about the things I wish I could improve in the future of my videos. In the past, it was about video organization. I fixed this problem by creating folders per month and adding them at the end of every month, then going and creating that months section of the video. This has helped me a great deal and I definitely will continue it in the future. I was underwhelmed with some of my phones camera quality, but I upgraded my phone so I hope that will improve future videos. Something I really want to improve on will definitely be the blog writing itself. I struggle with writing out the synapsis of my year, and even my art.

I hope you enjoy 2022’s a second a day video, and I can not wait to hear what you think! The link is below, and please do not forget to look for 2023 in the future!

I have four more blog posts, saved in my drafts and I am working to get them to you soon.

If you cannot see the video this blog, click here.

Links to other blogs in yearly order are here!

2021
2020
2019

2021 ASAD Video

Wow. I cannot believe its has been a full year already. 2021 was a year full of loss and heartache. 2021 also brought some amazing memories and an abundance of laughter with some of my closest friends, animal snuggles, a little bit more travel Than last year, and of course, good food that I love to showcase throughout my videos. I always like to explain the things I did well, and the things I wish to improve in the next year.

Due to the world events, I kept my social circle small this year as well as the previous. Which was nice because I got to spend another year surrounded by only my closest circle of friends, who are also family. With them, I got to have many mini adventures such as county fairs, dinner dates, beach trips at all hours of the day, and I even got to help participate in bringing a hometown best friend in to the city to surprise one of my besties for her birthday!

Unfortunately, with the good comes the not so good. We lost some very special animals, and I lost my grandfather at the end of the year. Molly, the Hunters’ horse, was the first one this year. If you know me personally, you’d know that horses are my favorite animal, I absolutely adored Molly. The last time I saw her, before I went down I bought an entire bag on mints. Mints were her favorite treat and though it meant she’d have to let me get on her back for an hour or so a day she gladly accepted. If you were not fast enough though, shed dig through your pockets herself. The next was the Hunters' dog buster, who I think only Chris was fond of, he was known for getting into messes, the stinkier the better. Last but certainly not least, after a long year filled with family stresses and struggles, we suddenly lost my grandpa to the flu and pneumonia. I am grateful for him and the time we got o share. If my family had to choose one thing to say about him, I think it would be that he made life interesting, just not always in the best ways.I am grateful for the two voicemails on my phone from him, especially since I don’t have anything from my other passed grandparents. It’s been about a month and it still doesn’t quite feel real.

I am very excited to be traveling again, Although I am still doing way less traveling because of the pandemic, I did fly to Denver this year, and I had to make in back to Ohio at the end of the year. Denver was fun, I ate lots of good food, went to lots of museums, and of course did a little bit of hiking. My trip back to Ohio was a little bit more stressful. The plan was to fly back to my parents house in South Carolina and then drive to Ohio from there for my grandpas funeral.Then things got a little bit more stressful when I went to check in for my flight, and saw that it was cancelled four hours before I had to be at the airport. Naturally the airline booked me on another flight instead. Since it was just about midnight on New Years eve, and my flight left in the morning I had to wake up my parents to see what they thought was my best option. Long story short, I ended up buying day of plane tickets on New Years day. Luckily in the end, I made it to Ohio and the service was wonderful. It also let me see my family some of which I have not seen since I was in middle school.

Even though i’m not posting as much, I’m still working as you can see in my video, and I am so excited to show you what I have coming. There will be a wedding blog, and at least five product shots coming your way soon.People have also been asking me about showing my before and afters for some of my images because sometimes I really change a lot of things. I think this is a really fun idea because it helps show off one of my strengths, photoshop. I am just unhappy with my coding options for it with my website. I may try it a different way and let you decide if its readable, or if you like it.

There are a lot of things that I consider to be strengths and improvemnets this year. I chose to change the background track from the up beat and tropical tunes that i typically use, because of my losses this year especially near the end, it didn’t feel right. So in the end I swapped out the ukulele and switch it for a nice, still happy just more subdued piano and strings track. I think I also improved my editing and workflow this year, so hopefully I can just keep building onto it. If you want to see my workflow progress, feel free to check back and look at my previous blogs that are down at the bottom of this post. MY workflow consists of a yearly folder. Within that folder I have twelve folders with the month names. This year I added number of days as well as a color system so know when I have put all my videos per month in them through out the year. This is helpful to me because I am a little bit sporatic with my video uploading.

Ofcourse, if i’m going to talk about my strengths, I need to talk about the details i’d like to improve in the next year. I do this video project as a look back through my year like a scrap book, but also a way to stay learning and focused. I would have to say that writing about myself, and my process is one of my biggest on my list of “needs improvement"“ Im just really not good at it, but im trying to better to get out of my own head to improve it. Also, I would say I wish my video was all horizontal frames, although I have much less in this one than my previous, I still have room to improve there.


My 2021 video is here, and below are links my other videos.

***If you cannot see my video below here is a link.***

Thanks for watching, and be on the look out for 2022!

Links to other blogs in yearly order are here!
2020
2019

2020 ASAD Final Video

     The hardest part of posting new content for me, whether it’s my photography or my videos is writing about them. Although a close second is showing anything I create at all. One of my college professors once told me, that if I liked my work, and saw no need for improvements, than I was not a real artist. I haven’t even posted my work or my life on social media sites lately because I do not think I have anything of importance to share. With that being said, I am sorry for the silence from the last year.

     This year has been a lot for everybody. Myself included. The pandemic has been hard in many different ways, some I cannot even imagine. For me, it brought my household down to me, as the only earning member for 3 months, halted all future traveling plans, and added to my anxiety as a whole. The last time I left my beautiful beach city was in February to go to Atlanta right before everything started to lock down.

    In addition to the world events, one of my roommates moved out, and with that, he took his cat, which after two years of living with, I was quite fond of. Although, this lead to the addition of my boyfriend’s sister, who I have called my sister for years. She later left again, due to a fight with her brother; however, while she was living here, I was able to help her through a really hard time, which brought us even closer than we were before. I have gained her back as a roommate recently in this current year. 

     Not all things this year have been hard times though. When my roommate left, I lost a little buddy, but it also gave me the opportunity to gain my cat. I got him from the shelter when he was 3 and half months old. His shelter name was Tutti Frutti, but I call him Lemon, among other names. A great thing that has happened this year amongst the pandemic and life hardships is simply being able to spend time with my family and friends. This just became trickier to make sure everyone was safe of course. I also turned 26, and witnessed my second hurricane.

     Also this year, my grandpa became ill, more mentally than physically. My family and I had to spend all year only hoping for the best possible outcomes for him and the rest of us involved. My dad also became ill this year, but is expected to make a full recovery. However, my family did lose my Great Aunt Phyllis. Who will truly be missed. The last time I talked to her on the phone she told me I was spoiled for living at the beach, and to take advantage of it.

    Now that I have given a little background for my video, let’s get to the technical skills. There were many great aspects that made my life easier while creating the final, like creating monthly bins to keep all my clips organized instead of the mess I had the first time around, where all 365 videos were all in the same folder.

      When there are good parts to a project, there are always ways to improve. Some of the things that I will change for this current year’s video are taking all the videos on one device, instead of having them spread across three. This is helpful when ordering the videos because it’s much easier to keep track of the dates. Rather than scrolling through three devices at a time trying to sort through the order. I would recommend not waiting until near the end of the year to put the videos together because it becomes very overwhelming. Lastly, I need to remind myself to make all my videos horizontal, and with better lighting all the time.

     This is incredibly long, maybe one of my longest blogs ever. With that being said, please enjoy my A Second A Day video for 2020, and be on the lookout for new images, and next year’s video. If you liked the sneak peaks I did last year, let me know and I will bring them back.

This link below, will send you to last years blog post to my ASAD 2019 video.

ASAD 2019 video here

2019 ASAD Final Video

Hey everyone, I am excited to say, the final project is here! I have Learned many things about myself, and about my techniques, and processes.

Let me start by telling you a few things I would like to improve upon for next years video. Ive already talked about organization in a previous blog, but I have to tell you, it was one of my biggest mistakes in this project was not having my monthly videos organized! My other biggest concern was simply, I wish all of my videos were shot horizontally through out the video. This would have kept the video more consistent. Now These are only a few things I wish I did better on, but I know I will get better, and I am proud of this video.

Since I have told you some of my struggles, let me talk to you about some of the things I really enjoyed about this project, and why I want to continue it. Honestly, one of my favorite aspects of this project, was to remember, and look back at some of the moments, from my everyday life no matter how big or small. The next reason I enjoyed this project was simply because it helps me with my video editing skills, since i only knew the bare minimum of premiere when I started. Video is a very popular skill to know as a photographer in this market, so I like to keep my skills well rounded and sharp. Making this video has been a lot of fun, and a lot of work. I am glad to see it all come to gather. It makes me even more excited for next year!

Without further ado, Here is the ASAD 2019 video!

Below are links the the other A Second A Day Sneak Peak videos and the blogs to go with them just incase you ever miss one, or want to rewatch/reread them.

Links to the other sneak peak videos in order:

1. Exciting Projects in the Work/ ASAD January Sneak PeaK

2. February’s ASAD Sneak Peak

3. March’s ASAD Sneak Peak

4. ASAD April Sneak Peak

5. ASAD May Sneak Peak

6. ASAD June Sneak Peak

7. ASAD July Sneak Peak

8. ASAD August Sneak Peak

9. ASAD September Sneak Peak

10. ASAD October Sneak Peak

11. ASAD November Sneak Peak

12. ASAD December Sneak Peak

ASAD November Sneak Peak

Wow! This holiday season flew by way faster than I expected. November was a month full of beach day get aways while the water was still just warm enough to enjoy, including finding my new favorite spot to read in my down very rare times. This is the first thanksgiving that I have ever spent away from my family. It was very strange, but luckily working into the late hours helped take my mind off of it.

Theres only one more sneak peak in this years video until I get to show you my progress so far! i’m very excited to show you the longest video project I have ever done. If you have fallen behind, the videos are still in order on the bottom of the blog.

Below are links the the other A Second A Day Sneak Peak videos and the blogs to go with them just incase you ever miss one, or want to rewatch/reread them.

Links to the other sneak peak videos in order:

1. Exciting Projects in the Work/ ASAD January Sneak PeaK

2. February’s ASAD Sneak Peak

3. March’s ASAD Sneak Peak

4. ASAD April Sneak Peak

5. ASAD May Sneak Peak

6. ASAD June Sneak Peak

7. ASAD July Sneak Peak

8. ASAD August Sneak Peak

9. ASAD September Sneak Peak

10. ASAD October Sneak Peak