Ep. 8: In Which I Make Like Nike at My First Wedding Gig
Here’s a story my husband doesn’t like being reminded of. Back in grad school, we were at a friend’s apartment, nearing the end of a night of drinking. Josh and…
Ep. 7: In Which I Pull a Two-fer over Memorial Day Weekend. Part 2: Dexter + Carlson Engagement Photos
In case you missed it: After a rather long hiatus on the photography and blogging front to start 2018, I dove back in headfirst over Memorial Day weekend, having booked…
Ep. 7: In Which I Pull a Two-fer over Memorial Day Weekend. Part I: Seaman Maternity Photos
The locations are idyllic—picture perfect Nebraska. On Friday: a little piece of country in the city. On Saturday: an old barn—red of course—with an empty loft, dusty light streaming in…
Ep. 6: In Which I Stay Classy in San Diego
After the usual whirlwind season of Christmases, my husband Josh and I escaped the nasty cold spell in Middle America and flew to sunny San Diego, where we met up…
Coyote Hunting Tagalong
Here’s how I closed out 2017, on one of the calm and graciously quiet days between Christmas and New Year’s: slowly going numb and trying not to move or breathe…
Behind the Scenes: Episode 5: My First Portrait Session
Camera: Sony a6000 | Lens: Sony 50mm f/1.8 OSS Prime Lens | Accessories: None | Lighting: Natural, cloudy. No flash. | Post-production: Lightroom and Photoshop In case you missed it,…
Ep. 5: In Which I Fake it till I Make it (And My First Portrait Session Actually Goes Pretty Great)
Laityn wants to wear this bow, not that one, and for this reason, she is crying.
Landen’s preferred cowboy boots don’t fit anymore, and his jeans are too big, and he is also crying.
And Lenna…wait, where’s Lenna?
We were getting ready to go out for a family photo shoot with my sister Candi and her sister-in-law Mandy (and if that isn’t confusing enough, their husbands are both named Jeremy), and things were not going well, to say the least. My bribes of later playtime were largely failing, and I was pretty resigned to the fact that my first attempt at portraiture was doomed before it even began.
But when we arrived to the pasture where we’d be taking pictures and let the kids out, it was as if the pre-picture crisis never happened. They all took off running, exploring, and then came back to me, ready to pose with the cutest dang smiles you ever did see.
It’s amazing what a little dose of open space can do.
Platte County Harvest: Some Meandering History of Nebraska Agriculture
I make it home about an hour before sunset—well, not home home, but to the field where one of my favorite pieces of home is taking place. My dad is…
Geary County State Park (Chasing Waterfalls)
It’s not too often that you’ll see me up before the sun. When it comes to the golden hours of photography—the time after sunrise and before sunset when you get…
Episode 4: In Which I do a Brave Thing and Go Back to School for a Month
When I finished grad school two years ago, I swore up and down I was done with school forever. And ever amen.
Well, this fall I broke my word and signed up for a photography class through UFM in Manhattan (it’s basically a community skillshare organization). And although the window A/C unit and old institutional building smell of the UFM conference room brought on flashbacks of my night classes in Eisenhower Hall, I managed to not immediately bolt out the door and run away as fast as I could.
(I jest, of course…kind of. Grad school was harrowing.)
The class ran through the month of September and was taught by a Manhattanite landscape photographer, Scott Bean. He’s really good at making Kansas look beautiful, and if you’re into landscapes or Kansas, you should definitely check out his work.
I didn’t necessarily sign up for the class to learn new things—I’d been through most ‘introduction to photography’ material in online courses, but I was pleased to pick up several new tips and tidbits, plus relearn a lot of things I hadn’t thought about or tried since learning them the first time.
Mostly, I was looking for a reason to practice and perhaps meet some fellow photographers—and I definitely accomplished both of those.
I even met a fellow blogger, Jill Carr, who’s just starting out with a food blog called Our Beef Kitchen. Basically, she’s an up-and-coming Ree Drummond.
The biggest draws to the class, though, were Saturday evening field trips to a few photogenic Manhattan locales.