City Deal / Groupon Vouchers!

Hello, City Deal/Groupon purchasers!

Thanks for buying a voucher for a photo session!  For more information, head to the special City Deal/Groupon Page here!

Personalized Laptop

A few months ago- maybe even a year ago- Benjy “decorated” our computer with some Hello Kitty stickers he found lying around.  It wasn’t the best of surprises I’ll admit, our laptop now looks rather ridiculous, but I never even considered taking them off.

And here’s why:  before it was just a laptop- a vehicle for doing- for emailing, working, wasting gobs and gobs of time.

But now it’s a memory.

It reminds me of the trip to McDonald’s where we got the Hello Kitty stickers and Hello Kitty plastic ring.

It reminds me of a time before kids when I swore I’d never take my kids to McDonald’s EVER.

It reminds me of Benjy’s love of stickers.

It reminds me that any time a child is too quiet, he’s up to something.

Yes, now the computer doesn’t look as perfect as it did when it came out of the box, but I smile every time I see those stickers.  Those totally ridiculous stickers.

And this, my friends is why I’m not a studio photographer.

WHAT?!  You’re thinking .  How did she end up there?

I’m not a studio photographer, because I like the imperfections.

I know that when you go to a studio, everything will look perfect.  The black screen will be just so, the lighting will be perfect, and people will emerge with a nice, clean family photo.

There’s nothing wrong with that.  I understand the appeal.  The new, clean, out-of-the-box, non-stickered laptop.

But what I LOVE are the images of the everyday.  I don’t mind turning up to a family’s house and seeing toys strewn about, the toddler’s face a mess, and breakfast dishes on the table.  If I get to photograph that, you’ll remember that her favorite toy was the wooden duck, her nose was constantly running that winter, and the only way she’d eat her breakfast was with the pink bowl and yellow bib.

You’ll remember that you felt life was so chaotic you could barely hang on, but hang on you did.  You made it.

You’ll remember that amidst the chaos, you found time to play.  Indeed, that you found playing more important than those stupid breakfast dishes, which really might sit there until dinner if you’re honest.

This is also why I’m so honest on my blog.  I can’t expect you to open your hearts and lives to me if I don’t let you into my own heart and my own life.  My perfect client says, “I’m so not perfect, but man, I know how to LOVE.  Please show me LOVING.”

I might not get a perfectly in-focus shot of the entire family looking at the camera and smiling (although, I’ll try- I promise), but if you let me, I WILL show you loving each other.  I absolutely promise that.

Buying Used

Finland is an expensive country.  Super expensive.  Super-duper expensive.  So expensive that when we go to London (a notoriously expensive city), we bring our dry cleaning, because it’s cheaper there.

So, it should come as no surprise, then, that buying used is also SUPER DUPER expensive.

But somehow I am surprised.  Shocked, even.  Because HOLY CAMOLY!  It’s outrageous.

Exhibit A:  The coffee table I got from the local charity shop.  If I were a proper DIY blogger, I’d have remembered to take the photo before any sort of restoration work had been done.  But I’m not.  So, I only remembered after I’d painted one coat of white on the legs.

The charity shop originally wanted 40 euros for this table.  FORTY EUROS.  I ended up paying 15 (not because I haggled- the price had been dropped).  People, it’s chipped and dinged.  It’s not even real wood!

It should have been free at the dump!  They should have paid ME to cart it away!

And the really crazy thing is that we live in the land of Ikea.  I could get a brand new table ding-free for 10 euros.  But then it would have been Ikea. And I didn’t want my whole office to be Ikea.  So I passed on Ikea and paid for overpriced used.

Exhibit B:  The arm chair I got from the same local charity shop for a whopping FIFTY EUROS.

It’s outdated.  It’s worn down.  It’s- as my dear friend Anna described- so fugly.  And FIFTY EUROS.

I’ve been reading these websites with slipcover tutorials.  Of course, they all live in America and are like, “Ooh!  Look at this awesome chair I got at a garage sale for 4 dollars!  What a steal!”

And then they go to the Walmart and get cheap fabric to cover the chair, and 20 bucks later they have brand new furniture.

Yeah.  Not so much here.  The fabric- at any place other than Ikea- is so prohibitively expensive it’s a wonder they can sell any at all.

Exhibit C:  The china hutch I tried to buy on Huuto.net (the Finnish Ebay).

I found it for auction last night- the auction was ending in something like 6 hours and the hutch had no bidders.  It was going for 100 euros.  Finally!  thought I optimistically (naively) Something reasonably priced on this website!  

Because it seems that on Huuto.net, the seller can simply paint any old, crappy piece of furniture white, label it “maalaisromanttinen”  (country romantic) and sell it for hundreds and hundreds of euros.

But I digress.

An hour before the auction finished, there was a bidding war between another customer and me, but I was victorious!  Huzzah!  A beautiful china hutch to hide the hideous wall in my office for only 112 euros!

But wait.

My bid didn’t meet the hintavaraus- the secret price the seller lists before he puts the item up for auction.  If the auction doesn’t surpass this hintavaraus, the seller isn’t under any obligation to sell the item.  So even though I won, I didn’t win.

He sent me an email today, saying I could get the the hutch for 200 euros.

Okay.

Here’s the deal.

1.  If you wanted 200 euros for your hutch, I guess you should have started the bidding at 200 euros.

2.  No one bid 200 euros for your hutch.  No one even came close.  It was there for 2 weeks and NO ONE bid on it, except for me and some other dude an hour before it closed.  You’re not going to get 200 euros.

So, needless to say I’m furnishing my office for a whole lot more than I’d need to if I lived Stateside.

But I guess if I lived Stateside, I’d have a 9-5 job doing something responsible like insurance brokering and I wouldn’t need a photography office in the first place.

Huh.  Funny how that works out.