West Dennis Beach

A few shots from a walk that I took this weekend with my mom on West Dennis Beach, Cape Cod:



How did I ever complain about growing up here?



Sorry for the exploitation Mister Skunk, but it's impossible for me to pass up photographing a dead animal.



Dennis and Yarmouth have a plethora of old motels from the 1950's. Gotta love a good hand painted sign.

Just a reminder too that it's the last week of voting for SHAPE's 2011 Best Blogger Awards. If you haven't voted yet, please take a second to do so, it only takes 2 clicks!

Vote for 12 Months of Lent

The Memento Works

I just stumbled upon this site, The Memento Works. Basically, you snail mail them your cherished sentimental objects and they beautifully photograph (and frame) them for you, before mailing them back. Although I love the underlying concept, I might be a little hesitant to send my favorite possessions off to a stranger. An interesting concept nonetheless.

It reminds me a bit of a project that I worked on a few years ago where I photographed people's prized possessions, the things that they would save in a fire if their house were burning down. I'd go to their houses and arrange a still life of their objects, and then shoot with a 4x5 view camera.

Then of course, a few years later a friend sent me a link to this project, The Burning House, which is essentially the same idea. Drats, someone beat me to it. I should at least submit my personal still life, right?



The things that I would save in a fire. Excuse the poor quality, but I'm so old fashioned that this is a digital shot of my c-print haha

The Work Week Slump

When I was dreaming up this month's lent, I had visions (more like delusions) of carrying my camera around with me everywhere, snapping shots of whatever caught my eye, photo documenting my entire month frame by frame (ha!). While I've definitely shot more this month than I have in the previous 9 months of the year combined, I've fallen victim to the work week slump. As good as my intentions are, it's just really hard to get in a lot after work, especially now that the daylight hours are dwindling (and especially because I really only like shooting during golden hour).

So, since we're already halfway through October and I don't want to see the rest of the month slip away to the slump, I've decided to give myself some weeknight homework to stay productive during my non-shooting days:

1. I'm going to read the entire Nikon D80 manual, cover to cover.

2. I'm going to watch some technical tutorials online (any suggestions?) and catch up with my favorite photo blogs.

3. I'm going to brush up on my night photography skills and finally get some pictures of one of my favorite local phenomenons: Weird Watertown storefronts at night. If anyone knows the area, you know what I'm talking about. Does anyone have any good night photography advice/resources for me?

And since I haven't picked up the camera since Grammy's house and I can't really justify having a photo-less post this month, I'll leave you with this shot that I took in 2006 while on vacation in St. Maarten. Crazy, huh?

To Grammy's House I Go

As I mentioned yesterday, my 91 year old Grandma Helen's house is one of my favorite places to photograph. She's been living in her 103 year old home in Brockton, MA since the early 1940's, and her house tells the history of her life, and of our family, through the possessions that adorn it.

I've photographed her house numerous times over the years, but it's definitely been a while, so I was excited to pay her a visit during photography month. In between stories of my Italian ancestors and brushing up on current affairs (she knows as much about what's going on in politics as she does about Dancing With the Stars), I managed to snap a few shots when the light was hitting the dining room just so.



The house where I've spent almost every holiday of my life



Grammy's hutch



A family portrait that my mom drew (and Grammy had put onto a plate) when she was a child



A photograph of my Aunt Carol (who passed away from Lupus 8 years ago) and my Uncle George at my parents wedding in 1978



I'd love to say that I took a photo of Grammy today, but I'm pretty sure that this one from 1975 is the last time that she allowed a photograph to be taken of her, seriously...

Saturday Shots

A few shots from my morning excursion into Belmont (I'll always be a diehard Watertownie, but I have to say, Belmont is really growing on me. It's full of photographic gems).



From an antique shop in Cushing Square



Old newspapers from the same shop



Belmont's music shop



The organ inside the shop



I love this door

Tomorrow I'll be visiting my 91 year old Grandma Helen in Brockton (her house is incredible and my most favorite place in the world to photograph) so expect a post tomorrow evening full of funny still lifes and relics from the past century. YES.

And in case you haven't voted for 12MOL yet in the SHAPE Best Blogger Awards, you can do so here, every vote helps! Thanks guys!

A Brief History of 12 Months of Lent

Since I’ve recently had an influx of visitors to my blog (yay!), I thought I’d take a minute to give a more in depth description of what 12 Months of Lent is so that new readers (especially those of you who don’t know me personally), have a better understanding of what exactly it is you’ve just stumbled upon. So, here you have it:

A Brief History of 12 Months of Lent, by Danne Dzenawagis

In December of 2008, I sat down to brainstorm some ideas for my 2009 New Year’s Resolution. Being my typical Type A self, I started by making a list of things that I wanted to work towards in the coming year, and as expected, the list was about 23,000 pages long. Great, how could I actually expect to make any real progress with such an intimidating/impossible list? Well, I thought, at least Lent’s in a few months, maybe I could work one of my goals into Lent…and that’s when the light bulb went off. Maybe I could work all of my goals into a series of “mini-lents”, one for each month of the year, which would break down my original list of resolutions into a clearly defined and manageable plan. Perfect. Type A sigh of relief…

Disclaimer: For anyone out there who may be reading this and thinking “Um, cool idea, but this sounds nothing like the Lent that I practice each year”, yes, I know, I use the term Lent very loosely. Having grown up in a Catholic household myself, I’m well aware that I’m pushing Lent to it’s limits, but really, I’m just borrowing the underlying concept: Personal sacrifice and dedication in order for personal growth and fulfillment. It’s as simple as that.

So what types of thing do I do? It’s honestly all over the map. I’ve spent a month picking up every piece of litter that I came across, another month not making any trash (it’s much more possible than you think), a month limiting my wardrobe to only 6 items (which I highly recommend that everyone try), a month cooking 3 new recipes a week, a month getting rid of 100 things a week, and other months committing to much more simple tasks, like writing in my journal each day, taking more photographs, and doing more yoga.

After almost 3 years of 12 Months of Lent, I can honestly say that this quirky little project has changed my life in such an incredible way. It's affected (and continues to affect) me in the most positive way possible and at this point, I honestly can't imagine my life without it. Thank you all for your encouragement and inspiration, and of course, for reading in the first place.

Love, Danne

What My Weekend Looked Like

Besides a weekend long yoga workshop and a Pizzeria Regina excursion for Marissa's birthday (HB MC!), this is what my weekend looked like:



Catching Fanne up on the bed where she knows she shouldn't be...



Intimidating her enough to jump off...



Laying cuttings from my herb garden out to dry in our beautiful new salad bowl (thanks Mark and Carol!)



Making it to Fresh Pond just in time for golden hour...



and incessantly photographing the kaleidoscope-esque reflections on the pond...

And now? Fanne and I are sitting out on the back porch, enjoying the moonlight and the unseasonably warm weather. Ahhhh Indian summer....

SHAPE Blogger Awards (eeeee!!!)

So, in case anyone missed my post on Facebook, I am super excited to announce that SHAPE magazine has nominated 12MOL for their 1st Annual Blogger Awards (um, omg?). I received an email from their associate web editor yesterday with all the details, so here's the scoop:

There are 6 categories in all, with 20 nominees in each category. Voting is done on the SHAPE website and goes until Friday, October 28th. Based on the number of votes, 6 finalists will be chosen, one from each category) and from those 6, the editors of SHAPE will choose a grand prize winner who will win a paid video series to be featured on SHAPE.com, as well as a possible mention in an upcoming issue of SHAPE magazine.

Totally awesome, right? Again, omg...

So, this is where I kindly ask all of you to follow this link and vote for 12MOL. Once you've voted, pass the link on to anyone and everyone, post it to your Facebook wall, tweet it, whatever you want. I wholeheartedly appreciate all the love and support I've received in the past few days. I love you all times 10,000.

Vote for 12 Months of Lent!

Also, if anyone out there is the person responsible for pointing SHAPE to my blog in the first place, please let me know who you are so I can find some way to thank you for being so awesome.

Digicam in the Belmont Victory Gardens

I’m not sure if this dates me (and I’m not even that old) or just makes me sound like a total hipster, but umm, confession time…I’ve never really shot digital before. I mean, it’s not like I haven’t used a digital camera—it's just been reserved for the more candid “hanging out” shots, whereas film has been saved for my more defined personal projects. Even in my digital photo classes in college, we shot film, scanned our negatives, and printed digitally. Again, I’m not even that old, this was only 5 years ago. It’s truly amazing how much has changed…

As much as I’ll always love film, I think that it’s probably time to get with it and figure out how to work a digital SLR. I’m not fortunate enough to own one myself, but I’m lucky enough to have a boyfriend who does, so this month I’m vowing I’m to navigate the analog to digital transition (or at least make some headway).

First step: Taking digicam out on a field trip.

Since I have Fridays off (working part-time is a dream come true), I had a chunk of free time this afternoon and decided to pack up digicam and take Helga II (my car, apparently I love naming inanimate objects) out for a drive until I found something compelling enough to stop for. Driving through Belmont during golden hour (the most glorious time of day), I decided to pull over at the Rock Meadow Conservation Area. Hoping I’d get a few magically lit shots of some suburban agriculture, I trotted down the first path I saw and was lucky enough to stumble upon the Belmont Victory Gardens. Total goldmine.

While I’m definitely still trying to figure out the mechanics of the camera, I had fun just poking around and trying to get back in the swing of things. As expected, I was drawn to the personalization of each garden’s individual space. How the owner adorned their tiny piece of land and left their personal stamp on it. Below are a few of my favorite shots:








]

September Wrap-Up and October’s Lent

Last month’s challenge from GOOD was all about connecting with people, and that I did. Out of the 30 mini-challenges that they presented me with, I was able to complete 26, only missing 4, go me! I sent postcards and thank-you notes, reconnected with old friends, strengthened existing connections, talked to strangers, complimented strangers, fed a stranger, high-fived, bought a gift for a friend, made a gift for another, lunched with a co-worker, lent out a book, asked for advice (I’m still taking suggestions btw), baked for my neighbors, and thanked my old teachers. Phew…now I’m exhausted (but also very well connected, thanks GOOD!).

After a month that was so externally focused, this month I’ll be switching gears a bit and working on something that’s a little more personal. For October’s lent I plan on rediscovering one of my lost loves: photography.

I’ve always enjoyed taking photos but I really fell in love with photography in college. The second that my schedule opened up and I had space for an elective, I signed myself up for black and white darkroom and I was hooked. Many more photo elective classes and BFA (in design, not photo) later, I found myself enrolled in Continuing Education classes at the Museum School, learning how to use a view camera (sigh) and the color darkroom (bigger sigh).

But ask me what I’ve photographed lately and I’ll tell you, “not much”. Why? Didn’t I love this? Wasn’t I seriously considering going back for an MFA? No excuses this month Danne, I’m kick starting myself back into action and sharing what I shoot here. I don’t have any defined rules really, just get out there and make some pictures. You up for a photo date Amanda E?

A photo that I took at age 3 of my lovely Mum. On the back it reads "Danne's First Photo"