EXTENDED: Register and book your FREE photo session before March 22nd!

Spring time is here!! It’s time to shake off those February blues and put on your spring time shoes!

We’re super excited about this contest because not only do you get a FREE hour long spring time session with Butler Photographic Artistry at their absolutely gorgeous studio with cute and cuddly live animals, BUT you also have the opportunity to win our prize package sure to make your spring pretty amazing for the whole family!

A special thanks to the Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU for sponsoring our contest this year!

How to Enter (please read carefully, you must complete each step to be entered into the contest.):

1. Register your child(ren) March 1 through March 22nd, 2015.  If you have more than three children you may fill out a second registration.  Register here.

2. To help you schedule your portrait session, Butler Photographic Artistry will reach out to you after you submit your nomination and schedule your FREE appointment between March 1 – April 4, 2015.
Your photo session will take place at the beautiful Butler Photographic Artistry Studio and photos will be available for purchase*. (Hurry! Sessions are limited.) If you would like to call and schedule your appointment you may do that as well:804-744-4700

Butler Photographic Artistry will provide Richmondmom.com with a photo of your child for our website and voting page after you have your photos taken.

3. Voting will begin April 8 – 25.  Spread the word friends, parents, grandparents and get them to vote in the contest.

4. Winner will be determined by most unique votes and announced in our newsletter and on Richmondmom April 29, 2015.  Our grand prize winner will receive our prize package.

*Although it’d be a shame to miss out on the opportunity for a free session and beautiful photos, there is no purchase necessary to enter or win.

 

Age categories for the contest are:

• 0-2 years
• 3-5 years
• 6-8 years
• 9-11 years

Check out our fun family prize package below:

A Portrait Wall Panel valued at $1249 from Butler Photographic Artistry

Summer Membership to Midlothian Athletic Club

Supernova Year Membership to the Science Museum of Virginia 

4 Garden Passes to Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden

4 Tickets to Arena Racing USA

One month of free classes at Romp n’ Roll

 

 

Be on the lookout! We’re getting ready to launch the Real Cute Easter Contest.

Richmondmom is paring up with the incredible photographer at Butler Photographic Artistry for some absolutely stunning easter portraits this year.

Forget the Easter Bunny (he’s scary anyway) and get your picture taken with live animals at a stunning local studio for heirloom quality photos. And of course, you’re photos will be entered into the Real Cute Easter Contest where you can win a bunch of fabulous prizes.

Read more about Butler Photographic Artistry here and keep your eyes on Richmondmom for the details!

A very special thank you to the Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU for sponsoring our contest.

Dan and his dedicated staff strive to be everything your family desires in a portrait artist. As a father, Dan recognizes how important it is to preserve the fleeting and memorable times you have with your children, and we do everything we can to perfectly capture your loved one’s personalities through the art of portraiture.
From Dan’s kindergarten days with his Kodak Brownie camera, to starting his business in a beautiful century-old Victorian house in Bon Air, he has grown into the most unique and praised portrait artist in Central Virginia. Whether he’s chasing around a three-year-old through water to get that perfect image, capturing a graduate at their proudest moment, or preserving the quiet reflection of a bride, Dan enjoys every moment. These days, his exclusive waterfront location in Brandermill boasts four incredible studios to suit your every need.

Dan’s life goal is helping share and cherish your family’s breathtaking moments, with superb quality to pass down through generations. Butler’s selection of portrait finishes is heirloom-worthy, combining beautifully-commissioned hand-painted oils on fine art, natural fiber canvas and state-of-the-art digital design. He is proud and honored to hold this responsibility for so many families throughout the nation.

So, why are you waiting? Life is not standing still. Adorn your home and office, and share personal art pieces of your loved ones with your friends, family, and future generations for many years to come.

Everyone has their favorite vacation spot. Whether it’s OBX or Smith Mountain Lake, Atlantic City, Key West, or Myrtle Beach, you know that certain place that makes your soul happy every time you visit. That spot for me is New York City. As cliche’ as it is, I really do heart NYC. I love the architecture, the distinctly different feelings that each borough and neighborhood convey, the food – holy wow the food. I love spending time in the City, and want to remember those feelings, the tastes, sights, and smells (most of them) long after I’ve come home. Each time I go to New York, I take my camera, I shoot photos to my heart’s content, and then come home and forget about them in the hustle and bustle of getting back into the groove of non-vacation life.
It wasn’t until I was doing research for 5 Ways to Display Vacation Photos back in July that I realized that I should be doing something with all of those vacation photos.

That realization was the inspiration for a new series on my blog that starts this month. We’re going to go room by room throughout the house and determine the best methods for displaying photos at home. We’ll talk about the different factors that go into deciding what to hang where, and tips for planning and hanging for each room.

Starting us off will be the dining room, the new home of my NYC vacation gallery. There were some practical reasons why I chose the dining room, and why I chose the sizes of the photos I did. The dining room already had two big blank walls, which I had been struggling to do anything with (for the last five years). At some point after we moved in, I had hung a large 16×20″ print, framed and matted in a 20×24″ frame, of New York, New York, the theme hotel in Las Vegas. At the time, I hung it to make the dining room seem less empty, because I already had the print sitting around the house. So, it made sense to continue to fill this massive wall in the dining room with my New York photos. Because I wanted to add some variety to the gallery, I looked for some New York-inspired art prints by other artists. I went to Etsy and ordered a print called “The Big City” and a 1950’s Braniff Airways print, which add graphic elements and a pop of drama to my photo gallery.

In determining the sizes of the photos I wanted to print, I first went through the house and gathered up the frames I already had that weren’t in use, and that fit my decor (a crystal wedding-themed frame would not have fit my décor. I went for simple black frames). I had several 4×6″ and 5×7″ frames that would work, but I didn’t have enough for all of the photos I wanted to include, so I went to Michael’s and searched their frame department for sales and clearance items that would work. I found a handful of frames for a steal, including some unfinished frames for $4 a piece that I can easily paint the color I want with some glossy acrylic paint. Even if I don’t use them all in the dining room, there are lots of other rooms where I can use them – or I could even use them for Christmas presents in a couple of months.

I then ordered the photos I wanted to hang, in the right sizes, from an online photo lab. My favorite lab for prints is Richmond Camera, because the color and tone is nearly identical to what I see on my computer monitor, and I can count on the pictures to come back looking how I expect them to look. Plus, they’re a local small business, so I feel better giving them my dollars than a big chain store like Walmart or Walgreens.

Once I had my prints and my frames, I needed to determine the layout on the wall without knocking a ton of holes in my dining room wall. I pulled out a couple of paper bags I had saved from the grocery store, cut them down one seam so they laid flat, and then placed the frames flat-side-down on the bags. I traced around each frame, cut out the shapes and then started arranging them on the wall in the dining room around my focal point, which was the large print of New York, New York. I used blue painter’s tape with the cutouts so I could take them off the wall and rearrange them easily without damaging the wall paint.

Once I was happy with the layout, I added a very small amount of tape to the back of each photo and hung them on the cutouts so I could see how the pictures and prints all looked together on the wall.

Then all that was left was to add nails, put the pictures in the frames, and hang. Voila!

You might notice in the above photo that A) I switched the top and bottom frames on the left of the gallery – it felt more balanced with the landscape-oriented print on the bottom; and B) some of the frames are crooked. We’re going to address how to fix that in December’s post, when we move to the family room.

A couple of tips for making your own mixed-print gallery:

1. Choose how formal or casual you want the gallery to be. We’re not super formal in my house, and our decor matches our attitude. Galleries with frames that are exactly the same in every way feel very formal, and wouldn’t go with the rest of my house very well. By choosing some frames that are a little different, I added some texture and visual interest for a more casual, “found” feel. Because the frames are the same color, the gallery still feels cohesive.
2. Larger walls typically call for larger prints. While I could have filled all of these spaces on the wall with 4×6″ or 5×7″ prints, because the wall is so wide, the gallery would have looked busy and cluttered, with your eyes trying to find a focal point. By having one print that is larger than all the others, your eye is drawn to that first, and then move out to the other photos, which allows you take in the gallery in smaller chunks. When we do a kitchen gallery next week, we’ll talk about the exception to the “one huge photo to rule them all” rule.
3. Stay grounded. Remember your audience when you’re placing your gallery on the wall. If you’re hanging your gallery in the dining room (like me), where most people will be sitting, you don’t want your gallery to go so high that viewers can’t see it without having to uncomfortably lean their heads back and look towards the ceiling. (Plus, then you have to continuously watch out for cobwebs along your ceiling line, because they’ll be really easy to see by people looking up.) Go eye level or just slightly above for rooms where the viewer will be sitting, or in small rooms where you can’t see the art from farther away.

I hope my rundown and tips are helpful if you are looking to update your dining room or add a photo gallery to your home. It doesn’t have to be hard, and if it means bringing a little more personality into your space, then I call that a win-win.

Now, go forth and create your own special-place gallery. Where is your favorite happy-soul vacation spot that is worthy of a gallery of memories in your home?

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Allison Patel is a lifestyle family and maternity photographer, and loves using Allison Patel Photography to meet new people and explore new places around Richmond. When she’s not working or taking pictures, she enjoys cheering for the Rams and the Hokies, and blogs weekly at allisonpatelphoto.com.

Facebook: www.facebook.com/allisonpatelphotography

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Website: www.allisonpatelphoto.com

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McAbbott Studios is keeping cost (and short attention spans) in mind with their mini sessions at Hip to be Round.

Book your appointment for August 2nd, 2014 and come in for a really fun, and blissfully short, mini session.  Go silly with props provided by the studios or take a more serious route with a classic back drop. Your choice!

After the session, you’ll get 5 prints for digital download so you can print as many as you’d like wherever you’d like (though they do have professional prints available at a discounted price).

Make a day of it and take a walk around Carytown and grab some cupcakes, or some lunch or head over to our friends at All Fired Up. Since the sessions are so short, you’ll all still like each other by the end!

Book your appointment by calling: 804-505-0443

Photographs of animals dominate the web. From the cute to the ridiculous, millions of pet images are viewed and shared each day. The historical precedent for this online phenomenon can be found in The Importance of Being Cute. This entertaining exhibition focuses on the relationships that have existed between Virginians and their pets since the advent of photography. Vintage images from the Library of Virginia’s collection allow visitors to explore more than a century and a half of pet photography, including photographs from Victorian cartes de visite, cabinet cards, and original glass plate negatives. Today’s visitors will be able to participate by submitting a picture of their furry loved ones to become part of the exhibition.

Back-to-school time! My Facebook feed is so full of adorable back-to-school photos it has drown out adorable politics for multiple days.

I knew I would take a few, but the fact that I’ve seen so many of them, the secret hipster in me whispered: Don’t post one. Even if the kids are wearing skinny jeans, fake glasses and carrying messenger bags with unheard of 70s bands, you cannot pull this off.

I was already down one cuteness factor when I decided that my kids still had clothes that fit so they didn’t need a special back-to-school outfit. I may have felt smug about not being consumeristic, but I also wish I'd hidden my son's Yoshi T-shirt.

The afternoon of my kids' first day of school, a friend remarked: I didn't even know they were back to school. You didn't post pictures. Everything okay? That’s just not like you guys.

(Was I just insulted? Meh, the truth hurts.)

I posted a few photos when I got home, but as the other's streamed through my newsfeed, I started to feel worse — not just because I hadn’t posted a photo of my kids showing off my excitement and tears to all our friends, but because I hadn’t done something adorable like had them hold a 2012 sign or stand next to my stuffed bear so we could cry about how big they are or thrown an entire back-to-school party (for them or for me).

I didn't even make a pencil wreathes for a posing background (although if you do, make one for me because they're kind of awesome).

But compared to last year where I was all I NEED A PHOTO EVEN THOUGH WE ARE RUNNING LATE AND I’M BAWLING BECAUSE BOTH MY KIDS ARE IN PRESCHOOL, I did pretty good.

This is my best photo from last year:

Who are those blurry kids? Oh, they're MINE.

This year, I was determined to have my children recognizable.

So cute! I think I finally took a decent school photo until I realize my son is holding the Moon of Endor.

The next 4 had no one looking at the camera, this 1 included, but at least, they look happy and snuggly, right?

What about you? Did you go all out for back-to-school or were you just happy to get to the bus on time?