A little hair fluffing…Laura’s assistant was taking photos of us taking photos for Design Milk’s Designer Dailies on Laura Day.

Natalie Wi, Nesting Newbies Senior Editor and photographer at work!

Meet the bloggers who spent the afternoon with us at Thomas Fogarty Winery & Vineyards. They helped us out by participating in our photo shoots for Nesting Newbies Magazine, Issue 4. For many, this was the first time meeting face-to-face.

Julia Walsh
CasaSugar

Carleigh Lowe
Remodelista

Lily Gahagan
California Home + Design
7 x 7 Magazine

Jeanine Hays
AphroChic
AphroChicShop

Karen Olivia
Alkemie

Kathryn Hill
Apartment Therapy | The Kitchn

Melissa Davis
Ruby Press

Anne Sage
The City Sage

Emily Goligoski
The San Franista

Jennifer Jones
Niche Interiors

Erin Feher
California Home + Design

Lynn Goldfinger
Paris Hotel Boutique

Rebecca Orlov
loving.living.small
Sweetline Agency
Blog Out Loud

See behind the scenes from our Thomas Fogarty Winery & Vineyards photo shoots.

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What a day! The folks at Thomas Fogarty Winery & Vineyards gave us exclusive all-day, all-evening access of their estate for our magazine. We took full advantage and staged “Casbah Cool,” one of our entertainment features, and “Midsummer Mediterranean Grill,” our main cooking story. Ellie Platis, one of Fogarty’s event managers, was such a doll. Her positive energy and pitch-in attitude helped us feel welcome and the experience enjoyable, even though for us it was quite a work day. (Image by Natalie Wi)

The entire estate…just for us! (Image by Natalie Wi)

We parked by the lily pond with the resident turtle on his floating island! (Image by Natalie Wi)

Jeannie Fraise and Allie Bruch from Lotus Bleu work on styling a modern Moroccan table with a nesting theme. James Burkart is filming their work-in-progress for the video bite in the magazine. (Images by Natalie Wi)

A close up of the table shows the chick vases by Kanick Chung (available through Lotus Bleu) and the flowers by Amy Burke. Don’t the flowers look like whimsical bonnets? One of Thomas Fogarty’s Pinot Noirs is ready to be uncorked. (Image by Natalie Wi)

We walked the grounds, and photographed our blogger “models” throughout the estate. (Images by Natalie Wi)

Inside, the culinary team works on our post-shoot dinner…preparing the recipes that are featured in Midsummer Mediterranean Grill. (Images by James Burkart)

Our models enjoy a glass of wine while awaiting dinner. (Image by Natalie Wi)

The evening concluded with special gifts for everyone! Take a peek at the gifts galore…(Image by Rio Constantini)

A taste of Thomas Fogarty Winery and Vineyards to take home…A bottle of their 2006 Estate Chardonnay (Santa Cruz Mountains).

Brick Monkey, known for their curious and distinctive furniture and accessories, gave everyone a chic ceramic pineapple-leaf candle holder with votive wrapped in their signature packaging.

Diane Phillips of DK Designs made beautiful paperweights…She handcrafted single white gardenias and attached them to antique blue glass made from mason jars by Midwest Finds. (Image by Diane Phillips)

Pamplemousse Patisserie et Cafe shared their French macarons…the best we’ve EVER tasted! (Image by Justin Miel)

SkinSpirit Skincare Clinic & Spa gifted their signature “Bochox,” a box of delicious dark chocolate! (Image by Natalie Wi)

There were not one but two delicious cupcakes to take home from Bebecakes Cupcakery–VaVa Voom (chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting and chocolate chip/cream cheese filling), and Miss Scarlett (red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting).

Lotus Bleu included sweet felt pouch by the French company, Muskhane. The pouches are eco-friendly, naturally dyed, and made by hand in Nepal.

What a surprise…A Pinkies Nail Salons’ gift card means manis for everyone! (Image by Natalie Wi)

Now, meet the bloggers!

Behind-the-Scenes images by Erin DeMartini

Our Nesting Newbies team took over a corner of the San Francisco Room&Board Showroom for our Spring 2010 cover shoot. Our thanks to Michael Gargiulo and Jason Levine for being so generous and to the entire staff for their support!

Bryan Mason is willing to climb the (very) tall ladder to clip on our custom pendant, featuring an explosion of white flowers–handcrafted from soft clay by designer Diane Phillips.

Does Jodi look nervous? By the way, we no sooner got the pendant in place when a woman walked by and asked where could buy it! (Here’s a secret…you might be the one to win it in our Inbe’tweet contest in July…more soon.)

Jeanine Hays from AphroChic Blog and AphroChic Shop came to help us style the bed with some of her modern soulful pillows.

We started with Room&Board’s Wyatt Queen Bed with Low Headboard and added the ANIS duvet from Blissliving Home.

Bryan, Jeanine’s hubby, gets the AphroChic Dreamland Collection pillows plumped and ready to place next.

Jeanine makes sure the pillows are set just right.  We brought in a With-a-Twist table from Brick Monkey for an unexpected twist!

We added the Duralee, Super Bulldog, and AphroChic Mandala pillows to the front.

Photographer Margot Hartford arrives and gets the camera set up and lighting ready to go.

Margot, Lea and Jodi check out the framing. Is everything in the right place?

Our front cover features a decor vignette…Did you notice that there’s always a bird element somewhere in the scene? On the back, we always include Lea in the vignette as Chef Lea is one of our Nesting Newbies brands. Lea’s wearing a bird robe made from a whimsical fabric called “Bird Swing” by Michael Miller Fabrics.

Trying all sorts of positions to get the best image. Gotta have those Charles Chocolates in the scene!

Meet the entire team: Erin DeMartini, Margot Hartford, Lea McIntosh, Bryan Mason, Jeanine Hays…and Jodi Murphy taking the shot (after Margot set it up : ). It’s a wrap!

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Chef Lea McIntosh creates the recipes in our magazine, but what you probably don’t know is that she also does the food styling.  For us, it’s important to show the real food without using any fancy tricks or slight of hand.  Of course, we want them to look enticing, so Lea prepares beautiful presentations for the camera…and we look to great photographers to capture every last bit of delicious!

Here Lea is in the San Francisco Christopher Peacock Showroom kitchen styling a small bowl of her Creamy Chevre Crab Dip (page 28 in the Winter 2010 issue).

She adds a piece of fresh crab on top so you can visually tell that the recipe includes crab meat.  Notice the small cups of Brandied Tomato Cream Soup that were styled for the same issue (Page 16 Winter 2010).

The final touch?  Two snips of fresh chives placed on top in a graceful-X, for a pop of green!  The layering of wooden plates underneath complement the organic bowl’s shape.

For more on today’s kind of  food styling for magazines…read this great post on mattbites.com

Images by Michael Soo, Soo Photography

Nesting Newbies™, Newbisode 1, has launched and is already getting some buzz!  Newbisode 2 isn’t far behind and the team outdid themselves as we all begin to get in the newbie groove.   Chef Lea McIntosh is at her best when she’s teaching and in this Newbisode Michael and Wendy Mantilla ask her lots of questions (we like to call them Newbie Q’s).  They are a lively couple and the set was full of fun and laughter as they learned how to cook Chef Lea’s Moroccan-style Seafood Stew over a Saffron Risotto.  Michael kicked things up a notch when he used “SHAZAM!” – His own newbie twist on a famous exclamation while adding an ingredient to the pot.  It was a hilarious and unexpected moment.

On the set in the Rutt of Los Altos kitchen,  everything is laid out in preparation, including the plump Christopher Ranch Garlic cloves.

Teachable moments include how to use a professional knife…

James Burkart captured all the antics on film!

Michael and Wendy are creating something together in the kitchen and are confident they can do it on their own the next time.

The seafood stew simmers for just a few more minutes before tasting…

Chef Lea uses a Calphalon stock pot and answers Wendy’s question about what kind of pots to use.  Calphalon was so excited about the show’s concept and this unscripted Newbie Q, they became a sponsor!  Chef Lea also taught Wendy and Michael how to use the leftover risotto in crab cakes.  Everyone on the set enjoyed a taste when the segment was over – we were chirping about it for hours.

The Newbisode segues into a Mediterranean seaside table top designed by Jodi Murphy and David Braddy using items from Bloomingdale’s Stanford, fresh flowers, lemons and seashells proving once again that you can entertain in style without breaking the budget.

Vanessa Rockey, the show’s hair stylist brought make-up expert Julie Acosta and together they primped and prepared Chef Lea and Wendy to look their best under the harsh camera lights.   Natalie Wi of Allure West Studios was on hand to document the happenings (she photographed all of these images) and take her stunning food shots.  Bon Appetweet ™ – JM

It’s time to tweet about two exciting project in the works – Nesting Newbies and The Lea Show. A team of very talented people have been working to produce two internet shows. Nesting Newbies is a cooking, entertaining and decorating show featuring Lea McIntosh who is using her culinary training to teach newlyweds, those newly out on their own and those who have no clue how to cook great food and entertain in style…and on a budget.

We always say “Leave it to Lea” when we need to find great resources for, well, anything and we’re showcasing her discoveries in The Lea Show. Experts and interesting talents show Lea how to do what they do on each episode. Lea asks the questions and the audience learns great insights, tips and “how tos” right along with her.

On Sunday April 19^th the team – James Burkart of Burkart Video, Lea McIntosh, Natalie Wi of Allure West Studios, David Braddy of Vine-agra, Vanessa Rockey, Pat Campbell and Betsy Rose (best crew ever!) and I – took over the Rutt of Los Altos showroom to re-film the first episode of Nesting Newbies and the second episode of The Lea Show.

Lea and Vanessa arrived bright and early to begin hair and make-up while Pat and Betsy started food prepping and setting up. Natalie Wi was there to photograph the day’s events, including all the behind the scenes pandemonium.

I arrived with the items on loan from Bloomingdale’s Stanford so that we could create our featured “Bella Notte Bistro Chic” tabletop. I had challenged David Braddy, a florist extraordinaire, to come up with something magical. I was doing the “happy dance” when he arrived because he had woven curly willow together anchored by two urns to create an arch over the table with a lantern attached in the center. It was beautiful, easy to make, and inexpensive! Perfect, since the goal is to show “newbies” how to stylishly entertain without breaking their budgets.

Diane Phillips of DK Designs dropped by to deliver two of her floral creations for the set of The Lea Show. Diane was the first guest artisan featured on The Lea Show (soon to be aired) and it was great to have her beautiful work decorate this episode’s set.

We learned so much from the first taping of Nesting Newbies that we decided to redo it and asked our first newbies, Lacee and Tejas Naik to come back again. The energy was high and when it was time for “Quiet on the Set” we were all in awe of what we were seeing. The chemistry between Chef Lea and the newbies was fantastic and the interaction, inspirational. Lea invited the Newbies into the cooking process and I think we all learned something new.

Personally, I discovered how to properly cut an onion and hold a knife properly…and I’m not a newbie!

Jonathan Murphy dropped by to meet everyone in person as he will be doing the voiceover opening for the shows.

Soon Jung Wi, Natalie’s husband arrived with their three adorable kids who were quickly called into “crew” duties while Jung prepared for his segment on The Lea Show. Jung and Natalie own Allure West Studios and Jung, a master photographer, also teaches people how to get the most out of their digital cameras. He busted so many “megapixel myths” and taught Lea (and us) what to look for when buying a digital camera.With so much valuable information, Lea invited him back for a future episode to teach her (and the audience) how to take better digital shots.

By the time we wrapped it was a long day but one that was fulfilling and fun! James is editing the shows, the opening illustrations are being created and soon we will launch the first episodes of Nesting Newbies and The Lea Show. Sweet! – JM

Photos By Allure West Studios