A Skydiving Birthday

So Lauren turned 18 on this gloriously beautiful of days (0ctober 19, 2012), and because of groupon I was able to take her Paragliding. Lauren is much crazier than me and someday wants to jump out of a plane and plummet to the earth. While this is totally her prerogative  and I will not be joining her on that day I knew I could handle this (by the way Paragliding is TOTALLY something i want to try someday).

The conclusion from this day was that paragliding is really fun, and that in october in the early morning, we all should have worn a lot more clothing because it was a little more than chilly.

This is Lauren, the always fashionable, wearing her electric blue ball gown.

Moving to Utah County

While living at home has been much more pleasant than expected, I'm OUTTA THERE! I'm planning on moving to provo here at the change of the semester, and I have two reservations... numero uno: money. Man how I hate money. It's clear by my choice of study that money has never been very important to me (the first major I chose was being an art major, now I'm an elementary education major- I am ridiculous). I worry about the cost of living because for a year now I've been living at home. I LOVED living in Logan though, and have made the best friendships of my life there-- side note, it is currently my dream that I can convince all of my Logan friends (and their future husbands) to live on the same street as me and we can all be best friends FOR-EV-ER. ANYWAY, I hope to make friendships down south as great as the ones I made in the north. Numero dos: This will sound silly, and the opposite of the popular female position, but I do not want to live in the marriage capitol of Utah. Not into the whole dating scene. I'd like to stay relatively unnoticed. I'm finally starting to enjoy dating every few months to a year. People say I'm lying to myself. FALSE. I'm a weirdo and I legitimately just like feeling the absence of awkwardness of dating. It's nice to enjoy friendships and not have to think about things getting all intense and annoyingly achey in the chest region when things don't work out. I'm currently working on my plans to be a spinster as I am now reaching the age of old hag in Provo years anyway! I'll be cloning my dear dog cookie and soon I'll be learning to knit. I'm not sure it gets more spinster-y than that. Does that not sound enjoyable? ANYWAY-- change is a-brewing in Miss Amy's life and I'm not against it. Should be grand on most counts.

life

Life at home has been an adjustment. I'm going to school at UVU now and that means commuting. Commuting means adventure. I have also found that communting has that lovely smell found in public restrooms. I found out today that my computer screen is very much broken. It will cost $250 for the cheap method and $370 for the best method. Well, now I have a decision to make... fix it, buy a used Ipad, or (assuming I get a job soon) save up for the coolest of the cool desktop Macbook pros. and that brings us to using that money on things like college. I'm finding my local singles ward to be, well, interesting. Between the "interesting" return sister missionaries, and the boys that flirt with me who I am not interested in, there are a lot of awkward silences desperately thinking of something to say. Also a lot of linger longer cake. As well as peer pressure to eat such cake. Darn my impulse to be polite! there goes that weight I was planning on losing. 2 years ago you wouldn't have been able to convince me that I would miss Logan. well I do. Hoping for my life to pick up in the "ideal category" soon. Spring hopeful... Amy

When Plans Change

as it turns out, I am moving home to the salt lake valley after this semester comes to an end. Its all a little bittersweet. I'll be happy to be home with family. I'll get to see my immediate family all the time, but I'll also get to see my extended family (and my adorable little cousins) a lot more. It would be nice to save a miniscule amount of money. Unfortunately the bus pass needed to get down to Orem cuts in on some of that savings. It will be great to have my own room though. Not complaining there. Not excited to be a Wolverine. Not excited to be a part of a singles ward that isn't also a student ward. Not excited to not be meeting new people. Not excited to be without my friends. What it comes down to though, is that my Heavenly Father wants me to be home, and I'm going to do it. It may not be high on my list of things I want to do, but I know its His plan for me. So, I'm going to suck it up and do it. Especially because if the past is any indication, it'll happen one way or another, I should just do it the easy way. I really don't want to know what the hard way is, because so far, this way isn't that easy.

hungry.

I'm on campus, pretty hungry and doing my best not to spend money while not at a grocery store. Well this past week I got out of the habit of bringing food to campus and as a result I am sitting in the Hub, smelling my peers food while waiting for a class to start. Although this may sound like a jam session of complaining, you are wrong. As I smell everyone's delectable food I'd like to put out my own freaky kind of advertising for all the restaurants I love the most. first we must start with training table. I am continually amazed by the amount of people I know up in Logan who have never been here. It's the BEST. Now while i'm on burgers we must talk about Culver's. Um, delish. you canNOT miss out on this place. we have one in Utah and I guess it started in Wisconsin. they have great ice cream, which that on its own would be enough for me, but they also have AWESOME burgers and their fries are amazing. And best of all the have caved to the social pressure of being in Utah, they have fry sauce. yeah. amazing. Now as a foodie my other favorite place to eat, is Farr's ice cream in Fort Union in Utah of course. So for anyone who has been to disneyland and had the pineapple dole whip and thought to yourself, "Man, this is the best. I love it so much I almost wish I could bathe in it. but the only place i can have it is in DISNEYLAND." your worries are over! Farr's has pineapple dole whip. I would live on the stuff if i could. now it is closer to a possibility. anyway, this is a post that could go on for ages. I'll just stop now before I make a scene and start drooling.

Thorpe Wedding

Friday the 9th at 5:00 p.m. Hannah Nelson and Ben Thrope were married. as you can see they are madly in love and are most definitely gonna have a happy marriage. This was the first wedding I have been paid to take photos for! I was very happy to get a little experience under my belt. haven't looked through all of the photos yet. I can just hope that out of the 1,070 photos I took some of them will be treasured.

school days.

forgot my first day of school outfit so this is the second day of school outfit. i love my roommates! they are such good girls! we have lots of fun. we had a crepe party last week and had lots of people over. school and work have most def kept me busy. weirdly enough my favorite class may just be math! i have always hated math but this teacher is great and i finally get it! i am taking institute and finally see how great it is! i can see that i am being blessed immensely because i go. i'm not super stoked about my ward... oh well! mostly girls and a lot of the boys aren't seeming like my type of guy... eh rude. anyway letting life live. not that that phrase makes any sense, but getting thru it best i can.

Tayler's Senior Portraits

Tayler is graduating this June. We could have taken her pictures a long time ago, but she wanted pictures in the snow. It was a great idea! Her photos ended up being very different from all her friends who took there's in summer and fall. We had a lot of fun. These were taken in Draper, Utah.

Its been a while [summer].

Well I don't really have any photography business to share, but life has been continuing no matter what.
In July I had a sweet party with lots of friends! I was hoping to cap off the summer before school started with an extreme sized slip and slide, but I had an accident.
In June I also had an awesome time running a half marathon! I was planning on doing a full marathon in September, again because iI had an accident, I'm very glad I didn't register.
My sister, futrure roommate and I all went to a free Modest Mouse concert! It was so awesome to see a band I really liked, it was just too bad it was so crowded. It was in Pioneer Park and I guess they had to start turning people away at 40,000 people. Even though pioneer park is big, its not that big. There were a lot of drunks and hippie kids smoking their weed. One day i'll go to a better Modest Mouse concert.
This weekend I went river rafting and on the river there was a spot to go cliff jumping. I was so stoked to go! unfortunately it was a rather precarious climb up to the top. The weather wasn't working with me. It started to sprinkle. I was to the point of the climb where you had to crawl through on your belly, as I was waiting to take my turn on my belly I slipped and fell what was assumed to be about 12 feet on to a rock landing. Fortunately I didn't hit my head or my back but I did end up fracturing my ankle.
I'm pretty hardcore though, I didn't cry! The most upsetting part of the treatment of my leg was the fact that my scratches and the best bruise of my life got covered up!

Prices revised

I have decided to change prices. My new plan is that there is a flat price of $75 for an hour (ish) of photo taking. With this flat rate you will get a CD of all your photos. You are then able to make as many prints as you would like!

For those who book an appointment for having photos taken before the end of May, will have their sitting fee waved. Contact me on Facebook by messaging me (I am Amy Christine Houmand) or by texting or calling my cell phone at 801-608-0859. Leave a message if you call; I will probably ignore your call if I don't know your number

Prices

These are very tentative-- Things may change a little but for the most part these will be my prices for the summer!

Sitting fee $35

$75 Package
2 combos of the following
(1) 8X10
(2) 5X7
(4) 4X6

$125 Package
6 combos of the following
(1) 8X10
(2) 5X7
(4) 4X6

Enlargements
11X14 $35
8X10 $25
5X7 $15
4X6 $3.50

And so it begins...

Logan. The town can be beautiful, but today in mid-January it’s more like an arctic wasteland. It was an icy, grey, miserable, day with the inversion at its peak, but this day had the potential of being the best day ever. And on my birthday no less! My family was taking the two-hour drive to come celebrate with me. I was very excited to see them, but the best part was that I was finally going to get my digital SLR camera. I had been drooling over the idea of having one for years. Thinking that it was just a dream I bought the photo magazines, and studied what limited techniques i might be able to try with my measly point and shoot six-megapixel camera.

Soon I found I had a true love for photography, especially taking it in school from a teacher that knew how to push her students. At first I did think she was a loon, I mean she only dressed in white and light tan, but aren't all great artists crazy? Later when she started wearing colors I wasn't so put off by her.

The first time I held my camera I remember squealing with joy. Which, I might add, is fairly out of character. I had never been so excited in my life!

Being used to my parents film Nikon SLR, initially I was frustrated trying to figure this camera out. But as I played with it and had some practice I found that I loved it so much more than the Nikon I had previously used. As much as I miss being able to work with film, and the hands on feel that it has, I'm very excited to get into digital photography. I love doing portraits now that I have an SLR to work with. I am hoping to do some photography this summer to make some money for college next year (as well as getting some experience to see if I'd like to pursue this as a career).