Happy Independence Day!

Just a short note to wish you a very happy and meaningful Independence Day! Having personally lived in 4 countries around the world and visited many more, I am SO grateful to be a citizen of the United States of America!

We got some really fun pictures of our girls with sparklers and we'll try to post them soon. In the mean time, here are a couple of favorites from a session we finished editing today.



Have a great weekend!!

Sara & Brian's Wedding Preview

We're working on Sara & Brian's wedding and wanted to share a few since Sara has been so patiently waiting for them! Here are some of our favorites with 600 more coming soon to an online gallery near you! =) **EDITED: The gallery is now ONLINE! Check out all 831 images here!



Brian and his mother share a moment together as he seats her to start off the ceremony.


Beautiful day for a wedding in front of a waterfall, no? =)






It was apparent all day how much these two were into each other. I love capturing moments like these!


And this one...






The chances of capturing the exact moment the adorable flower girl's camera flash went off: probably about 1 in 50,000.




Besides the flower girl, I had some tough competition with this little guy, too. I love how serious he is! First a landscape shot...


...and then mixing it up with a portrait-oriented shot!


These two little girls were dancing like pros!


Sara's dad with his granddaughter, if I'm not mistaken. Nobody could resist her smile!









A very enthusiastic "grand departure!"



Thanks for stopping by! Time to run out to 2 meetings... Is there a backpack rack for mounting a Mac Pro and two 24" monitors? =)

Megan & Chadley :: Engaged!

Seriously? June is here and almost gone already? Wow... On one hand, it's gone so quickly that it's hard to believe, yet on the other hand we're slammed and behind like we always are at the end of June so I can't help but believe it!

This is a special "Thank you!" to our brides and customers waiting for pictures so patiently! We are working as fast as we can to catch up and we should be caught up completely in another couple of weeks. Yesterday was a great day and we got SO much done!! If I could just have 5 of those days in a row, I think we'd be all caught up!

Here are a few faves from a Megan & Chadley's engagement portraits...







If you know Megan's last name, you can view the entire gallery of proofs here.

Thanks so much for keeping in touch!

Jamie & Todd's Wedding Preview

Congratulations on a beautiful wedding, Jamie & Todd! We're working on your wedding pictures and thought we'd post a few favorites just as a little preview for you! Hope to have the rest up in just a couple more days...





Time for date night and then back to work later once the kiddos are asleep and the house is quiet again. =)

Thanks so much for checking in to see the latest! We have so much more to blog about, but we've just been too busy to do it all, so the blogging gets axed since it's a lower priority than other deadlines. We'll try to catch up once the weather gets really hot and we slow down some more.

Kristen's Bridal Portraits and Some Recent Happenings

We're still alive! =) Just wanted to confirm that, despite our lapse in blogging for the last couple of weeks. I'll give you an update below, but first...

Here are some favorites from the bridal session we did for Kristen back in March up at the Scottish Rite Masonic Temple in Guthrie. Now that Kristen is married, we can finally share them!







It's definitely the busy season! Editing is piling up and the warm weather is settling in! Despite everything that we had going on, we just got back from taking almost a week off to visit with family -- particularly my grandfather who was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer's. He lives in the Caribbean and was flying up to visit family in Iowa, so we made an impromptu road trip in order to see him and the rest of the family.

My uncle recently moved to Iowa with his wife and eight children (yes, 8!) and lives in a massive (former) bed and breakfast, so amazingly, all 30 of us actually stayed with him without any trouble or inconvenience at all! Now, you have to understand that my family is just a little bit loud, especially when they're all together, so it was really amazing that we were all able to stay in one home and not lift the roof. =)

Anyway, the visit was SO enjoyable! It was really restful and therapeutic to see everyone and to visit for a few days. Grandpa's Alzheimer's has started to affect his memory, mainly short-term, but the joy of being able to see him and enjoy his company far outweighed the sadness. I couldn't help but think that this may be the last time we visit with him as he is right now... That maybe next time he wouldn't remember us... Or that maybe there wouldn't be a next time. Life is so short and these things definitely help us to keep our priorities straight.

Driving back from Iowa, we actually stopped in Tulsa to attend the memorial service for a friend, and amazing pianist, composer and conductor Larry Dalton, who died unexpectedly of a heart attack two weeks ago. I was shocked to find out that Larry was actually 63 years old. In my mind, he was in his 40's... he was so energetic, such a fun, interesting person to be around, and quite the prankster I might add. The music at the memorial service was just amazing and there was no end to the stories people had to share about him. Larry's ability to relate to and converse with anyone was really outstanding. I've heard that the essence of a gentleman is being able to put those around you at ease, and Larry was so good at making those near him comfortable. Today, we're listening to some of our favorite arrangements he did, including one that we used at our own wedding for Holly to walk down the aisle to. We were really honored to even have Larry play piano at our wedding... so many great memories.

Between Grandpa's diagnosis and Larry's recent passing, I am reminded of a quote that says it's better to be in the house of mourning than of feasting for a few reasons...

1. It reminds us that ultimately that's where we're all headed
2. It gives us a more healthy view of and appreciation for life
3. It's foolish to seek only fun and merriment all the time

And so, after this week's experiences, I find myself a little more contemplative than usual. I hope you don't mind.

Readers Choice Awards :: Last Day for Nominations!

Today is the last day to nominate your favorite businesses for the Oklahoma Readers Choice awards! Every year I somehow don't hear about it and so I've never had a chance to actually vote in it before, but this year we heard about it (albeit the very last day). So I just plugged my favorite companies in a handful of categories.

Just wanted to let you know in case you enjoy these kinds of things! You can check it out at http://newsok.com/readerschoice but you'll want to do it today since today is the last day for nominations.

Photography is under Shopping: Local Retail: Categories N-Z if you're looking for a place to nominate us. =) Hope that doesn't sound too self-promoting... but you're on our blog, so we'd like to think that you're a fan. =) If you're having trouble remembering good nominees for pizza, Humble Pie was mine, of course!

Memorial Day was wonderful! We spent the day with Holly's family, grilled out burgers, watched the kids play in the kiddie pool and watched the movie "Valkyrie."

Now we're back in the office, catching up on piles of to-do's. It's always kinda hard to get going again after a long weekend... Guess I'll go put that french press to work. We have a ton to blog about, but we've been swamped with higher-priority work, like editing, meetings and returning emails and calls. Just so you know we haven't forgotten about blogging images. =)

Hope you have a great week!

Kristen & Kameron's Wedding :: A Preview

Talk about a lucky couple! A first for us, Kristen & Kameron were one of the few happy couples who prayed for rain in order to take advantage of BC Clark's "Pray for Rain" program. (If you haven't heard of it, the program reimburses couples for up to $5,000 for the cost of the engagement ring if it rains an inch or more on their wedding day.)

Besides getting a great "rebate" on their wedding rings, they get a sweet write-up in the Brides of Oklahoma magazine as well, so we were just a little under the gun to get some of our favorite images edited and ready for use. =)

The wedding bands (engagement ring was on Kristen's hand, of course!)


Their "first look" moment was moving... Kameron wipes away a tear of joy.


Praying together before the big day really gets going...


I just loved all of the stained glass windows in the beautiful chapel there at Wesley United Methodist.








If you haven't noticed the pink theme yet, I'm not sure what to say. =)


Including the engagement ring... Nicely done, Kameron!


Loved this angle capturing the Mothers lighting the candles.









At their request, we did all of the formal and family pictures before the ceremony, so they were free to immediately leave and head over to the reception.






The newly renovated Oklahoma City Golf and Country Club was just beautiful!






Check out this beautiful cake by Amy Cakes


A candy table -- pink themed of course!


The first dance was awesome, thanks to some great tunes by The Wavetones


The father-daughter dance




Kristen coaches a cheer squad, and they came with a special cheer just for Kristen & Kameron!


The Tulsa Photo Booth was there and there was a line all evening of people waiting to get in and create some fun images. One set gets put into an album, and the 2nd set is yours to keep. Here's Kameron with some close friends who all managed to fit in the booth together for a few frames. =)


We created a special custom guest book for Kristen & Kameron and we're eager to share some images of how that turned out, so keep posted... We'll blog about it soon!

And now that they're married, we can share our favorites from Kristen's gorgeous bridal session as well, so stay tuned!

Congratulations, Kristen & Kameron! We enjoyed getting to know you and work with you over the last several months! We'll soon have the rest of your wedding images edited and online here.

Photographer's Lunch on Thursday

Hey, Photographers! If you'd like to join a group of us for lunch on Thursday, come on out to Humble Pie around 11:30 for the best Chicago-style deep dish pizza within 700 miles. =) I'm going to bring Canon's flagship 1Ds Mark III for any of you that might enjoy checking it out. It's a loaner from Canon that they sent us to check out and use a little bit.

Humble Pie is at 1319 S. Broadway in Edmond. Let me know if you're coming and we'll try to set up a table big enough for all of us. =)

MMA Fight Photography

It's unusual for us to have an opportunity to photograph something like MMA fight night, so when Brad Myers invited me to join him in the adventure, I jumped at the chance. They're a bit violent, so I didn't put them on the blog, but I have a special gallery here if you would like to see them.

Holly doesn't like to see MMA images or clips and I know that's not an unusual thing, so I didn't want to turn any stomachs or offend anyone by posting them here, when you expect to see images that are easy to look at. =)

Dana & Ryan's Wedding

It's 2AM and I'm ready for bed, but just *had* to get this blog posted without any further delay. It's been a few days since we last blogged, so an update was overdue!

Dana and Ryan married at Coles Garden a couple of weekends ago and we just got their images edited and online for them. It feel wonderful to be caught up and not getting behind like normally happens this time of the year. We've really limited how many sessions we shoot every week in order to actually schedule in time to edit and keep up - and it's working so far!

Here are a handful of my favorites from the day, followed by a link to see the rest if you know Dana and Ryan... Hope you enjoy!

My favorite from the rehearsal...


Blue skies for the ceremony... but I think this was the day that started the 9 days of overcast and rain we had recently. The clouds started coming in as the reception started and it was raining pretty hard before the night was over.


May is definitely the month for an outdoor ceremony. It's actually comfortable enough for the guys to wear suits without risking heat-stroke. =)






This is one of my favorite moments to capture from each wedding... the couple's smiles and uncontrollable joy and relief as they walk back down the aisle.




Morrison's Floral did a beautiful job on the bouquet and flowers.



If I recall, this was Ryan's niece, cute as a button. Couldn't resist capturing when she climbed on the swing for a moment of peace and quiet.


Some cool clouds forming.


First dance...



This little guy was having way too much fun dancing with his new Aunt Dana.


Final dance while everyone gathered outside to throw rose petals






To view the rest of their 600+ images in the online gallery, click here! Dana's last name is the gallery password.

Congratulations, Ryan & Dana! Hope you had a great time in Playa!! That's actually where we want to go next for a relaxing vacation, so we were just a bit envious of you two. =)