Alana & Scarlett ~ Oz Portraits

My life requires at least one Dorothy Gale/ Wizard of Oz photo shoot per year. It's how I was raised. ;) And what better time to dress up than around Halloween. You can see the one I did with Sasha in California last October here. While Michael and I still lived in Birmingham, I got a text from my dear friend Alana in July sending a photo of a scruffy gray dog that she and her husband were going to adopt. At that moment I became excited letting her know that we had to have a Dorothy photo shoot when we moved back to Orlando. When they got their dog, Scarlett, the rescue center had shaved her hair, so we waited until this past Tuesday while her hair was grown out more. Scarlett did a pretty great job and other times we just had to let her run around and "play all day" as doggies do enjoy. We took over 500 photos and I have narrowed it down by 75% and, out of those, these are my favorites.

 Originally I wasn't planning to get her horses in the pictures until I remembered the horses in the movie. The Kansas farmhands make the horses run out when the tornado is coming. And I noticed tonight when I watched the movie that there is a horse in the background at the beginning of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow". But it was my first time noticing that there is a water pump in their yard. The horses run behind it. I had to turn the movie off halfway through because I wasn't getting any work done. I was simply watching the movie. Fancy that!!

 Aside from the lovely photo above that shows how much dogs love their owners, I think the Kansas barn photos are my favorite. Alana makes such a beautiful Dorothy!! I had not noticed before that their stable for the horses had windows on the back. It was my favorite part of the structure. The photo directly below on the right may be my super favorite of these bunch.

 **Of course, thank you to my mom who sewed the dress for me during high school!!
But aside from the photoshoot, I am back to loving the 911 shifts- work two days, get two days off, etc. On my days off I have been making small purchases to craft stores so I can binge watch "Bones" on Netflix while creating handmade mailing envelopes out of scrapbook paper until the wee hours of the morning. They are quite beautiful. During the sunshine hours I split time between hanging out with Mia and Alana. And Miriam too, but our schedules don't match up as well. I start answering 911 calls without a trainer on Monday and have had conversations with my superiors about becoming a certified trainer myself. Next week is the last week of Halloween Horror Nights at Universal. Michael has enjoyed being a make up fx artist Lead again and is looking forward to working Grinchmas in December. We have been getting along very well since I watched the movie the Pursuit of Happyness starring Will Smith. It really put life and money issues into perspective. We go walking on trails when we can, but have very few days off together when Michael works HHN. Hopefully we will have a lot more chances next month. I'll need it after eating all this chocolate candy!! ;)

 ~ ✩ ✬ ✭ ✬ ✩ ☆ ✩ ✬ ✭ ✬ ✩ ☆ ✩ ✬ ✭ ✬ ✩ ☆ ~

 I staged this one due to the behind the scenes picture of Judy Garland that I had seen multiple times of her reading the Wizard of Oz between takes on set (maybe 1938 since the movie premiered in 1939).