Category Archives: www.bonnie-rose.co.uk

My 2014 Resolutions

Expat Life 2014 Resolutions

Thank you for everyone’s sweet wishes on my 9th Blogiversary on this weekend past. Words cannot express how much I appreciate all the out pouring of love I received on the blog and across social media. Thank you for making the past year an especially rememberable one in the blogosphere. Last week I shared How to do your 2014 Resolutions and today I want to share the ones I have made for myself this year. authenticity

My resolutions for the year seem to surround one of my most favourite words: authenticity. When I sat down to think more about this word and what I wanted most for 2014 similar ideas sprung to mind.

To me it is more about being just true to yourself and honest with others. It is about living a life that in all areas you can devote the same level of authenticity, heart, mind, and soul. I was born a passionate being who loves to jump in and give 100% of herself into what I am doing. It is so easy to be swept up into that sea of creativity, work, family, and all the other aspects of life and realise later that some areas are failing. 2013 was a growing year for me in blogging and I learned a lot about time management through the months. I give too much of myself and devote too much time to blogging, all that goes into preparing, writing, sharing a blog post, and the social media aspects (twitter, facebook, instagram, etc) then my family members get less of me and a less authentic version of myself and who I live to be. On the other side of things if I go ‘unplugged’ and spend days away from the blog (even with pre-published posts ready to go), the blogging work starts piling up and the connections with friends and followers starts to fall to the side. Which always brings more stress as I then have so much to catch back up on by way of catching up on social media interactions, answering messages, responding to comments, reading blogs, and commenting on blogs. It is not a pattern I wanted to continue or relearn in 2014.

authenticity

(source: my 30 Day Photo Challenge from 2011)

Blogging. My resolutions for 2014 in regard to blogging is continue with being prepared, working to deadlines, and keeping to time requirements. I will be authentic as giving exactly how much of myself I have said I would give and not compare myself or my blog to others for those that may give more or less of themselves and their lives on their blogs. I see growth coming this year through keeping things simple. To continue to be be honest and authentic as I share my life as a Third Culture Kid, an Expat, and a photographer living in England.

Simplicity. Just as I want to focus on simplicity on ACR, I want to work at this through out all areas in my life to work toward living an Authentic life in 2014. In regards to my profession and the work I do outside my home. Simplicity to the relationships in my life of family and friends and to the work and activities that goes on in my house. I have the personality type where I like to do it all, jump in head first, and act out the biggest, creative, and grandest ideas that I can think up. That is a true part to my being and I do not want to stop embracing that energy. I just mean to focus myself towards a direction of keeping things simple. To let the things in my life that I love and spend time with to grow and flourish. To be as authentic as I mean to be without letting other things jeopardize or get in the way of the goal.

Authenticity. I do not claim to be the only one coming up with this goal for 2014. I have heard many people addressing their need to live more simple lives and to keep more focused on what matters most in their life. To embrace a more holistic approach to all aspects of living. This is how I want and will be moving forward this year.

2014resolutions

To simply all aspects of my life from home to work and beyond. I want to have the most time available for my husband and my children.
To keep working towards a holistic life from what we eat, to exercise, and to health. To continue doing without shampoo and conditioner (read: no poo) as I am now 7 months going strong!
To continue every month with scaling back and cleaning out things we do not need and help my kids learn to adopt the same principals.
To work even harder this year with home education with my children. They both go to schools, but I feel it is important to continue their education outside of the classroom.
To not let my love of photography take over my life by staying on top of backing up and organization of my personal photography from camera phone to cameras. To work towards getting past years photographs simplified from folders of files into presentable yearbooks and slideshows for our family to enjoy.

Images custom to Bonnie Rose Photography © 2007 – 2014 All Rights Reserved | http://www.bonnie-rose.co.uk

Happy 9th Blogiversary!

33 Replies

Nine years ago today on January 4th I wrote my first blog post. I was days away from my due date of my first born and was excited to find a new way to keep in touch with family and friends all over the globe. So much has happened since that first blog post. I finally gave birth to my first child, I have moved about fifteen times, became a military family again, gave birth to my second son, became an expat family, and celebrated ten years of marriage with my husband. I look forward to seeing what this new year will bring!

A new year and I bring you another year of self portraits.
I take one self portrait a week and share on Saturdays.

———-

DO YOU LOVE SELF PORTRAITS?

I try to do one every week and post on a Saturday.

If you would like to link up with me, add this button to your blog.

I would love to see your photography!

Get out those tripods, remote controls, and set your self timer!

How It Works: It must be a ‘self portrait’ and does not need to be an image you took this Saturday. Feel free to link up to past Self Portrait posts in your blog. This link up will be every Saturday so feel free to use that as your motivation to learn more about your camera, hone in on your photography skills, try out new post processing techniques, and let your creative spirit come alive. Join the Self Portrait Saturday challenge!

*Self Portrait: ‘A New Year’ by Bonnie Rose Photography © 2007 – 2014 All Rights Reserved | http://www.bonnie-rose.co.uk

5 Steps to Improve your Photography

5 Replies

5StepsPhotography

If you have been around this blog for a while you know that I have a hobby of taking self portraits. While the proclaimed ‘selfie’ has been around since the days of Myspace, taking a simple self portrait is more of an art. For me it began in last year with a new photography series I wanted to do revolving around one themed self portrait a week with my friends. Every week we had a theme based off a song title or lyrics and we each brought what that meant to us in a self portrait. Challenges like this can be fun and a great way to keep you accountable as you learn more about your art and craft. I really push people to start taking self portraits when they want to get better at photography because it can help you grow both technically and creatively.

FIVE STEPS TO IMPROVE YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY
f r o m B o n n i e o f A C o m p a s s R o s e

1. Start taking Self Portraits. You never need to find a model or tell someone else how to pose. Forget about needing a tripod or a remote. I take most of my self portraits without either of these items. All you need is a sturdy surface and the self timer on your camera.

2. Take One Photo Every Day. There are many challenges out there to keep you occupied with your camera every day. There are even social media groups that participate these types, including on Instagram. Perhaps you do not want to be tied down to a specific or limited theme. Just keep your camera available and shoot what sparks your fancy.

3. Do not Delete. Just because some of your photos did not turn out right, do not rush to delete them off your camera. Learn from your mistakes. The best way to figure out how to improve your photography is to study the photos where you did not achieve what you wanted with those where your photo turned out perfectly. Learning to trouble shoot can take you to the next level as a photographer.

4. Be Inspired. Find ways to inspire your photography. Look at elements within a photograph and go from there. Perhaps focus on locations. Where can you take a photograph and what mood would it set? Start being observant to the world around you and find things in your part of the world that make you enjoy photography. When you love what you do, it shows through your work.

5. Take a Class. Love photography and want to improve? I offer B.Lux Photography courses and in December I am introducing two new classes, with more to come in 2014. No matter where in the world you live, if you have have the willingness to learn you can take these online courses.

BLUX B. In Focus | An beginner’s course or a refresher for intermediate photographers who want to take back the control from their camera and learn how to shoot in manual. We discuss both the technical and the creative aspect of photography as we get to know your camera. Tired of getting fuzzy or outof focus photographs? Not sure why the colours never look right? Having a hard time with lighting and want to know how to work with many different types of lighting situations? Do you want to take better photographs? You have the technology in your hands and you have the creative mind! Now put it together with this course and really push yourself as a photographer. This four week course includes a bonus teacher free week with a final project at the end of the course.

B. Retouched | Do you like to photograph people and take portraits? Not sure what to do with the photos in post processing? In this four week course we learn how to use photoshop specifically for the need of retouching people and faces in your photography. Learn how bring out their natural beauty and how the steps differ depending on the person’s age. From spot retouching, to smoothing skin, and even how to apply make up! The final project in this course will teach you how to take your black and white photo and bring it back to colour with the retouching affects in photoshop.

B. Transformed | An introductory class to photoshop for photographers and bloggers. Whether you are diving into photoshop for the first time as a photographer or are wanting to take your photos to the next level on your blog. We get started with learning the basics to help get away from feeling overwhelmed and start getting creative. In this online course you get on screen videos of how to work in photoshop. From working with layers, filters, brushes, and simple retouch & healing tools. We then look at how you can protect your work, make it web ready, organize and archive your photographs. Help photoshop work with you.

THREE B.LUX CLASSES AVAILABLE!

REGISTRATION BEGINS DECEMBER 2!

——

M A K E F R I E N D S & F O L L O W L O U I S A!

Instagram | Facebook

*photography belongs to Bonnie Rose Photography © 2007 – 2013 All Rights Reserved | www.bonnie-rose.co.uk

The War on Girls: Beauty

4 Replies

I love people. As a photographer I love photographing people because of how we are all different. I like that we do not all look a like. That we each carry our own personal armoire of stories, scars, and triumphs. To me a person is not really beautiful because of their skin, their body type, or what clothes they wear. I love finding the beauty in people. I love hearing what makes a person happy, what drives their passions, and hearing about their hopes and dreams. That moment where a person opens their mouth to speak fueled by the ignite of life behind their eyes. Eyes really are the windows to a person’s soul and why I love to photograph people. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I believe everyone should be able to see and realise their own beauty and worth.

We can be our own worst critics, seeing the faults in ourselves that no one else can see. To find things unworthy of beauty that are our personal characteristics. To dislike things about ourselves that others in fact love about us. Since we need our reflection we spend more time seeing others than seeing ourselves. Yet some of us spend more time scrutinizing and critiquing ourselves.

This week remind yourself of how beautiful you are and how precious is your life. Then make sure to encourage the girls and women in your life. We are made beautiful. We have the power to live beautiful lives. It just takes the belief in yourself. See the world as a beautiful place and life will look beautiful to you.

The War on Girls: ‘inDependent’

9 Replies

In this next installment of The War on Girls I take another look at how society is failing us. I feel the need to preempt this with the fact you may not whole heartedly agree with me. I am not a medical professional and I do not claim that all medications are unnecessary. Perhaps you function perfectly well with them and live a ‘normal’ life. Or maybe you are living in a part of the world where it seems unfathomable and unbelievable that one could live a life dependent on anything but a superior being. Then again maybe this story will be all too real for you and a truth you too share. Which ever walk of life brings you to The War on Girls series at ACR, I thank you for your open mind and taking the time to hear my words.

There was a time in my life where I was dependent on drugs just to get through the day. I was taking them to fight off the depression and anxiety that plagued my life after the sudden death of my father and during a near divorce in my marriage. Out in public, even with friends, anxiety attacks would make me want to rush home and just be alone. In my solitude I could not find comfort and the emptiness would swallow me up. I did not feel safe in my own skin. My pills became my security blanket, helping me to feel…well to feel nothing. They did not make me happy and they could not make me forget. However, a quick swallow and life would just slow down for a long enough moment that I could relax and calm down. My depression weighted on me heavily and often I just wanted to sleep. Something my medication helped me do easily. I may have not been having to feel the entirety of my sadness but I was not living life fully either.

It was not the solution I had sought after for myself. I had tried to be independent and take it all on by myself. Even my closest friends did not know what I was keeping to myself. My religion told me I could take it all on with prayer and my nomadic free spirit pushed me to carry the weight myself. But when it got to be all too much after my father’s funeral, my mum urged me to see a doctor for medical help. I had seen therapists before and I was hungry to talk to someone. To have someone hear me who could listen and offer advice. My psychiatrist however spent more time filling out my prescription than he did asking about how I was doing or listening to what I had to say. I became seduced by the magical idea that a miracle pill could help me. After all it had helped friends I know. Was I buying into the idea that having prescriptions was trendy? I was too sad and too anxious to focus on anything but change my current state of mind.

“There were issues with the dosage while I was taking it as they tried to find the right amount over the course of my treatment. After getting my dosage raised once and still taking it in the morning, it would knock me out so quickly. I would not even know I was getting tired until I was fast asleep. It was more than that it was the way it took away the passion and the heart of my personality. I may have not been myself with dealing with everything going on in my life, but I was definitely not me on Klonopin either. My emotions felt very flat and if I was needing to take another pill I could be really irritable and upset. I remember just wanting to be alone a lot of the time. Being around my in-laws at all brings on a lot of stress and I just sat in a closet once during the Christmas holiday to find some quiet and past out amongst the coats and the darkness until my husband found me. There did not seem to be an end to this tunnel because it was masking the problems. It was not fixing the loss of my dad or the cracks in my marriage.”

– Excerpt from ‘Overcoming Klonopin’

You can click the link above in the excerpt to read the whole story of my personal journey with taking Klonopin. In the end I found alternative people with optional solutions to help me find my happiness. I realised that it was okay to ask for help and that I would have to rely on myself and be okay with that fact. While I cannot change my past I look at my experience as a way to connect and reach out to others. I cannot help but think that people like me have been failed by society and the people around us. In a world where it is so much easier to find a medicinal answer to our ailments instead of a solution for the underlining problems. Where everyone wants to get the job done and fix things but no one wants to take the time to listen. Where we feel too scared to reach out to our friends when we are ourselves drowning in pain. When as girls it is easier to just say we should ‘see a doctor’ or be put on medication then to see us as beautiful, raw, individuals with our individual flaws. I have in-laws who continue to see me as a broken individual, a fragile rose with thorns, a person who should always have to see a doctor. Why? For the believe that depression never ‘really’ goes away. Who makes these rules and puts these shackles on us just because we are girls who feel ever pain and strain of the world around us? Why must the girls of this world be made to feel like we are worth less and unable to be built up stronger than ever before?

I am happy to say that I found my happiness in England. The anxiety attacks which still plagued me every now and then up until 2011 stopped as soon as I relocated back to Europe. It amazes me that the personal triggers and situations that I knew all too well, do not phase me in my ex-pat life abroad. I finally feel like myself. I am not saying I do not ever get sad. I am not immune to monthly mood swings, culture shock and homesickness. I recognize that things like ‘seasonal depression’ do exist with the changing seasons and shorter days. For me personally I focus on a more positive look at life and I know what things can quickly turn my mood around. Cuddles from my boys, kisses from my husband, and being outside on a country walk do more for me than my pills could have done. It makes me thankful to know that life does get better.

———-

The photographs in this post were from my project, Secret Lies of Men & Women. The middle image pictured was the main image chosen to represent my woman who was dependent on drugs and alcohol. The lie written on her hand states ‘i am inDEPENDENT’. I chose to write the the word ‘dependent’ in all caps as it was the real truth visible in the image series.

*Model: Pua | Make-up Artist: Dhyana Leung
**Photography by Bonnie Rose Photography © 2007 – 2013 All Rights Reserved | http://www.bonnie-rose.co.uk

Self Portrait: ‘Peek’

1 Reply

My first self portrait for November has to deal with lies ahead for the rest of 2013. We are now officially in my favourite time of the year. This month alone is filled with Bonfire night and fireworks, a blogger meet-up in London, my husband’s birthday, my birthday, a friend’s wedding, Panto rehearsals, and preparing for Christmas! So much is still yet a head and I wonder what is all in store for us this holiday season.

———-

DO YOU LOVE SELF PORTRAITS?

I try to do one every week and post on a Saturday.

If you would like to link up with me, add this button to your blog.

I would love to see your photography!

Get out those tripods, remote controls, and set your self timer!

———-

Are you shooting with training wheels?

Tired of blurry or incorrectly exposed photographs?

Perhaps your subjects look great but the skies are always blown out and not sure why?

Wish you could take better photographs with your camera?

Ready to take your photography to the next level?

Get your camera to do what you want it to do by taking back full control over the camera.

B. In Focus is a four week online course with a fifth bonus ‘teacher free’ week. Whether you have a simple point and shoot camera or a complex DSLR you can take this course. You already have the technology and the creative eye, now learn how to combine the technical and the artistic side of photography to become a better photographer.

Listen to what current students are already saying about B. In Focus!

“LOVING this course!! Shot in Manual a wee bit today!”

“You’ve done such an amazing job with all of this. Thanks so much for this!”

Interested in learning more about B. In Focus? | Find out more and Register here!

War On Girls: ‘All I Need is Love’

5 Replies

“We all fail to appreciate each day just how much we already possess.

Light, air, freedom, the companionship of friends.”

― Sophie Kinsella, Confessions of a Shopaholic

I Want More. This is easily a subject that can attack us all no matter your sex or age. Christmas is just around the corner and already ‘wish lists’ and Father Christmas are on my children’s radars. At any time of the year I find myself holding several ‘want’ lists in my memory for either next month or as soon as it becomes feasible. It is almost shocking how often our ‘wants’ are disguised by the word ‘need’. As a consumer I see how the newest phone releases send out the message that you need to have the newest model to keep up with with the rest of the world. In our current day technology ages faster than ever before, but the need to want more is not a new phenomena.

I Need More. As a girl growing up I remember wanting the latest new thing. I fell in love with the American Girl dolls and loved when I got a new catalog so I could circle all the new items that I just had to have. Though an iconic toy from my childhood, they would be replaced by other material items through out my life. As a photographer I feel as if I am always ‘in need’ of the newest and latest or just better item then what I have in my kit. It is not like we are going to wake up one day and realise we do not need something that we want. It would have to be a self made choice to find happiness in life and not in the material world.

Materialism and the War on Girls. How does this affect our younger generations of girls growing up in today world where society is heavily centered around consumerism? When I was growing up as a teenager overseas I had moved on to catalogs geared towards clothing for teenage girls like Delia’s and Alloy. Every time a new issue would come in I would be plagued with things I wanted and ‘had to have’ and then would bug my parents for new clothes. I cannot imagine what it would be like today with a teenage daughter. Mail order catalogs have pretty much been replaced with hoards of online shopping options. Add that with the bombardment of materialism messages sent out from online, fashion blogs, television shows and movies, magazines, advertisements, and visual stimuli available by smart phones. Top that off with the cherry of viewing others for what they have and you have not and it becomes a pit of never being satisfied.

All I Need Is Love. I took the photos in this blog as part of a photographic series I did entitled ‘The Secret Lies of Men & Women’. While the woman shows you the lie written on her hand ‘All I need is love’ you can see visually the truth being that she feels she really needs money and love of designer purses with the image of credit cards, cash, and purses. When does needing material hide what we really want out of life? Are we missing out on other areas of our life, relationships, or opportunities because we are more focused on what we do not have? How does this affect the relationships we make and the ones that are continuing in our life?

3 SIMPLE WAYS TO HELP GIRLS IN A MATERIAL WORLD

You ARE valuable. Life in itself is so precious. We never know how long we will have on this life or with the people we cherish most. Remind the girls you know, that they are valued in your life and in the world. The focus should be on the person and not on what a person has or has not in life.
Your self worth comes from the inside. A person’s worth is not based on numbers or possessions. Nor is a person’s beauty about their place in society or how they look on the outside. You are beautiful with our without the must have fashion item of the moment. You are beautiful in your skin. You do not have to be deemed ‘perfect’ by someone else to be worth a second of happiness.
Do not believe everything that you hear. Just because you hear an advertisement that says you ‘need’ this or that to satisfy _______, it does not mean you have to believe it. If you know a young girl who feels she needs to own something to be worth something to her peers, help her see her self worth. Encourage, love, and inspire the girls around you to love life for more than material things in the world.

———-

Q: How do you see yourself in today’s ‘Material World’?

** Model: Lolo Leialoha Seabiscuit | Make-up Artist: Dhyana Leung