dusting off the F3

During our move, I came across my Nikon F3. Turned out it still have half a roll of Ilford 100 in it. I quickly finished off this roll and started to get a taste for shooting film again. Turned out I need to get some film and shoot some photos of hte damage in our old apartment. That taken care of I still had a couple rolls left, so in stead of taking my digital camera out with me, I grabbed the extra rolls and the F3.

Arielle and I had some time to kill downtown so we wandered around and did some street shooting. On our way to towards the Chase Field, we found our own no flash corner.

Liz lives downstairs at the old place. She's one of the more awesome people we've met in Phoenix.

I won these sauces at Arielle's boss' ugly christmas sweater party. Yes, my sweater was the ugliest one of all the guys there. I had hit up two different Goodwill stores to find everything I needed for it. Arielle decided spelling hate was more interesting than heat, go figure.

The new apartment is very close to the parade route here. More on the in another post. The evening after the parade, we wandered to grab some dessert. The road was still closed while the city broke down the bleachers from the parade.

Dancing with the Stars

Friday I got a call from the AZ Republic. They had a last minute assignment for me. Four words I never expected to hear... Dancing with the Stars. I've never seen the tv show much less expected to cover the tour. Turned out it was more like shooting a concert than I expected. I got to shoot the 2nd, 3rd and 4th songs then I was done.

Christmas Day at Aunt Toni's

After getting home after midnight on Christmas Eve, we went to bed. Christmas day, I got up early and started editing photos from the night before. When Arielle got up she helped me put together a slideshow from the previous night, which the cousins loved.
Overall the day was more relaxed than Christmas Eve, but just as fun.

The Wedding Photo

Last week Ray posted a preview of our wedding album and let us know we would have it soon. Friday, Arielle and I received the album. It took a little longer than we expected, but it was worth it. Arielle and I were brought to tears several times.

We both wanted to thank everyone who was involved, Ray and Jared for putting it together. Tim, Lisa, Ray and Taylor for all the wonderful photos. Mom and Dad for all the support through the years. Tom for all the help getting things ready for the day. Jill, for opening up her home for our special day. Jill, you're an awesome neat lady, thank you. Mario and Darcy for the amazing food and making it legal. Laura and Vinny for all your help. Alyssa for being such an awesome little girl, who we were honored to have as our flower girl. Jak for your help with the music. Plus all our wonderful friends that that came from near and far to help make our day one of the best days of our lives.

After the wedding Ray and Tim dropped us off at the Sheraton in Downtown Raleigh. Arielle and I didn't get to eat much at the wedding but we enjoyed leftovers and a bottle of wine in the hotel room.

Jen and Merritt picked us up the next day and we hung out at Cup-A-Joe and relaxed.

Thanks again to Ray for confiscating all mine and Arielle's photos. Several of our photos we hadn't seen until we got the album. I actually forgot I took this one while we were hanging out drinking coffee.

Cousins Christmas Eve: part 2

At around 10 or 11pm the presents came out and the carnage began. It was a great time with a lot of love all around.

Cousins Christmas Eve: part 1

Arielle and I spent Christmas Eve with the cousins at Shane and April's house. It was much different than how I spent Christmas last year.
Several bottle of wine were cracked up and a good time was had all around.

Ninja

Ninja was a stray that wandered into Arielle's life several years back. She's had her share of drama, several surgeries do to what looked like being hit by a car while she was a stray.
Since we moved to Phoenix, Ninja has really adopted me as dad. In the process she's becoming my new lap cat. Most of her lap time happens while I'm at my desk, working at my computer.

She's very demanding and is definitely a pretty pretty princess, but she's my new little girl. Oops will always be my little big girl though.

PUG Christmas Party

Last week Arielle and I went to the Pictage Users Group Christmas Party, held at Dave and Busters. Melissa Jill was kind enough to do most of the leg work for the party. It was a fun evening and I met a lot of nice people. When socializing died down we headed out to the play some video games. Arielle and I ended up tagging along with Megan Resch and her crew. We pretty much played any game that spit out tickets.

Opening night at Conspire

Saturday, Arielle and I headed down to Conspire for the grand opening. First we had to grab some dinner so we stopped in at Fate which happened to be a block away.

At Conspire someone was taking portraits of all the opening night attendees for an art project to be displayed later. I think I threw her off by taking photos while she was trying to take mine. I've been on that kick lately. Check out Melissa Jill's blog for the group photo from the PUG christmas party last night. How many cameras do you see?

Soggy Soggy Football

I love watching a good soggy football game. I also love looking at photos from such a game. I don't enjoy the act of shooting games those games. It's a constant struggle to protect your gear while still trying to use it to get the best photographs you can. In this particular instance, I found that my hiking boots are no longer water proof. Wet feet when it's 50 degrees and raining is not fun.

We had a unusually strong late storm that dropped over an inch of rain on the valley last Friday. Before that rain, we had a little over 4 inches for the year. I was surprised they actually played considering there was over an inch of standing water between the tackles from the 30 yard line on one end to the 10 yard line on the other.

All that said, the end result is worth the discomfort and exhausting working conditions.

Thanksgiving

For me, Thanksgiving has always been about family. That includes the extended family we choose to surround ourselves with. Mom would always start cooking the turkey before the crack of dawn and we would eat around 12 or 1, whenever was decided on before hand. Friends would show up about half an hour before hand as to not miss out on anything.

Looking back, those gatherings meant a great deal to me. If I wasn't able to get home for Thanksgiving, then I would find a group of close friends or the family of a close friend to share the day with.

Last year was the first time Thanksgiving was anything different for me. I didn't have family in the area and didn't really have any close friends to share the day with. I did have Arielle. Originally we hadn't planned on doing anything special for the day since she had a shift at the radio station and I had to work. We ended up cooking a chicken and making our own little special day. That day was special in it's own way.

It turns out Arielle has a lot of pretty cool cousins out here. The closest relation of any of them is 1st cousin, once removed and they get more distant from there. The first time we met them, if felt like the family that I was used to.

So, this year Thanksgiving was very familiar for me. Even if the faces weren't as familiar. We had dinner at Toni's house with about 20 other cousins. To them everyone's a cousin, so we're just the newest cousins.

Arielle volunteered to bring something, so I was up early making green bean casserole and cranberry sauce. I also roasted 2 jars of coffee, one regular and one decaf. If nothing else we could have good coffee and it's another talking point. Turns out I didn't need the talking point because I had the exact same feeling of family as I had when I first met all the cousins. We were welcomed as family with open arms and big hugs.

Mmmm... freshly roasted coffee

Toni's daughter Taylor was pretty cool. We're going to her 10th birthday party in a week.

Bella's pretty serious about playing.

Taylor had a turkey drawing contest. Looking back, I wish I had entered, but Arielle represented and got an honorable mention in the girls class. Next year, she'll own it.