Archive for the ‘Birthdays’ Category
June, the Wedding Season! A Few Tales…
It’s been a very hectic & busy June for Steve and I. The main reason? It’s wedding season! Love is blooming and making itself known all around us.
Steve, being a professional bass player, has been kept very busy being hired for weddings across the state, and beyond. One of the bands he plays with, Marmalade Hill, gets frequent super-fancy wedding gigs through the summer, many of them in Sun Valley, Idaho… a 5 hour drive away.
These gigs sporadically began in April, and he’s spent a couple weekends on the road with Marmalade Hill playing a Friday Night at Whiskey Jaques, then a wedding the next day, to return home on Sunday. But this month it’s been almost EVERY weekend that we’ve had a wedding.
Wedding season began for me on Memorial Day, where I took the 2 hour drive north to Logan, Utah to photograph the wedding of my sister’s childhood friend, Kristin to her boyfriend Corey. Their wedding was held at a park, and the weather was just perfect. My sister was also a bridesmaid, and I had a lot of fun taking photos that day!
The first weekend in June was our one and only *free* weekend. We celebrated my 32nd birthday by having a BBQ with friends on Saturday, then on Sunday (my actual Birthday), rowing on Oquirrh Lake in the morning, doing some shopping and relaxing in the afternoon, and going to a family dinner that evening.
The next weekend was the wedding of my dear friend Cindi to her longtime boyfriend Jason. Their wedding took place in Moab, Utah at a place called the Red Cliff’s Lodge, which overlooks the Colorado river rushing along giant red rock cliffs. We left early Saturday morning to get down there before the wedding began. I toted along all my photography gear… (because really… I can’t go to a wedding without it), and went a little crazy taking photos, while trying to stay out of the way of the photographer she had hired, the beautiful & talented Sarah Drown of Sparkle Photography. Their ceremony was one of the most emotional and touching I’d ever witnessed. We had a fabulous time!
After Cindi & Jason’s wedding on Saturday, we crashed at a hotel on main street in Moab. We woke the next morning ready to explore. We had planned to get together with all our friends and hike Delicate Arch in Arches National Park. The weather was scattered thunderstorms that day, though, so most people opted out of the hike. The only ones who ended up going were me, Steve, Sommer and Mike.
It was such a weird day, temperature wise. It would rain, then the sun would come out, then go back to rain again. I opted for pants instead of shorts, because cold breezes kept ripping through the canyon, and I really really hate being cold. Halfway into the hike, though, I really regretted the pants. Part of the Delicate Arch trail is a huge slickrock hill. It’s completely exposed… there is no shade or trees at all, and the sun absolutely beats down like you can’t imagine. I was so hot I was tempted to just take the pants OFF and hike in my knickers. 
That area is just so gorgeous, though. I kept stopping to take photos. I could take photos in Southern Utah for hours and hours and never get tired of it.
After a long day of hiking, Steve and I packed up and drove home. We got home Sunday late evening, and pretty much crashed.
The very next weekend, I didn’t have to work anywhere… but Steve had a wedding gig he was playing in Sun Valley. This one was for some College Football star (whose name has slipped my mind) and it was some big fancy shindig. Steve and his band left early Saturday morning to make the drive and get there in time to set up by 2pm.
That evening, just as the wedding had started, I get a call from Steve. “You’ll never guess who I just spent the last 10 minutes talking to,” he said. “Guess. Someone famous.” Obviously, that’s too broad of a clue. I had no idea. So he just told me.
“Rush Limbaugh.”
Auuugh! Gross! I proceeded to laugh and ask questions… we both absolutely LOATHE that man. Steve has a real knack for only running into celebrities he hates. [Tangent: last month his band ran into Kobe Bryant while the Lakers were in town to play the Jazz in the playoffs. End Tangent.] Rush was a guest at the wedding… a friend of the Bride’s father.
“Why can’t I run into someone cool, like Jeff Bridges or something,” Steve asks. Then he sent me this phone pic. Rush is the disgruntled looking dude in the gray suit.
So Steve and his band spent the whole evening chatting with Rush on and off. Despite how much we dislike him, he said he’s perfectly nice in person. I had to text my Pop, who’s a Rush Limbaugh fan, and he told me to have Steve tell Rush that my Dad is a total “dittohead.” So Steve did. Rush liked that. (I guess a dittohead is someone who loves Rush’s show.) Steve also enlightened us all with a few fun observations. Rush is a horrible dancer, but will not hesitate to be in the front of the crowd dancing anyway. Rush is a chain smoker. He smoked cigarettes allllll night long back to back. (When Steve asked him why he wasn’t smoking a cigar, Rush told him they ‘take too long’.)
And finally… Rush is totally deaf. One hundred percent deaf! He has a cochlear ear implant that allows him to hear at all. He told the band that if he takes it out he can’t hear a single thing. Dan, one of the members of the band, being a total smartass replied, “Well, can you still hear YOURSELF talk?!”
Everyone laughed, but the joke went right over Rush’s head. He replied. “Yeah! I can hear myself.” Hah! [Another tangent: Dan is also the member of the band that said something so offensive in the microphone at the bar when they met Kobe Bryant, it caused Kobe & his entourage to storm out of the bar. But that's a story for another time!]
Steve got home that weekend late Sunday night. Again, exhausted, he crashed and got ready for another week of work.
Then, finally, to wrap up the weddings of June, last weekend I traveled to Moab again to shoot the wedding of Angela and Chris, the cute couple whose engagement photos I took in a lavender field last summer. Their wedding also took place at Red Cliffs Lodge… the same as Cindi & Jason. I was glad, because I was now familiar with the spot, and knew just how to prepare. I took Lindsay with me as my photo assistant. Steve had yet ANOTHER wedding he was playing on Saturday, but in Lehi. So again, we had to spend the weekend apart working at weddings.
Lindsay and I left early Saturday morning. We made great time and got to Moab with plenty of time to spare. We checked into our hotel, walked around the shops, and stopped to get ice cream and cupcakes. After filling up on sweets, we got dressed for the wedding and made the short drive up scenic UT-128 to the lodge.
Angela & Chris’ wedding was phenomenal! We started shooting photos at 3:30pm, and didn’t stop until after 10:30pm. Needless to say, I took thousands of photos, and my hand was totally cramped by the end of the day, but it was so worth it! Angela & Chris hired the band Great American Taxi to play their wedding… which featured the lead singer from Leftover Salmon. The band was just AWESOME and they played under the clear starry sky with a full moon. They also had a campfire set up, and even a fire thrower. Those two sure know how to throw a party!
I’m still working on editing the photos from that wedding, so I don’t have any to share here yet. But hopefully this week I’ll have them done and up on my Flickr and Portfolio site for all to see! They’re some of the best photos I’ve ever taken, I think!
Now, it’s July. And, with a sigh of relief… we’re finally relaxing. *whew!*
Early Birthday Gift
Last year Steve surprised me and got me the ultimate birthday gift, my DSLR camera. It still is, and will forever will be, the best birthday gift I’ll ever receive. It was way more than I deserved, for sure! I told Steve he was pretty much off the hook for gifts for a long time… no need to splurge ever again!
Little did I know that his gift last year was the beginning of a strange sort of addiction. I am now a photography gearhead. It starts with the DSLR camera. Then, you begin to learn about all the different lenses and flashes and the different things you can do with them. Then you realize lenses are just as expensive as the camera, if not more.
Over the past year I’ve saved up and invested in a few key lenses to add to my collection. It’s all about fast aperture… lenses with an aperture of 2.8 or less. But fast lenses don’t come cheap! I purchased a nice prime 35mm 1.8 lens. Then, a few months ago I splurged on a 70-200 2.8 lens, which will be ideal for portrait sessions and weddings. The lens that came with my DSLR was the 18-55mm 3.5-5 lens, which is a great lens for a “kit” lens, but the slower aperture just wasn’t cutting it. I’ve been wanting a fast 2.8 lens to cover the 18-50 focal range for a while. I feel like it will complete my lens repertoire for the most part. (Famous last words, I know.)
Nikon’s lenses in this range are over $2400. That is an obscene amount of money, and I can’t imagine justifying spending that kind of cash on anything other than purchasing a car, lasik eye surgery, or emergency vet bills. It just ain’t gonna happen. Probably ever.
Luckily, Sigma makes this same lens for much much much less. Thousands less, actually. You have to be careful with third-party lenses, though. So I read review after review after review of their newer 18-50 2.8 HSM Macro Lens, and all of them rated it at the very top of the class. “A must have for every serious photographer” was the general consensus. So I’ve been saving my pennies.
When Steve asked me a couple weeks ago what I wanted for my birthday this year, I jokingly said I wanted this lens. There wasn’t a shred of seriousness in the comment. I hardly expected a gift like this, especially after last year’s splurge. “Well, how about we go halfsies on it,” he proposed. I definitely didn’t expect this, since even half was still a splurge as far as birthday gifts go. But he was serious, and pretty much insisted. Wooo!
I checked the local camera shops, who had the lens on backorder. Then I checked Adorama & Amazon, who also had it on backorder. Finally, I found B&H Photo who still had a few in stock. This is a popular lens! I had to act quick if I didn’t want to wait for it for 4-6 weeks. Even though my birthday is still two weeks away, I ordered the lens immediately.
Today, it came.
Isn’t she pretty? Okay okay, only other photo gearheads will think so. It’s sturdy in your hand, heavy but not too heavy, nice and solid.
I tore the box open and snapped it onto my camera. Then Steve and I headed to the nearest park for it’s maiden voyage.
Steve insisted on actually EATING on our lunch break, even though I just wanted to take photos for an entire hour, so I only got a few photos. But the few I got make me very excited for the fun things I’m going to be able to do with this baby! I’m thinking it’ll live on my camera 90% of the time.
It has fabulous Macro abilities. I was able to capture this without even getting as close as this lens will allow, and while the wind was blowing:
It also can do wide angle, with a nice shallow depth of field. I had Steve brush the bagel crumbs off his mouth to test this nice feature:
I have a couple portrait sessions and a few wedding shoots coming up… and I absolutely can’t wait to use this lens in action. Not to mention, it’s finally SPRING and SUMMER and it’s time again to take some great Landscape photography. With it’s wide-angle capabilities (and my new polarizing filter) this lens is also perfect for Landscapes.
Thanks, Steve for this great gift! You outdid yourself. Again!
Happy Birthday Sooki!
Yes, it’s America’s Birthday. But it’s also Sooki’s Birthday! Today she is four.
Four years ago her cute little white body was sleeping curled up in a corner of a big cage at a rescue shelter. Her brothers and sisters all pounced around excitedly at me, meowing and pawing through the cage asking to be picked up, while she quietly slept. But I skipped the hyper ones, and asked to see the little quiet white one. I knew the second I picked her up and she looked at me with those giant blue eyes, that I had to take her home.
And she hasn’t stopped terrorizing us since.
