The Wedding

We're home safe and sound - thankfully...

A big shout out to my buddy, Susan, for being a weekend zookeeper - despite the fact that Odie whined all night as she tried to sleep over. I'm sorry, Su....

JayR and Jenny's wedding - what a beautiful event!!! I took a ton of pictures and some of them came out nicely:

This is Jenny and Angelica in the Bridal Suite. She looked stunning - Jenny was the absolute picture of beautiful that day...she was cool and seemed relaxed and looked like she enjoyed everything.
This was Angel in the hallway outside the Chapel at Jericho Terrace in Mineola, NY (it was very pretty!). She took this job seriously and did just fine - walked and threw her petals in the right place and listened to directions. It made me so proud of her. Her favorite parts were the dress, the shoes and the makeup...
The wedding ceremony took place in the Chapel at the Jericho Terrace. I took this picture with my Canon 75-300mm, no flash. We didn't have the best seats for the ceremony, which was in the middle of a circle.
This is the happy couple - right before we had the professional photographer take our group photo with them. She just looked like a doll....

I don't cry at these kinds of things, but I did when JayR and Jenny publicly thanked their parents and JayR ended up in tears...me too. I also got teary when he danced with his mom to Kenny Rogers' "Through the Years" (I love that song)!!!

It was the biggest wedding, I'd ever been to - 390 guests at last count. There had to be at least 100 people at the rehearsal dinner - JayR's family provided dinner for all their out of town guests at the hotel they were staying...JayR's dad, my Uncle Mario is an amazing cook - I grew up with his cooking. (I took that picture of Angelica at the rehearsal dinner)

JayR and I go way back - I know we are distant cousins but we were close friends as kids. His dad, my Ninang Emily (godmother and mom's best friend) and some other friends of my parents would visit nearly every weekend to play mahjongg for 3 days straight. Everyone would come over late Friday night, stay all day Saturday, and most of the day Sunday since I was in the 8th grade. We learned how to play mahjongg by watching them. When I wasn't doing something in school on the weekends, I was with JayR and his sisters, Marlette and Marilou. They were quite shy in the beginning, clinging to their father's leg for dear life (they're all a little bit younger than me) but once they warmed up, we lived for these weekends and getting busted for making so much noise in the middle of the night and watching Star Trek: The Next Generation and having Uncle Mario's cooking all weekend long. We went on vacation to Lake George together. We celebrated holidays and birthdays and graduations. JayR was my prom date (I was single in Senior Year of high school) and he was a groomsman in my wedding. He's Angelica's Ninong (godfather). And I'm ever so glad that he married Jenny (they've been together longer than I have been with Adam).

Congratulations, newlyweds - may all your dreams come true with the fewest obstacles that can hurt the least but make you the strongest you can ever be.

Is summer really almost over?

I love summer - I think I always have and just really didn't appreciate as much as a kid. I'm sure my kids love summer but don't appreciate it as much as they should while they are young. This summer seemed to fly by so quickly that here we are with about 2 weeks until school starts - haven't started school shopping and this year, all three of my kids will be in school.

Yes, 1/2 day nursery school - 4 days a week - counts. Melody will tell you that it is real school.

My job requires me to take 2 consecutive weeks somewhere during the year and what better time than the summer, when all the kids are home to drive me nuts? Since taking up photography I have learned to soak up and revel in the moment - even if it's the one that will drive me to drink. (Don't worry, parents - I barely drink...I swear.)

As a person obsessed with documenting individual moments, I find value in nearly everything that happens, bad or good. And not just the big moments - even the little ones. For instance: One day last September, after a good rain, the kids went out the backyard to play on their playground. All of a sudden, we hear the PAIN cry coming out of Melody's little mouth...and Adam finds her like this:
This was taken in the bathroom, right before I gave her a bath. This picture is hilarious!!! Melody looks like she's growing a goatee. Adam was kinda annoyed that I stopped to take this picture instead of giving the poor kid a hug - "for goodness sakes, she just took a header off the swing, there's no need for a photograph." he said. I'm not a horrible mom, I did ask Melody if she was ok and she said yes...there wasn't any blood or broken bones...just a whole lot of dirt and grass on her face. Look, she was fine, 2 shots later:
...still I'm glad that I took these pictures - they still crack me up!!!

Big moment pictures are a must, right? I don't know who took this picture of Angelica, but I know that it wasn't me as I was the 5 month pregnant (with Melody) Matron of Honor for a friend and Angelica was her flower girl:
...I do know that this picture wasn't taken by a professional (I'm gonna go out on a limb and say maybe my dad took this picture). What a shot - check out the lights in her eyes (proof of a flash for certain because that church is as dark as pre-dawn with their lights on). I'm thinking the same person took this picture too:
...those lights in Angel's eyes, pretty cool. In this picture she's 2 and Dylan is 3. He was the ring bearer. They walked into the church right after I walked in and Adam stood at the front of the church to wave them in his direction and keep them walking. It was all going well until they got about half way when Angelica saw all the guests who kept awwing, and stepping into the aisle to take their picture. So she dropped the basket and high tailed it to the back of the church, crying, prompting Adam to run up the aisle to get her and leaving Dylan to walk the last half of the aisle by himself, waving at people, nearly running at me with the pillow in hand.
Since big moments are not readily available (not a bad thing), I take pictures of everyday things. I love taking pictures of people but I love practicing on things too:

Flowers and slow moving animals are great practice subjects. Either they are still or move slow enough for you to adjust your focusing (or for your auto focus lens to make the necessary adjustments).

Keep practicing - I am - it will take years for me to be the photographer I want to be. Ask any pro photographer; it took them years too...