Tag Archives: no i really do love ohio

Happy End of 2012!

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Sort of forgot to mention that I left for Ohio on Tuesday night. They were offering FIVE HUNDRED DOLLAR vouchers at the airport for all of the oversold flights. I was going to ditch my family so hard and stay in NYC for as long as I needed to to get that voucher. And then of course my flight had zillions of extra seats. Because no one’s flying to Ohio except me.

But here I am! Until January 2nd! Which means I probably won’t blog again until January 3rd.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and don’t you forget about me. (Follow me on Facebook to see all of my Instagrammed Ohio pictures.) Loooooooooove yoooooooooou.

Shootin’ Photos of Some Ladeez

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Of course the point of my visit to Ohio last week was the Circleville Pumpkin Show,

but I also had the great fortune of setting up photoshoots with my friends Kim and Samantha in celebration of some pretty major moments in their lives.

My best friend Tracey met Kim when they both played flute at THE Ohio State University’s School of Music, and they’ve since started a dinner club together and see each year’s Oscar-nominated films together and go 80s dancing together on Thursday nights. When I agreed to shoot Tracey’s friend Dayna’s wedding next year, Kim asked me to shoot hers, too.

Along with their engagement photos, which aren’t remotely edited yet, I got to provide some new headshots for Kim, who’s a professional flute player and adjunct faculty at a college. Kim recommended the location, and it turned out to be the most perfect place for me to get my Ohio photography sea legs. I think the colors of the fall trees were doing about half of the work for me, but I won’t mind if you give me some of the credit, too.

I’ve known Samantha through Tracey for about half of my life and have loved seeing how Tracey can be so close with two TOTALLY DIFFERENT people. Where Tracey and I were staying home on Friday nights to watch David Bowie movies on repeat and writing letters to Gavin Rossdale, Tracey and Sam were out picking up boys at Arby’s. I couldn’t be happier that she found such a great partner in her husband, Sam, and the two of them were adooooorable this weekend.


Tracey thinks I made Sam look too sultry in this picture, but I love it!

Many thanks to Tracey for introducing me to Kim and Samantha, to Kim for choosing the location, and to Kim and Samantha for making it such a great experience!

And now I’m going to Pittsburgh to see Cassie of Sisters from Different Misters for the second time, to meet Jessica for the first time!, and to help Jessica photograph Cassie’s sister’s wedding. Duuuuuuuuude.

Off to the Circleville Pumpkin Show 2012!

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You guys.

It’s Circleville Pumpkin Show time!

If you’ve been around this blog in October of years past, you understand that this is bigger than Christmas for me. And this year, my youngest cousin is up for Miss Pumpkin Show! Clearly, the only way to improve a week of eating nothing but deep-fried pumpkin-flavored food is to add a beauty pageant element to it.

Picture me doing a lot of this for the next week, except with a less-scary look and with more powdered sugar on my face:

If you’re not already following me on Instagram, now is the time.

OHIO!

Everyone and Everything Ohio

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It’s an Ohio picture party, and you’re invited! Meaning that you’re obligated to compliment both my family’s and friends’s appearances and my skill in photographing them! You’ll want to look away, but you won’t be able to! THE OHIO DRAWS YOU CLOSER.

My BFF, Tracey, and I went dancing with our friend Kim on Thursday night mere moments after I arrived, as planned, and then Tracey and I spent the next two days doing whatever the hell we wanted to. My dad was busy in the fields shelling corn way ahead of schedule due to this summer’s drought and my sister was stuck working in Kentucky, so I slept in Katie’s Room at Tracey’s house (sheets embroidered with my name forthcoming), and then we woke up both mornings to lazily drink coffee (a first for us), watch “Parks and Recreation” (a second for us), and eat Dairy Queen, Arby’s, or usually both. We visited her husband’s favourite Italian restaurant that may be mine, too, and she showed me her office for the first time since getting her new job. Our friends Erin and Jenn came over for Cards Against Humanity, and I laughed so hard I choked on the ridiculously sweet wine we finished in a matter of moments. Because apparently we are adults now who drink wine and entertain people and DO WHAT WE WANT. Bliss.

Saturday night, I went to my aunt’s surprise party, where I saw half of my family and half of our hometown. I was reminded of just how Ohio State-y everyone is:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

But I’m not complaining, because it was SO UNBELIEVABLY WINDY and cold that night, and I had come from tropical NYC in a short-sleeved shirt, so my cousin Bethany lent me a hoodie. Mine wasn’t OSU but “real doctors treat more than one animal”, because she’s a vet.

We ate the giantest hot dogs I’ve ever seen and buckeyes and birthday cake until the sun went down, and then my uncle really got the bonfire going, which resulted in these terribly creepy pictures that make us look like lonely hill people:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

Sorry, not that my aunt looks like a hill person. But my cousin Karl certainly does while photobombing Bethany and my sister, Joanie:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

And there’s something really strange about seeing pictures of Bethany holding her niece and cackling as the fire swirls around them:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

And then, of course, there’s Bethany and Joanie looking so happy as everything burns to the ground behind them:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

Bethany looks almost gleeful with her dog, Honey:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

And after I point out to them how crazed they appear, they decide to just go for it and start doing a fire dance on top of the bales of straw:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

Then there was a moment of quiet reflection after my mom’s cousin told me I’m singlehandedly bringing the antichrist to America by being tolerant of religions other than Christianity:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

We played with lights for a while and all loved the dog breath in this shot (and the way little Kaydence is looking up so expectantly):

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

Was I making fun of Bethany’s mom for being so old or for having her name on her jersey? The world may never know:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

On Sunday, I went to church with my family, where people stood up and talked about how liberal professors are warping the minds of our children and how our country will be plunged into darkness and/or civil war if “we” don’t do something this election. I was sitting with my also-liberal great-aunt and -uncle, who were having their 60th anniversary party in the church basement afterward. Aaaaaaaaawkward.

Their original cake topper from 1952:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

My sister, posing with one of the 60th anniversary notebooks-that-look-like-matches we were handing out at the punch bowl, where she and I were stationed for three hours:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

But it was totally fun, because my cousins Will and Bethany spent most of it standing there with us, so we could all make fun of the people who came to the punch table and asked, “May I have a glass of punch, please?”, insinuating that Joanie should dip them a fresh one when we had five glasses sitting ready right in front of them:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

This is the look my sister would give:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

She’s not nearly as bitchy as she appears, though, at least when she’s with her husband, Josh, who is brilliant and waited until the last 15 minutes of the party to show up with our dad:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

By that time, my great-uncle was all, “Stop, stop, no more pictures”:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

And so Tracey and I went to the park in the center of “town” to meet up with our friend-since-birth Katie:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

and our loooooooooong-time family friend, Erin, and her kids:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

And everyone was a daredevil:

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

But no legs were broken. Only spirits, as moms pulled kids from the tops of jungle gyms over and over.

I spent Monday riding around the cornfields with my dad, taking the post-apocalyptic pictures you saw yesterday. My great-aunt picked me up that afternoon, and her friend drove us and my great-uncle to the airport because they’re afraid of the highways, and they freaked out about me wanting to be left at the passenger drop-off instead of everyone parking and accompanying me inside, because they looooooooove me.

OHIO!

Ohio Bonfire and Anniversary Party

Long Weekend in Ohio

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I’m leaving tonight to spend the next four days in OHIO. My plans are as follows:

Tonight: arrive at the airport at 10 p.m. and get whisked away by my BFF, Tracey, to one of several fast food joints I don’t have access to in NYC. Steak ‘n Shake, Taco Bell, and Arby’s are strong contenders. Go back to her house, put on a shit-ton of gaudy of makeup, and go dancing with our friend Kim at Skully’s for Ladies 80s night, where I will want to hear The Cure, Tracey will want to hear anything she can play air saxophone or flute to, and Kim will rap along to every single lyric of every single 80s hiphop song. Arrive back at Tracey’s at 3 a.m., reeking of sweat and with “I’m Too Sexy” ringing in our ears.

Friday: hopefully spend the entire day stuck on Tracey’s couch, watching reruns of something like “Breaking Bad” or “The Killing”, stopping only to drive down the street in our pajamas to Dairy Queen. Revel in the fact that neither of us have kids and can therefore be totally selfish with our time. Drive down to our hometown for a photoshoot with our elementary school friend Stephanie and her family in the massive woodlands nearby. Say hi to my dad as he shells corn in a combine on one of our farms and possibly hitch a ride with him for a few rounds, reliving one of my favourite childhood memories. Go to Caffé DaVinci to relive another favourite memory, eating this, and then see our friends Erin and Jenn for a game of Cards Against Humanity, which makes Apples to Apples seem as dull as Go Fish.

Saturday: hang out with Tracey aaaaall day, then hang out with my family–including my little sister, who will be driving up from Kentucky–aaaaall night.

Sunday: possibly go to church with my family to see all of the people I used to see every Sunday for the first eighteen years of my life. Go to my great-aunt and -uncle’s sixtieth wedding anniversary, where I’ll play a pivotal role as punch bowl girl.

Monday: hang out with my great-aunt and -uncle aaaaall day, proving that I am the greatest faux-granddaughter and deserve all of the love and attention and homemade red velvet cake. Go back to NYC and nap.