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Vinh and Nikki
We were invited to a very purple wedding last night and got some great purple pictures to share. Nikki (I know her as Thao, her Vietnamese name) is a friend from high school. Coincidentally, Vinh and Nikki’s first date was Jenni and my wedding, so it was fun knowing that our beginning was someone else’s beginning as well.
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Cheers!
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Photographic Families
In June, Jenni and I had the privilege of photographing two families. My coworker’s family of girls have a wonderful home with a backyard that led into an open field. I was inspired by a different coworker’s photography work to use a reflector more and got great results using the sun that day.
The second family, or I should say families, was Jenni’s cousins in the Longview area. We did a short shoot of the youngest cousin of six months, then a mix of group and individual cousin shots. Some of the best came when we let them play outside. Whew! That was a crazy day with seven little ones (including our two) zooming around.
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Walking in Wilderness
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Tug of War
As I grew up, my parents did not allow me to own a video game console. Although, I eventually got around that when we owned our first computer (albeit, I had to justify that the game was educational initially).
Looking back, I’m very thankful that my parents forced gave us the opportunity to use our imagination instead of being entertained by flashing pixels on a television. I made up a lot of crazy plots while helpless G.I. Joe or Transformers action figures did my bidding.
I’ve rekindled that imagination as I watch our daughters play with the simplest of things and having the greatest joy doing so. From peekaboo with a baby wipes box to today’s tug-of-war, I’m amazed again and again how much fun can be had with simple objects.
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Fiery Flowers
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End of an Era
My cousin Eileen graduated from Benson last night. It marked an end of her high school career but it also the end of Benson High School as I know it. Class of 2010 will likely be the last where Benson is a four-year polytechnic program—the program that gave me a head start in computer science fifteen years ago. My senior project was my first jump into web site design and I’m sad that the opportunities Benson offered are gone for future generations.
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Remembered
At Wanda’s funeral, I was initially touched that the memorial ground keepers would provide flowers for each grave since almost every grave had flowers. I was even more touched when I realized that it actually was each family’s descendants who placed flowers.
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Farewell Great Aunt Wanda
I found out that my grandma’s sister passed on tonight. Great Aunt Wanda Yinger was almost like another grandma to me because she lived across the field from Grandma and Grandpa Hill’s house, and we saw her and Great Uncle John quite often growing up. We would sometimes walk across the field with cousins and climb through their fence and play over at the Yinger’s place. They had a wooden box with water and live crawdads in it. We always liked to go peek at the odd creatures. Dad told me that when Uncle John opened the lid to get some for their fishing trip, he’d wave his hand across the top and say, “Can I have a volunteer?” The unlucky crawdads would raise their claws.