true story: death threats, racism, and me

I have a disorder.

In short, it is this: sometimes I'm a complete and total loser. I try to say something and it comes out all wrong. Yes, I know. Common mistake, right? Well, for me it happens all the time. Like tonight's utterly foot-in-mouth worthy example.

Tonight I shot bridal portraits for a lovely client that will be getting married in a couple weeks. I've already shot her engagements, and so I feel familiar and comfortable with her, her fiance, and her family. In fact, I feel like we're friends. Buddies. Pretty close to besties. I'm not bragging or anything about having awesome clients that are also friends. I just want to explain my frame of mind when the Disorder occurred. You'll see.

Disorder Incident #1
While shooting Madi, clouds covered the sky and the lighting dimmed. I decided to lower my shutter speed to pull in more ambient light. So to help keep a steady camera hold, I braced my back against a nearby fence. Madi's uncle, Kurt (also a friend of mine...again, not bragging) came to the shoot. I thought he was standing behind me. I thought he was also propped against the fence. I thought he was the one banging the fence over and over and over again.
So when I yelled over my shoulder, "Stop that or I'm going to KILL you!" I didn't expect to turn around to find Madi's lovely mother staring wide-eyed at me in complete shock. Apparently she's never had a photographer threaten her life. I guess there's a first for everything.

Disorder Incident #2
Flustered and completely embarrassed, we left the first location (after I apologized repeatedly) and sought out a spot that was better lit. Upon arriving at the second location, a light rain began hitting us. I wanted to hurry the shoot along so beautiful Madi and her handsome fiance, Cesar (take note of his name now) wouldn't get drenched.

"Madi," I said from across the field, "turn to face the poppies. Oh lovely. That looks awesome. Perfect."
Snap. Snap. I shot a few more pose changes, and then decided it was time for Cesar to jump into the picture.
I looked up to where he stood near the side of the road, waiting to be called into the shoot.
"JORGE!" I yelled. "Jump in."
He looked at me. Madi looked at me. Madi's lovely mom who I threatened just minutes earlier looked at me.
Then Kurt (did I say friend earlier? I meant former friend) turned to me. "You mean, Cesar? Wow, Erin. Just because he's Mexican doesn't mean you can throw any Hispanic name out there. Are you a racist or what?"

In that moment, I wanted to die.

Disorder Incident #3
After apologizing profusely, in between laughing so hard tears were streaming down my face, I recomposed myself. I was determined to finish the shoot without one more moment of complete mortification.

Five minutes later. "Madi, now you and Jorge..."

Son of a flipping mother! I said Jorge again. Apparently I am a racist-death-threat-throwing photographer. Apparently I have a Disorder and it doesn't matter that my clients are like friends...because that probably wont last very long with my record.



Reading Update. Need a book suggestion?

Books are crack, and I'm a full-on addict. Thus, the reason I've been working on writing my own YA novel for the past three years. I'll be the first to admit I've written some serious crap, but hopefully I'll one day rise from my pile of great stink and produce something worthy of publishing. Something as awesome as the list of books I've come up with this evening.
Since the weather's been down right sinister lately, I've had a lot of time to read. And I've read a lot. Some good, some not so much. I'll skip the mundane, boring, and serious lame books. I'll only suggest the awesomest of all. These are the books I give a 5 out of 5 stars. That way you can be sure of your next Amazon purchase because any book on this list has my stamp of approval.

1. DIVERGENT by Veronica Roth
This is the first on my list. Probably because I just finished it ten minutes ago, but mostly because it was wickedly awesome fulfilling all of my dystopic novel dreams. It's the Hunger Games meets the Matrix. Men, women, boys and girls alike will think this book is crazy cool. And if they don't? They're pansies.

2. WITHER by Lauren DeStefano
Leery, I was when I first picked up this novel. So I checked out some of the Goodreads ratings. They were mixed reviews and left me wondering why some people would hate this book while others loved it so much. Could they all be besties to Lauren? I didn't think so. So I read. Polygamy meets The Forest of Hands and Teeth...but without all the zombies. Just death. Imminent death due to a post-apocalyptic world and medical science gone haywire. Then you mix in a little polygamy with the eeriness of a controlled society that comes with all dystopic novels and you have something that's at it's core is sickening yet fascinating. Basically I couldn't put it down.

3. A BRIDE IN THE BARGAIN by Deeanne Gist
First off, I never venture into Borders and head to the historical romance section. Never! It's just not my thing. When a friend suggested I pick up this novel I scoffed. Maybe said a few disparaging remarks...I can't seem to recall. Whatever, I read the book. It sucked me in. I loved the adventure that the Seattle territory brings to the plot. And I thought the idea that a man could purchase a civil-war widow as a bride was intriguing. I read the thing from start to finish without stopping. It made me laugh, sigh, and even cry. It was eloquent, and heart wrenching with a perfect ending.

4. CRYER'S CROSS by Lisa McMann
This book isn't for the feint of heart. It's creepy. But the spookiness of the story is presented in such a humorous, and poignant, yet simply stated package that it left me in awe of Lisa's writing style. She can write one small sentence and invoke a spread of emotions. I loved how she weaved the complexities a teenage girl with OCD might have to face into a deadly mystery. It's a quick read that will leave you chilled to the bone. You should read it, but I suggest you don't do so at 2am.

5. IT'S NOT SUMMER WITHOUT YOU by Jenny Han
Alright, this isn't the first novel in the series. In fact, it's the fourth. So this book suggestion is kind of a cheat. You have to read the first three books in the series before you reach this fourth one. Check out: The Summer I Turned Pretty, It's not Summer without You, We'll Always Have Summer, and then It's Not Summer Without You. They are are heartfelt story of a girl who moves into maturity and finds her first love. Sounds silly and girly, right? You are so wrong there. They were crafted in a way that you can see the individual emotional growth in each character. Of all the series out there, this one is one of my favorites.

There's my list for this month. If you are a reader like me, you can become my friend on Goodreads. We can share books we like, and ones we don't.

Or, have you read anything good lately? Let me know, and I'll pick it up.

food glorious food...and other conference pictures

In January I stopped eating sugar and drinking caffine. Well, mostly. Alright, so it was a little hard when we went on vacation to California, and then even harder when Harts (my city's beloved gas station) has free drink day, but the hardest when I went to a writing conference last week and EVERYBODY was drinking and eating what I wanted.

So yeah, I broke down. I drank the Diet Coke and ate the M&Ms. I swear I wasn't thinking about food and soda the whole time, but when I look back at the pictures I took, I wonder if maybe I was just fooling myself.

You decide.

 That's a snickers.

 Yeah, and a Reeses Peanut Butter Cup. Yum.

 An apple. So I was trying to stay healthy...at least in thought.

 Soda!!!

 Food, glorious Food!

 Yes a gummy worm. And sadly, if she offered it to me I would have eaten it from her nose.

These may be the unfortunates that didn't win a Whitney at the 2011 Whitney Awards,

but I just see them as Cheesecake lovers.

Yes, I'm guilty of being a food lover.

Sigh.

luv, erin

two loves.

First, Happy Mother's Day to all the wonderful mother's out there. I can't say enough good things about my own mother and the many women in my life that have raised and supported me throughout the years. I'm truly blessed by their influence, and grateful for all that these wonderful women do for me.

Second, because it's Mother's Day, which essentially means MY DAY, then I figured there could be no better way to celebrate today than by posting about ME ME ME ME ME ME ME!

Yeah, you get the pic. I'm slightly self-centered.

Regardless, I want to share with you what I did this last weekend. I went to the 2011 LDS Storymaker's Writing Conference. And I attended as the "Official Photographer." No joke. That was my title. You know, I dab in photography now and then.

Besides hearing amazing speakers like (prepare for unbelievable name drops): Janette Rallison, Agent Sara Crowe, Agent Sara Megibow, Agent Becca Stumph, Josi Kilpack, Tristi Pinkston, Elana Johnson, Larry Brooks, James Dashner, Sarah Eden, Clint, Tyler, Brothers: Rob and Dan...notice how I'm dropping to a first name basis like we're total besties. Yeah, we pretty much are.

Ok, don't go asking them or anything. They might be modest and act as though we've never really met. But trust me, we have met and we are BFF'S.

The point of my endless self-enduldged monologue is that while I was there I shot lots of people's pictures. Basically I was in a semi-heaven with the combination of my two hobby loves in life: writing and shooting. Learning to write (because apparently I haven't figured this one out yet) and shooting lots of name-droppable people made me feel happy and warm inside. I don't have time to share much, but here are some pics I nabbed of two of my favorite ladies.

Happy Mother's Day!
luv, erin

The famous Tristi Pinkston:

The amazing Shari Bird:

run erin run.

This morning I signed up for the Timpanogos Half Marathon. Crazy, right? I hate running. Every time I start I silently curse the forsaken exercise for at least the first two to three miles. But once I hit mile three, something happens inside me.
No, I'm not going to call it a runner's high, because there's nothing high about my feet repeatedly pounding the pavement, and the monotony of inhales and exhales to keep up with my forward motion. It's almost like I hit a numbness, and in that moment I no longer feel the ache in my legs or the burn in the tips of my lungs. It's like my body just gives up and says, "fine, what the heck, keep running then. You suck."

So I keep running. On Monday, in fact, I ran just under seven miles.

Today when Mark proposed we run a half...something we've been considering for awhile...I figured, what the heck. Let's do it. We signed up, we paid our money, and now we're in. There's no turning back, but I figured why not get a few of you out there to do it with me. It could be like a super-cool group thing. You know, all the cool people are doing it.

So if you want to join me, click on the link for details:

Timpanogos Half Marathon

best album ever. oh, and a contest.

I was recently reading a friend's post in which she asked, "what's your favorite road trip song ever?"
Well, my first thought was:
Of course, I'm Moving On by Rascal Flatts
That song is a given for all road trips. If you haven't sung your guts out with the Rascal Flatts boys to the smooth harmonies of I'm Moving On while driving down the I-15, then you haven't road tripped. Just hearing the song on the radio puts an itch in my step to jump in my mini (van, that is) and head North or South to my sister's homes.
But before I could type my answer, a buried memory clawed it's way out of my cobwebbed brain, and I thought of another road trip I took years ago. During a short-lived summer job in New York City, I accompanied my boss to her summer home in the Adirondacks. We drove for a few hours at most, but what I remember was bonding over a particular album that we both loved:

U2 - Joshua Tree

Favorite song:
Where the Steets Have No Name

Um, pretty much. Best. Song. Ever.

The songs in Joshua Tree were like my personal anthem for that summer, and many more after. In recent years, I lost the album and sadly forgot about how much I loved playing it over and over again. That is, until Ally's post. And if you want, you can go and enter her contest:

HERE

And now that I have that memory back, the Summerills are going to be enjoying the musical stylings of Bono and the U2 gang once again. 

What's your all time favorite album?

second day of the journey I came across a large group of Wilcoxen...

Remember how I said my sister has seven kids, well I shot them all! Muah ha ha ha...ok, pardon my ill-placed humor. I see now that sounds disturbing, possibly sick. It could be a result of my easter bingeing, but regardless, it was uncalled for. However, that doesn't stop me from posting the fruits of my labor, the kill of my hunt, the fabulous picture of all 9 Wilcoxen! (That's what you call a family of Wilcox, just saying.)

Enjoy your Monday. Luv, erin

seven.

My sister has seven kids. I have four. That means, she has practically twice the amount of kiddoes running under foot than I do. Twice the mess. Twice the chaos. Twice the noise. So up until we visited her I thought to myself, why would any sane person have more kids than I have because I can't even keep up with the four that I have. And then when I was staying at her home in California, I remembered.

Because they're so sweet and cuddly. And they look up at you like this:

Isn't this little gal so adorable? I can understand the temptation to have another one, so sweet and cuddly and cute. Is this a spew of my own future desires? Heck no. I'm still set with my four...especially after Ruby and Teddy made sure everyone in church heard their uncanny ability to mimic a machine gun during the sacrament. That was a treat. But in all honesty, I love my four. I'm grateful for the manic joy they bring me every day...especially today when my thoughts are on all that the Lord has given me. Manic chaos and all, I've certianly be blessed.

Happy Easter.

luv, erin

build it and he will come.

Remember Field of Dreams? Such a classic, back when Kevin Costner was pure awesome.

Today Brekke, my frienemy, came by with her decadant strawberry lime "scratch" cakes (cupcakes made without a box mix). Unfortunately for me, and my kids that may or may not have heard me curse, I am not eating sugar. Mark and I agreed, when we returned from California, that our sugar days were over. So for the last five days I've been doing great.

And them Brekke came.

Well, I did tell her in the past, "Bring it and I will shoot." And so she did. I guess I shouldn't be complaining. I only had to leave the room once, fist stuffed securely in my mouth, to keep myself from lunging at the scratch cake and shoving it, wrapper and all, in my mouth. Now I have these lovely pictures to post.

Enjoy a strawberry lime Brekke-Cake.

Sigh. Remember when I could eat sugar and my hair wouldn't fall out. Yes, those were the good days.



hot sister of hair.

There are many things that I covet. The number one thing being: My Sister's HAIR!

If you don't know who she is, you can check her out:

HERE

As I was saying, she has Hair. Loads of it, and I have none. When we were younger I was convinced my hair was thin because of her mean, hair-pulling, older-sister ways. I see now that I lucked out and got the bum, thin-hair gene which isn't helped when I eat sugar or caffiene...there will be another post on this conundrum later...as I was saying, Nikki has awesomely thick hair. I love it and I'm jealous of it.

Confession over. Here she is.

A head full of hair, and smokin' hot.

This picture was taken during the Summerill Family Trip to SO-CAL 2011...also, there will be many of these pics to follow. Stay tuned all your 2 readers!

weedy niece.

My niece is growing like a weed.

hairy situation.

This is my husband, Mark:

Hairy? Yes.
Why? Simply because I cut his hair and I haven't had time to do so in the last year. So Mark got to embrace the 70's and grow out his wavy fro (as pictured above).

So, this last week I figured, why not really rock the 70's look. After a little persuasion, he was shorn like a sheep, sampsoned like Delilah would want it, de-hair-i-fied to look like this:

Oh yeah, baby! That's hotness for you.
But his serious man-ness was a little overwhelming after about 30 seconds, so we cut the rest off and now here's the new and improved Mark:

 

Which "look" do you like best?

a. 70's Fro

b. Mullet Man

c. Clean Cut Mark

I'm leaning toward Mullet Man.

Throw in a wife-beater top and a dirty old truck and he'd have some serious Mullet style.

luv, erin

Yard SALE!!! You know you wanna come.

Guess who's having a MASSIVE yard sale tomorrow? 

ME ME ME...want good stuff, come to my place: 

439 E 900 N, PG.

henry.

I try really hard not to label my kids, at least not while they're listening. I don't want them to think that's how they should always be. For example: if I said, "George is my shy child."

I would feel like a fail-mom if he never made any friends because of his tendency towards being shy.

But, since my kiddos hardly read this blog, I feel I can spurt about anything on here without them knowing. Mom-Of-The-Year goes to me, I know. I pretty much dropped that award in my pocket years ago.

So let me just say, my kiddos are gloriously different from one another.

Sometimes I love it. Other times, not so much.

The other day I overheard Henry say to George:

 "Hey Georgie, what happens when you're feeling really grateful for something, but you really have to toot?"

Did your eye brows just screw together in a "Did I seriously just hear that?"

Mine certainly did.

Henry's answer: "You have a gratitoot!"

I'm not going to lie, a laugh burst from my lips and I thought to myself, that kid is definitely mine.

I'm so grateful to have Henry. He's clever, witty, charming and always fun.

Happy eight years old, kiddo!



book love.

When I first read My Fair Godmother, I died over it. I laughed and cried and wanted more, more, more.

I told friends to read it and then I searched out, stalked, and befriended the author. It's been almost two years since all that happened and I'm finally so super excited to tell you that the second book in the series is coming out. I believe it will be as epically humorous and romantic and adorable as the first. And, she's giving it away FREE!

http://janette-rallison.blogspot.com/2011/03/fairygodmother-countdown-give-away-arc.html

Cut and paste the above address in your browser to try for a free copy of:

Don't you just love the book cover? Sigh.

cupcake.

As if I didn't need another reason to break Lent. Brekke, an amazing photographer and friend, showed up on my doorstep today with a lovely box of these goodies (see images below). Believe me when I say they smell as good as they look. So here's the new motto of my little ghetto blog:

If You Bring It, I Will Shoot It.

Do you think it's too Kevin Costner? Nah, I didn't think so either.

So, if you perchance happen to make something mouth-watering and ridiculously good-looking, don't hesistate to stop by my house. I take a couple shots, more than a couple bites, and we'll call it good.

luv, erin

And in case you were wondering, the cupcakes on the left are blueberry cream cheese, and the ones on the right are peanut butter chocolate. Terrible, right? Ugh. Talk about kill my Lent with a fiery vengence.

popcorn and parties

Every year March rolls around and my stomach clenches in knots. You see, I lucked out in the birthday department. My oldest two boys are born 2 years and 4 days apart. So every other March (we have friend's parties on the even years), I get to throw one wildly enormous party or two parties 4 days apart. Neither option thrills me, but this year I opted for the easy route.

Two parties. Both a trip to the movie theater so my house stay's intact.

A Movie Party! Easy right? Well, not so much. Herding 15 kids to the movie theater and back wasn't my finest mommy moment. I'll spare you the details, but I will share my one epiphany of the week. In photoshop I made these nifty popcorn invitations, and then I googled popcorn cupcakes and came up with a plan to make what you see below. If you like it, let me know and I'll be glad to pass along the party invite in a digital file.

Oh, and if you want to check out my George-a-pie's pics, they're up on my photo blog:

www.erinsummerillphotography.com/blog

withdrawal. an ode to sugar.

I am

a crack addict

not really, but holy hell it feels like it

Today.

one of the lovely ladies at the PG Rec Center ate a doughnut!

In front of me.

Can you believe that?

The sweet smell of sugar glaze was like fire to my nose.

Burning my olfactory system with maple sugary goodness.

Sugar.

Sugar. 

Sugar. 

Itch. Scratch. Itchy. Scratch. Scratch. 

I want me some SUGAR!

Withdrawals suck. 

38 days from now, I'm going to feel like a friggin' rockstar. 

38 days to go. 

LENT. die sugar die.

Lent, typically followed by Catholics, starts tomorrow.

I am not Catholic, however, I see the need in my life and my family's to break our addiction to sugar. And I figure, why not do it now while a great deal of other people are doing the same. Mark and I started our quest to cut sugar at the beginning of the year, and we did awesome for quite some time. The last few weeks, littered with holidays and vacations, haven't been the best. And I'll tell you, I can feel the difference.

When I eat a lot of sugar, frankly, I feel like Poo!

I'm tired. Blue. Un-motivated. Sluggish. Mean.

Pretty much, life sucks. Watch the video, you'll see what I'm talking about.

So, though I know cutting the sugar addiction is hard (I've traveled this road before), I also know it's better for my well-being.

I'm not saying that all sugars like those found in fruit and veggies are bad, but I definitely think rocky road ice cream before bed isn't scoring points with my thighs.

So here's the plan:

40 Days to become a healthier, more-energetic me!

Eliminate:

Candy

Cake

Cookies

Anything made with High Fructose Corn Syrup

Any processed food that has SUGAR listed as one of the first three ingredients

Are you in?

to mark.

I know it's cliche it is to say, "time flies," but there isn't another phrase that can accurately describe how fast the years of our marriage have passed. It seems like just yesterday we tied the knot, moved to a cozy apartment in Springville, and started our exciting married life together. It's funny, really, to think of how poor we were back then. How we scraped by on $800 a month. How we once walked by the Springville Taco Bell together and my mouth watered something bad, but it just wasn't in our budget to buy even a taco. How could it be on $800 a month?
We were the poster children for poor married college students. Living on nothing but love.

I used to curse our stinking poorness, and pray for the day when I could go to the grocery store and buy whatever I wanted to buy.

Shari, your older sister, once told me that I'd look back one day and miss the struggle, and the small apartment, and the nights you and I walked up and down the block because that's all we could afford to do.
At the time Shari was talking to me, I thought, Yeah Right! But it's true. Even though I love our lives now, our four kiddoes, our lazy fat dog, our home and careers, I do miss those early days. And at the same time I'm so glad we've moved on. The last dozen years have been littered with trials. Ugh, more than I wish to count. Finances, loss, moving, children, worry, health...so much to remember, and I'm sure there's so much more to come. But the crazy thing is, as I sit here and try to remember all we've been through together I keep getting stuck on the "we." The trials fade from my thoughts and all I see is You.
You, by my side.
That's all that's important.
I'm grateful that you're the one that's gone through it all with me. You are an amazing husband that is my equal, or better, in every way. There isn't a day that goes by when I don't thank the Lord for blessing me you as my companion. I hope our next dozen years will be as wonderfull hard and sweet and rich as the last dozen.

Happy anniversary, Mark. luv, erin

Now, if you've read through all my sap today, and you want to see some amazing pictures of our recent trip to Key Biscayne, Florida, go check out my photo blog: www.erinsummerillphotography.com/blog