A Real Photo Studio and an Asthma Attack

{PHOTO SHOOT}

Yup. We went to a real photo studio....complete with lights that were "triggered" to our cameras. Simply put, for photography newbies like moi, the studio lights go on when we click our cameras to take a picture. Trouble was, there were 3 of us with cameras! Hehehe. So you can just imagine what it was like in the beginning. Groans, curses and mumbling as we fiddled around with the lights and our digital cameras. After more than half an hour, we figured we shouldn't be wasting precious studio time tinkering with our cameras, but that we should PRACTICE on the real live subjects we brought with us: the kids.

Photographers: Elizza, Japa, Me. Boydee, Bang and Gelo arrived after an hour or so. Only Boydee and Bang and moi had point and shoot cameras. Everyone else had their precious DSLR. After several attempts to get the lighting correct on my photos, I FINALLY figured out that I was better off just turning off my flash and shooting in automatic mode, hehehe. It sure saved me precious minutes, and my patience!

Some photos from our shoot. Not the best. Yet. I have Photoshop to help me make good pics better. Most shots will most likely go into my layouts. Of course! Who can beat nice (relatively) lighting, great backgrounds, matching outfits, and cooperative (for the most part) kids?!?!


Raegan and Raine woke up extra early because they wanted to have their hair and make up done for the shoot. I ironed their hair and applied foundation, eye liner, mascara, powder, eye shadow, and lipstick to their darling little faces. Not too heavy of course, but just enough to make them extra pretty for the shoot :)

The kids were pretty good during the 3 hours we were in the studio. They mainly played with their video games --- their Nintendo DS and their Game Boy. Thank goodness we had those, otherwise, it would have been a madhouse in the studio! Reese also crashed on the sofa while waiting for her turn to have her picture taken. The poor thing probably lacked sleep since we all had to get up unusually early for a Sunday morning, she didn't care about the decrepit furniture in the studio, hehehe.

All in all, a good day. Now, to get my grubby little hands on Elizza's photos during the shoot as well. And Bang's. And the few shots that Gelo took before his camera battery died on him.

{LUNCH}

Japa was craving steak at Seven Corners, so we HAD to go there for lunch. The kids were so excited to go to a buffet; they were ready to eat since they missed breakfast! I know some of them had a snack of mamon from Red Ribbon and some lemonade, so at least they had something in their tummies.

We gorged ourselves on steak, steak and steak. By the end of the meal, I told Japa that I didn't want to see another steak for a loooong time. He agreed, since he had stuffed himself as well!

{ASTHMA ATTACK}

Poor Rogan. He woke up this morning and was having difficulty breathing. Japa and I surmised that the boys (yes, even Ranger had the sniffles and was starting to cough up phlegm) had gotten the Gavino asthma attack when they went to Tanay yesterday. The grass, the horses, the piggeries......they weren't conducive to the boys and were triggers for their asthma. Sigh!

We nebulized Rogan so he could breath a little bit easier. But he was not a happy camper during the shoot, for sure. He FELT and LOOKED sick, poor baby. I'm monitoring him tonight to see if the medication will help him a bit. I'm hoping it does...he has taekwondo first thing in the morning!

{PACKING...}

...for Cebu. We leave tomorrow afternoon, yay! We have looked forward to this mini-vacation since summer started for the kids. And they can't wait to see Miggy of course. I'm having them bring their GSS stuff too---just in case we have an hour or two without any planned activity, I'm going to push for art or reading or vocabulary :) That's the teacher in me.

We're staying at Bang's beach house in Mactan. It has a pool, so we should be set. A nice-sized private pool :) Not like the Orlando vacation home we stayed at a few years ago. Of course, it was a timeshare property, so we had to share the pool with other residents, hehehe. But sometimes, with the number of kids we have, we prefer private pools.....at least the kids can be as noisy as they want to be, and as rowdy as they are apt to be.

{SPONSORED REVIEW}

Before signing off, a site recommendation, especially if you're shopping in Euros or pounds (is England still retaining it's own currency? Or am I being totally dense and clueless about current events again?!?). I think it's an alternative to amazon.com. Their site seems pretty easy to navigate and they've got loads of stuff available! Go check it out: TWENGA

It seems a pretty easy site to shop from. If you look at all the links in the first part of this post, they should lead you to the different "departments" of twenga. They've got everything from Photography stuff to Home stuff to Health stuff. There are even tabs that will list their stock items by Brand names and by Top Deals! Now how cool is that? I'm sure Amazon probably has these too, but I love discovering and exploring new sites online, especially if it involves some sort of shopping! Hehehe.

{FAMILY BLOGS}

Just a plug of sorts. Bang has started blogging again; she's got a new blog up, which is ALL about eating, eating and eating. Check out The Accidental Gourmand if you want to know more about off-beat places in Manila (or anywhere, really). Bang reviews the places where we eat at. She has her handy dandy camera to take care of the photos.

Elizza has her blog set up now, too, with a new header, which looks awesome. That reminds me that I MUST change my header soon. Like yesterday, hehehe. If you want more pics from today's photo shoot, check out her blog.

The latest blog to hit blog land is Zhar's blog. Very very cool look! Love it! Looks like it was done by a professional...but we found out that Rodney has some background in Web Design! Sheesh! And here Elizza and I were, tearing our hair out trying to figure out this damn HTML code!!! Hehehe.

Ok, time for bed. I'm going to have to be up early in the morning and TRY to buy some waxing stuff for my legs (and other parts of the body, lol!). I really MUST have everything waxed or shaven before we leave for Cebu!

Good night (really, I should be saying good morning since it's 3:30 am already!!!) and TTFN!