Houses ???

Aeon and I have done our research and its all pointing to "Now is a very GOOD time to buy a home". Coming from LA where home prices start in the mid to low $300,000s, I never thought of owning a home and actually put that thought aside in my head... I thought I parked it... until now. Within a week, we've shopped around for neighborhoods we like, looked at several houses, chatted up residents about the neighborhoods and even pre-qualified for a home loan. Aeon, being a vet, makes a huge difference! TODAY we are making an offer. An offer on our very first home - TOGETHER! What an amazingly beautiful step to do together. I find myself falling more in love with A. everyday we're together. Life comes at you fast... and I wouldn't have it any other way! Stay Tuned


~~~~~~ Jana

Trip to Wyoming

So Jana and I took off for two weeks to go to Crowheart, Wyoming to visit my dad and have a sort of ceremony to initiate his property into our hearts. He called his new property 'Sundance' and said it will be a sanctuary for all of ours and his girlfriend, Monte's, families. And a sanctuary it is! 30 acres of heaven not seen from the highway with a creek running through it and 4 wells. Amazing. Walter loved it the most! One morning he even found a dead fox to roll around in and was happily eating its skull when i poked my head out of the tent to see where he was at. He is a terribly cute and utterly clumsy dog and we absolutely adore him!Jana and I had a wonderful time and even had part of a very special day to ourselves in Dubois. We worked hard, we played hard and, in the end, felt that we hadn't spent enough time there. Perhaps next year we'll get more time to plant trees and set things right.

One of the highlights of the trip was meeting Monte's daughter, Lisa. She is a beautiful and intelligent woman whom Jana spent a lot of time with and who's company she seemed to enjoy.


Not all of our trip was strictly for visiting Pop's new ranch in Wyoming. I also did much research on climbing gyms along the way. One of the gyms I went to was Momentum Climbing Gym in Sandy, UT where I spoke with the owner, Jeff, who seemed very interested in my project. I wished I had more information for him and he more time for me. But this is the great thing about emails... we can take care of that business online.

I really want to model Higher Ground after much of Momentum, particularly the walls made by Walltopia. It was as beautiful an indoor climbing experiece Jana or I had ever had. I'm convinced that putting this type of wall in Las Vegas is the way forward and am actively working on finalizing my plan to do so.
We got back to Vegas and got immediately to work. We moved Jana out of her old office and into the new space, "S P A C E", located conveniently right across the street. We have been working very hard on getting that ready for her to occupy and get back into photography full-time. We've painted walls, floors, done construction and demolition and even had a nightmare of a time with hard-wood flooring & flaky LV people which cost us 3 days and $550 more than it should have.
But it's progressing well and should be completed by First Friday in July so
Jana can showcase the new space to future clientelle / tennants.


Jana here ... Wyoming for me was a chance to see another side of Aeon, spend some time with him and his family and really connect again to nature. It was so wonderful to watch his eyes light up as he drove me around Jackson Hole and showed me where he played as a kid, where he lived even what preschool he went to. When we got to the ranch to visit his pop and Monte... it was beautiful watching Aeon and his dad walk and talk and share moments, it was so sweet watching Walter play with his new friend the Goat. We cooked, planted, cleaned, drank, drummed, walked, talked, played games and just spent time together. I'm looking forward to visiting again, and spending more time @ Sundance. I wanted to add in a few photos of all of us together...

LOVE IS IN THE AIR!

What does it take to be HAPPY
??????
Many times its simple... food, sleep, nature, a good cup of coffee
or a good conversation with a
good friend or a kiss from the puppy.




But what does it take to be TRULY happy with ones self & ones life ????

Last night I admitted openly to Aeon, that I was HAPPY.
That for me is a big thing!

I've found my heart so open, and full of love and HAPPY. Its interesting when you realize that your truly happy!!!! With your life, with your partner, with where you are at a certain point in your life. It's B E A U T I F U L ~~~ I'm so excited to share this love and beauty with Aeon. Each day, we tell each other how we feel, that we love one another. But those words sometimes don't cut it. The words I love you don't come close to scratching the surface of what we share and the energy between us.
I wanted to simply put it out there to the world ... that I've found peace here in Las Vegas and I'm working to put some roots down. With Aeon, with friends and with work.
This is a new step in a positive direction and I'm looking forward to the years to come with Aeon & Walter (the puppy) ....

Live ~ Life ~ Love
Jana

Walter Eyebrowz Jones

You know... we've been itching to get a dog for a while now. Jana's always loved Boxers and I'm a big big fan of Rhodesian Ridgebacks but because of the constraints on our lease in our apartment complex we are limited to a small dog: 25 lbs. or less.

We had never really considered ourselves little dog type people. We don't really like the long hair on dogs and little dogs have the added stigma of being 'yippy'. Throw into that mix that we're both artists and strive to have the beauty of aesthetics in our lives and we were beginning to think Beagles were the only resort. But, of course, Beagles are stubborn animals who get lost in their noses. PLUS they shed!

Our friends, Chris and Sara, found a Short Haired Wheaton Terrier at the Lied shelter (which I can't real

ly say enough good things about here) here in Vegas and they are the most happy people with that dog! The thing we like about Brisket (what they named him) is that he doesn't shed. Let me repeat that - HE DOESN'T SHED! Plus, they are so cute as a puppy that we were sort of set on getting one of those for ourselves.

And the Jana goes to the shelter the other day and calls me up and says "Aeon, you have to come down here and look at this dog".

"Okay." I say "I'll be there as soon as I can".

As I walked up I saw her there in the pen with him squatting down on her haunches to be nearer his head and reading about miniature schnauzers on her phone. He looked like a 'Walter' to me from where I was so I said to her "Is that a Walter?" I then walked him a little and ran a bit with him and he seemed like an okay little fellow to me. I gave Jana the go-ahead and we now have a new member to our growing family.

I present to you Walter Eyebrowz Jones.

And he's a good dog, too! He was picked up in a vacant lot somewhere and brought to the shelter. The shelter people guessed his age at about 1 year and I believe it because he pretty much knew how to sit on command from day one, learned his (new) name in about 4 days and I can already walk around the apartment complex with him and not use the leash! It's pretty amazing. His personality comes out a little bit more every day. We're really excited for the two week timeline for his surgery scar (they castrated him) to pass so we can bathe him! Even though he stinks like vacant lot dog - we are beginning to love him.

Here's to you, Walter - you are very, very welcome here in our home, with us.

Jana Here ~~~~
I'm just adding that since we've got him a week ago, we've stared at him for hours and hours wondering how this little energy came to be in our lives. He is the most wonderful pup ever! We are blessed to have him as part of our family.
We're so happy! & Walter is too!!!!!!

THOUGHTFULNESS

A while ago my best girlfriend and I had a talk about thoughtfulness, and what that means in a relationship. We both agreed that it is one of the most important things in a relationship, however it is also one of those rare things in partner. I have to say that Aeon is be far the most thoughtful man I've been with. It is natural to him, at least with me. He is so considerate, and so loving and SO THOUGHTFUL. There that word is again.... thus stressing its importance. Dictionary.com describes THOUGHTFULNESS as - 1. attentive, solicitous. Thoughtful,considerate mean taking thought for the comfort and the good of others. Thoughtful implies providing little attentions, offering services, or in some way looking out for the comfort or welfare of others: This all stems from our experience last night @ Church. We went to see our good friend Miky V. sing in the choir. During the performance, Aeon noticed a little hang nail on my thumb... he touched it gently and with is other hand fished around in his pocket for something. I didn't notice any of this until he took out of his jacket pocket a small container of climb on bar, (its a salve used for cracks, dry skin ect). There in the church, with full attention on the performance , he started to rub this magic potion into all my cuticles.... very gently. When he was done, I just looked at him in complete awe of what just took place. Here we are ... in a public place, enjoying an evening out, listening to a performance and he notices a need of mine, and addressed it... with out hesitation or a second thought. I was completely taken by this little gesture of his. It struck me as so kind and so considerate and most of all THOUGHT FULL!!! Thank you A, for being so amazing! ~ J

WORKING TOGETHER = FUN & MONEY

The last few weeks have been busy! I was in PA visiting family and as soon as I got to LV I was fortunate to get a really lucrative gig for a large ad agency in Las Vegas. It was such a large gig that I needed a lot of help pulling it off before heading to MEXICO on the 15th of March for a shoot.

The job came in and it was up to me to pull off about 2 weeks of production in 3 days. To shoot on the following Monday & Tuesday. The only way I could do it was to pull Aeon in and have him help me.

Aeon is a natural at production. He is very task orientated, give him a list and he'll get right on it and get things done.

By weeks end, we were in a rhythm working together in the same office. I think we only snapped once, and that was due part to lack of food. (We both get a little moody when we're hungry)

We rocked it, pulled this production off and entered the shoot Monday more prepared then ever and I owe a lot of that to Aeon.

Then, on the shoot, he assisted me. It was fluid and we were professional. The client was very pleased with the entire shoot and it was such a great success. I'll blog more in detail about it on Jana Cruder Photo blog.

After the GVC shoot Aeon and I were able to finish out the week working together on a shoot for a NYC photographer I work with frequently... He was in LV shooting for a NY magazine.

It was a hectic, super busy week, with 18 hour days every day and I realized we work really well together.

Plus at the end of the day we take care of each other. That is something so precious to me. How tender and loving A is with me, I only hope to return such beauty and love to him.

The pictures above are some behind the scenes shots from my shoot for GVC as well as some shots of us standing in for the other shoot we worked on together later that week.

Here's to love and working with those you love!!!!!

Thank you A. I couldn't have gotten through the last two weeks w/o you!

Mammoth Ski Weekend with the Hermosa Crew

from L to R: B-Dub; Jana, & Mikey V makes 3 (or Family on a chair)!

So I haven't been skiing in more than a decade - ever since I took up snow-boarding back in '96, to be precise. Snowboarding was nothing that radical or new by then, and I've never been one to adopt a fad from the very start, but I sure loved that hip-rocking back-and-forth motion you made while carving turns on the slopes WAY more than I ever liked bounding side-to-side on a pair of skis.

But this past weekend Jana and I piled ourselves and a metric shit-ton of winter gear into her car and drove to Mammoth from Vegas via Amboy (about a 6 hour detour down near Joshua Tree in order for Jana to scout out a shoot location) in order to do just that - GO SKIING!

And you know what? I had an absolutely BITCHIN' time! Jana doesn't snowboard and I'd never tried those new 'parabolic' shaped skis that they have out so I thought I'd stick with Jana for the day and give those a shot. And, to be honest, I think I did pretty good. For not having been on a pair of skis for so long, it sure didn't take much for me to get back into it. As much fun as it was, I did miss snowboarding and am really looking forward to going back to Mammoth to do just that!

But it wasn't just the time on the mountain that I enjoyed. The boyfriend of one of Jana's friends, Eric, booked a house right on the ski resort slopes for everyone and we all (24 of us!) fit into this nice little condo with a hot tub (yeah, yeah!). We arrived and Jana went straight to work fixin up Spaghetti for everyone who would be there for Friday dinner. It was good! Big, heaping plates of garlic bread (Mmmmmmm, I looooooooooooooove garlic bread) and pots and pots of pasta and sauce. The best part about bringing all of our crap in from outside while Jana cooked was the smell of garlic and olive oil cooking on the stove. Just simply delicious.

And it wasn't just the condo and the food - the real prize of the weekend goes to Jana's Hermosa Beach friend group. It is a pretty rare event that you can enjoy such a varied and large group of people down to the last person. And it's one of the things that attracted me so much to J to begin with: she doesn't hang out with douche-bags! Hey, it may sound stupid, but it's important.

One shining moment of wonderful companionship that I won't soon forget was on one of the first runs of the day when I got a little overly confident a little too early and hit a small jump on the skis. I went airbound and my feet went airbound even more behind me. So I tucked my head and did a digger into the fresh powder. I stuck a perfect landing right in front of EVERYBODY - and, of course, they all clapped and laughed - what're friends for? But lo and behold, just a couple seconds later here comes B-Dub and he does the SAME STUPID THING! So I did what anyone would do - I told him to pose while I snapped a portrait of him there in the snow. Its the first image on the left, above. And that's what I mean about the quality of this particular group of people: I only met B-Dub the night before at the house - I already knew most of the other folks from HB, and I didn't really even spend that much time with him Friday night because I was getting drunk with Mikey V and being camera nerdy. So really... HOW COOL IS THAT?

Mammoth Mountain is an amazingly huge area and I'm looking very forward to going back there to snowboard it with Jana. I would feel lucky if the HB crew were to come along on that trip, as well.

Jana gets a point for dragging me along.

A~

__________________________________________________________________
Hi Ya, I wanted to chime in here... first of all I wanted to take a second to honor and love my man!!! He's the sweetest most amazing man in the world. That post was so beautiful A.
Now, MAMMOTH kicked some serious ass this year. We had so much fun! Aeon is a really great skiier, I was impressed with his pick up and go ability. Since he hadn't been on skies in over 12 years. It was a treat to bring Aeon around the HB crew. These are the people that have become family to me over the years. It was so great to see everyone, even better everyone loved Aeon (after all who doesn't),

We're looking forward to going again next year!!! Next year I'll take some snowboard lessons and snowboard alongside my sweetie.
~ J

It's worth the wait while this picture loads...

So we're all moved in - FINALLY...  Phew!!!

As much as moving sucks normally... this time was not really any different!  However, we weren't just moving some crap from one place to another...  Oh no!, we were actually CONSOLIDATING all of our crap from several places into one solitary place!  The process of this can be seen in the photo above... if you give it time to load. (go and make a cup of coffee while it does that - trust me, it's worth it)

 I'm glad to report that we did all of this with minimal drama and have settled quite very happily into our new home.  We now have the art on the walls, the didgeridoos on the wall above the fireplace, the bed made, the dishes put away, the rugs on the floor, the closet organized, books arranged in size order on the bookshelf (thank you, Jana) and, finally, after a purchase of a new vacuum cleaner, the floors cleaned up after all of the move-in shenanigans.  And we are nearly completely unpacked, too (I have two more boxes to go through, still - and giving the nature of what's in those boxes means that's going to take some time)!

 Living together is sure to bring about some unexpected surprises along with joys and doubts and, perhaps, setbacks and letdowns.  I love Jana so much, though, that I've got absolutely no regrets about moving in together.  This has been one of the best decisions I could have made.  

 I'm looking SO forward to the next phase of our relationship which J's already blogged about: PUPPIES!

 

Caffiene Makes my Eye Twitch

Moving = Stresses

I'm not sure we realized just how much stress we put our bodies under in our day to day lives, and with "everything" going on in the world ( Obama, taxes, printing $ with no back up, lay offs, rent due, the environment, Las Vegas has a crap recycling plan & much more ) piling on top of our daily life stresses ( work, growing business, maintaining self, supporting friends emotionally, new apratments, expenses, credit card payments ect ) one has to ask.... how much can we possibly take before we give and break down? Well the thing is we're all human, and in this move I've realized that Aeon and I are getting stronger as a couple as the days go on. We're encountering and communicating through things I never thought I'd share with another person. Successes & fears, up's and downs. The best thing is we're here for each other, supporting one another daily in smiles and tears. The report from Las Vegas is optimistic and we're trying to stay positive. I'm so blessed to have such a loving and cherished friend and love in my life.

Here is a pic of Aeon being Aeon ... on a shoot I had last week here in LV. Oh, and I've realized that Whole Foods coffee beans have 10x more caffeine then most other coffees ... that is what was causing the eye twitch ;-)

PUPPIES & Pups

Attached are some pics the beagle puppy Aeon and I looked at in Jan. They were all so precious, and cute as all get out but none of them grabbed us like we anticipated. We're looking for a pup and so badly want a little 4 legged friend to add to our home and life together. We started looking a little prematurely right before my January trip to LA and right before we moved into our new apartment. The little beagle puppy was almost coming home with us when we decided to go look at the shelter...
At the shelter we ran into Sunshine a little mutt with blonde fur, who could run and jump like no other dog I've seen. She was calm and smart and fast and could keep up with us on our adventures into nature. She was precious and absolute perfection... we were so excited and we looked at each-other with tears of joy in our eyes and the dog between us ... and said "we're getting her" and hugged(dog in middle). Sunshine was so so so excited she looked up at us with absolute excitement... she knew... she knew she had found a family. When we went to the front to ask if they could hold her for a few days while we sorted out the apartment and got all the paperwork taken care of to have a pet .. the shelter let us know THEY DON'T HOLD animals.. its a first come first serve facility. We couldn't take her that day. We called and exhausted all resources and we ended up not getting her because we weren't moved into out apartment yet and it was going to take some time to pull the pet deposit $ together... talk about trauma. Word to the wise don't go to the pound and look at pups unless you're ready to walk away with one. I was heart broken and I could tell it really got to Aeon too. Its a no kill shelter so hopefully she went to a beautiful home where she was loved. Soon, we'll start the process of getting a pup.

~ Jana