Time flies! It’s already time for my second Project 10×12 post. Remember what 10×12 is? I will post 10 personal photos related to my life every month for 12 months!
To me, February is the month of love and festival. Valentine’s Day falls in February. I had a successful series of Valentine’s Day mini sessions in my studio, where I met lot of cute babies and toddlers! What’s festal in February? This year’s Chinese New Year also falls in February! Last year was the year of dragon. This year is the year of snake.
Chinese New Year is very important to me because I grew up in Shanghai, China and it’s nation’s biggest annual festival. Although I have been living in the States for 15 years, my family still celebrate Chinese New Year. My husband and I have been hosting Chinese New Year party every year since we moved to Kansas City. This is our 8th annual Chinese New Year party. We invite all our close friends over to eat, drink, and have fun. My husband Billy is the cook in our house. Kitchen is his stage. He normally cooks 15-20 courses for Chinese New Year party. This year is a little bit challenging because we don’t have our inlaws’ help watching our little Irish twins. Thus he only cooked 8 dishes and the rest was potluck. All the friends brought food and drinks.
Besides food and drink, another tradition is the red envelops – money used to suppress or put down the evil spirit during Chinese New Year. Each red envelop contains even number money. $8 is a luck number. Adults will pass these to kids. Kids can also request red envelops from adults (usually grandparents, uncles, and aunties). We prepared red envelops for our friend’s kid. Audrey and Wesley got a total of 8 red envelops!
The first two rows of the photos are the food from this year’s party. I did not get to take many good food pictures this time because Billy was busy cooking and I was watching the kids. I used to take tons of food pictures and thought I would be a food photographer. I have a huge collection of food pictures on Flickr.
I also had a little photo booth set for my friends. The scene was from the Valentine mini session I had earlier that day. My girls and I had lots of fun making girl poses (row 3). The first couple in row 4 is Alex and Rena. The second is my little family. Kids were dressed in traditional Chinese New Year outfit. It wasn’t a perfect picture. The kids were obviously doing their own thing, but we all had fun. The first couple in last row is Kristen and Lawrence. Lawrence is my good friend and the first friend I know since I moved to Kansas City. Aren’t they cute in this picture? Kristen is just gorgeous. I hope I get to use her as my model in the future. The last couple is John and Nancy. Nancy is a good friend of mine. She was also born in Shanghai, but moved to the States when she was 4. Nancy and John just got engaged last month! And this concludes my second 10×12!
Don’t go yet. Now please head over to my talented photographer friend Amanda Becker’s 10×12 project. Amanda is the owner of Amanda Becker Photography based in Minnesota and she also owns a farm. Also check out my photography Monica’s 10×12 project.
Tagged with: 10x12 • celebrate • Child Photographer • China • Chinese New Year • drink • Family Photos • festival • food • Kansas City • Kansas City Life Style Photographer • Liberty • Liberty MO • money • Photographer • Portraits • Portraits Photographer • red envelop • Shanghai • studio • tradition • valentine • Wedding Photographer
欢乐的二月^_^
Happy New Year!
[…] to see some other posts like this from my photographer friends you can see my friend Lai’s HERE and my friend Amanda’s […]