Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes!

Dear friends and followers,

Remember me? Don't worry, I always look startled in pictures. It might be an awkward characteristic for a photographer, but I never liked having my picture taken. I hope you're doing well! I'm very sorry about neglecting this blog, I will try to do better from now on ;) 

The reason I've been away for so  long is that we moved! Things happened so fast and I can hardly believe that we've lived in our lovely new home for over a month already. Sometimes wonderful opportunities just cross our path and we better grab them before they're gone, right?  

It's an old house (from 1950) and a ninety year old man lived here before us, so the house needed a lot of improvement. We removed suspended ceilings, repaired and sanded all the walls, painted them - including two wooden walls, which look lovely in white - laid new floors and so on and we're still not finished, but that's alright. It's a home of our own and we already love it to bits! I absolutely love how it has a character and a story of its own, as old houses do.
We finally have a garden now and the cat and the kid love to play outside. Our cat Ziggy is twelve (that's her in the pics) and has always been afraid of traffic, so she has always been inside. But in this short period of time she turned into a true adventurer, exploring the garden and the alley at the back! I'm so happy for her, it's a whole new chapter in her life :) Our other cat, Zelda - probably the sweetest cat in the world - sadly passed away this year, so it's nice to see Ziggy this excited about her new home. Nothing more relaxing than having breakfast while watching her hunt and "kill" fallen leaves ;) 

However, in all this time I've missed photographing! But now things have settled down a little, I plan on catching up as soon as possible. Starting with some family snapshots and some refreshing autumn walks! Lots of new ideas are taking shape in my head and now there's finally time to enjoy the process! I'll keep you updated and I promise to take some photos of the house soon as well :)  

                                                                                                                                                          


























Last but not least: as a token of my gratitude to all my followers and supporters of my work, I'm having a giveaway on my facebookpage! Just like and share (make sure you've liked my page as well) and you might be the winner of a 8"x10" print of my original photograph "Tonight, Tonight"! Good luck!

Studio Yuki Giveaway   

https://www.facebook.com/StudioYuki

See you all soon and have a great week! xx

Giveaway!

I guess I could start with apologizing and explaining why I haven't blogged lately and stuff like that, but the people that stop by on a regular basis know how chaotic I am, so I don't think it's neccessary ;)
Anyway - and I know I'm late with this as well - I'm running a GIVEAWAY on facebook at the moment! The winner will be announced on Monday (the 13th). Just click the link here:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=248446618630737&set=a.197110973764302.53116.188847921257274&type=1&theater

Feel free to join in on the fun and have a wonderful weekend! xx

Just A Perfect Day

"Just a perfect day
drink Sangria in the park
And then later
when it gets dark, we go home"
Lou Reed - Perfect Day

Sometimes it's just the little things that make me happy. 
Finding little lost treasures when cleaning the house. 
Seeing my two year olds eyes go wide with anticipation 
when he realizes he can have those hand puppets that 
have been lying in a closet for ages. Hearing a big 
'Weeeee!' when he bounces around the room, happy 
with his new toys. Playing endlessly with them, me - 
holding a french looking police man puppet - exclaiming ridiculous half-french sentences and 'parbleu!' and 
'affreux!', while he - holding a puppet of an old lady - 
giggles like a school girl. Simple moments, but oh, 
so precious...

Later that day I took my camera for a walk (I have a feeling it may become unhappy if I don't take it out regularly, or maybe that would be me) and that's when I found this. A little place of magic. 

I've passed that place so many times and it never occurred to me before to walk downhill a little, to check what's down there, closer to the stream. Now I'm glad I did. I felt like being in the Cambodian jungle again, only this time in my own back yard (not that I actually have a back yard, but it wasn't far and it sounds pretty good, don't you think?)

Some days are better for magic than others. This was a perfect day, finding treasures everywhere I looked. Imagining the end result, the way the photograph will be once I've sprinkled my own, personal magic over it. But isn't that what life is? A treasure for us all to see and experience in our own way? 

What makes you happy? Where or when do you find your magic? I'd love to hear from you!

Farewell, for now. Keep dreaming. xxx

Awakening

Last week it seemed that Spring was on the verge of a breakthrough. We actually went for long walks in the forest again, left our coats unbuttoned and built castles in the sand. We even had ice cream! Every year I'm excited to see the world awakening again. To see little flowers pop up everywhere, to feed the ducks now their river isn't frozen anymore and to enjoy life at its prettiest. Especially now we have our little boy, who sees everything for the first time.  

But just a few days ago, Winter came back and turned our world into a large, white canvas again. 

And even though it looks pretty as well, I can't say I'm too happy about it. It's very windy and oh so cold!

I went to one of my favourite spots to take photographs and nearly froze my toes off, my car got stuck in the snow (of course I left my phone at home) and I almost broke my camera lens (luckily the filter protected the actual lens!). Maybe I just need to find some nice spots that aren't so far off ;) 

But despite all that, I love to be in the great wide open, with only the occasional farm in sight. Wouldn't you just love living in a house like this? I know I would!

And after a few weeks of us all having the flu and not being able to get much work done, I finally got my creative spark back. I've been working on new ideas, learned new techniques and best of all, had lots of fun! Having a chaotic mind can be a plus sometimes, especially when it comes to ideas and creating. But it can be a burden too! I have so many ideas and so many photographs still untouched, some still from Morocco (I haven't nearly finished going through all of them!), some I've been working on - on and off - for weeks, sometimes even months. And every now and then I just forget about them and find them again when rummaging through my files, leaving me puzzled why I didn't finish them in the first place. But I love doing this and I'm so very grateful to be able to go with my chaotic mind and create whatever I'm in the mood for!

Tomorrow we'll take our little munchkin for (hopefully) one of the last sledding adventures of this winter :) After that: LET SPRING BEGIN!!!
Stay warm and happy and I'll see you soon! xxx

New Beginnings

When a friend told me about Etsy a long time ago, I decided to check it out. Maybe it really was a great place to find those little eyes for my amigurumis.... So I created an account by the name of Maximonstertje, a name inspired by one of my favourite children's book: 'Where the Wild Things Are' by Maurice Sendak. Little did I know that I would start my own photography shop on Etsy within a few months! Well, when it comes down to it, I never really thought about a good name for my shop. I already had the account and I had nothing to lose, and thus Maximonstertje was born!

Although I love the name, I do realise it's not easy to pronounce, let alone remember. That's why I've decided to change it. The idea has been brooding in my head for a long time (and I tend to take my time with things, have you noticed? ;) and now it's finally official: Maximonstertje Photography will from now on be STUDIO YUKI!! Weeee, exciting times! :D

Now I've explained the why, I'll fill you in on the new name. 'Studio' pretty much explains itself, the name 'Yuki' is a name I've loved since childhood. I always had a thing for Japanese animation (and everything Japanese, for that matter) and, having a 'boy's name' myself, I dreamt of having a cute, girly name like Yuki (though Yuki is also a boy's name in Japan, to make it just a little bit more complicated). Yuki is a name that is used a lot for anime characters and it always stirred something inside me. It also is the Japanese word for snow!

So, what's going to change now?
Not that much. I'm still me and my work won't be any different! I will be focussing on doing some more photo shoots this year, on learning new techniques and on creating more of the ideas that have been jumping up and down in my head! And on getting organised, but I'm not going to talk about that now... it would fill an entire blog post!
What will (and has) changed is my facebookpage! I would love it if you'd visit me:

www.facebook.com/StudioYuki

Since facebook doesn't allow us to change our page names (isn't that ridiculous?), it felt like the right thing to do. And of course I'm changing the name of this blog, my Flickr page, my Fine Art America shop and so on too!
I'm also working on an actual website! Won't be long now! I'll keep you posted :)

And...... to celebrate new beginnings... I'll be doing a giveaway soon! Stay tuned and enjoy your week! xx