day 23 - a day of freedom

Today was a free day. John wanted us to go around the city and shoot for one of our last days in Paris. So we woke up and walked around and shot stuff. T (Tia) and I were super tired from our late night and it was hot and bleh, so we went home and took a quick nap. When we went out to shoot again later that day, we ended up going to Sacre Coeur. I really wanted to go because it's a place that my dad recommended to me, he said it reminded him of me and I especially wanted to go because of that :)
It is beautiful there. The basilica is gorgeous and it has an amazing view of the city of Paris because it's set up on a hill. Around the basilica are art markets with artists painting and sketching in the streets and lots of cute little shops. It's an ideal little spot that I was absolutely in love with. Picturesque in every way.
We really wanted to get something to eat before we headed out. We found the cutest, most ideal, could've been out of a movie scene restaurant named La Maison Rose. It was right as the sun was going down and the light was gorgeous. The company was amazing. The service was so sweet and funny, they kept wanting to see the pictures we were taking and would give Clark old wine corks :P And the food was delicious. It was by far the best experience at a restaurant I have ever had. It was definitely an incredible, romantic and magical evening to remember.
I was sad to have to leave. But it made me happy to find a graffiti elephant. T kissed it :)

We then had critique time on our images with John. He looked at my first image and said, Missy, this sucks, the lighting sucks. I'm not going to lie, it shocked me a little at first, I've never heard anything like that from an instructor at first. But oddly, I really loved it. I always want honest feedback from people whose opinion's I value and I really appreciated John being so honest with me. I need that kind of feedback to be able to push myself past my comfort zone. I'm happy that John knows me well enough, trusts me enough and sees me as a strong enough student to be able to say something like that to me. Because I didn't see it until he pointed it out, but yes, the lighting really did suck.

We just hung out after that and it was wonderful and fun :)
Yay for day 23!

(Top two are from the restaurant. Bottom is T kissing the elephant.)