Lauren Clark Photography » Blog

Yesterday we had the Braun’s and Jerry Newton over for hamburgers and the Pioneer Woman’s peanut butter chocolate pie (yum). Jerry works at Lifeway Christian store here in Lubbock and he was telling me about a book called RADICAL by David Platt (my mom and sister’s new favorite pastor) and he said how good of a book it was. It sounded like something I should read, and remember devout blogstalkers, I was on a reading kick a few months ago and only made it past 2 books before I was out of that phase. I thought that I needed to just read it all in a day and get it over with instead of starting it and never finishing it, and so I went to Daybreak with some friends to chat it up and ended up having 3 shots of espresso in my drink to help me stay up and read it all.

I am a lightweight when it comes to caffeine. I hardly ever have any, and when I would even half a half decaf at Starbucks my eyes would burn and my heart would race within 10 minutes of drinking it. It is sad and quite funny, so I knew that the 3 shots would do the job and maybe a little extra. Josh warned me not to do it, he said that last time I tried this I was up til 4 AM and was grumpy the next day, but I did it anyway. Caffeine really is a miracle. I couldn’t believe that my mind was so focused even after staying up all night and having such a really long month! My eyes stayed open and the entire book was incredible.

This book brings to light the contrast of the “American Dream” type churches with their million dollar buildings and soft cooshy chairs with the light show during worship and the churches in Asia and Africa where thousands of people come from villages risking their lives to sit all day in the hot sun to learn about the Word of God. It talks about how most of us think we aren’t “called” to go and make disciples of ALL nations, even though this is what Christ commanded everyone to do, and how we spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on new playgrounds and church event centers and don’t even give anything to missions or the local poor and needy.

I don’t want to be this way. I want to be less materialistic, less greedy, be fearless in my faith (the biggest struggle I have), travel to foreign and domestic lands to help the needy and share the love of Christ with them and not be consumed by all that does not matter, and tell me friends, does anything else really matter when compared to eternity? How  can I get so caught up in wanting a chair that costs $500 when that same $500 could feed and give water to so many children and families in need? How can I want a huge, modern house that will cost a fortune when there are so many people locally who NEED to be cared for? I want to be a foster mom and accept all who need help. I don’t want my life to pass by and look back and see selfishness and self-absorbed memories and possessions.

I want to live my life for Christ and not for myself.

I want to be radical.

My heart has a longing that I’ve never felt before and I think it’s because Christ’s return is soon and he is quickening the hearts of his people. Is anyone else out there feeling this?

Love Affair workshop (I’m a speaker!) is giving away things on the blog ALL WEEK LONG!!!

Check it out each day to participate and win FREE things!!!

CLICK HERE TO SEE TODAY’S GIVEAWAY!

Sam met me in Stillwater, Ok for her OSU grad pictures. She was super fun and I can’t believe how smart she must be, because she got accepted into Princeton for Architecture, WOW!!

I am “B”. I want to be “A”

So about 6 months ago JD and Barney from Green Tent approached me about their services. I have had many telemarketing calls before about how I am not ranking at all in a google search for “Lubbock Wedding Photographer” and how I should use their service, but why did I need this if I was already booking enough weddings? Barney contacted me, and just wouldn’t give up. I kept thinking that this was going to be a scam or a service that wouldn’t work, but oh was I wrong! They did a search for Lubbock Wedding Photographer and my name didn’t EVEN show up. I thought surely I had enough html text, link backs and people coming to my site for google to pick me up in their local searches, but N O. I wasn’t even ranking. Green Tent got me setup with their local boost service and BAM, within 2 weeks I was on the front page, and now after being on it for a few months I am the SECOND website mentioned on the first page!

These people have the humongo brainpower to set your website ablaze in the local google search engines(and hello! I am pretty sure they would do this for any business, not just photography! Photographers are their specialty though.). They were telling me that all of the things that I was doing to try and get ranked actually were working against me. They are seasoned professionals and know google like it was the back of their hand.

So why is this so important and why am I blogging about it? Because I believe in their service and it WORKS. Now that I am moving to a state and a town that has never heard of me, I REALLY need this service. Barney and JD just set me up today for Stillwater, Oklahoma and I should be ranking there very shortly. This will increase my business and by golly, people in that area going to see my website on the front page of their search and hire me!

If you are having a hard time getting inquiries because no one knows who or where you are, then green tent is the perfect place to start.

I really like JD and Barney. JD also designs really flashy html sites (Barney told me that google likes those better than flash), including Fred Egan’s Unabashadly Prep!

www.greentent.com

Our picnic area that we made right up from our home site. It was really fun and hard. My obliques were super sore the next day.

baby racoon and momma racoon tracks.

My pet turtle that I released at the creek.

Look at my hunky husband tending to that fire!

The entrance.

I’m looking pretty country right here.

This was such a fun session from last Wednesday! Melanie Pittman found these cute boys and styled the shoot. I just loved it!!

This one is funny. I think this sling thing should have been a bit smaller.

My new phone number is 405-269-2861, put it in your phone if you need it, because all of my other numbers don’t work anymore. Well, the business phone will be turned off in a few months, but this will be my new catch all number. Don’t call me if you are a scary creeper, or I will sick my diseased, aggressive great dane on you. Just kidding… well maybe not all the way kidding:)

Working full speed all night to get orders, emails and special projects out the door!

My land is amazing. Let me tell you, I was shocked to see the transformation since Josh and Mike have been working on it so hard every month. I planted some mammoth sunflowers down by the creek and the redbud tree and then widlflowers along the creek in the video below.

More to come Monday and Tuesday when I get home!

Mariel

Brylee and Averi’s airplane shoot!

So I thought I would be able to stay up and work on these and get them posted before I head to Stillwater this morning and that didn’t work very well. More to come on Monday!

This was funny. Poor Meridian, always being bossed around and used by her kid sister, London. Ick, I need to pull out the ol Dyson, look at my rug!