Week 45

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!  Though 2011 had been the best year of my life so far, I knew 2012 would be even better.  Addy would certainly be the biggest reason for a splendid time, so how else could I display her importance in the new year?!  I bought gigantic numbers and she stood between them.  They were $200 each.  Just kidding, although I'm sure if you've added up all the crazy props I'd purchased thus far, you probably believed me for a second!  The numbers are actually die-cut numbers and are about 3 inches tall.  I dressed her like a little jewel thief and added the Happy New Year headband from the Christmas Tree Shop.  I took a picture of the numbers, then of Addy, and put them together for the final product.


Did I mention I ditched the paper numbers?  I started adding the numbers with Photoshop. Wayyy easier.  And no little chipmunks chewing on them.

Week 44

Sooooo wait... we leave cookies and he leaves presents?  Yeah I have to see this one.




He IS real!!


Week 42 fell on the Monday right after Christmas, so I was able to post a picture of her discovery under the pretense of a Monday Picture.  Santa. Is. Real.   True discovery learning caught here, people.  No description necessary.

Week 43

There's a sweet little Christmas Pixie frolicking in my poinsettias!  And, had you seen her, you'd know she frolicked for about 30 seconds and took off.  I love this toothless little mouth that allows her gums to mash together and create a straight-lined grin.  She's wearing a tutu and headband set that I found at Marshall's, then saw at a local baby store chain for double the price.   Gotta love a bargain!  (This one's for you, Christie, Queen of the Bargains!) I smushed my poinsettias together and left a spot for the Pixie.   She sat it in the clearing for an instant then POOF! With a burst of sparkles, she was gone (crawling under the dining room table).

Week 42

"I'm an Addy-in-the-Box!"  While technically she's a misfit, I'd take 65 more of these toys!  If they promise to sleep at night.  Anyway, Christmas season is not complete without Rudolph and the Misfit Toys.  I searched for these toys and paid far too much for them on Amazon.  And it would figure that 1 week after I took this, I found another misfit toy doll in the grocery store for half the price.  Imagine my temper tantrum in the clearance holiday aisle.  A role model I was not.  She's sitting in a diaper box wrapped in paper and wearing the same elfin collar from Week 40.  See, I reuse props!  The backdrop is a shower curtain and the mountains were cut from the top of a white cardboard box.  The snowy ground is the underside of a very cozy blanket perfect for watching Lifetime movies on rainy days.  Not that I'd done that in 42 weeks.

Week 41

Nutcrackers can be intimidating little Christmas figures, especially the tall ones.  Have you found the sweetest Nutcracker ever?  When I posted this picture originally, many people didn't even know she was in there!  Addy had some confused fans.  I was so determined to take this picture that it took several tries.  The background is the same red curtain from the apple bushel.  She is wearing a military pea coat from Old Navy (she already had this, I didn't buy it just for this photo... surprisingly!), a pair of leggings, my belt, and my socks pulled up to look like boots.  I made her hat from a top hat I had and stuck stickers on it to mimic the other Nutcrackers' hats.  PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN.  You know, the man you can't see because I blocked his arms.  Addy couldn't stand up on her own and my lovely assistant is behind the fancy backdrop holding her up.  His arms are blocked by the taller nutcrackers and I used a little Photoshop cloning to hide any other visible part.  The red cheeks are also done with Photoshop because she isn't allowed to wear makeup yet.  I told her to give me the Nutcracker look and she played the part perfectly.  Isn't she a genius?

Week 40

You better not cry, you better not pout (but you can giggle because this is beyond cute).  Christmas season is here and this little elf is watching you!  I wanted The Elf on the Shelf to be a family tradition since I heard about it a few years ago, and YAY look at the one that came in my set!  She's so lifelike!  :)  My elf is wearing red feety pjs with a makeshift elfin collar and a hat from the Target dollar bin.  I moved the shelf away from the wall so my lovely assistant could fit behind it.  He's holding her up there VERY securely and I edited out his arms and hands.  I used a flash that created a shadow, so that helped hide his arms.   I am even more sure of her safety in this way... the kid wakes me up so often during the night that I KNOW she isn't traveling solo to the North Pole every night to report to Santa!

Week 39

HA!  This chubby little entree makes me laugh every time!  Special thanks to Target for coming through on the fabulous hat and holiday sign!  Dollar Bins strike again!  Addy is sitting on our dining room table flanked by several large potatoes and our wedding china (I think this is the most usage its ever had).  I had originally placed the sign in front of her but being the ham (ahem.. turkey) that we adore, she picked it up and started waving it around.  I think she was auditioning for the Grand Marshall position of the Macy's Parade.  I can't understand how she didn't get it.
I forgot to mention a few pictures back that I had started doing the numbers differently.  They had become so big and annoying (and Addy had taken a bite out of a few of them) that I had to find a way around them.  I started taking a picture of just the number and (poorly) pasting it into the portrait.  See it here magically floating in the corner... with the chunks missing? :)

Week 38

My cornucopia of cuteness!  It was the beginning of November and time to roll in the Thanksgiving theme.  Frankly, I think this is one of my least favorite Monday Pictures.  I love the idea and the chubby cheeks, but the coloring is way off.  I would love to go back and do it again, but I deleted my original (don't do that!!).  I took this on a Monday afternoon as close to the window as possible.  The lighting wasn't great so I used my flash, which is the root of all the problems here!  Good thing the main subject remains precious!  I set everything up and slipped her in.  She was so sound asleep she probably could have spent her entire nap here.  Who knew a cornucopia was so cozy?

Week 37

Anyone who knows me knows how I treasure my wedding dress.  They also know it isn't unusual to stop by my house and find me wearing it while watching tv.  For Week 37, I put my two treasures together to make one of my favorite pictures.  Because my dress has a gigantic train and a full skirt that swishes and sparkles and stands out as the most glorious dress...ahhh I digress. I didn't need a backdrop because my dress is so big and I chose an angle that didn't allow for a background.  I spread the dress out first (and talked to her, promising that someday soon these baby-bearing hips would once again fit in there and we could go back to vacuuming and watching tv together) then sat Addy right in the middle.  Maybe she'll wear this dress again someday when she meets her own Prince Charming!  Hopefully he's patient because she isn't allowed to date until she's 30.

Week 36

Ladies, Gentlemen, and Little Monsters... Baby Gaga.  We're big Lady Gaga fans around here and Addy really wanted to show her some love by sporting her own version of the Bubble Dress.  I searched through the Gaga outfits to find one that I would be able to recreate and the Meat Dress was a close second.  I made the Bubble Dress with acrylic Christmas ornaments and a white t-shirt.  I sewed (and I use that phrase loosely) the ornaments on with a few quick stitches around each loop.  Lady Gaga wore fishnets with this dress but would you believe they don't come in size 6 months?  Geez.  If you look closely, you can see our backyard reflected in her sunglasses, so you know she was sitting on the black shower curtain by the window.  I found her sunglasses at Babies R Us and this was one of the three seconds that she kept them on.  She didn't want them on her P-P-P-Poker Face. 

How Do I Come Up With These?

I honestly don't know.  So many people have asked me this and I really don't have have an answer for them.  When the pictures moved past a simple portrait, I started keeping a list of idea.  Whenever I thought of something I made sure I wrote it down.  On Mondays (and eventually Sundays) I would go through the list and choose the one that was possible that day.  I love craft stores and I'm lucky to have several close by.  I could spend hours wondering through them!  Whenever I go, I cruise the aisles looking for possible props.  I've come up with many pictures that way (i.e. I saw rubber ducks and came up with Week 30).  All the props that I've said came from a party store were all purchased on the same day.  I was picking up paper plates for a little soiree and found all these goodies!  I couldn't help myself so I bought them all and stored them for future photos.  I've also searched the Target dollar bins each time I've been there and have been super successful.  At this point (I'm currently on Week 50) I've used most of them!  My goal was to get to 52 and this method has carried me through!

Week 35

You gotta know when to hold 'em, know, when to fold 'em, know when to eat the card because it's more fun.  Addy decided to have a few friends over for a game of poker and Lamby really cleaned up.  My lovely assistant had a hard time seeing his poker cards get slobbered on but he decided it was for a good cause. :)  I bought the hat in a party store and my assistant happened to have a tie that matched well.  By now you can probably tell when I used natural lighting as her eyes practically glow.  The black shower curtain made a strong comeback this week, draped over the back of the couch.  I used Photoshop to make it a little cleaner behind the baby.  When you try this, make sure your stuffed animals sit up well on their own.  See that giraffe hanging its head on the left?  It's because he almost got tossed from the game for lousy posture that made me stop mid-shoot several times..

Week 34

This Cabbage Patch baby is certainly one of a kind, but there is not an Xavier Roberts autograph on her heinie.  I had started taking her picture on Sundays and posting them on Mondays because coming home from work and scrambling to get her photo done was too much.  This Monday Picture was taken on a strangely hot Sunday afternoon and the picture was posted the following day, which was no less than 40 degrees cooler.  I had to post a disclaimer so people knew I hadn't risked pneumonia for a picture.  Anyway, over the summer we had one of those pop-up pools which left a lovely dirt ring in the backyard.  I took that lemon and made lemonade!  In other words, I threw some cabbages out there, made a cabbage patch, and grew the sweetest cabbage patch baby ever!  Also, she didn't sprout that much hair over the previous 7 days.  Those pigtails are part of a headband made by Bebe Doos (http://bebedoos.webs.com/).  Isn't it adorable??  She has tons of headbands, but this one is my favorite!