It has not only been a lot of fun, it has been a great mini break from photography. Well when I saw the signs for the Big Air Competition 2010 I thought, hey why not take some pictures of these amazing athletes jumping way up into the air. And dontchaknow… it was FUN!

Some of the images were published on the Pats Peak website, these are my favorites from the day…

So where was I rambling on… Oh yes! the party! I mean what goes better with an emotionally charged wedding ceremony between two loving people, a ROCKIN’ PARTY. So after Candi and Tj exchanged rings,

they had some fun. First they had a beautiful first dance…

Then they danced with their parents. Its a really wonderful tradition that honors where they came from. Candi and her dad did a sort of jitterbug which was lively and up beat. Tj and his mom did a more traditional dance during which his mom spent the bulk of it in tears, it got me chocked up once or twice.

After the dancing we played a game. Now you ask what kinds of games do we play at weddings. Well the NEWLYWED game of course! Candi and Tj stood back to back they had a bouquet in one hand and a Red Sox hat in the other. The DJ would ask questions and if they thought the answer was Candi they raised the bouquet and so forth. It was really quite cute and it got EVERYONE laughing. Especially Candi’s mom, the picture below is after a particularly funny question, I believe it was “Who is always right?” Both of them raised the Red Sox hat…

And then we danced, drank, laughed… All of the things you do at a fun party. I’ll shut up now and leave everyone with some more images. If you are waiting to see the entire catalog it will be up when Candi and Tj get back from their trip and have seen the entire thing first. If you want to register on the website feel free, or if you just want to email me I will add you to the email announcing the whole catalog.

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!

So lets get started… My very lovley 2nd shooter and I arrived at the Woodbound Inn just before noon. I don’t want to go into detail about the Inn because it was so awesome, so there its awesome if your looking for a good weekend getaway check it out.

Ok back to the day, gesh I can get myself off track too easily. The day was shaping up to be a killer November day, and there was questions about where to have the ceremony. Tj was trying to get guidance, he wanted it to be perfect but nobody had their cell phone on! Sure he’s laughing below, but he was trying every number he knew to get SOMEONE on the phone.

After we had the ceremony site all set, Tj set off to get dressed with his dad (also the person who married them, pretty damn cool).

Then he had a very private moment with him…

We checked with the official “ring security” and with his ok we were ready to depart… Yeah he fell asleep on the job at one point but was after his “duties” were fulfilled.

I left to go meet up with the girls and my very lovely 2nd shooter stayed with the guys as they departed for the venue.

So with the flowers in toe I took off to see Candi. She was so full of excitement/nervous energy when I showed up, she was litterally bouncing off the walls, it was so cute. There was one rule, no crying. As you can see one minute she was hugging her very attentive sister/maid of honor, and the next smacking her to keep the 1 rule intact. Jill almost lost it several times…

Before we knew it, (and on time I’ll have everyone know) we too were ready to leave for the venue. Candi had a limo but…

We arrived at the Shattuck Golf Club Candi waited in the limo while everyone went down to the ceremony site, then the limo drove her down over part of the course right up to the start line. I mean the bride gets privileges on her wedding day.

There were a lot of people ready and waiting for this momentous event to offically start…

While the ceremony is one of the shortest parts of the actual wedding day it is at the center of the event. Without those magic words, we are all just dressed up for fun. I could post 50 pictures from this ceremony, but in the interest of editing the story I am showing everyone the one that sums it up completely.

Candi and Tj were so excited that he almost forgot to stop on the glass as they ran down the isle! Then we had some fun together with their families and bridal party.

Remember this little guy? This was just before he went “off duty”.

Then Candi, Tj and I had some alone time…

Well this has been a MONSTER post, and we haven’t even touched on the party yet! Stay tuned later this week (more likely the beginning of next week) for the second half of this story.

The Nonatum Resort is an amazing little spot right on the water right outside of Kennebunkport ME. Yes that Kennebunkport that is famous for Bush 41’s summer home…

Well this bride and groom spent quite a while looking for places to have their reception and after an exhaustive search of the area this was the spot. The kitchen even accommodated them making several family recipes for the dinner, now that is really cool.

After we finished getting ready, this couple alloted about an hour with me to go for a little adventure. We scurried up the coast a bit to find some spots out of the wind to do some bridal portraits.

After portraits and a light snack, we ventured off to the church. It was the beautiful historic church in the center of Wells ME. After a beautiful ceremony the bride and groom took off in a “special” limo.

I easily could have put 20 images up on this wedding alone, but I had to edit to tell a story… Part of that story involves the “shot ski.” If you say it fast enough shotski you think I am talking about a older Polish gentleman, not the case. This is a tradition amongst skiiers, and this is a family of powder hounds…

Yes that is the bride with the grooms brothers doing a shot. As the story goes at the engagement party she drank them under the table on that thing. Made her an instant hit in the family!

Well this could go on and on and on, I had so much fun with this couple! But I will leave you with a perfect end to a perfect day…

They live on a beautiful tree lined street in Park Slope Brooklyn. The kind of house you saw in the opening credits of “The Cosby Show.”

After we dodged the rain drops we came inside for the real magic… Ok we put a very cute snowflake onesie on Norah and a hat. She didn’t really care for the hat.

Norah is as smiley and happy as they come! While she will probably harbor a deep hidden resentment towards me for the hat thing, I’m ok with it… She was too cute!

You would think Booker and I are old friends at this point, but maybe he is confused by the camera in front of my face?

Being very close to Halloween we decided to incorporate the them into his session. And well, his momma likes neekeid baby!

Just before we finished up, we did some clowning around…

And as a special treat, Grandma and Grandpa were visiting all the way from Germany!

Now we start planning the 9 month shoot, I am hoping for snow

They are an extremely lively couple, they would barley hold still enough for me to get them in focus!

After covering a very large portion of the city to do pictures we headed off to a resturant that holds a special place for this couple. Radici is a lovely little Italian restaurant on middle st right in the heart of the city.

This is a very spcial place to Becky and Chris and it was extremely important to them to shoot here. They made special arraignments with the owner to come in before dinner so we could have the place to ourselves.

Becky and Chris are making a sign in book from this shoot to take with them on their Caribbean adventure. Its gonna be an amazing book and I can’t wait to design i!

As with all of my portrait clients we had several discussions about locations, wardrobe, makeup, jewelry, shoes etc… we started out with the semi formal clothing in Concord center, and planned to move to some more casual stuff in a wooded area I found on my scouting trip.

This young lady was amazing, not only bright and energetic, she didn’t even blink an eye when I suggested climbing a tree…

After this location we moved off to the Old North Bridge.  Not so much for the bridge itself, but for the beautiful fields and natural landscape that surrounds it.

The last stop on our shoot is a secret…  Why you ask?  Well we weren’t exactly supposed to be there.  It was a 15 min hike into the woods to find the perfect spot, and when we did look what happened…

Yep that’s a rainbow.  I know where this spot is, and would happily shoot there again, but cannot promise mother nature will provide such a landscape.

My style is well at little more “lifestyle” I want these senior portraits to be about documenting this time in their life, sadly they can’t say 18 forever.  After we finished up with the grey we went off to the high school.  We had so many more fun things to play with, things that were much more relevant to who she is now.

This particular subject has a love of lacrosse and martial arts.  So we found the lacrosse goal and had some fun.

This next image is the one she ultimately chose to go in the year book… after all that it was an environmental shot, not a studio type shot   And its an excellent shot if I do say so myself!

After we wrapped up the lacrosse goal area we went over to the bleachers.  The grauaing class is allowed to paint their year onto the bleachers each summer.  Well needless to say my graduating year only had 2 numbers not four.  We had a lot of fun, I hope you enjoy!

So now on to the images…  The bat mitzvah girl is gorgeous! goes without saying right?  Well let me say it again in case I didn’t make my point clearly the first time, this bat mitzvah girl is gorgeous, and to boot, sweet as sugar.

Not to leave out the family unit as a whole, they were a pretty sharp dressed bunch…

When it came down to brass tax, this girl was focused and flawless during rehearsal…

Now for the reward, and these kids know… its all about the party!  This party, cool as ice…

On October 11th, 2009 over 80 photographers in 31 states and 2 countries are participating in this event. Its very simple, contact me to setup a time to shoot, then go to Schedule a Session, they are taking care of the financial aspect of the day, its very cool. My session fee for the day is $125 for a 45 minute portrait session, after you donate forward the confirmation email to me, and away we go!  All products purchased from Images For A Cure sessions are 20% off.

Whether you want an engagement session….

Or a family portrait…

It is entirely up to you!

One special thing I am doing as part of this project is pet sessions. Because of shooting location restraints it will be limited to dogs this time. But I believe each and ever member of your family is worth of being photographed… so bring out, fido, max or daisy!

Lastly for you seniors out there, if you haven’t done your senior portrait this is an excellent opportunity! The fall deadlines for many schools are fast approaching!

We spent about 2h in varous parts of Manchester NH, downtown doing some great street scenes and then to Wagner park, AKA “Pretty Park.” I didn’t want to stop, but alas all good things come to an end at some point…

This little guy is so inquisitive, with that hint of mischief in his eye…
His Nana bought him this outfit, his dad remarked he’s ready for his first day of school!

His mom got this little tux on freecycle.org for a wedding this past summer, they ended up not needing it. So we decided that heck this was the perfect opportunity to use it, its not going to fit much longer…

This is one of my favorites, I feel like this expression sums up the entire shoot. This kid has a bright, bright future…

I believe this will become popular, that blending of the traditional still image and the video is possible. It does require effort on both the part of the person making the video and the people in the video. However, when we collaborate we tend to get a result beyond our own imagination… so I present lifestyle fusion. Update*** this piece will be re-edited after consulting with some people on the DWF, stay tuned!