Grief,
mourning & sorrow. We have all been at a point in our lives in which we are
burdened with a situation or affliction we believe to be hopeless. Our hearts
have felt broken and irreparable, our minds- irremediable, our spirits-
crushed. Some have lost people they love, pets they adored, jobs they worked so
hard for, houses they made homes. Some just don’t feel like they fit in or
belong, which causes severe pain, confusion, misunderstandings and many times,
irrational thinking which can start the vicious cycle of grief all over again. Sometimes
you might have an overwhelming feeling of impending & infinite doom.
This project
started with my amazing, kind and beautiful niece, Taylor. When I have projects
in the back of my mind, I try to gain inspiration as to who should model for
me. Many of the women in my life come into my mind for different creation and
Taylor was one of them. 6 months ago she lost her adorable dog “Pixie” who she
had for 11 or so years. Pixie was always wearing pink and loved and comforted
her family. After her death, Taylor even had a pink pixie “fairy” tattooed on
her shoulder hoping that it would help with some of the healing process. This
thought of commemorating Pixie’s life through a photo shoot blossomed into
something so personal and emotion for me as well.
With
National Breast Cancer Awareness Month coming in October, the color pink fit
right in along with the inspiration driving this shoot- loss & mending
broken hearts. It was right around this time of year back in 2007 that my
sister, Shelsi, after spending January through August treating a massive tumor
in her chest, learned she had a large tumor in her brain as well. She lost a
lot of time in the hospital, lost her hair 2 times and lost other things that
will affect her for the rest of her life….but the most important part in that
last sentence was “the rest of her life”. She still has her life, and we still
have her in our lives (which will be the theme behind my next shoot in October!
Make sure you stay tuned for that one!).
My other
sister in Heaven, Kandyse Layne also came into my mind. She would have been 26
on October 1st this year. My heart is so full of love right now and
my eyes are filled with tears writing about her. Trying to imagine what she
would have looked like now. If she would have been a blondy like our mom, me
and Shelsi, or if she would have taken on dark hair, blue eyed features like my
daddy and brother. I know that she inspires me all the time. Every time I get
pictures of cute sleeping smiling babies, I always know that she’s helping me.
We all lost her in in this physical world, but her spirit still lives on and I
know that we will all see her again. That reunion will be spectacular!
So many
friends and family come into my mind when gaining inspiration for this
creation, including my good friends who lost their daughter at the beginning of
this year. Little Savannah would have been 3 years old in a few days. She is
another sweet spirit who lives on through her beautiful family.
There is so
much about this whole process- the dress, the wings, the flowers, the burnt scenery
that has meaning behind it and I will write about all of those thoughts below.
Enjoy the
next 3 pieces to this enchanted photography gallery. Pink has always been a color that
symbolizes our hearts and love. For me, “she’s” like an angel sent from Heaven to
comfort us and bring peace in times of loss and affliction.
Introducing….
The
Enchanted Pixie of Peace
So now that you
have the story behind the entire thought and creation, let me tell you the
stories behind the set & our special day, and let me just start by saying
that it is 4:30am right now and I just can’t break away from this darn
computer! Here it goes!
I started
off gathering this gorgeous tulle from an online garage sale. At that point, I
was just looking for fabric and silk flowers of all kinds. When we decided to
create this scene, visions of a wild pink puffy skirt kept coming into my mind.
I ended up ordering a petticoat from DHgate.com and I had an “EASY” idea in
mind, which was to cut 2 slits about an inch wide and a cm. apart, so that foot
long bunched up piece of tulle could slide in, and then repeat this MANY TIMES.
The original garage sale buy of tulle was about 9 yards. I ended up buying and
using another 50 yards!!! I think I cut about 600 slits into that petticoat. My
amazing friend, Leyla came and helped me cut and stuff some of it too! It would
go by so much faster when I had help so I am soooooo sooooo thankful for that.
My boys actually helped me with the last of it too!
As I was
piecing this dress together I kept thinking to myself how amazing it was that
this tulle had been ripped to shreds, but was now coming together to make
something so beautiful. Of course I thought of how sometimes WE are the ones
that feel like we have been torn into pieces, but when we finally get up and
dust off, we can choose to come out of our trial even more beautiful than
before. When I showed Taylor a picture of the dress, she said the exact same
thing!
Next I found
this beautiful corset at the Goodwill for $4! Woohoo! It happened to match
perfectly with the skirt. I really wanted to add a little extra flair to it so
I twisted the tulle, hot gluing each spiral to a piece of fabric to make it
look like a little flower. I added the bling in for some extra fun. I did the
same thing with her hair piece as well.
Taylor and I
began our search for makeup ideas we could share with Brittany. I really was
not having ANY inspiration with this. Most of the pictures I saw just didn’t
click until Taylor came across a masquerade mask painted onto a face. I knew
that this was it! I immediately bought our supplies! It just went with the
theme. And you can see in the pictures, Brittany did a SPECTACULAR job!! I
think this is one of the most beautiful costume makeup pieces! Thank you again
Brit! I love you!!
The
wings…..I almost just wanna move on and not talk about them at all. This was my
3rd set. I had so many ideas that I spent several hours on, that
just didn’t work the way I wanted, so I ended up just doing some twirls and
twists in wire and left it at that. Part of me wonders why I put myself through
this with the wings. I love the idea of having wings in all of my creations
because wings are magical, but this probably could have worked either way! Live
and learn I guess!
The
flowers!! Even though I had seen oversized flowers before and thought they’d be
cool, they were also something that Taylor saw as well. She is a Pinterest
queen! We are totally on the same page. We started making them a while back,
but I didn’t want a dozen giant flowers hangin around my room too long, so we
actually finished them the day of the shoot! They are made with tissue paper
cut into flower petals (4 petals of 3 sizes). Starting with the smallest
petals, bunch them into a bouquet & tape around the bottom. Keep adding the
next sizes up while continuing to tape the bottom until it has several layers.
Then put a small circle of tissue paper in the middle for a pop of color. We
then scrunched the entire flower and let it flop back open. It took a while to
get it right, but I think we achieved what we were looking for. The stem was
easy. Just green tissue paper spay glued onto PVC pipe that was cut into
different lengths. The leaf wasn’t too bad. Again we cut tissue paper into this
leaf shape, used wire for the center vein leaving a stem that we cold hot glue
to the PVC pipe, and then spray-glued two together. V-walla! We had our flowers
So that brings
us to the actual shoot. We finally had everything together, and had just packed
it all into my van around 5:20 (already 20 minutes after I had wanted to leave)
and noticed that I had a flat tire!! Really?? So then we swapped our stuff into
our other car and hit the road up to Mount Charleston. We’re driving up there
watching gorgeous sunrays melt over the mountains. It was breathtaking. We get
to our spot, start unpacking, knowing that we will lose light quickly and I
notice that my bag of supplies for hair makeup, dress, flowers, etc was left in
the van when we made the swap! Again….REALLY??? Thankfully my wonderful hubby
had some zip-ties to connect the flowers to the stems. We were totally all good
even with all of our bumps in the road.
We got a power
converter this week so that we could hook up the fog machine to the car…MUCH
better than driving with a stinky generator….am I right Brit?? Lol. Andrew
planted all the flowers for me while Taylor and I made sure lighting was right
on. The setting was just amazing- light and clouds in the sky, beautiful
oversized pink flowers, and fog creeping on the ground around burnt cactus and
a beautiful pink pixie. The lighting was low, but it gave a cool effect when she twirled the dress. Lots of movement! Every bit of it was perfect. I wouldn’t have had it any
other way!
This project
has consumed my bedroom, my time and the time of many others, please feel free
to share, pin, tweet, comment and help me to spread it around for others to
take part in.
BIG X's & O's!!
Making the dress....
The twirly flowers....
The "wings"......
The full look.....
The flowers....
The crazy man....
The makeup....
Gorgeous sunset on our drive....
Planting...
Kira, as always... BEAUTIFUL, AWESOME, AMAZING, FANTAZMIGORICAL! You always wow us into your enchanted world!!!
ReplyDeleteAWWWWW Thank you so much!!! I cant wait to share more of my world with you!
DeleteI especially like #11 (the one at the top) amazing -- the composition is impeccable, the colors perfect (even down to the blue in the mountains complementing the pinks and greens). And the colors in the sky giving it all an after the fire feeling. I also like how the tallest flower on the right side is an antithesis to the burned plant on the left (at nearly the same level as the flower) and how the landscape frames the flowers and girl - genius!
ReplyDeleteAlso, the tenderness and love really comes through from the model, the way she is posed and the expression on her face -- more genius!
Keep it coming!!!
ah ha!! Now I know who you are! haha :-) Thank you so much Steve!
DeleteAnother thing I really like about these pix,is how some of the leaves on the tall flowers are a little yellow making them look even more real. Some people have assumed these are actual pictures of flowers photoshopped into the scene. That was brilliant that you didn't just make them all the same color of green. Simply amazing - as usual! <3
DeleteWhat a really cool picture!
ReplyDeleteThank you Tammy! It was a blast!
DeleteI love that you added the picture of Kandyse too. You think of everything, kira.. What a genius daughter I have. :) Love you.
ReplyDeleteAwe thanks mom!! I wanted to post one from the beginning, but I didn't have a picture on hand until you posted it of her! <3
Delete