Stay toasty everybody!

The century would change and they would each hit the road and live abroad on separate continents. And then one summer afternoon back in Indiana in 2002 they would meet up to share travel stories and photos and start to fall in love.

In 2005 he asked Sara to shoot with him at a friend’s wedding… and they were hooked.

In 2006 they would stand in front of the cameras out in the green grass to celebrate the ceremony they have photographed together… a wedding day. Our wedding day!

The rest, as they say, is history!

To kick off our 5th year photographing together, this March we’re proud to present our Photography Gallery Debut.

Come celebrate with us Saturday, March 7, 2009 as we kick off our very first Gallery!

Saturday, March 7th, 2009 – 7:00-10:00pm
Ugly Mugs Coffee & Culture
102 N Main Street, South Bend, Indiana

Click HERE for directions!

We hope to see you there! Click the photo or Click Here to see and add the FaceBook event page!

Wow. I caught this video following Zack Arias‘ blog.

For those of you outside the photography world, this week is the WPPI (Wedding and Portrait Photographers International) convention in Vegas. Yes, warm Vegas. Shiny, warm, not Indiana Vegas where rock star photographers show you shiny new books, cameras, software and toys related to making you an awesome photographer. Everyone pats each other on the back and has sparkles in their teeth when they smile. They’re all booked for a year straight and still have time to travel the globe and make awesome photos, albums, software, and…….

It’s my week of skipping almost every single blog post, Twitter tweet, and email news update from these photographers because one stuck in a rainy, snowy gray Indiana can be quickly overwhelmed at reading “this is so awesome” so many times a day while feeling totally left out of the fun. (And I’m pretty sure it’s marketed that way on purpose.)

And in this winter funk… much needed inspiration and reminders to push on have come over and over in the last week. This one sums it up best. Enjoy.

If you don’t see this video check it here http://blip.tv/file/1785698/

This marks a 33˚ difference from the record-tying -19˚ it was yesterday.

Stay toasty. I’m gonna go enjoy some positive temperatures.

I don’t love subzero temperatures.

Just thought I should clarify.

The arctic is no respecter of fashion.
Ice, snow, nowhere to go.

Be safe out there.

I haven’t written a Tuesday Thoughts post since last year, and long ago since November at that. Since Election Day there’s been a flurry of things happening etting ready for the wintry holidays Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years and post-holiday decompression.

For anyone who hasn’t seen him in person so far this year, Adrian is walking. He’s got 10+ steps in a row down just fine and loves every step of mobility. We’re planning his first birthday party for the big event in under a month! We’ve got some mega snowstorm on the way and it was in the middle of a good snow-in that we met our little boy for the first time last year.

In the Home Office we’re (I’m) in full-speed ahead Album Design mode. Been making up books all over the place. Creativity is a wonderful thing when I can harness it to Photoshop for a while. The previous two posts have a very cool fine art Wedding Album design and Senior portrait session book. We’ll be incorporating new album styles this year too.

We spent a good portion of the weekend with some of the friends I’ve known the longest, the Jelinski family. The boys and I used to hang out what seems at least once a week when I was a kid. Life, family, kids and work sure gets you busy these days, and I hadn’t caught up with them much since my sister’s wedding in early 2007. But walking into their parents house it was like I visited just minutes ago.

Too cool to see two guys I played with when I was a single-digit aged kid now have kids of their own too. Jon was home on leave from the Army and the family had a big get together extended Christmas celebration. I made sure to take a camera (and lights, stands, umbrellas, flashes that I lug when I know I’ll use them) to photograph 4 generations of Jelinski boys together.

– Post caffeine –

While it’s not quite a blizzard as forecast it has been snowing quite a bit this last week. I just dug out the cars and shoveled out a walkway. There’s a good 1-foot-deep trench from cars to front door. A neighbor with a snow blower is friends with the neighbor we share a walkway with and excavated our sidewalk for us over the weekend. The neighbor on the other side hasn’t been out to shovel and had a good 8″ drift covering his walkway. Since our walk was cleaned for us I paid it forward and cleaned his so it’ll be walkable when he’s home from work. I really do enjoy the neighbors I have here, even if we all mostly keep to ourselves.

Crocheting is the new fad among my friends it seems. When Adrian was born a friend and an aunt had both made us baby blankets for him, and we use them daily if not hourly while sitting with him for feedings (when he sits still). Yesterday Justin came by to have a stupid humor movie afternoon and watch help me clean the office and brought yarn and his heavy blanket in the making. That cozy blanket would be a welcome and warm addition to these cold Indiana days we’ve been having. Twisting yarn seems to take the mind off daily life for a while, plus the satisfaction of making something is something I’ve always found rewarding.

Seems the cloud of white-out snow that was attempting to undo my shoveling progress has lifted, and errands are still waiting. Out into the wild white wonder I go.

Stay safe, and from all of us at Possum Lodge, keep your stick on the ice.

Let’s review this one by the numbers:

• Running on 2 hours of sleep (excitement is contagious)
• in 20 minutes at 2am I will have been up for 24 hours since those 2 hours of sleep
• it took 6 hours of car travel and
• 2 Amp energy drinks,
• 2 cups of coffee,
• 1 glass of Coke to ready and use…
• 5 Nikon cameras
• (more lenses than I can count right now)
• 3 remote lights
• two geeky photographers to perform…
• 12 hours of wedding day photography at
• 1 awesome couple’s wonderful celebration

I’m pretty amazed, considering the numbers. Creative excitement makes for some serious energy bursts. Caffeine is good too, but inspiration keeps me up more than anything.

It was an awesome start to the year to join forces with Matt at Zeta-Alpha Studio again, see a handful of former brides we’ve photographed all get together for Katie and Peter’s Indianapolis wedding day celebration. As Matt put it when we walked into the salon at 9am, “it’s like spending a day with old friends.”

Lastly – glad to be home. I missed my baby Adrian and my wife every time I saw cute babies and heard a bride and groom I photographed with Matt in 2005 are expecting twins! Congrats Jessica and Rob! Great to see you guys again!

Goodnight!

Here’s a favorite from the reception at the Pumpernickel Cafe in the old Elkhart Hotel – newlyweds and shadows

Congrats Amber & Phil!

Click the photo above or CLICK HERE to get a reminder when the wedding gallery is ready.

I picked up this album last year and wondered why I didn’t already have this classic of my childhood, and probably most favorite jazz album ever! Just saw an ad that it’s $2 at the Amazon store… superb!

Click the photo or the link to check it out for your own nostalgic Christmas cheer this Thanksgiving weekend!

A Charlie Brown Christmas [Expanded]