Happy Halloween and Happy Birthday, Riddick!

Happy Halloween (since I seldom update my blog on Saturdays), and Happy First Birthday Riddick!  Goodness, I'm still up after a long night of editing.  I figure it would be appropriate to update my blog with halloween themed photos before the weekend.  Hope you enjoy them! :)

The birthday was a halloween-themed birthday and was decked out in killer decor.  The cake was incredible!  The knife handle has the shape of a One.  Too cool!  Will have to find out the place Kathy picked it up.  You can't really see them as well, but the cupcakes had brain-shaped frosting.



Genius!  They made the fingers with string cheese and bell peppers and the monster teeth with apples and almonds.  Then the name labels for the drinks!



A brain carved out of a watermelon.  They don't mess around.



This was the real cake that he got to dig his hands into.  Babies + messy food = priceless!



Kisses with mom.  He's making a kissy face. :)  He practically imitated a lot of the mouth shapes we made throughout the day to entertain and keep his attention.



Cute moment with grandpa.  Taken by Jacob.



The entire gang.  Love all the different costumes.



The next photo is of Riddick's auntie and uncle, who helped make it all possible.  :)  I met Michelle and Adam as models on a photography workshop with Scott Robert.  We even had to do the Scott Robert signature pose for the memories.  They still got it!  ;)  Also, the photo in the back is Riddick's dad's.  He's a photographer himself and had tons of awesome photography around his house.



It was so good seeing old friends and making new ones.  Definitely a pleasure getting to shoot this birthday with them!  Hope this gave you some creative halloween party ideas.  If you need photography coverage for an event, let us know (jacob@estherjulee.com). :)

As for the update on the costume.  Now I am even more confused.  I'm an owner of a brand new sewing machine, and I have no idea how to operate it, starting with threading the thing.  I have tons of fabric and all sorts of crazy miscellaneous items I've never owned, but not a clue what to do with any of it. :)  The ideas are there... I assure you.  I just can't quite execute them... well... yet.  I have a backup, too, so we'll see how it all goes.  I'll update with photos next week.  Saturday, I'm hoping to go out and photograph the foliage before all the colors disappear.  It's about time for another photo adventure!

Sidenote:  Halloween-themed weddings don't look as cheesy as they sound.  But I probably wouldn't do it for my own wedding.  Cool to see though

Melinda and Ben E-session Slideshow.

Melinda and Ben's engagement slideshow. 



The song set to the slideshow is falling in love at a coffee shop by Landon Pigg.  I thought it fit the atmosphere of the photos being in Athens really well.

Probably one of the most random things I've ever done, but I was also a booth girl selling tee-shirts and CDs at Landon Pigg and Among the Oak and Ash last friday.  A fine frenzy is also on tour with them for the next few weeks if you wanna catch them.  They were all very sweet people and fun to hang out.



Wow.  I look so happy here.  Secret's out.  And I thought I was too old to have crushes.  lol  And check out that scarf that someone made him with his name on it.  Gosh, I want groupies!

Melissa Headshots.

Here's a couple headshots I did for Melissa last week.  It's just too easy when you've already done an engagement, bridal session, and wedding with them.  They were pretty much striking their own poses.  ;)



More from their session to come soon.

Halloween shopping this year is proving to be a lot more tiresome and stressful than I had imagined.  I've been doing way too much brainstorming and browsing around than doing something constructive.  Maybe it's overrated to be something creative and original.  :P  It's so much time and energy.  Maybe if I can't go for something original and creative, I'll just pick out something "sexy" or "sassy" if you're shopping at wal-mart.

Hmmmm.  It's $70 for something I'm going to wear once.  Have you guys ever returned costumes the day after Halloween?  lol

Writer's block.

I used to love blogging…  I swear.  I used to blog semi-regularly just for fun before I felt obligated to have clever things to say for each of my entries showcasing my photography work.  Oh, how obligations make things no fun.

I don't like the fact that I don't enjoy blogging anymore.  I'm always excited to share more photos, but I most certainly do not get excited thinking I will be sitting here for at least an hour staring at a blank screen.  I wish I could do a better job story-telling through words, but I am no writer… I'm a photographer.  So until I improve my writing skills, I guess I will just have to tell them more with photos.

Another tidbit of my life.  I forgot to take wall-e with me to Orlando, but I'm glad he came out to the airport to welcome me home.

Tara and Jamie E-session (Teaser).

After two rain-checks on engagement sessions (literally got rained in on both times), last Friday happened to be a perfect day for these two.  What do they say... about third time's the charm?  I know it probably would have been more appropriate to post one of the outdoor photos after saying all that, but this one from the tail-end of the session is my favorite of the day.  They look so good together.  :)

Pauline Wedding Slideshow - Huntington Beach, CA

Here's Angeline and Paul's wedding slideshow.  Click here if the below image link doesn't work. :)



Just so happens, it's posted the same day as Angeline's bday... so happy birthday Angeline! :)

What happens after Germany?

One year ago around this same time, I decided to go to a discipleship training school in a very small town in Germany to get a taste of what missions was about.  I had never even been on a short-term mission trip abroad before, but I knew it was something I wanted to experience.  In my mind, I was "open" to the idea of doing missions full-time, but I was pretty much convinced I would just go there and get a taste of what it was like and get confirmation that it simply wasn't my calling.  Little did I know, I was in for a crazy ride where it would flip my world upside down. 

It's really hard to describe everything that happened within the span of the six months I spent out of the country.  It was nice meeting new people, learning to love beyond cultures, and getting a different perspective of life.  People on the other side of the world think and live completely different from Americans.  But more importantly, I got a taste of who God was and experienced Him in ways unimaginable to me.  It shook me to the core and I knew that once I got back, I didn't want to go back to the same comfortable lifestyle I had always lived. 

I wish it was so easy as making one simple decision, and it would be smooth sailing from then on, but I guess like most things that you value, you really have to work hard for it.  The school may have given me the tools for change in my life, but honestly, the change happens when you wake up every morning and DAILY make a conscious effort not to slip into that comfortable lifestyle.  And it sure hasn't been an easy task.

This past week, four of us from the DTS had a reunion in Orlando.  It was really refreshing, and suddenly I don't feel so alone in this confusing mess YWAM has left me in.  ha  These girls first taught me what love and community was about.  Of course living together sometimes made things messy and ugly, but through the ugliness and messiness, we were actually able to grow in love for one another.  How crazy is that? :)

The week was packed with lots of catching up as well as interesting, new experiences.   We went to the shark attack capital of the world, New Smyrna Beach, and only had the guts to go knee deep in the water.  We got the rest of our tan on from swimming in the pool almost every day.  There was also lots of endless walking around.  We did the tourist thing and decided to do four disney parks in one day and wet n' wild water park another day.  That was insane.  I'm not sure I would recommend that to just anyone.  I certainly am disneyed out from putting myself through 17.5 hours of it in one day.  We ate a mountain of ice cream and saw whip it, which really made me want to bring out the skates!  And, I'm sure I can list of twenty other things we did, but really I enjoyed just being able to be in good company.  (For me, it's not so much what you do, but who you do it with).

I am incredibly blessed to have such amazing people in my life. :)  Want to thank Nancy, Michelle, and Sarah Kate for a great time this past week.  Wished the rest of the gang could be there.  We miss you dearly.  There's always next year, though. ;)  Where shall the next reunion be? HAWAII??

Just a few photos from the week.  Let me know if you want some wallpapers.





And the mountain of ice cream mentioned earlier is the kitchen sink at Beaches and Cream.  Eight scoops of ice cream and every topping imaginable topped with an entire can of whipped cream.  It was like a surprise in every bite.  Wanna see the video on how they make it?  I don't think I want to eat ice cream again for a while.



Little sad that it melted before we could finish it.  We'll have to train for next time. Harder, better, faster, stronger.



Here's a video link of us riding a kiddie roller coaster.  I can't stop laughing watching this because of how much we were screaming.

Next up: Angeline and Paul's wedding slideshow.

CRAZINESS!!!!

CRAZINESS, I tell you!!

Sorry, I've been a little MIA.  I've been a bad, bad blogger.  I've been meaning to update at least twice a week!

I was in St. George Island over the weekend.  It was beautiful weather where we got to lay out and get our tan on and swim a little.  I'm not going to go into other parts of the weekend.  I'll have to use pictures to tell the story later.  ;)  LOL. 

But I will share a pic of a new friend I took along with me to St. George.  Wall-e found a shell. :)  I think he's a cutie.



On the way back, one of our cars ran out of gas.  Not a good idea to forget to fill up the tank when you're going through hours of backroads in the middle of nowhere where gas stations all close super early.  Needless to say, we were set back a few hours and got back at 4AM Monday.  Monday was filled with some napping, editing, a client meeting, and packing again to go back to Orlando, FL the next day.

The reunion with the dts girls is happening!  This year in Orlando.  It was weird getting used to seeing each other after six months apart.  We had all roomed with each other in Germany for three months dormitory style, sharing bathrooms and listening to each other's sleep noises.  Feels like old times.  First few days have been just catching up, but we have a pretty packed week ahead of us.  We're going to be tourists!  Tomorrow we go to the number one shark attack capital of the world.  Gonna catch us some sharks. :)

Sidenote: a friend let me know my photos were on weddingbee's gallery of the day! :)  http://www.weddingbee.com/2009/10/05/gallery-of-the-day-63