lately...

I've spent too much time sitting on keester.

I've been totally uninspired.

I've been a little depressed with all I want to do but haven't been able to.

I've been happy to have the extra time to think about all the ways I am blessed.

I haven't taken a single personal picture...

But yesterday I had a sudden burst of inspiration and took advantage of it searching for nursery ideas online. I started to feel like my old self again! Summer is after all my favorite time of year, but I haven't gotten into a groove yet. I swoon over the silly romanticism of the summer months. Beautiful outdoor picnics, perfectly decorated. Huge chandeliers hanging from trees and such ;)

But alas, most of those things look better in my mind than actually played out. One thing however, that always seems to appease my desire for the romance of summer is a display of flowers on my table.

My church has been so amazing and has arranged for a few meals for us this week. What a huge relief! I haven't been as sick as I know some people get with their first tri-mester, but enough so that I have been down and out for over a month! It's been hard and I'm grateful for loving people to come to the rescue ;)

Yesterday, our dinner from Annette came with a beautiful bouquet of flowers picked right from her garden. The BEST kind!



I love it!

besties :)

Alicia and I go waaaaay back. Met in the hallways of the Elim dorm summer of 2003. We were instantly connected by a picture on her dresser of a girl I knew... and the rest is history.



We've been through a ton together... more than I have been with any of my friends. We are kindred spirits... the kind of friends who get eachother when nothing is spoken.



These pictures were taken while we were on vacation last summer 2009. The top one was the pier on Carolina Beach in Wilmington, NC the bottom was in Myrtle Beach, SC.





Truly, I couldn't ask for a better friend. I love you Alicia!!!

Ben and Nicole finally tie the knot!

I can hardly believe that my wedding was almost 5 months ago, but really, what's even more amazing is that at my wedding, Ben and Nicole still weren't sure that they were getting married this year. Then all of a sudden, after dating since 11th grade they made it happen :)



If I were to have had a fall wedding, this is what I would have wanted. Nicole's artistic side really showed through in every aspect of the wedding... from her asymmetrical train on her dress to having the reception in a barn. Just so beautiful!



The ceremony was held at the north end of Hemlock lake. It was windy and a bit chilly, but altogether perfect :)













The barn was transformed into a spectacular display of fall beauty with these concord grape centerpieces and old twisted vines.







So happy for you guys :)

in keeping with the trend of weddings

I realized also that I never posted the pictures I took at our friends Mike and Aiyana's wedding! That was way back in June. Steve and Mike were college housemates and Mike was a groomsman in our wedding, Steve was a groomsman in theirs.

Warning: I have a TON of pictures from this wedding... there is a reason for this, I was infatuated with the fact that this was the first wedding in years that I had attended as an actual guest! I took pictures of whatever I wanted, because I wanted to. Not because someone was paying me to. And the coolest thing about it all was that I could have not taken a single picture and it would have been ok. I just wanted to play around in some ways I may not have if it was one of my own weddings {kapiche?}





lest you think that I went in and commandeered her dress as I would have being the photographer, I did not. In fact, her actual photog was taking pictures of the dress in this same spot, I just stole a shot too :)





















Call me a cheeseball but this was the first time I got to see my new name written in type like this :) It was a special moment lol



I can't believe it's been 4 months since our wedding now! When I look at other people, I think 4 months is a long time, but when I look at me, I think it was like yesterday! But so much has happened since then. Amazing...

Anyways, Mike and Aiyana are actually coming up to visit us in 3 weeks! We are going to try and show them everything fall about NY. I can't wait to see them again :D

friends getting married

This year I've been to 10 weddings.

5 as the photographer
3 as a guest
1 as a bridesmaid
1 as a bride :)

And I still have one more next week! In Texas no less. That's right, I'm photographing a wedding in Texas on South Padre Island. I could not be more excited honestly.

But right now, I am sharing some pictures from the September 10th wedding that I was a bridesmaid in. My friends Laura and Danny got engaged a couple months after I did, leaving about the same amount of time I worked with to plan their wedding. It was at the Woodcliff in Victor NY and it turned out to be a spectacular day for an outdoor wedding.



The gorgeous bride!



her stunning dress. I hesitate to even say this, because there's really no way to tell from this picture, but there was a serious tailoring fiasco the day before the wedding. The only reason I am mentioning this is to give a very stern thumbs down to Quick Fix Tailoring in Marketplace Mall. I will forevermore speak of how poorly she was treated there and pretty much ruined her dress... which we fixed. But the day of your wedding is not the time you want to be fixing a serious mess up :(









This is Laura's daughter, Naomi, who was the flower girl :)







Almost every formal event we've gone to since getting married we have (slightly intentionally unintentionally) matched. Oh just wait til we have kids... ha!

Anyways, congratulations to Danny and Laura aka Mr and Mrs Castro! I love you and am so very happy for you :)

freakhogstupendousnessfest 2010

July 2009
phone call with my bff Alicia
pining away about going to the beach
a decision was made.

we were beach-bound:
North Carolina

Budget:
as little as possible

Trip name:
freakhogstupendousnessfest

Why?
Because we can



And we did. Here we are actually on Myrtle Beach in SC but most of the week was spent at a sandy campground in Wilmington, NC on Carolina Beach.

While we would love to be able to repeat trips to the beach every summer, that's just not realistic. So this year's fest looked a little different:



We decided to make a weekend trip down to Accord, NY near Poughkeepsie (because I'm sure noone, not even an upstater would know where Accord is) to visit our college friend Dave.

I drove first to Alicia's place of employment to pick her up... and while waiting for her to get done I did some recon.





But soon enough it was over and we headed back to the site to store section where she clocked out and we were headed on our way.



What's documentary of a wal-mart worker without pictures of said worker with random other workers?



This is the point I was not allowed to go past. So I stood outside the door with my very large camera and lens (which looks so much bigger with a lens hood on) and got stared at by the marties walking in.



still waiting to get on with freakhogstupendousnessfest 2010!!!



Another question: what's a road trip without appropriate window paint detailing the event?!

(word of caution: even though car window paint is made for *ahem* car windows it may still take hours to scrape it all off)











It's a long drive without a lot of places to stop... capiche?

Once we arrived at Dave's we toured his house and talked of making a bonfire... but to woods were too dry to do that. We reminisced about the *old* days and played dutch blitz until it was time for bed. The next day we went to church in Kingston and had a picnic after, returned home for another rousing game of blitz and then headed on our way home. It was a short trip, but great to be with good friends nonetheless.

In putting this post together, I felt it was appropriate to gather the other pictures we have taken over the past few years of our get-togethers...



This was our first trip to see eachother in Syracuse which is where Dave went to college at ESF. We were at a high school musical of the Sound of Music in this pic.



Among other things we did that weekend, this is possibly my favorite memory and most definitely my favorite picture of the trip. No explanation really needed, you'll either see the humor or you will not ;)



Then a few months later we had another splendiforousnessfest where we learned some ninja skills and trained my kitten to be an assassin (see below)







Most recently, we all got together back in October when Dave's brother got married and we travelled to Troy to photograph the wedding.

Good times...

So from now on, freakhogstupendousnessfest will refer to any one summer event had with Alicia. Any others may join but two will remain the same. I'm accepting applications for next summer where the plan is the Outer Banks in September!