Just a few from the wedding....

WOWZERS!! That was SOMETHIN'!! On the way there, Nicole and I were so excited and nervous and talking about how this could be the beginnings of a career and a partnership... we even spend who knows how long trying to think of a business name.

On the way BACK... we were beat up... exhausted... achey... and totally doubting ourselves. Shooting weddings is FREAKIN EXHAUSTING!! Not to mention the day was probably THE MOST COMPLICATED DAY FOR SHOOTING PHOTOS EVER!! It POURED, then the sun came out, it was foggy, it was clear, it was indoors in an old seaside home, it was outside in a wedding tent................ DAMN!!

Today... I am back to excited! It was a BEAUTIFUL wedding. Not over-the-top, just a bunch of people so happy to see each other and be there to support the commitment of the couple. the bride and bridesmaids were gracious and sweet, the groom and groomsmen were down to earth and welcoming. Actually EVERYONE was welcoming! They all knew that this was Nicole and my first wedding shoot and everyone was SO helpful and nice.

I can't BELIEVE how many pictures we took and how HARD it was to choose just 8 for this post!

Off to take the kids to Harry Potter :)

I learned that getting Rick Cabela's giftcards is a great way to trick him into an OOB trip!!

We had a great day yesterday!! Rick had some GC's he wanted to use at Cabela's and wanted to go down and spend them.... I said sure. Then thought... hmmmm....... Old Orchard Beach is near Cabela's..... and I haven't been boogie boarding in a couple WEEKS!! To my SHOCK... I suggested maybe we could go and Rick was totally on board. Shock because he is NOT a "beach guy" at ALL! Even after he agreed and even as we were walking to the beach, I was expecting a grumpy "Can we go yet?" dude that I would want to kill. Happily... I was wrong!! Even though the water was at LEAST 10-20 degrees colder than last time which cut our boogie boarding short, we still had a blast!!

NCA.... over.

....and as the last trophies were awarded, and the teams rejoiced over their spirit sticks one last time. The NCA team arranged themselves into formation ONE LAST TIME to preform a slow motion re-enactment of the highlights of cheer camp set to the inspirational voice of Miley Cyrus signing "The Climb." Cuz.... There's ALWAYS gonna be another mountain... and it's ALL about THE CLIMB. After all.... they are CHEERLEADERS goddamnit!

they may not know it
But these are the moments that
they're gonna remember most, yeah.

And one single tear streamed down my left cheek.

Ok Ok... I tease... but I am very proud of Jessi, her team is really good and won first place for their cheer and earned the opportunity to compete in nationals or something (a lot of the cheer talk may as well be swahili or that clickety-clack language ...lol). GO JESSI!!!!


(but seriously... all I could think of during that slow motion Miley Cyrus thing was the signing performance at the talent show in Napoleon Dynamite)

Trimmin' the blog hedges

Did a little trimmin' the hedges around the ole blog. Wow... it's been awhile since I've done that. What a difference getting a job and a life can make on internet use! It's kinda sad how much I was attached to that damn laptop!! Now I sit in front of a screen all day long at work, so it's about the LAST thing I want to do at home. (TV does not count... loves me some TV... especially since I got DirecTv "for Rick" and got all the movie channels free for 3 months!!!)

If your blog is gone from my blog list... sorry... I either got sick of waiting for you to blog... got bored of your site... or you were a casuality of my lost interest in scrapbooking. If you got an add onto my list... well consider yourself extremely privileged that I would want to spend my time reading your blog when I should be doing other things! ;-)

Taking Jessi to a college and getting her all set up in a dorm room

....is too much like taking Jessi to college and getting her set up in a dorm room.

NCA day has FINALLY arrived!!!

YAY!!! Jessi has been ready to BURST with excitement ever since school ended for NCA cheer camp! Today I drop her off at Husson University and won't see her again til Saturday.

On Saturday morning they have the last big cheer "thing" and anyone can go watch... so if anyone out there wants to come, it's at 9am and the directions just say "don't worry.... you can't miss us!!"

Cuz 1 get together and 2 blog posts weren't nearly enough....

Rick REALLY wanted to smoke some meat with his new toy... AND we learned that having a get-together the day AFTER a get together is GREAT incentive to clean the house from the first get-together... get it? ;-)

An attempt at redemption for the horrible photos I took last night ;-)

Rick's birthday weekend

Even though the weather didn't cooperate... the party was great!! Rick got some great gifts and everyone had a great time (ok... well I know _I_ did... I guess I can't really speak for everyone else...lol) Rick is head over heels in love with the smoker that his parents and brother got for him. I guess it's a good thing I am back to low-carb with a vengeance tomorrow since I have a feeling there is a LOT of smoked meat in my future!

Bath time!!

Cooper LOVES bath time..... NOT!!!

"Oh please god, not me next."

Tomorrow is your day, Sampson. Lucy's day is EVERY day... that damn dog can NOT stay dry!!

The thing about Old Orchard Beach......

Is that you have to embrace it's complete and total ghetto-fabulousness!! So many people turn their noses up at the mere mention of the place... but not this girl. I FREAKIN' LOVE IT!! From the fat WAY TOO TAN french dudes in speedos.... to the rode-hard-put-away-wet chicks with their cigs and lighter tucked into the string of their bikini... to the lobster red beer bellies.... COME ON... what is NOT to love!!?? I could just sit and watch people all day long.... if there weren't some totally rad waves to catch, dude. ;-)

Last time I made this, it was so labor and time intensive I swore it would be a LOOOONG time before it happened again.

It was SO much easier this time... "I'D" make it again ANYTIME!! ;) ;)

Summer has officially arrived

(Let's just pretend it's not cold and raining out)

Today is the first of our FABULOUS FUN FRIDAYS!!!! We wanted to start it off with some something REALLY COOL... but since it's raining, we settled for "pretty darn cool" with a trip to the UMO rec center WAY COOL POOL, lunch at Pat's Pizza, and then going to see the movie UP! I LOVE that Karyn has Friday's off too and is up for any kind of adventure with all the kids! I even caught her googling "sea kayaking in Maine" the other day!! BRING IT ON KARYN!!

it's only NOON!!!???

We are kickin' ass and takin' names today!!! The den of crap is actually almost presentable!! The hallway of "where the hell should we put this... I don't know just put it in the hallway" is CLEAN and ALL of our shoes are in the CLOSET on SHELVES!! Thanks to all my scrappy stuff going bye bye... I actually have SPACES to put things!!

Rick took about 127 contractor sized bags of bottles down to the bottle drive to save the "B" teams that got cut out of the schools budget. We will be taking FULL credit when the teams are out there playing next year. Rick also took... and is still taking... 2,769 bags of junk to the dump as he works on cleaning out the basement. I think it's ok that we skipped the gym this morning since we are both a sweaty mess!!

We also cleaned Sean's room. The dump and goodwill are now fully stocked. For reals. It was BAD.

I'd love to say now that we have it all good... it will stay that way, but who am I even trying to kid?

Orono Farmer's Market and some garden on campus...

The market wasn't really the "jackpot" for me. I bought some flowers to plant, but other than that there wasn't really anything I was interested in. After that Sean and I found a little garden to take some photos in.

Very glad to have some sunshine today!!

Chris and Raffi.... seperated at birth?

I'm just sayin'.......

Jessi has whipped up a little dessert....

Hangin' out(side)

Gorgeous day today... AND too windy for blackflies!!

Sean setting up one of his MANY "snake traps."

He has random things laying all over the yard and checks them periodically to see if any snakes have gone under. He is usually rewarded. He has mad snake trappin' skillz. Today he even almost landed a new species he had never seen before. A Milk Snake. Ew. (Not my photo... his got away too quickly.) Let's all be very happy that there are no poisonous snakes in Maine.

Here is another favorite pasttime...

I don't even know the last day that Lucy stayed dry all day long.

P.S. In case you are into that kind of thing... I didn't take these with my new zoom. Ken is taking it for a test run right now. I took all of these with my 135mm prime that I LOOOOOVE!!

'Sup chickens?

Wave bye bye to all my scrappy stuff. It's sold off to a lovely family in Dover, Maine.












Wave HELLO to my super yummy, super fast, super sharpy, new zoom lens... bought with the proceeds of aforementioned scrappy stuff! LOVES IT!!

(tried to take some fun outdoors stuff but was out there for 1 minute and am already all bloodied up from blackflies... BASTARDS!!!!)