Calendar Photoshoot: Behind the Scenes

Yesterday was the first night for shooting with the amazing Stewart Cohen for our calendar. It turned out to be even more mind-blowingly brilliant than I had ever thought possible with all the help of my friend Erin and her fantastic stylist friend Barri.

Here are a few behind-the-scenes shots of the shoot Tuesday.

Barri styling Stephanie between shots

Suza spinning fire on the rooftop deck of Stewart's studio

Brook, Skye, Suza, Dawn and Stephanie

Our ladies in red, Dawn and Skye

Dominique doing Skye's hair

Brook getting a touch-up between shots

Barri touches up Skye's wardrobe between takes

I am so excited for Friday and Saturday's shoots! Watching all the girls get dressed up made me want to get all gorgeous too. Friday it's my turn, yay! Look for more behind-the-scenes photos here later this week.

I Feel Symmetrical Again.

Yesterday we spent the entire day at my BFF Michelle and her hubby's for a tattoo party. Our good friend Derrick arrived about 1 pm and tattooed almost until midnight, the rock star.

Here's my latest addition:

A compass rose, sometimes called a windrose, is a figure on a compass, map, nautical chart or monument used to display the orientation of the cardinal directions — North, East, South and West - and their intermediate points. Older sources sometimes use the term "compass star", or stella maris ("star of the sea"), to refer to the compass rose. Compass rose tattoos have been around for hundreds of years. For most of that time, this design was the domain of sailors who wore their tats for a number of reasons. Among the most prominent, seamen believed that a compass rose tat would bring them good luck and ensure that they made it back to shore alive.

Michelle and Jerrime both got outlines for new pieces:

Swallow with ovarian cancer ribbon

Baby crawling. Symbolizes life and it's journey.

Barking Dog (covered up the initials I'd had there for 28yrs). Then the light bulb was added to symbolize my idealism, bright ideas, putting 'light' on every situation. Ha

Head Explosion

"No filter on her mouth or her cigarettes.. baby, what you're lookin' at is what you get."

-Pistol Annies

Too much pressure. Not enough release or relief. Head might explode.

The calendar shoot is coming up and Erin and I are emailing back and forth about all of the details, and it's making my head swim. Since the hair and makeup people are donating their services, it would be nice to be able to provide dinner, snacks and drinks for them during the photo shoot days... but where is the money going to come from? We are broke as f*ck and I'll be shocked if there's enough gas in the car to get to downtown all three days I'm supposed to be there. On top of all those details, my dad and stepmom are pushing me to start promoting Visalus, which also takes a lot of time, thought, detail, phone calls, party planning, pre-party planning.... all which I'm supposed to do with a 1.5- and 3.5-year-old when? When they asked me to join, I was all about gaining weight, helping people get healthy and possibly making some money at the same time. Now I'm wondering how I'm going to do it all. I mean, I can't even keep fruit or juice in the house to make a shake with for myself because my kids steal them.

I want to promote Body By Vi. And I want to build my own Tattooed Hippie Pirate Momma empire. But I don't possibly see how I can make both of them work at the same time.

What is Body By Vi, you might be asking? Well, it's a protein shake that's helping me gain weight. It's the number one home-based selling business in the world right now. Skeptics call it a ponzi scheme or a scam.. I did myself until my dad got his BMW and they both quit their jobs to make Visalus their full-time business. And they are very successful in just a year's time. You can see my site at http://visalus.com/promoter-portal/body-by-vi-overview-presentation.

Stress and pressure make me anxious, and that makes my head tight like it might explode. Stupid anxiety.

Pin-ups & Website News

So the calendar shoot is set and everyone is getting excited and serious about it. The girls' final stats are being pinned down, and tomorrow I'll send the final visions to the stylist so she can pull pieces for wardrobe. Lots of research is going into this, so it's a good thing I like researching! ;)

This week me extra energy has gone into Tattooed Hippie Pirate Mommas organization marketing ideas to get the word out about our group/organization.

The lovely mister, Kevin, is currently teaching himself how to design a basic website.  The next step will be gathering the money to host it, which should be low to start.We've decided on hostgator to design and host the site, which we already own the domain name for.  The site will feature our logo, blog, merchandise like stickers, calendars, posters, prints, and an e-zine/possible print magazine with ad space available to purchase. Now that it's been 1 year, we can officially 'register' the trademark instead of it just being whateverit'scalled.

My job is keeping track of all of the finer points. Kevin will design a bunch of stickers and momma cards to hand out so the name is all over. Many of the stickers will feature Tattooed Hippie Pirate Mommas Jenny, Skye, and Ashley. I'll be sending those out to a girl in each area, which will be quite a lot because there are 260+ girls in the Facebook group.

Jenny

Ashley

 On the to-do list is shooting and designing the pin-up calendar, with partial proceeds given to charity. Printing will be the hard part; pre-ordering will help offset cost. I also need to set up a Tattooed Hippie Pirate Mommas email and Paypal account to make an official organization/business. On the website, we will sell canvas prints of calendar girls, photographed prints of calendar girls, shirt stencils to make your own shirt, and shirts with our logo on them.

My good friend Bart, one of the few local Tattooed Hippie Pirate dads, is eager to work on the ezine/magazine. He is researching ad space sizes and prices for the ezine/magazine and website. He also wants to interview Kevin about being the husband of the head Tattooed Hippie Pirate Momma. We'll both write content articles and use photos of Tattooed Hippie Pirate Mommas to go inside the zine. He's going to sell website space and do whatever else he can to bring in money for our overhead until we can start making money.

Now all we have to do is get the website running and things will take off. Right? ;)

Calendar Girls, final version.

We've pinned down a date, photographer and stylist for the Tattooed Hippie Pirate Mommas calendar! So very exciting. My friend and fellow momma Erin is helping produce the shoot, as she had the contacts. And contacts they are! Stewart Cohen has some amazing work, and Barri Martin has dressed the band Blue October and many other famous names.

The calendar will feature a pin-up type look that shows off each girl's personality. We have three pregnant tattooed mommas, some heavily tattooed mommas with modeling experience, and a few adorable hippie mommas without tattoos. Each girl is beautiful and Stewart will capture their personalities in each photo, which will surely produce breathtaking photography.

I'm very happy with the turnout and the excitement for the project. Did I mention everyone is volunteering their time? Proceeds from the calendar will benefit a battered women's shelter yet to be named. So, here is the final lineup of girls!

Kendra from Dallas

Cassie from Austin

Leisha from Dallas

Suza from Dallas

Ruby Soho from Dallas

Dawn from Dallas

myself

Bekah from DC

Skye from Dallas

Stephanie from Denton

Brook from Denton

Amanda from Dallas

Laci from Dallas

Azure from Dallas

Kate from Arlington

Samantha from Denton

House Dreams

I'm dreaming of a house in the country... This one is a barn refurbished into a home. The wood makes me swoon, and I adore the loft feel of the upstairs.

How could you NOT love chilling in this backyard sunroom/deck area? If only. Sigh.

Sliding barn doors are the best idea in the world. I want them everywhere in our dream house.

Hello, perfect bathroom.

An atrium will be the center of our house when we build it, so we can bring nature indoors. My hubby has a green thumb and my kids love being outside, so it's the best of both worlds.

Road trip

This week my other half is out of town making that dough,  so I packed up the kids and made the six hour drive to my hometown.

They are incredible travelers and made the ride really smooth with very few stops. What kills the vacation feel of grandma's is breaking their usual routine.. and that leads to a 1 and 3-year-old climbing the walls until 1:00 am. Stella looked like a drunk walking home from the bar,  bouncing off walls and wandering aimlessly while Cole tossed toys around and whined a LOT.

The second night I started early.. two hours later he's still whining instead of talking and she's screeching like the devil's kin. Oh how I will praise my schedule.

Calendar Girls, again.

Putting together the models for this calendar shoot is becoming a bit insane (but in a fun, loving what I'm doing kind of way). Chelsea got shy and wants to back out of modeling, but will be our prop helper/assistant. Here's the new tentative lineup, with a few back-ups...

sports fanatic tattooed momma Brittany

derby girl Stephanie

Ashley, our hottie from Ohio

tattooed momma Laci

Katy, pretty bubbly momma

MO enterpreneur momma Jenny

wine shop momma Brook

beautiful Azure

DJ and fancy cake maker Dawn

our bohemian dollface Kendra

Samantha, our pregnant pin-up

the adorable Skye

Beautiful Bekah is our backup.. wish she lived closer.

and yours truly.