Photoshoot - AFS

My agent has been great - giving me many opportunities lately for work. Well, one finally panned out this past Friday, not only for me, but for Eva too. How fun - our second shoot together, our first since she has entered toddlerhood!

Shoot time: 12:00 aka naptime
Shoot length: 4.5 hours (half day, not a bad job!)
Job: farmer family

Our call time was 12:00 and we had some down time until about 1:30, so the makeup artist asked if either of us were hungry. They had a full spread of Japanese food which looked great! I knew Eva wouldn't pass up food so we went over to take a look. Some of the staff was trying to determine what would be kid-friendly enough, when Eva exclaimed something like 'Oh, look mommy, sushi, my favorite!" So I opened a little bento box for her and we decided to share it. Before she started to dig in, she looked around and asked the guy next to us where he got his chopsticks. I told her that she could go ahead and use her hands, because it would be easier. She must have agreed because she told me that she couldn't use the chopsticks without her girl. Now, 'her girl' is a chopstick aid that santa brought her for Christmas. It goes on the top of chopsticks and holds them together. She was so polite to everyone, thankfully, and said please, thank you etc. She also kept raving about how fabulous the lunch was. After finishing her sushi and juice (which was a real treat since she rarely gets juice), it was time to get dressed.

Eva looked so cute. The stylist brought overalls and an off-white shirt with different color hearts on it. She accessorized with her new froggy rainboots, which she absolutely loves!

I, on the other hand, looked like a farmer! I had to wear a plaid button down. Look out eighties/early nineties...The funny thing was that Eva was so upset about the plaid shirt. She kept telling me not to wear it! She clearly didn't like it and she wasn't shy about it. I may have a future stylist on my hands, or at the very least, a fashion diva ;)

The fun part...off to see the goat!
Ok, now I know that I usually take a backseat to furniture when it comes to modeling, but this time, we took the back seat to a goat! The goat was the star of the ad and we were just the background family. What a blast though. Eva was so excited about meeting this goat. The goats name was Patty and she was extremely gentle and tame. Eva got to feed her, pet her and eventually ended up giving her a nice big kiss on the lips. Yuck, off I went to find some disinfectant. All I could think about was E.Coli.

Time to actually shoot...
Usually my modeling jobs involve holding still. This one - a little different, we needed to move when the goat moved to keep the photographers perspective straight. Eventually, we ended up being shot without the goat - not sure if Photoshop will be involved to put the scene together or if we were doing another shot. Here is where the toddler came out in full force for Eva. By now it was probably somewhere between 2:00 and 2:15, long past nap time. I am supposed to be holding her on my hip while my farmer husband is standing next to us. She was cooperative for about 5-10 minutes when she decided she had had enough! One crew member had a huge reflector that was shining the sun directly in our eyes. This is easy for an adult to ignore, but apparently not easy for a toddler to ignore. She repeatedly yelled a few phrases...'stop pointing the reflector in my eyes' 'I can't see anymore' 'it's too shiny' etc. All I could think of was, we're fired!

Then it came time for Eva to smile. Needless to say, they had to pull out the same toy that they used to get the goat's attention to get Eva's! She was so slap-happy tired by this point, she couldn't stop laughing. They were telling her to say cheese and she was screaming it in the loudest, highest pitched voice that one could imagine. I was smiling and laughing, not because it was my job, but because it was a nervous reaction to her behavior! At one point, she decided that she would rather have farmer daddy hold her. Thankfully, he was a good sport.

The photographer had to switch out some equipment and decided it would be a good time for Eva to run around for a few minutes before shooting again. She kept calling the hill behind us a mountain and really wanted to run to the top of it...again. There was another crew member that was great with her. She kept following her around and keeping her occupied. Well, during this break, Eva ran to the top of the 'mountain' and screamed 'Patty, come up to the top of the mountain, come play with me.' The goat wrangler was also a good sport, thankfully. She walked Patty up to the top of the hill where Eva grabbed the goat around the neck giving her a big hug and said, 'Patty, I missed you so much.'

All in all, it was a lot of fun. Eva had a great time and has been talking about Patty ever since. She woke up in the middle of the night after the shoot and told me that she had so much fun with Patty, but that she made her so tired. She passed out right after that.

Once I get the ad, (if I ever get the ad) I'll be sure to post it!