jacob and i went out shooting to get some more of his senior pics

the weather has finally been good enough to go out

this one was from a few days ago

i was driving and figured i might as well snap a quick pic of the last frost we will see for the year probably

our weather is a very different story from what family and friends are getting back home
i miss having a couple feet of snow on the ground but i don't miss the high being 0 for the day or when the snow turns dirty and the top of it freezes over which makes it pretty much useless

we had our middle school winter retreat this past weekend which made for some crazy times with 140 students

there are definitely more from this weekend but this was my favorite

hopefully it will do for now

finally i was able to make it over to this water tower i have been able to spot for awhile now but just never really had the time to seek it out

hopefully i can find some different spots to try and get some better shots at some point but these will work for now i guess

last night was pretty fun as we continued with our love series at youth group
we also had a guest high school band lead us in worship which was a good time

i love seeing high school kids lead their peers in worship

i pretty much just love it when i am able to see students who realize their giftedness use it in order to glorify God to the best of their ability

this pic comes from just messing around a bit before things started

we were chilling the other night at barnes and noble reading and then i had to get my camera b/c i wanted to get some shots

jenica always feels awkward when i am taking pictures...she will get over that...hopefully

we had a great time with the super bowl the other night

jenica and i met up with some friends and ate our fill of junk food while also showing off our skills (or lack there of) on guitar hero

the baby shots are of mavis, who belongs to jake and hannah, playing guitar hero in the first pic

i've never really taken baby pics before but need to practice since i will be shooting some in a few weeks hopefully
mavis makes it look at a lot easier than it is though

so i got to shoot a wedding reception a couple weeks ago which i was really nervous about but i think that it turned out pretty well

it was great experience and i think i was able to manage pretty well considering the poor lighting i had(and will most likely always have to deal with and learn how to still get great shots)

hopefully there will be more pics to come but here are a couple

we had our winter retreat for the high school kids this past weekend

it was a good time as we had some friends who are missionaries in costa rica speak

here are a few more

the Student Life band has been recording some stuff in order to put together a cd

the cd will consist of worship songs done by both high school and middle school bands which is pretty cool

these are just a few shots that i took during their first recording session

jenica and i went to the world of coke the other day...it was pretty fun.

we knew it would be though since it was a whole museum dedicated to the drink of the south (other than sweet tea of course)

at the end of the tour you were able to try all of the coke products that are sold worldwide at these little "world tasting stations"

they were pretty good, all except for some nasty drink called Beverly from Italy....little hint: stay away from that one...it seems fine at first and then attacks you from the inside. it's sneaky.

anywho, we had a good time and even got to walk away with our very own bottled coke that says "world of coke" on the bottle (in glass, not just a sticker) so that was pretty cool.

So i realize it's been awhile since i have posted...that's pretty much because i shot my first wedding (just the reception) the other day and i was studying up as much as i could.

Overall i think it went pretty well despite the low light. It was a great first learning experience and my hope is that i will only get better as i learn my equipement more and hopefully build up to the point of getting some other stuff.

I have also being working on some maternity pics which i was happy with. Right now i am just doing as much as possible to build up my portfolio and we will see what God decides to do with it.

Here are a couple from the maternity pics.

so i went geocaching the other day

if you don't know what that is, it's basically a worldwide treasure hunt where you find other people's "caches" with the aid of a handheld gps and then sign their log book or trade out for something someone else left in the "cache"

it's pretty fun and some are hidden in really cool locations

if you want to check it out go to www.geocaching.com

there are over 500,000 in the world so chances are there are some close to you

i have been messing around a lot with some new techniques...some of them are actually coming out better now that i have a diffuser for my flash

there is a lot coming up that i get to shoot which i am really excited about: a basketball league, wedding reception, and some maternity shots.

hopefully they all come out well

i had an awesome break.

it was so great being able to be with family and just relax for a couple weeks...not to mention finally being able to see snow

these are just a few from my time in chicago/evanston