Ashleigh, a native Kansan, met Alex when she moved to Massachusetts after graduating from the University of Kansas. She was out one night when she saw him and decided to approach him. When she went up to introduce herself to him, he didn’t respond. Alex said he couldn’t hear her when she introduced herself. Apparently they ended up hearing each other at some point in time because they’ve been together ever since

We shot their engagement session in various places on the University of Kansas campus and throughout Lawrence, Kansas beginning at the mecca of college basketball, Allen Fieldhouse! Like just about every other Jayhawk, Ashleigh bleeds KU basketball. But Alex just doesn’t quite understand the passion that is KU Basketball! It won’t be long before he’s made into a believer though.

Love that ring!

After leaving Allen Fieldhouse, we headed over to the cute little “love garage” on campus. I LOVE the love garage But I do think I love Alex and Ashleigh’s Zoolander impressions a little bit more! Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you…*drum roll*…Alex and Ashleigh’s rendition of Blue Steel:

Don’t really remember what was going on here, but I’m pretty sure this elicited an “AWWWWW” from me. Yep, pretty certain.

They went bowling on their first date so in honor of that, we went to the Jaybowl in the Kansas Union and took a few shots there.

LOL

I absolutely loved working with you two! Can’t wait to see you again!

Many thanks to ultra-fab make up artist Leslie and the lovely model Erin for braving the 34˚ morning cold (which is actually kind of warm, I suppose!) and absolutely rocking out the shoot. The shoot took place on my old stomping grounds of Lawrence, Kansas–where I spent 8 of the best years of my life! So any reason to return to Lawrence is a good one. We started off our shoot just north of the river by the trail and ended the shoot in some of the alleys behind Mass St.

MUA (and stylist): Leslie of Classically Chic Designs by Leslie
Model: Erin

I.Absolutely.Adore.This.Jacket. Like, if I was some sizes smaller, Leslie and Erin would not have left the shoot with it. lol

This is an image I’ve been wanting to create for a while! Can’t wait to try something like this again!

Definitely loved her whimsical look in the midst of the alley.

Work it!

I absolutely loved working with the both of you! Can’t wait to do it again!

• Celebrating the 6th anniversary of my 21st birthday
• Applying for my first passport
• Going to and photographing my first Hollywood party
• Photographing my first Desi wedding
• Wearing a salwar kameez for the first time. They’re very comfortable:

• Finally learning to read the Devanagari script
• Not gaining any of the nearly 30 lbs I lost (but not losing any either lol)
• Got some of my images of the space shuttle Endeavour featured on CNN iReport
• Speaking to a native Spanish speaker in Spanish (those six years of studying Spanish really did pay off!)
• Speaking to a native Urdu speaker in Urdu (that was actually really awesome)
• Being able to maintain my natural hairstyle! If you all have seen/felt/dealt with my hair, then you know how much of an accomplishment that is
• Finally settling on a logo and website design that I absolutely love and will not want to change in 4 months lol
• Last, but certainly not least: all of my awesome clients that I can say, without a doubt, that I love to pieces

So it is in this spirit of reflection that I also include some of my favorite images captured this year!

I am incredibly excited for what 2013 has in store!

• Am a really big nerd.
• Love logic puzzles. (Hello, Crytoquip and Sudoku)
• Love learning new languages.
• Am obsessed with Bollywood movies. (Obsession may be a bit of an understatement)
• Currently have India on my bucket list of countries to visit.

Based off of all of that, OF COURSE I’d start learning Hindi, right? Right Learning a new language is like solving a puzzle every time I sit down to translate. I felt that way when I was studying Spanish (for 6 years), French (for about a month), and Italian (for about a day ).

I am particularly excited now because I’ve been trying to learn Hindi off and on for the past couple of years but I have just now finally decided to commit to really actually learning it lol. And learning it I certainly am!

So that brings us to my favorite image of this week. These are some practice sentences written in the Devanagari script that I rewrote into romanized Hindi and then translated back into English. I was so excited and proud that I finally accomplished something!

My goal is to be conversational in the next few months. Let’s see if that happens

It was so much fun being able to spend the evening with Terrell and Krystal and getting to know them better during their engagement session. They are so fun, relaxed, and easy going and it was an absolute pleasure to work with them!

We started off the session right near the Kaufman Performing Arts Center. I love this area–there is never a shortage of awesome locations.

I love ring shots…which you’ll probably be able to tell by looking through this post, lol.

Awww

Once the sun went down, we headed over to the Crossroads district and finished up the shoot in an alley, with very “colorful” words spray painted on the walls lol.

At this point of the session, I pulled out my phone (thank You, Lord for YouTube!) and played Kem’s “Share My Life”. Terrell was feelin’ it! Loved this shot I got of them dancing together. So sweet!

…they were dancing but not to Kem’s song, lol.

Krystal and Terrell are hilarious and are not afraid to get a little goofy for me. This is one of the many reasons why I’m so happy they are my clients!

The last couple of shots of the night!

I’m so excited to shoot your wedding! Already counting down the days to July 6!

And many thanks to Jessica for assisting me during this engagement session!

• My latest TV obsessions:

Thank you Netflix for introducing me to Heroes and Gossip Girl. I have now been as least productive as I’ve been all year. …and you can add White Collar to that list as well.

• I believe I have finally conquered my fear of flying. Now whenever there is turbulence, I don’t freak out. Instead, I look at the flight attendants. If I don’t like their facial expressions, THEN (and only then) do I freak out.

• This is home for me.

• I am guaranteed to love (usually popular) songs years after they come out and play them like they’re new. Those songs for me right now are:
*American Boy–Estelle
*Who Needs Shelter–Jason Mraz
*I Don’t Trust Myself (With Loving You)–John Mayer
*Stop This Train–John Mayer
*Edge of Desire–John Mayer
*Clarity–John Mayer
*Vultures–John Mayer
*Come To Bed–John Mayer
Actually, pretty much anything by John Mayer, I’m going to like, lol. (If that wasn’t already evident)

• I have a love/hate relationship with rainy days. I love them because they make my night’s sleep so much better. I hate them because my hair never wants to agree with me. Being natural is definitely an experience, but it’s a not-so-fun one when my I try to force my hair to do one thing and it clearly has other plans.

• I got to meet super fab Nashville photographers Zach and Jody Gray at the Kansas City SMUG meetup last Thursday. I learned so much from their presentation and I can’t wait to implement some of their techniques in my business!

• I am currently dancing in front of my computer screen. And I must say, I’m actually staying on beat! I’m about as good of a dancer as I am a shower singer.

• Tomorrow, November 6th, is a very important day. To you all, it’s Election Day. But for me, it’s my parents’ 36th wedding anniversary

Yay Mom and Dad! When I say I have the best parents in the world, I truly mean it–God has blessed me with the most awesome parents anyone could ever have and I love them very much

• And speaking of Election Day, this pretty much sums up my thoughts of this election cycle:

And so that’s it’s for now! Back to editing I go Be on the look out for Saturday’s engagement session with Krystal and Terrell coming soon to the blog (next few days).

This week’s favorite image segment comes from this past weekend’s wedding that I had the pleasure of second shooting with Sarah Winston Photography! Thank you so much Sarah for inviting me to shoot alongside you!

Their wedding was an absolutely beautiful event at The Loretto in Kansas City, Missouri. I had heard a lot about this venue so I was pretty excited to finally shoot there.

I’m known for photographing people at the times when they least expect it (paparazzi style), you know to capture the realest of emotions . But Tomme’ said that I wasn’t going to catch him slipping…and I didn’t. But not for a lack of trying!

Details

Brittany’s beautiful dress!

Where their ceremony was held, right before a lot of the guests starting arriving. The sunlight pouring into the room was what dreams are made of.

Brittany was such a gorgeous bride!

I love seeing couples jump the broom!

Love! These two were making my heart melt

Parent toasts.

How cute!

Congratulations Tomme’ and Brittany! I had so much fun on your wedding day!

I had SO much fun shooting this wedding. Lots of food + lots of dancing=my idea of a great time. Over the weekend, I heard some of my favorite songs (Maula Mere Maula and Pee Loon) and got sing along with them. When everyone started dancing, I had to suppress the urge to dance too (I didn’t want to embarrass myself with my lack of dancing skills)!

The best part of all of this (in addition to getting to know Jawad and Mehreen) was meeting both of their families! They are such sweet and lovely folks that were kind enough to not laugh at me when I tried speaking (and singing in) Urdu .

It was an amazing experience and I am honored that Jawad and Mehreen chose me to photograph both of their special days!

And many thanks to Jordan for all of the help with shooting during the weekend!

And we’re going to start off this post with one of my favorite shots:

Jawad and Mehreen’s shaadi (wedding) took place at the Overland Park Marriott. The shaadi day is a very elaborate affair where rings are exchanged and cake is cut. Their colors were red and gold–from the room decor, down to the details, and Mehreen’s lehenga.

Mehreen getting her makeup done by super fab makeup artist Ayesha Baig!

Jawad and Mehreen are such a gorgeous couple!

Congratulations to the both of you!

Gene and Joslyn went with a Grammy theme for their day which was absolutely perfect for them. Gene is a rapper and Joslyn sings and it is music that brought them to together. They connected through music when they met each other four years ago in a parking lot. Joslyn sang a song for Gene and they agreed to meet up to work on some music. When Joslyn met up with Gene totally unprepared to work on music (she didn’t bring a pen or any paper to write–tsk, tsk Joslyn lol ) things only progressed from there

Almost a year after getting engaged in Las Vegas, Gene and Joslyn were wed in front of their close family and friends at Metropolitan Missionary Baptist Church in Kansas City, Missouri. Their reception was at the beautiful Vox Theatre in Kansas City, Kansas. Many thanks to my second shooter Casey Wright for all of her help throughout the day!

Joslyn getting ready!

Casey captured shots of Gene while he was getting ready.

Gene and Joslyn opted to see each other before the ceremony. This freed up a lot of time to do some more creative shots and enabled us to make it to the reception even sooner after the ceremony! These next few shots are the first time they saw each other on their wedding day

How the rings made it down the aisle.

Joslyn and Gene’s mothers right as the ceremony was starting.

Some details from their Grammy themed reception at the Vox Theatre. That cake was DELICIOUS.

First dances.

I was really fighting back tears as Gene danced with his mom!

And below is a slideshow from some of their images from throughout their wedding day!

Gene and Joslyn I had so much fun spending your day with you and your families! Congratulations and I can’t wait to see you again!