Posts Tagged ‘Photography’

  • 12 Nov

    Posted by
    emily


    Category

    Design for Life {by Paulo}

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    {my dear husband wrote this, as we are in a time of asking God what he would have us do. this is what he felt. he’s the amazing webdesigner who designed my site, of course!}

    This is the sketch of what my heart burns for..

    I dream of night and day constant everlasting prayer and worship that will affect people, that will change hearts. Not a mega-maniac concept that sees the big and imagines nations changed, that will be a realistic outcome of our intimate prayer life, of hearts being touched by a passion that burns stronger by the day that it stays in the presence of the Holy.

    I want to rescue kids from prostitution and the streets, I want to grow old with them and walk and watch as Holy Spirit transforms their lives. I want to rescue teenagers away from drugs and teach them what I know, teach them what I have in my hand. Teach them how to translate their life story into design.

    I have a dream of forming a design agency made up of young adults rescued from the streets. We will serve the church and help NGO’s and institutions to create relevant and high quality design so that they can bring out their message and in partnership they’ll help us to train and develop more “life designers”, to rescue others from destitution. I want to design for life, to give them a future, to teach them that each line they draw, each typography they work on can mean a chain being broken, how it can mean a message of Hope being brought to the world.

    I want this agency to spread bringing future and proving that Design and Creation can truly announce our essence: that we were created to create, we were designed by God to design, to design life, to design hope, to create the Kingdom of Jesus in this world. Design as a lifestyle, as a fruit of constant worship. This is my dream, this is what I long for; serve the Church and strengthen our Message of Love and Hope by in return giving Hope to those who apparently have no future.

    This is what I’m walking towards, this is what I will look like when I go into full time ministry. I will design for hope, I will write code for the Body so that I can free others to code with me, so that through my art, through my sketches I can show others a way out of the streets, i can give them jobs, show them that they’re life story can be relevant to others around the globe, all they have to do is be willing to pick up a pencil and draw that first line, express who they are, simply design.

    Design for Life
    Pray for Change
    Live for Love

    -Paulo

  • 12 Apr

    Posted by
    emily


    Category

    Shutterfly Announcement Celebration

    0

    My goodness, I feel like I have nothing to announce right now.  Is a new job an announcement?  I feel like announcing that with cards to everyone, I’m so happy to be working again!  And, we’re moving, shortly, but we don’t have a new address quite yet!  I think thats our biggest announcement this spring!!

    But for someone who has moved around too much, moving again almost doesn’t seem like news.  We’re just praying that the new place we find is better than this one!  Our current house has so many issues- flooding, loud neighborhood, party house across the street, eccentric landlady, and mold.  Last year we were looking more for how the space looked and felt, this year we will be looking for how it is structured and who our neighbors are!

    When we get our new address, it would be prudent of me to actually send out address cards with our new address!  I love getting mail… and visitors would be nice too, but usually it’s a little too far for most of my friends from the US.  But after writing out a super crazy long address, anyone who sends mail or visits will be happy when our address is a bit easier to remember.

    One year ago, we were announcing our wedding, though it seemed like an April Fool’s joke since I told people on April 1!  If we had actually had time to do save the date cards, I bet we would have used something like these save the date cards, they’re classy:

    I can always fine something I like (ok, maybe thats a problem for a photographer like me) on Shutterfly.  Especially when I had lots of wedding photos to play with.  I can still play with them, but I already got photo books made up of our wedding photos.  Or at least from one of our 2 weddings.  I’m still waiting to see the rest of the photos from our second wedding.  I loved how this design matched our wedding colors perfectly.  Everyone here wows over the photo books, they are so completely different than what people here are used to seeing.  Sometimes I love being American.  Sometimes.

    Maybe next spring we’ll have a better announcement… but for now, we need to move so that a better announcement would be a possibility…

    **Are you a blogger, too? Click here to register for a chance at 50 free announcements!

    This post is part of a series sponsored by Shutterfly. I was selected for this sponsorship by the Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity, as I do.**

  • 16 Dec

    Posted by
    emily


    Category

    Christmas at the Creche!

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    “Ho, Ho, Ho! Papai Noel Chegou!!”  was the cry we were greeted with as our small caravan of three cars, not camels, arrived at the daycare center, or Creche, in Santa Maria.  The kids were chanting “Ho, Ho, Ho, Santa is Here!!” because we were bringing these kids Christmas gifts.  They all come from very poor families, and live in a rather poor neighborhood, and otherwise don’t receive any gifts.  Their excitement was contagious and quickly spread to the church group, made up of Americans and Brazilians.

    The kids sang for us, and then we taught them new songs and one team member had a puppet and told the kids a Christmas story about the first Christmas with the puppet.  The kids loved it!  There were smiles all around, as the kids waited in anticipation to get to take their presents home.  We were glad to share the real meaning of Christmas with them, as well as love on and give to those who have less than we do.

    We gave the kids a snack, and had a chance to play with them.  We sort of gave out the gifts to some kids, but they weren’t allowed to unwrap them.  Can you imagine 30+ 2-6 year olds all opening up Christmas gifts at once?  What chaos that would be… so we took photos with the kids we bought the gifts for, and when their parents got them, they took the gifts home to open.

    This visit to a project was a nice change for me.  I wasn’t leading it,which was different.  Almost everyone spoke Portuguese and English, so no translating for me either.  I wasn’t even interviewing the co-ordinators of the project or anything, as I usually do.  I was just free, absolutely free.I was able to play with the kids, photograph them playing, see their joy in receiving gifts, and be reminded that we give gifts to these kids just as the magi gave gifts to baby Jesus.  We, the rich, the middle class, the modern day magi, took time to give thoughtful gifts for these children, born into destitute situations.  Many come from broken families, born out of wedlock, the mother pregnant without being married, like little baby Jesus’ family was.  We never know who these children will grow up to be, like Jesus came from such a humble family’s beginnings, yet grew up to be the Savior of the World.  We give to kids we don’t even know, to kids we meet when we give the gift, in the same manner as the magi gave to a baby they had never met.  But the magi knew he was special.  Like we all know these kids are special.As we celebrate Christmas, we must not forget the real reason why we give gifts, and why we celebrate.  And if you have the opportunity to give an Angel Tree gift, or an Operation Christmas Child shoebox, or donate to a local homeless shelter, please take the opportunity you have to bless someone else and show them what Christmas is really all about.

  • 23 Nov

    Posted by
    emily


    Category

    The Happiness Project {week 3}

    1

    We caught a glimpse of a huge bright pinkish orange rose right outside our kitchen door on Sunday.  It was big and bright enough that we could see it through the rippled glass windowpane.  Caught it just before the rain…

    With so much having been going wrong and being difficult here, it can be hard to focus on the little things that make me happy- like this rose, or the mangos in the tree outside.  Or even when my mom calls asking if there is anything I want at the crafts store (really?  she doesn’t even need to ask!!).

    Photobucket