Our “This Old House Magazine” photo shoot

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When I first started our blog last summer, never in a million years would I have thought I would find so many wonderful new friends and people who were interested in following along with our lives and renovations. Earlier this year, I was contacted by an editor at This Old House Magazine inquiring about our family room makeover. She requested some additional pictures and we exchanged a few emails but that was it. A couple months later, I received this email in July while vacationing on Cape Cod,

Imagine my surprise when I got this email. My eyes about bugged out of my head while riding go-carts. Almost six months after our first email exchange, our family room makeover will be in the upcoming October issue of This Old House Magazine.  This experience blew my mind. It’s insane the amount of work that goes on behind the scenes of the gorgeous pictures you see in magazines. I had no idea! I have always wondered about the process and what goes on behind the scenes and thought some of you would might enjoy seeing the process so I have some pictures to share with you!

Meet the sweet stylist Kelly and her assistant Rebby. Rebby is from France and is learning the art of styling. She has a really cool accent! They arrived bright and early in the morning with a van full of accessories and gorgeous flowers from the Boston Flower Exchange.

My second sentence after I said, “nice to meet you” was, do you mind if I photograph you? haha. Little did they know, I would be taking pictures of them all day. Eric the photographer, thought I was kidding but he soon found out I was serious. I told him I planned on blasting their faces all over blog land.  I’m not sure he believed me but I think he will now.

Meet the hilarious photographer Eric and his rock-in assistant Sila. This girl makes the lighting happen! At one point, she was basically hanging over the deck in the backyard holding a big canvas light blocker thingy for 20 minutes! Eric forgot at one point she was out there, and once he realized she was missing, he said, “oh geez, I think she is still outside holding the light blocker” ( I can’t remember what that thing was called). The camera setup and the ability to see the photo’s directly on the laptop is pretty amazing.

I am very limited with the pictures that I can show, as to not reveal anything in the upcoming issue so I had to crop out most of the room in these next pictures. We had a blast having our pictures taken. You will notice that my son and husband are in shorts and a “fall” shirt and sweater. Did you know that magazines shoot 3 – 6 months in advance? It was almost 90 degrees this day and we were dressed for fall. Ha. Although Eric made it easy, he said waist up for fall attire.

This was such a special day and I’m so thankful for Megan at This Old House Magazine for finding us! For all you bloggers out there, this is an example of “you never know who is looking at your blog!” So plug forward, you never know :).

The October issue hits stands on September 28th and I cannot wait to see the pictures of the room.  Our room will be featured along with other budget-conscious DIY projects. Oh and before I sign off, my friend Tonya at Love of Family & Home started a new series on her blog sharing home makeovers and she just featured this room. Thank you Tonya!

Update: You can see the magazine feature here.

 

Meet Jessica

What started as a hobby, Jessica’s blog now has millions of people visit yearly and while many of the projects and posts look and sound perfect, life hasn’t always been easy. Read Jessica’s story and how overcoming death, divorce and dementia was one of her biggest life lessons to date.