a texas wedding.

For those of you that know me well, you know I don't particularly like shooting weddings. At all. I have been known to be coerced into photographing them on a rare and special occasion if I'm close with the people getting hitched and they ask nicely enough. Well, I officially came out of my "retirement" from weddings after a year-long hiatus for my two good friends Dylan Burrows and Mylah Watkins (now Burrows). Back in the fall of 2007, I lived in Greece and was a sort of temporary assistant to the Greece program they were both attending at the time. They met while living there and became close friends before returning to the states and later getting romantically involved. How could I say no to such a perfect couple who met in my favorite country and grew to know eachother in my company?

I couldn't.

After the beautiful ceremony, which was led by the director of the Greece program, I was a little discouraged by the lack of light I had to work with, as it'd set fairly quickly in the moments we scrambled to take family group shots. Lucky for me, the lighting just after sunset paired with the warm glow beneath the gazebo(?) they shared vows beneath made the perfect setting for the best shot of my day.

I figured it was blog-worthy and decided to post it for the world to see. Just don't get any ideas and start asking me to shoot another wedding anytime soon.

portrait of tijuana.

I was lucky enough to go down to Tijuana for Thanksgiving and work with and photograph Spectrum Ministries. Even more wonderful was that I was able to write an article and post a photo gallery from the day via my new job at The Patch.

Here's the article: http://imperialbeach.patch.com/articles/thanksgiving-thursday-in-tijuana

And here's the photo gallery: http://imperialbeach.patch.com/articles/photo-gallery-tijuana-thanksgiving#photo-3465113

I couldn't be more excited to be following my dream and finally working as a photojournalist again. The best part about it is that The Patch not only assigns me stories to write and photograph, but allows me to seek out my own. That's why I got to combine all of my loves yesterday. Ministry and photojournalism. I couldn't have asked for a better Thanksgiving.

Along with taking photos of the events of the day, I shot dozens of portraits of the neighborhood residents where we were working. By the end of the day, I had groups coming up to me tugging at my sleeve and camera strap, asking for their photos to be taken.

This is one of my favorite portraits of the day.

slice and a smoke.

The friends I stayed with in Brooklyn have a wonderful band called Swamp Cat. You should definitely check them out. (Ukulele, spoons, washboard, trumpet, accordion…pure awesomeness.) I was lucky enough to get a chance to attend a show of theirs on my trip to New York City. After the show, a few of us were famished, and what do you do when you're starving in the middle of the night in New York City? Grab a slice of pizza. This is my friend Nate outside the pizza place around the corner from the venue.

Fun fact about this photo: this was taken outside the same pizza place I grabbed a shot of from a cab over a year ago…seen here.