Photography by Lisa: January 2009

Monday, January 19, 2009

2010 CALENDARS

The 2010 are nearing completion. The proofs have been worked on and the photographs are posted. Just a couple small changes to make and we're ready to go. They are now available for sale until June 15/09.

I am excited about a couple of changes for the 2010 calendars. Saskatoon Fastprint is very excited to be printing 3 calendars for me for 2010: a Black & White SK Calendar featuring memorable photos from days gone by; a Car Calendar featuring 'cruisin chrome and fast muscle' cars that are locally owned in Saskatchewan; and an Inspirational Israel Calendar featuring photos taken in the land of Israel as well as a photograph from the land of Jordan and of Egypt as well. A great variety to choose from for your 2010 calendars to give to your customers or to use for your fundraisers. There will also be envelopes available for you to purchase along with these calendars. The 2010 calendars will be resized just slightly so that they will fit into a regular 10 x 112 or 13 inch envelope that can be mailed with regular postage.

The prices for the 2010 calendars are staying the same as the 2 previous years: $2.00/calendar for a black imprint of your business logo and information, or $2.50/calendar with a color imprint of your business logo and information. The minimum order is 100 calendars and there is a $30 design fee per order for the printer to set up your design on the bottom of the calendar with your business logo and information.

Orders are now being taken until June 15, 2009. The calendars will be printed in summer and ready to be distributed to you in the fall so that you have plenty of time to have them out to your customers before the end of the year.

If you continue scrolling down, you can view the photos that are in all 3 calendars.
I look forward to hearing from you. God bless you!
Lisa Braun
lisaspics@sasktel.net

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

2010 Israel Inspirational Calendar

What an incredible dream to have come true - going to Israel. Such an amazing journey and very hard to put into words what you experience there. But I'm very excited to have put together this incredible glimpse into the lands of Israel, Jordan and Egypt for you. The calendar is mainly Israel but with a photo from Jordan and one from Egypt as well. Below each photo will be an explanation of what was happening or had happened in that are shown in the photo.

These calendars can be ordered now until June 15/09. I am taking preorders - the calendars will be printed in summer and ready for distribution in fall. The cost is $2.00/black imprint and $2.50/color imprint - the imprint will be your business logo and information. I sell these to businesses to be used for their advertising - the minimum order is 100 calendars. Individual calendars are sold for $10.00/calendar. These calendars can also be used for fundraisers...email me for information regarding this at lisaspics@sasktel.net

I know you will be blessed by this calendar....enjoy.

The above photo was taken near Haifa, Israel and we're overlooking the Meditarranean Sea. It was so incredibly gorgeous here....what a marvelous sunset God gave us this first evening here. I'll never forget this sight.

Nearing the end of our trip, we drove into Egypt and stayed at St. Catharine's for 1/4 of a night. We had to wake up at 2 am so that we could leave with the bus at 2:30 in order to be at Mount Sinai, Egypt at 3 am to begin the climb up Mount Sinai. There were 26 of us who climbed up this mountain in the middle of the night, in darkness with only a handful of us having flashlights. It was a 3 hour climb up the mountain to the very top so that we could watch the sunrise at 6:30 am. What a sight that was!! I was a crazy nut and rode a camel up 2/3 of the way. My camel was a bully and wanted to be at the front so he bullied his way past the other camels and led the way up the mountain....I prayed the whole way "Lord, you must have an angel guiding this camel up the mountain because my guide is nowhere to be seen." It was a steep climb and the ledge was always very close to my camel's legs. It was a good thing it was dark and I could not see where we were walking. :-) After the 2/3 climb, I numbly got off the camel to rest my extremely sore legs so that I could walk up the 750 steps to the very top. Oh but was it worth it! If you ever have a chance to experience this, do it!

Here we are on top of Masada, overlooking the Dead Sea in Israel. This was a fortress where King Herod lived part of the time, with swimming pools/baths and every luxury he could have back in those days. The Dead Sea in the distance is at 1,400 feet below sea level and here we are on top at sea level. Some guys walked up this mountain, including my hubby and my son but the rest of us took the cable car up. Incredible view here too. Just extremely sad at what took place up on this mountain. When the Romans took over the world so many years ago, over 900 Jews committed suicide here - they did not want to be ruled by the Romans. It took the Romans a whole year to build a ramp to get up here with their huge machines to break into this fortress. They were not expecting to find a fortress full of slaughtered Jews. Certain Jews believe that they were heroes but now the Israel community is now leaning towards it being an act of cowardness. Only 1 mother and her 2 children remained alive.

Our 1st view of Jerusalem. We are standing on a spot near the Mount of Olives and directly below us is the Kidron Valley and we are overlooking the city of Jerusalem in Israel. Our Jewish guide had taught us a song - the song of ascent into Jerusalem. It doesn't matter which direction you take to come to Jerusalem, you ascend into the city because it is on a hill. It was quite emotional standing here, singing this Jewish song together as the rain fell on us and the sun shone through the clouds over Jerusalem. A very memorable moment.

This is the most likely spot of the tomb of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane - this is the Garden Tomb in Jerusalem, Israel. It was so quiet and serene in this spot. Knowing that Jesus is no longer buried, that he had died for our sins, crucified, died, buried, but then he rose from the dead so that we could have life eternal. Wow! How could you not get emotional at a spot like this. There was singing and praying all around us, in different languages and some were speaking/praying in tongues....it was heavenly, absolutely heavenly. To walk into this tomb and see a sign that read "HE IS NOT HERE, HE IS RISEN" Yes, it spoke directly to your heart and you could not help but be deeply moved.

Here we are at the town of Capernaum, Israel - this was a synagogue that Jesus had preached in and also the town of the Apostle Peter - we saw where his house was as well. I loved the marble pillars/rocks at this sight. It was so amazing to be in here and try to imagine how it would've been in Jesus' time.

Ah, to express to you what my heart experienced when I saw this sunrise over the Sea of Galilee at Tiberias, Israel - this was the view from our hotel balcony...the peaceful holy moment of this morning is quite hard to fathom. We didn't experience any storms while we were here for 4 nights...just gorgeous peaceful mornings of incredible sunrises...and an incredible sunset while we were on a boat ride on the Sea of Galilee....that was another incredibly moving moment - to be on the sea that Jesus was on, and walked on, and to stand on the shoreline where he may have roasted the fish for his disciples one morning. Amazing experience.

We walked the streets of a town in Israel and went into churches and walked through the markets. We passed this man sitting on the sidewalk holding out his hand for money on this street....it made me think of what Jesus would do if he had been there...he would have walked up to him and healed him. That would've been quite something to experience. I was so thankful to have this amazing time in the Holy Land.

This photo was taken on the top of Mount Carmel, Israel - imagine the prophet Elijah defeating the 800 prophets of Baal with the fire of God coming down from heaven and burning up the sacrifice, the wood, and even the water around it...amazing! I stood here trying to picture Elijah running down this mountain in front of King Ahab's chariot running down to the town of Jezreel. The Jez'reel Valley is pictured down in the distance and to the left of it, is the valley of Armegedan where the last battle on earth will take place. Now that was a bit wierd to picture that...the last battle...hard to fathom but we know it's gonna happen because the Bible says so.

The mighty Jordan River in Israel - imagine Jesus being baptized by John the Baptist in this river and God speaking from the heavens and a dove descending down. Wow! I've often pictured the river Jordan as "deep and wide, deep and wide...." like I often sang as a child. But, the river is not very wide but at places it is quite deep. Many places along the shoreline are very steep - if you were to step in, it would be quite deep right away - maybe even up to your waist. So, when the priests would have stepped into the water as they were carrying the ark, the water would have been quite deep right away. So wonderful to be able to picture these great Bible stories at all of these locations. Thank you God!

Standing at Caesarea, Israel where the Apostle Paul began his missionary journeys was amazing...seeing the theatre, the complex where horse races would have taken place and trying to picture the huge shipping wharfe that King Herod had built here...wow! It was beautiful here and the sound of the waves crashing against the rocks and coming onto the shore was such an incredible sound...music in itself...and the water was so warm. I could've sat here and listened to the waves all day long.

This young child was so adorable as he/she sat by his/her little box of rocks that he/she was trying to sell for "a dolla" each in the land of Jordan. When he/she realized that I had taken his/her photo, he/she wanted me to give him/her a dolla. So many small children were trying to sell their rocks or stones. That was how they helped to make a living for their family...sometimes it was sad to see though. But when they looked up at you with their adorable eyes, at times it was really hard to say no to them.

The Bedioun shepherds were plentiful in the land of Israel, trying to sell you their wares and also selling camel rides/photos of you with them. The Bedioun's are from the line of the Ishmaelites. I loved seeing all the camels and their tents/shacks/caves that they lived in. It's interesting seeing their tents with a satellite dish on top of it...or a shepherd riding a camel while talking on his cell phone. There was always so many interesting sites to see in this land. :-)

I hope you've enjoyed reading up the stories behind each of these photos. If you ever get a chance to visit the Holy Land, don't pass up the opportunity...it's an amazing experience. It will change your life. God bless you all!

Monday, January 12, 2009

2010 Black & White Saskatchewan Prairie Scenes Calendar

The 2010 Black & White SK Calendar is now available for viewing and preordering.
I am excited about this unique calendar that will bring back memories of days gone by. I had a lot of fun putting it together although it was difficult to choose the photos for this one because there's so many great memories out there. I am thankful to God for giving me the gift of putting this together for you. I hope you enjoy this one.

I'm also excited to announce that I am going with a new printer for this batch of 2010 calendars....Saskatoon Fastprint. They are really looking forward to printing these calendars for me and have enjoyed putting them together with me. Because of this switch in printers, I am pleased to announce that I am able to maintain the price of $2.00/for black imprint and $2.50/color imprint of these calendars. With everything else going up in price in today's world, I am very glad that I can maintain these calendar prices for you. If there are larger orders, there will now be room for adjusting the prices somewhat.

With a minimum order of 100 calendars, and a $30.00 design fee, the cost of the calendars is $2.00 or $2.50 per calendar. Some of you prefer to have your business logo and information in color so that would then be the $2.50/calendar price. With black imprint, the price is $2.00/calendar. Check with me for individual pricing for orders over 300 calendars. You can email me at lisaspics@sasktel.net

Below is a sample of the photos as well as a brief description of where the photo was captured:

the above cover photo - near Hague, SK
I met this couple out near Hague that have this fabulous place with this old setting...my kids had a blast here exploring all the cool old stuff. I had taken wedding photos here a couple of years ago and it sure made for many unique and different settings.

January photo - Shell Lake, SK
when I was a child, I remember old wheelbarrows like this one that were used to help around the yard and the garden....or for giving rides in. :-) Oh how I loved having rides in those wheelbarrows.

February photo - south of Prince Albert, SK
This is an old railbed near Prince Albert that still had an old bridge overtop of it. The railbed ran east and west. Makes a good hiking trail now.

March photo - south of Neuanlage, SK
This barn was built by my grandfather and this was the yard that my father had grown up on. I had never met my grandfather as he had passed away before I was born. It was really neat to go and check out this barn and have a bit of a glimpse into the past.

April photo - Warman, SK
Ahhhh, a treasure many men would love to find in the bush to fix up and drive. :-)

May photo - Memorial Lake, SK
A couple of years ago, I had taken wedding photos down by Memorial Lake and the father took his daughter for a ride through the pasture from their home quarter to bring her to the wedding site, to give her away to a young man who was anxiously waiting for her to become his wife. :-)
Reminds me of how this would have been done this way for every wedding before cars were invented.

June photo - South SK River train bridge at Saskatoon, SK
This is a beautiful hiking trail along the Meewasin Trail in Saskatoon that runs alongside the South SK River....the train bridge is a popular crossing for hikers and bikers.

July photo - south of Dalmeny, SK
I loved these two dogs hanging out together on a warm day...the little one in the truck was hoping he'd get to go for a ride....and maybe he did after I left. :-)

August photo - South SK River east of Rheinland, SK
This land where I am standing on taking this photo, is the land that my mother grew up on along the South SK River. She told me a story of how they would go and visit their friends who lived across the river by rowing over in a small boat. When they would come back at night, at times it would be so dark that they just hoped and prayed that they were rowing across the river to get back home and not down river.

September photo - west of Blaine Lake, SK
Whenever we come back from the lake, we often pass the farmers working on the fields during planting time and harvest time. I loved this picture of the grain truck coming up the lane to collect the wheat from the combine.

October photo - Neuanlage, SK
Another memory of days gone by...an old wagon with a sprout of wheat growing along the side. This one's still in really good shape and was standing out in the yard of a home in Neuanlage.

November photo - east of Hague, SK
A couple of years ago, I had taken wedding photos at this site as well....I had the groom pick up his bride pretending to carry her over the threshhold. I loved this old log cabin with this huge tree beside it...I can just picture the small girls in their petticoats running around this yard.

December photo - Osler, SK
One year, a huge blizzard stormed through this area and I had gone out the next day capturing photos of all the snow and the cars in the ditches and the yards with lots of snow piled high to the doors. This place is one of my favorites in Osler....as I said in the caption earlier, I love log cabins. :-)

I hope you've enjoyed the journey going through this calendar. I look forward to collecting your orders for this one and the other calendars as well. I know you'll enjoy this calendar hanging on your wall for 2010.
God bless!
Lisa Braun

Wednesday, January 7, 2009

2010 Saskatchewan Classics Car Calendar

I've always wanted to make a car calendar....there's lots of car lovers out there and lots of gas stations and mechanic shops that prefer to buy these car calendars year after year to give out to their 'car' customers. I'd like to get in on the game here and thought that it would be really unique to have a car calendar with cars that are locally owned in Saskatchewan. So, here's the first ever, SK car calendar that showcases locally owned cars. I'd like to especially thank Bill and the guys from a local car club called the Valley Kruzers and a couple of others who gave me the opportunity to photograph some of their 'babies' for this calendar project. I thank God for giving me the resources, the opportunities and connections with some great people to be able to put this calendar together for you. Hope you enjoy it! God bless you all!

the above cover photo was taken at Saskatoon, SK
1966 Chevelle Malibu