Happy Birthday, Lisa!

Today is my sister Lisa’s birthday. She turns 37 today, 10 years older than me. She is married to Rodney Higdon (not him in the picture above. That’s our bro-in-law, Troy) and they live in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.

Unfortunately, since Lisa is so much older than I am and she’s lived out of state for many years, I don’t have millions of memories with her, but I do have some good ones. Here are a few:

• I remember her taking me on many shopping trips. She’d take me to all the cool, trendy shops and helped me choose cute outfits to try on. Sometimes she even bought them for me. That was SO cool of her!! I remember her buying me a short, white skort with purple flowers that tied in the front and on another occasion she bought me a white button-up shirt with a tie and suspenders. They were so cute (at least back then they were)! :)
• I remember watching her get ready for dates or go out dancing. She’d doll up in her gorgeous outfits and stiletto heels, curl her hair, and carefully apply her makeup. I LOVED watching her do her makeup. She would tell me about the man she was going out with or the men she was hoping to run into. I thought it was pretty amazing to be able to date. I was way too young for that at the time.
• When I was older, there were times when we’d go out together. She introduced me to the billiards hall and taught me some moves, some with the cue and some without ;) She can totally hold her own on the pool table and showed me how to work it in order to get a guy’s attention. I can testify that those moves work ;)
• She went to massage therapy school and is a talented masseuse and knows her stuff. I’ve had the pleasure of getting a massage from her and I loved it!

Some other notable things about Lisa now:

• She’s a great gift-giver. When possible, the birthday and Christmas gifts that she gives are generous. For example, one birthday she gave me a spa gift certificate!! It was awesome. When she’s not able to spend too much, she always sends a loving note with birthday wishes. It’s very thoughtful and nice.
• She has many interests and talents. It seems that she’s good at everything she tries. Like I said before, she’s a great masseuse, but she’s also a great fisherman (woman), knows all about fine jewelry and gemstones, loves to cook exotic dinners, is a shoe expert, a fast typist, loves to work out (used to be into body building), can work people like nobody’s business, and knows how to get what she wants.
• She always wanted to live in Alaska so she actually picked herself up and moved there…all by herself. I thought that was pretty brave and cool of her. She loved it and that’s where she met her husband. 

Doesn’t she sound like the most fascinating person? Well, she is.  I miss her since she’s been living away from the family and hope to visit with her soon. Happy Birthday, Lisa!! I love you!

Recent Facebook Status Updates

• My sister Breanna wished me a happy final year of youth. 
• Thanks Everyone (for birthday wishes).
• I am reading up on lateral pressures against pile foundations during spreading of foundation soil.  I love my job.  :)
• I am excited to read my new book (The Hot Shoe Diaries – Bit Light from Small Flashes, by Joe McNally) that came this morning.  Thanks Julie!
• I am out dancing with Julie, we learned the fox trot.
• Thanks for the birthday wishes everyone!  I had a great birthday.
• Fun pictures that the YM took of themselves with only a little direction (blogged here).

Happy Birthday to Me (Rob) :)

Coming off a great birthday weekend, I am feeling the love.  Having such a great family, friends, and coworkers makes the sting of turning 29 evaporate (Although my little sister did tell me to enjoy my last year of youth – 29 is coming for you too little sister!).  We had a combined March birthday party on both sides of the family.  We had so much fun at both parties!  I’m going out to lunch with my coworkers tomorrow which should be a lot of fun.

Julie surprised me with a fine evening of ballroom & swing dancing with a live 16 member orchestra/band (The Junction City Band)!  We took a lesson before the show and learned the fox trot.  We had such an amazing time and really enjoyed the romance and passion that dancing provides.  Julie is hot stuff on the dance floor!  The Junction City Band plays often so we’ll be attending another dance soon! 

As far as gifts go I really made out like a bandit. I’m going to talk about the gifts here; however, I’m not going to name the givers of the gifts for political reasons.  :)

Mae concerts tickets – I can’t express how excited I am about this concert!
Light stand bag – A nice bag made by LightWare – Awesome!
Hot Shoe Diaries, by Joe McNally – This book is amazing and I’m learning a ton about speedlight photography!
Remote Trigger for our camera – I’ve got a lot of great ideas for this!  Photos coming soon!
Sennnheiser DJ headphones – Oh man, I can’t express the sweetness, oh the sweetness of the sound!
Batman Begins DVD – Completes my Batman Collection, oh yeah.
Nice Sony DVD Player – We had a clunker of a DVD player and this one has all the nice features!  Such a nice change.

Thanks to everyone!  A ton of people wished me well on facebook which was very nice.  I had an awesome birthday thanks to all of you!  Very special thanks to Julie and the kids for making me the happiest husband and father on the planet!  I feel very loved. 

Foto Friday - Untitled

Taken with the Nikon D40 in Washington City, Utah on October 21, 2008. Manual Exposure Mode, 50mm, 1/60sec at f/6.3 ISO 400, Nikon Raw Format converted to Adobe DNG format. Edited in Lightroom 2.3

This week I selected this photo of the wheel of an old-time fire cart.  The cart was on display near an existing fire station in Washington City.  We added this photo and a few others to the St. George set from our trip last year - check out the new additions at the end of the set. I made a few quick edits in Lightroom; converted to black and white, increased the exposure and clarity (mid-tone sharpening), and added the slightest amount of split-toning. Today is my birthday so I’m going to keep it short and sweet.  Have a great weekend!

Senior Portraits for Liz – Senior Portraits Package Special

Today we want to share a few senior portraits that we recently took of Julie’s niece. For family members, here’s a link to her session proofs. Liz wanted a few portraits set in more of an elegant and formal tone so we chose the Joseph Smith Memorial Building for the amazing columns on the mezzanine and great architecture.  Inside we tried to capture a few different moods, some simple and playful, others more strong, independent, and confident. 

For a different look, Liz changed outfits and we went outside for a more casual setting. As usual, Julie had some great ideas for locations and posing that worked really well for Liz.  We stopped by some stairs near the South Visitor’s Center for some cute photos, the outer wall near the Assembly Hall where some attitude came out, and finally in a nook of the Assembly Hall for a sweeter look. 

We’re still planning on taking some tennis shots (she’s on the Taylorsville High School tennis team) and some cool, artsy shots of her welding. We’ll get with Liz again soon so stay tuned for those photos. We had so much fun with Liz and are thrilled to photograph her at such a pivotal time in her life. We hope she can look back on these pictures when she’s older and remember how fun and crazy her high school days were. She is so beautiful, inside and out, and we hope these photos will always remind her of that.

Now for the deals. 

Package 1 - $55.00

Up to One Hour
One Location
Two Outfits (formal/casual/sport/cap & gown)
One 8X10
Two 5x7
Six 4X6
Digital Version (Web-Sized) of Purchased Images

Package 2 - $110.00

Up to Three Hours
Two Locations
Three Outfits (formal/casual/sport)
Two 8x10
Three 5x7
Twelve 4x6
Sixty Wallets (For Graduation Announcements)
An additional portrait taken after the cap and gown are received
Digital Version (Web-Sized) of Purchased Images

Additional prints may be purchased a la carte.

Please contact us for an appointment or with any questions.

What Are We Up To?

I thought I’d share a few things that we’ve been up to lately. Good times.

Rob’s the Young Men’s President now and he really enjoys it. He works with great men who also work hard in their callings and the boys are great. He’s excited for High Adventure this July when they will be hiking up King’s Peak for a week. Me? Not all that excited for it…wish I were going…

Nate is almost totally potty trained!!! YAY!!! We have a little more practice with him going at places other than home. But when he’s here, he’s almost 100%, even over night!! I usually don’t even have to remind him to go. He just does it on his own. Such a stud. One gripe, why do the underwear makers put the pictures of Cars, Thomas, etc. on the back of the underwear instead of the front??? Nate insists on wearing his underwear backwards so he can see the characters. This presents him with a perpetual wedgy.

Speaking of potty stuff, we can now call Miss Madeleine “Poo Face” (but we won’t). She is a chronic bum scratcher. Every time she has a chance, she has her hand down the back of her diaper scratching. I guess you can see where this is going. I went in her bedroom to get her this morning and she had poo all over her face. Gross!

Last night we had the Lingwall’s over for dinner. We’d been trying to get together for, like, 28 emails. But we finally pulled it off. Tonight we’re having Rob’s sister and her family over for dinner. Last Friday we went bowling with my sister and her husband. Rob won both games by quite a bit but the rest of us were pretty close. Wednesday we’re probably going to Tracy Aviary with some friends, sometime this week we have a March birthday party with Rob’s family, and I have a playgroup on Thursday. It’s so great to be surrounded by family and friends! It just makes me feel good.

Tomorrow night for Pack Meeting I’m presenting an Arrow of Light award with a ceremony. There hasn’t been one given in our ward in recent memory so I have no precedence to follow. Should be fun. Hope I can pull it off.

Well, that’s all I can think of for now. I hope everyone has a GREAT day!!

--Julie

Happy Birthday, Mark!

Today is my brother, Mark’s, birthday. He turns 26 today…only 16 months younger than me. He is engaged to Cammie and they have a beautiful, sweet baby girl named Racheal who is 8 months old.

I happen to have a fantastic memory, so I’m able to recall moments of us playing together when we were very young. I’d say I was probably 3 and he was 1 1/2 when my first memories take place. He was such a fun kid. Always up for anything and was so funny! He always made me laugh and helped me chill out (I was (am) a little high strung). Since we were so close in age, I have a ton of memories. Some of them include:

• Watching him fall down the stairs in his baby walker and laughing because I thought it looked funny. Luckily, he was fine…tough kid.
• We had a space heater and his favorite stuffed animal, his Snuggle bear, got singed.
• We loved climbing the apricot tree in our backyard. It probably wasn’t even an apricot tree, but we always sung Popcorn Popping while we were sitting up in it. One day his coat got stuck on a branch and he was unable to climb down. He just hung there and I thought it was HYSTERICAL. After a while of laughing I finally went inside to tell my mom.
• We loved exploring together when we visited my Grandparent’s house up in the California mountains. We found treasures, played with the dog, and swung on the tree swing. One year, when I was 10 and he was 8 1/2 he and I were visiting my grandparents (just the two of us). It was fun spending that one-on-one time with him. I ended up getting really homesick and would confide in him. I remember him saying, “Don’t worry, I know it’s hard. But it’ll be okay.” He was really understanding and was cool with going home early even though he was having a good time.
• He went through a phase when he was mean and hit our little sister. This would upset me so one night I typed this note on the typewriter (I was 9, he was 7 1/2). “Dear Mark, I want you to know that I can see everything youre doing to your sisters. I do not want to see you not coming home to happiness. I love you dearly. Signed, Your Father in Heven.” I don’t think it made an impact…
• Many times when I was practicing the piano he would do anything he could to distract me. He’d bang on the keys and try to make me laugh. He made up a scary song where he played two really high notes very slowly, then it got faster and faster until finally, he banged on the very low notes. He’d also pretend my electronic metronome was a time bomb. He’d set the tempo really high, then pressed the button so it made a buzzing sound as he threw it into the living room as he was hurling himself out trying to escape the explosion. It always made me laugh.
• We liked to watch movies together at home and in the theatre. One time we went together to see The Fast and The Furious and I thought it was really cool that we were doing something fun together, even though we were teenagers and should be “too cool” for that.
• I let him borrow my car one night when he was 16 to take his then girlfriend out on a special date. I went to bed and he came into my room sometime in the middle of the night and said, “Julie, I was in an accident.” My first thoughts and words were, “Are you okay??!!” I remember that it kind of surprised me that I wasn’t concerned about my car at all. I mean, I was 18 and it was my new car that I had just bought with my own money! But I was truly concerned about him being hurt. And, by-the-way, Mark, you still owe me $500.00…;)

Some other notable things about Mark now:

• I’ve always thought he looks so handsome in a suit.
• He is a great uncle. He always tries to talk to and listen to his nieces and nephews. He has a sincere interest in their lives. There are a couple of young crazy boys who love to wrestle and he tries to do it whenever he can, even when his bad back aches.
• He really loves his fiancé and daughter. He looks out for them and is trying to give them a great life surrounded with family and love. And it’s so cute that he and his daughter give each other the same ornery look!
• I’ve always been impressed with how thoughtful he is of others. He gives my mom hugs, talks at length to my dad about subjects that interest him, is protective of his sisters, and is a genuine GREAT guy.

Happy Birthday, Mark!! I love you!!

Foto Friday – Silhouette

This photo was taken at the Jensen Nature Park in Syracuse, Utah last month as the sun was trying to set. I really liked how the details of the plant (can’t remember what it’s called!) stood out against the beautiful sky. The clouds were parting in such an interesting way and I loved how it framed the shot.

In post-processing, I simply used a Lightroom preset which completely blackened out the foreground and brightened up the background while adding a vignette. Simple as that!

I’ve added two other pictures I took that evening to our Jensen Nature Park flickr set. They are “Double Barbed Wire” and “Thistle”.

Birthday Girl

Today is Madeleine’s 1st birthday. She’s a St. Patrick’s Day girl! Here are pics of her great family party on Sunday where I dressed her up in her new jelly shoes with painted toenails, a tutu, a necklace, and flowers in her hair. SHE WAS ADORABLE!!! We had a great time with all of her cousins, aunts and uncles, grandparents, and great grandparents. I think her favorite part was the ice cream cone.

She had her check up yesterday and she is 29 in (54%), 18.15 lbs (17%), with a head circumference of 46.6 cm (89%).  She has two teeth on the bottom and has four popping through on the top. She’s a very healthy and happy baby (except she’s crying right now…ready for a nap).

Man, this year has flown by so fast. Last year at this time I was in the hospital having contractions and waiting for the epidural to find it’s way into me. The anesthesiologist was helping someone else first and I was having so much pain the nurses gave me some other good stuff to take the edge off. It felt sooooo gooooood……

She was just adorable when I saw her. Looked so much like her brother! Her little fingers were like toothpicks and I was afraid of snapping one. She was so pleasant and slept a lot. Didn’t cry at all for the first week. Just a little angel. Her dad, brother, and I are bewildered at the thought of what our family would be like without her. 

Here is the card we printed for her invitation. They’re a great deal starting at $30.00 for 20 cards with price per card going down the more you order (does not include price of the photoshoot if one is needed). So think of us for your invitation/announcement needs. (Discount for family).

Foto Friday - Innocence

Taken with the Nikon D40 in Layton, Utah on March 3, 2009. Manual Exposure Mode, 55mm, 1/125sec at f/5.6 ISO 200, Nikon Raw Format converted to Adobe DNG format. Edited in Lightroom 2.3

I love this photo of my daughter for a lot of reasons.  It really catches her sweet and happy personality and really embodies the innocence that children possess.  When I look into her eyes and admire her beautiful face, a flash of memories go through my mind that show her great personality.  Those thoughts make me so happy.  Madeleine is a very important part of our family and we love her very much.  I don’t know what we would do without her!  Her brother and I are going to have to fight off all the boys that will line up to get her phone number!  I’m already worried!

I put up a some cool shots of Nate a few days ago that were a lot of fun to take and process.  Mad’s birthday is coming up soon and we needed a similar type of image for her birthday invitations (I’ll post the invite soon) and they also happen to go along with Nate’s very well.  I used my SB-600 flash camera left with my 45” shoot-thru umbrella for soft lighting of the face with a white reflector camera right to fill the shadows just a little. Nate has a little 1.5’ tall train table that makes an awesome platform for photographing the little ones (see setup graphic below).  This setup is very simple and I love the great catchlights in the eyes that this setup provides.  Catchlights make people look “alive” and I always try to have them in my portraits.

 

In post processing I increased the exposure and contrast a little and converted the exposure to black and white.  I made several adjustments to the color channels to get the black and white conversion right (this is like using color filters on the lens).  I wanted it to match Nate’s portrait from the other day so I used the split toning controls to give the warm color to the black and white image.  I used the adjustment brush to bring out her eyes.  I made a Lightroom preset for my split-toning treatment and an adjustment brush preset for eyes (I’ve been using this on some of our recent photos).  If any Lightroom users are interested let me know and I might share them with you.  :)  The preset for eyes is part of the adjustment brush tool and only works with Lightroom 2.

If you want even more details related to this image you can get them on the more properties page for this image on flickr (it even documents the tweaks I made with the adjustment brush).  I hope you enjoy this photo and hope you enjoy yourself behind the lens! 

RJ Snow Photography Photowalk at Temple Square

Right on the heels of the Exposure workshop we are announcing the spring photowalk to be held at Temple Square on Saturday April 11, 2009 at 8am.  It is kind of early; however, we want to go for the best light possible.  The sun will have just risen to bathe all the east facing areas with superb light.  We selected the week after general conference when the area is a little less packed; however, the tulips should still look great and we may even have some blossoms. 

We expect the event to last for a couple of hours; however, as usual we can stay as little or as long as we would like.  After the photowalk, those interested can meet at the Nauvoo Cafe (menu) for a late breakfast or early lunch.  To RSVP a spot please leave a comment in this post or send us an email using this form.  See you at the photowalk!

Foto Friday – His House

I cheated this week. Rob actually took these pictures. He didn’t think they were any good and wanted to delete them. But I sure do! I decided to post-process them and really like how they turned out. I had a lot of things planned to say regarding this week’s Foto Friday. Unfortunately, I’ve been sick all day so I just don’t have the energy. 

But I will say that I love going to the temple. It’s a house of worship, a house of learning, a house of prayer. It’s the Lord’s house. We’re very blessed to have so many temples around the world, over 120! It gives so many people the opportunity to feel our Heavenly Father’s presence and gives us an eternal perspective. We feel so loved when we’re there. I know the gospel of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is true.

Here are a few other St. George Temple shots. Enjoy!

Happy Birthday, Karen!

I decided that for 2009, I would do a post dedicated to each of my siblings on their birthday. Today is my youngest sister, Karen’s, birthday. She is turning the ripe age of 20. She has been married to Jake Hymas for 1 1/2 years and has a daughter, Jordin, who is 9 months old.

I remember coming home from a friend’s house one afternoon and my brother, Brian, ran to me and told me that mom had her baby. I was excited to have a baby around. As she became a toddler, my friends and I would play house all the time and she’d be our baby. She followed us everywhere and we thought it was so fun! We always made fun of her “plumpness” but she was just so cute! I liked to choose her outfits.

Some other memories that aren’t often shared:

• She had the chickenpox when she was maybe 3 and I thought it would be funny to connect the dots all over her body with a permanent marker. HAHAHA. Mom wasn’t thrilled, but it still makes me laugh.
• I and my other two younger siblings would always fight over who she got to tag along with at family functions. 
• I remember she would giggle like crazy. Always smiled. Super easygoing. Didn’t need the spotlight. You could persuade her to anything you wanted her to, and we did. Extremely shy around people outside the family. Embarrassed easily, but would just giggle it off.
• She was in a choir when she was maybe 7 and I was impressed with how well she sang.
• We went to Hawaii as a family when I was 16 and she was 9.  My little brother and I made up a song for her sung to the tune of “Popcorn Popping”…”I looked out the window and what did I see? Karen falling off the balcony. I looked up and to my surprise, Karen was falling right before my eyes. I can see an arm there and foot there, too. And there is her head stuck up in a tree. It was really so, and it seemed to me, Karen could not defy gravity." Wow. That’s bad!! And I can’t believe I still remember it!
• I shared a room with her for a few months when I was 19 and she was 12. She was on the top bunk and every night I would beg and kick the bottom of her mattress until she would sing me “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” to sleep. I did it partly because I could and it was funny. But partly cause I just liked to hear her sing.
• Rob and I took her and Rob’s sister to Las Vegas about 5 years ago. We went shopping and we were pointing at different clothing items we liked. Finally, at one store, I pointed to a sweater I thought was really cute and classy and she said, “Julie, you have such a MOM style.” I was so offended, especially since I was only 23 and wasn’t even a mom. That phrase STILL haunts me every time I go shopping…it echoes in my mind…

Some other notable things about Karen now:

• She is still very easy going. No drama, no stress. It’s such a relief!
• She is an animal lover! She’d be weird cat woman if she could. Just kidding. But she does love cats and dogs and is SO sad she can’t have a pet right now.
• She and her husband are so easy to take pictures of because they have great chemistry, aren’t afraid to show affection, give great looks to the camera, and are FUN!
• She’s a great mom. Her daughter gets lots of affection and all the cutest clothes and accessories a girl could ask for.
• She the BEST youngest sister an older sister could ask for.

Happy Birthday, Karen!! I love you!!

Nate and some new photo gear

Our children are extremely photogenic and here are a couple of good examples of that.  I recently got everything I need to use my SB-600 flash as an off-camera flash and I am completely thrilled with the results!  I used my SB-600 at about 1/8th power with a 45” shoot-through umbrella camera left with a 42” reflector camera right.  Nate made this awesome pouty face because his sister knocked over his trains (out of the frame near his feet). 

This shot was taken the same way except that Nate had pushed over the reflector (this is how I got such a cute expression on his face).  We repeated this exercise about 4 times and the photo above is my favorite from the set. What a stud!  I went with a split-toned black and white treatment for this one and I think it works well.

Nate has been so much fun lately and is learning so much.  Nate had is adenoids (it really bugs me that we say adenoids when there is only one adenoid) out and tubes put in his ears a couple of weeks ago and his audiologist recently confirmed that he is now hearing normally!  Go Nate!  Hearing better has made a huge difference for him.  His speech is getting much better and we are just so happy for him.  Here are a couple of cute things he has done lately.

He had a cold the other day so we told him we were going to put the humidifier in his room.  He got an intense look on his face and said, “no fire in my room!”  I told him that it wasn’t a fire and that it would put water in the air to help him breath, to which he responded, “but it will get in my eyes!”  After we put his fears to rest he was pretty excited about the whole thing. 

On Sunday, I ran in the door from a home teaching visit, grabbed a snack, told everyone that I was late, and that I was going to visit with the Bishop.  Nate said that he wanted to come and was really enthusiastic about it!  I told him that he could go with me to visit his friend Kohen later and that I would be right back.  He was excited to go visit his friend but was really bummed that he couldn’t go with me to visit the bishop.  Weird I thought.  Later that evening, Julie told me that further conversation with Nate showed that Nate thought I was going to visit the spaceship rather than the bishop.  :)

My family rocks!

A Saturday With The Cromey’s

A few weeks ago some friends (Brad, Tiffiany, and Lincoln Cromey) had decided to drive all the way up to Roy from Eagle Mountain to take their son to the Hill Aerospace Museum (pictures). Since we live just a couple of minutes away from the museum, they called us up and invited us to join them. Luckily, we hadn’t made other plans and were able to go.

It was windy and chilly, but the boys had SO much fun! They ran from airplane to airplane pointing up at them and smiling. They even got to go inside a helicopter! But when all that good stuff got old, they had a blast chasing each other in circles and in between the rows of chairs. But I’d say out of everything, their favorite part was putting coins in the donation funnel and watching them go around, and around, and around. Simple pleasures, eh?

After all that excitement, we decided to go to lunch at The Pizza Factory. It was a little crazy with the boys fighting over Lincoln’s motorcycle toys and Madeleine spilling a huge glass of ice water, but the company and food was fantastic.

Thanks, Cromey’s, for the fun Saturday! Next time we’ll meet down your way.

RJ Snow Photography Workshop Aftermath

We would like to thank all that came and participated in our workshop on Saturday.  We had such a great time learning about photography.  Special thanks to Shannon (see her stuff here) for joining us and sharing her skill and knowledge of photographic subjects.  If you would like to review the materials or if you didn’t attend and would like to learn more about exposure, please review the slideshow and handout (pending) from the event.  Hopefully, we’ll see you next time. 

We have started a group on Flickr for sharing photos that were taken during our photowalks and workshops.  If you’re not a member of Flickr then sign up (it’s free). Please join the group and submit your photos.  I was busy helping people and didn’t get a chance to take any pictures; however, Julie took some really cool pictures that you can see in the group. 

If any of you would like to offer some feedback on the workshop, please do so in the comments or send us an email.