Julie's search for a little photographic respect...

This may be a tad bit off the topic of the Crop, but it is definitely something that needs to be addressed. One of the hazards of working on an event such as this is that you will do just about anything to make it be successful. That means: allowing your friend and co-organizer to slap photos of you all over the worldwide web. For those of you who have visited our humble little blog more than once, you may have noted an often changing header photo. Let me point out that we are charity minded. That extends to the way we treat our friends. Poor Julie. If you have been paying attention, you will have seen that Julie has suffered mightily for our cause. The header photo has been changed frequently in an attempt to capture a photo that represents us and the Crop, but also that represented Julie in a state much closer to the real thing. That means: not looking like one or all of the following: very angry, very "challenged", or like a stalker (as in the last header photo where we are posed with the giant Cricut cricket at CHA Chicago). Like I said: poor, poor Julie. She suffers from a complete inability to be photographed in her natural state. Seriously. And now she is getting a complex. The whole time we were at CHA, Kim (who is a bit of a photography nut) kept snapping pictures all over the place. Everytime she took one of Julie she would look at the resulting photo on the screen and go "Nope." or "Yeah, that's not good." So, you can see why this has become a bit of a hurdle for Julie. Now whenever anyone goes to take a picture, she freezes like a deer in the headlights. She reminds me of my kids. If they know I am going to take a picture, they suddenly lose all natural control of their facial muscles and they come off looking like a jack o' lantern with one eye shut and a stiff, cheesy grin on their face. Now, before you think I am being unkind to Julie, you have to know that I am changing these photos per her request. The first step towards healing is always acceptance. And Julie has definitely come to accept that she has a slight "photographic problem". So, please, tell her how nice she looks in the new photo. We will be doing an intervention soon where I'll tie her to a chair and we'll snap flashbulbs in her face until she relaxes out of sheer exhaustion. I'll keep you up to date with her progress. So, I think it is only fair that I give you the following photos for your consideration. Kim, who is undeniably the most photogenic of the group, did a little posing in our hotel room as "Super Scrapper"! Enjoy!

Well, I'll be seeing you. At least I hope so...I'm gong into hiding. Because Kim's going to kill me!!!!

-Alane