FUN IN THE SUN {photo contest}

Finally.... the iCandy Fun in the Sun Photo Contest!!  Show us the fun that you've been having over the summer.  Let's see your best picture of the most fun that you've had!  Here's how it works:  Email a photo of either you, your kids, your spouse or just any old photo that captures some good 'ol summer fun to micah@icandymadeyousmile.com by August 5th, all the pictures that are entered into the contest will be posted on Facebook on August 6th for the voting to begin and the winner with most votes will be announced on August 13th.

How do you get your votes?  Well that's up to you!!  You need to make posts on your Facebook page to your friends to go vote for you.  The more posts the more votes you're going to get!!

What's a vote?  A vote is either a "LIKE" on the picture that you've entered, or a comment on the picture that you've entered - if someone "likes" and comments, only one will be counted as a vote.

What do you win?  A FREE PHOTO SESSION, silly!! The session is good for up to 4 people (each additional person over 4 is $15) along with 20-25 digitally edited images on disk, copy-right free! (a $200 value!)  Plus you'll become a part of the iCandy family being able to participate in our referral program which will give you discounts for future photo sessions!

Now c'mon... what do you have to lose??  NOTHING!  And what do you have to gain?  LOTS!  Starting with some good 'ol innocent fun and a chance to show-off your summer and also win a photo session which will give you more memories to last a lifetime!!

ready, set.......      GO!!

The Holley's... (hunks, divas and heart-throbs!)

It's been 8 DAYS since I've "blogged" (I love using that word - duh!) Me and the 3 kids took off to Idaho last Saturday - back to my hometown of Blackfoot to do some photo shoots and to hang with family and friends - I had so many "moments" while there that I was actually able to come back with much blogging material - good laughs ahead, my friends!

But this blog is about the session that I had with my good and long-time friend, Marcy... we have many many good memories together, some that we'd NEVER want our kids to know about, after all, we were 15 & 16 when we first met and that's when history was made! We clicked and clicked good and it was on from there! Unfortunately, we had to grow up, get married and have kids (I mean, have kids, get married but still working on the growing up part...) and of course, we were no longer sleeping at each other's houses, staying up or sneaking in at 6 or 7 in the morning, sleeping in until 2pm, waking up and starting all over again - so in the meantime we lost contact but she's always had a spot in my heart - with all her big 90's hair - even if I wanted to kick her out of my heart, I couldn't because of all that damn hairspray she used - she's permanently pasted!  (I'll dig out the pictures for a future blog) So unfortunately, I haven't been able to be a part of her 3 children's lives and get to know them so I was especially excited that she wanted me to do a session of them! And holy moly!  These kids are HOT! When watching she and her 13 yr. old son, it reminds me so much of me and Deondré - nothing but some major head-buttin' and bickering like brother and sister! LOVE IT (well love that I'm not the only one out there in pain and suffering!)  So here's Dylan, he's a handsome little hunk and he's pretty content with it!

And next up is this little amazing diva (not diva in the works, straight up diva!), McKinlay.... she knew how to work the camera and I loved every single minute of it!

And finally, Bridger... he put on the shy act with me but I have a feeling he's really not - but what he is, is a heart-throb. Marcy, you better be careful with this one and just prepare yourself now for the girls that are gonna be chasin' your baby around - WOOT WOO!

  

And here they are, altogether... proof that Marcy and Jon make dang cute babies!

Thanks, Marc, for letting me boss your kids around and capture their contagious smiles, smirks and twinkling eyes!  You're always in my heart...

Sugar & Spice & Everything Nice, That's What Little Girls are Made Of....

I love it when Chevee is in such a smiley mood - which happens to be a lot - but I think as most photographers experience, it's all smiles until the camera gets busted out! I've learned that I just have to keep mine on my hip most of the time, especially when we're hanging out outside... and if I'm sneaky enough, I can catch her at her best, which, I have to admit, I've accomplished in these pictures!

So in honor of Chevee's 3-month old birthday today, July 15, here's our little sugar muffin, monkey butt, lover girl, Chevee - aka "BUBBLES!"

Do you see how she smiles with her eyes??? I love it! Talk about tender-heart moments.

It's amazing the joy, love and tenderness a baby brings into a household

and family and especially when we needed it most.

When we lost my dad almost 3 years ago, I don't think any of us have smiled the same since, I know our kids haven't, Grandpa was a HUGE part of their lives from the day they were born. But we know, and my Mom especially knows, that Chevee and Grandpa hung strong before she came to us, therefore not only were we blessed with the gift of her but we know she also brought a piece of Grandpa with her to help us smile again. I'm sure when she's old enough to take fishing, she'll out-fish us.  Thank you, Dad, for taking care of our Chevee while she was waiting for her turn on earth and thank you, Heavenly Father, for blessing us with such a sweet little lady and also for Deondré who carries so many of Grandpa's traits and for Aaliyah who is just a character of her own that we love so much.  I especially need to remind myself how true and special  children are, not just sweet little babies - we have those patient-testing moments but I know in our house, we also have a lot of fun and laughter...

The Gorilla's Birthday - as a Comic....

My Gorilla had a birthday on Tuesday the 12th - the BIG 36!  He's officially in his "late thirties" but still acts like he's in his teenage years! And just as little kids do, he still gets excited to have his birthday, open his presents and blow out the candles on his cake.  So why not share the pictures as kiddish as he...

The Cake!  (A big 'ol 1/2 lb. patty melt - just like my birthday boy!!)

 The cake with 24 candles - the wifey didn't have her thinkin' cap on straight when she was buying candles - shouldn't one package of candles be enough for any birthday cake?? Well thank goodness we stopped at 24 because the kids have little singe marks all over their arms from trying to light the candles, not to mention, we got our share of wax in our bellies!


The Gorilla thinkin' on what he should wish for when he blows out these flames before him...

 YES, YES, YES! He's got the PERFECT wish! (silly boy, he keeps forgetting he's already got the best wish ever - being married to me!! :)  But you know how boys like to dream and keep on wishin' for more....

And here it goes.......

Good grief, look at all that smoke! (I thought ahead though and turned off the smoke detectors!)

The Cake.... after - poor exhausted candles!  (check out the size of those wicks!!)

A few gifts to show off...

 Who wouldn't get this excited to get a shaker and a Bob Marley clock to add to his Bob Marley wall of fame??

We love our Gorilla papa.... even if he's just a little boy stuck in Gorilla man's body!

The Stare-Off

I've been dying to share these pictures from last month of "Bubbles" (Chevee) and her little friend...  This "stare-off" lasted about 20 minutes & boy was it fun to watch!!
Contestant #1:  The ever so beautiful, Chevee Rae Baldwin

Contestant #2: The Bee Thing that Hangs from the Bouncer (and plays a little jig if ya tug on it!)

I don't know if I even need to explain the next pictures or not, I'm thinking not... they pretty much tell their own story and show the intensity of the competition - and let me be the first to say, it WAS intense!

I couldn't concentrate this hard on something if my life depended on it! (I wonder what she's thinking the prize will be!!)

Still holding strong....

O this bug doesn't stand a chance!

Her strategy?  Use the bitter-beer (milk) face.....

And drool and blow bubbles out the mouth.... it's sure to work!

Can't you see the fear in this bug's eyes?  He's about to throw in the towel...

And the winner is.........

O boy, was this some hard work... I've lost all control in my face, I'm just gonna let it all hang out!

The next encounter?  Now that she's progressing so well, she's wanting to shove that whole bug in her mouth, staring's for whoosies!

{The True Fun in Summer...}

I took off through our little town of Alpine today with camera in hand - heading to the park in hopes of capturing some summer fun moments for my upcoming "Fun in the Sun" contest... and boy did I find the best example of what kids do for fun & it reminded me of being a kid, not having the internet or XBox or iPods or any of those other gadgets, only our imaginations....

Walking up the road I ran across these kids carrying this beat up couch down the sidewalk... doing a good deed for the neighbor perhaps? I continued to follow (stalk).....

No good deed for the neighbor, they'd done past up all the houses and continued on... the curiosity was killing me!

Ahhh.... okay - this is making much more sense now! They carried it up the road to this nice little piece of grass and were just gonna hang out on it (though the girl had a lot to say & was obviously trying to prove herself to be right about something! Cute - I get it.  So I carried on with my walk, still heading to the park.

I looked back once I got up the road a little further & snapped another picture... something was about to happen here - these weren't kids that were just going to stop at furnishing this little patch of grass, they had much bigger plans....

And then I heard it, the "oh no's" and the "there it goes" and the "catch it!"....  a brilliant plan gone wrong...

Now if you look real hard at the above picture, clear up that creek you'll see the brilliant plan gone wrong... the couch with no kids on it! Their idea of floating the creek on the couch back-fired and the couch took off without 'em! I knew I should've stuck around to catch every moment of this mishap! I'm now probably known to them as the crazy evil stalker lady because all I did was run around using my left hand to push Chevee in her stroller while trying to take the pictures of this humorous moment with my right hand... why was I getting such a kick out of this??  I finally caught up to them and in the above picture, the couch was actually stuck but they'd managed to set it free but it had flipped upside down so here they are trying to flip it back over.

I couldn't creep them out any further to stick around and watch the conclusion so I went on my merry way to creep out the horses I came upon next.... but I still can't help but wonder what the conclusion was. Guess I need to go for another walk tonight!!

And here's a picture of my next victim!

I love this little town we live in... so much to see and only lots to do if you put your mind to it (something our kids are having a real hard time comprehending now that we're no longer living in the city).

{Amazing Yet Exciting! Welcome to My Blog!!}

Well I'm not even exactly sure where to start or what I should say first other than HOLY HELL - after months and months and months of procrastination I've finally made it to my blog - my own little personal space all about me and my new career of iCandy Photography. But wait! It's not just going to stop there - I decided that if I'm going to promote my business you're gonna have to get to know me and what I have to say, not just on a business level, but also a personal level.  What fun is doing business with someone if you don't even know anything about them or their personality. Me, personally - I don't care HOW good your work is, if you don't have the personality to make yourself enjoyable to be around - forget it! So my goal with my blog is to not only share with the cyber world my work but also me, me, me - brace yourself - you're about to embark on a ride of a lifetime - I plan on getting right down personal & opinionated & I hope that I can have at least ONE person that can relate with whatever it may be that I'm "blogging" about that day. Blogging is going to be my own personal therapy, so please bare with me... if it doesn't make sense, so be it - just be happy for me that I've been able to clear my mind on my blog and that I'll be able to go on with my day!!  So thank you in advance - and welcome to my world!