fash-un

 

I took some photos for my friend’s portfolio the other day, KB ‘assisted’ me and then she shot some photos for our other friend while I ‘assisted’ her. Other friends were ‘models’ and it was such a nice time…listening to music, hanging out and eating cake (thanks Gwen!) in between outfit changes (sidenote: they make some crazy stuff over in fashion).
I am by no means a ‘photographer’…especially one who takes photos with lights in studios and fancy stuff like that but it was fun to pretend for an evening and the photos turned out alright so I’m certainly not complaining.
These are some photos that I took on my Canon after taking the digital ones of Gwen’s pieces. Technically these photos are pretty awful but there is something about them that draws me back in. Film, for me, captures life as I remember it. The camera was set to 400 but the film was 200 so the grain in these photographs is pretty bad, the studio lights aren’t the most welcoming and I shot most of these with the underexposure warning light flashing.
All that aside, the warmth and grain and slight underexposure of these photos are what make them for me. Thanks girls for the opportunity to play ‘fashion photographer’ for an evening. xo 

E

This dude got his first choice in college with sixty points to spare. Nice, huh.

Tuesday

Did I mention the dog is part flying fish?

This is what weekends are for.

Don’t you agree?

‘work’

This is my cousin. She has the nicest toes of anyone I know. Don’t ya think?
I am so lucky I get to squeeze these chubby little baby legs every day. 

Delish

Sometimes breakfast is my favourite meal of the day. Today we went here to celebrate my brother’s amazing LC results. Have I told you before that he’s the best?!


PS: Thanks to my lovely boyfriend who left for work the other morning after whispering that he left me this pain au chocolat hidden in the kitchen for me! 

cocktails

I found this recipe last week for strawberry mint juleps and my best friend agreed that we should make them, immediately! We infused the bourbon as instructed and I shook it diligently every day. We decided to make a night of it as you do and I invited some friends for cocktails on Sunday when the bourbon would hopefully we strawberry-filled. Eoin & I made another jar full when I realised we probably didn’t have enough for everyone. 

Unfortunately the cocktails we kind of…gross. Someone said they tasted like strawberry minty toothpaste and after that I couldn’t stomach any more! Luckily we had made a few jugs of mojitos which went down a treat. I would give this cocktail 10 out of 10 for looks, but about 2 for taste! What a bummer :( 

The best…

…thing about shooting film is picking up the prints or scans and seeing the pictures that previously only existed in your head. Often the reality is far more impressive than the prediction. I’m particularly happy with this one and will share more over the week (when I’m more functional).

sun

I could lament the summer’s near passing without barely a week of pure sun. But I don’t want to. So I won’t. There seven weeks before returning to college and I have been assured that sun catching will occur. For a week at least. Hopefully more. 

E & Me

I’ve been hanging out with my little brother a lot lately. Although at over 6 feet tall he’s not so little anymore. We are both kind of just hanging out at the moment and lots of our respective friends are away or working or busy it seems and as a result we’ve found ourselves doing nothing together a lot more than normal. I, for one, am pretty happy about this. He’s a cool guy my brother and, despite the fact that sometimes I want to kill him, I do enjoy his company. There’s only two years between us and over the years we’ve fluctuated between being thick as thieves (when we were small people often thought we were twins!) and hating each other. The two year gap has felt vast at times but as we get older I can feel it shrinking. Lots of my friends have younger brothers that are also his friends and we’re spending more time together which is really cool. The other week we played sibling scrabble—with my friend Donagh and his brother Daniel who is also Eoin’s best friend—which sounds totally lame but was actually a lot of fun. We also went to the beach a few weeks ago, all piled into the back of the car; my friends and Eoin. It didn’t feel like he was tagging along, he was just part of the gang. It was cool. Today we baked cookies together and then went for a stroll.
I can never imagine being an only child. With two brothers and one sister I know how lucky I am, I can’t imagine not having brothers or not having sisters. I get the best of both. My sister is travelling around the world with her boyfriend and my older brother lives with his girlfriend (not too far, but it’s not like I see him everyday) so without Eoin here I would be an only child at the moment. I hate that thought. I love having other people who’ve experienced childhood with the same parents, in the same house, who’ve gone through the same divorce, the same christmasses, easters, birthdays, the same ups and downs…albeit all from different perspectives. We are each others memories. I imagine us growing older, getting married, having babies, getting together every year as our kids grow and our hair greys. I love that image. I really love these guys and I am so lucky that I get to call them family.

A Party

On Saturday my brother Eoin & I had a party to, emm, celebrate this fantastic summer we’ve been having and raise some much needed funds for our charity work next year. The summer part was a little bit ironic as on the day itself we had big black clouds, lashings of rain and hailstones. ‘Oh well’ was all we could say as we soldiered on cooking and slicing and chopping and mixing. We brewed 14 bottles of elderflower champagne which we served along with tortilla chips, chopped vegetables, blue cheese dip and hummus. 

A while later we served dinner; spicy meatballs, quinoa salad, cous cous with roasted vegetables and goats cheese, rocket salad, honey glazed sausages and minted pea pesto with pasta. It was all delicious (and as we were a little ambitious with the portions we had plenty left over for Sunday and Monday!).

When it got dark we lit candles all over the house and served four different brownies—that I had spent Friday afternoon baking—with freshly whipped cream and berries. The flavours were cheesecake, peanut butter, mint and raspberry with white chocolate chips. People brought wine and there were beers as well for when the home brew ran out. We were a little skeptical about how it would go down but (with a cheeky bit of cordial added to sweeten the taste) everybody seemed to love them! 

The party went on till the early hours. I crashed, exhausted, around half one but I think the last to leave were the lads at 5am. I felt like such a party pooper but I literally could not keep my eyes open any longer! 

The next morning I woke up to mess and empty bottles: the sure signs that a good time was had by all. 

Eoin & I would like to extend our enormous gratitude to all of our friends and family who made it on the night, your company and generous donations made all that hard work of cooking and baking and cleaning more than worthwhile. We are also overwhelmed and extremely thankful to all those who couldn’t make it on the night but who donated anyway. We love all of you guys. You’re the best! 

day dates are for oldies (but we don’t care)

 Before Richard left for scout camp (he’s home now! and still alive! yay!) we had, hands down, the best date we’ve gone on in ages. We drove towards the sea and headed up Killiney hill before wandering down to White Rock where we saw hundreds of jellyfish (the non-stinging kind) washed ashore and in the sea. It was crazy! Then as we walked back up over the hill the clouds started to creep in closer. They had gotten dark and looked fit to burst. We were minutes from the car when the heavens opened and set about drowning everyone out and about without a coat (or tights!). We ran through the mud and made it before we were drenched. We got to Richard’s house a few minutes later driving on dry roads; the shower, it turned out, had been very, very local. After hanging out for a little while watching the dog try and eat the hose we went down to Dun Laoghaire Market for falafel wraps, an impromptu classic car show and sweet crepes with a side of frozen yogurt for dessert. We were full and warm and happy. The best way to be if you ask me.

from where I stand

I really do live in the most beautiful of places.

 I shot two rolls of colour  film this weekend and the resulting photos blew me away. It was nice to take a break and only shoot black and white for a while (don’t even mention those four (four!!) rolls of 120mm waiting to be developed in my fridge), but it was like a smack bang in the face returning to colour. A, much needed, smack bang in the face I’ll have you know.

These shots were taken up Killiney Hill, down on the Vico road and the last on the sands of White Rock beach.