We walked around and even hopped some fences in and around Crissy Field and I find the fence hopping pretty impressive for a woman who was 38 weeks pregnant at the time!

Enjoy your sneak peek, Chrissy! 30+ comments will get Chrissy an adorable gift. Show her some love.

The truth is that I am so busy with client photos that I am not motivated to pick my camera up for personal use and I am ashamed to admit it but it’s been 3 years since i’ve taken a birthday photo,  a photo of my children opening gifts at christmas, or anything for that matter on a digital camera but instead opted to use my iPhone.

Listen, don’t get me wrong I am glad to have SOMETHING but it’s kind of sad to think that I don’t have something that I can print bigger than a 5×7 and what if I lost all of the photos on my phone? What then?

I have no prints, instead everything is just sitting uselessly online… You know because in 50 years my great, great, great, grand kids are going to friend request me on Facebook and look through my photo albums (said with sarcasm). I know how important it is to document and print but I had gotten lazy. In the last 3 years my children have changed so much that the photos on my walls don’t even look like them anymore.

Now onto the story,

I was sitting at my friend Cindy’s house and Cindy shoots primarily film, she has beautiful images! It never would have crossed my mind that some day I might want to be a film photographer, I mean lets face it I couldn’t even pick up my digital camera so what would motivate me to pick up a film camera and then go get film developed? Cindy asked me if I would like to shoot a roll of film sometime and I begrudgingly agreed because I was trying to be a nice guest but I wasn’t exactly stoked about shooting for fun.. it had been too long since I had shot for fun and I had so much real work to do that I just didn’t think it was wise to add personal work to the pile.

Fast forward a couple of months, I get a text from Cindy, “What are you doing this weekend? Want to shoot that roll?” I had no plans so I decided, “Why not?” I love hanging out with Cindy so the shooting was just something else to do. I show up and she hands me her Hasselblad with an instant back on it, for those of you who are not photographers, I am probably speaking greek right now but just imagine an amazing camera that happens to spit photos out like a polaroid.

As I am holding the camera I am excited and nervous. Digital cameras give you so much information, you can see what your photo looks like immediately, if you don’t like it you can reshoot it with no consequence, and you can shoot as much as your memory cards allow… this was film, I had to get it right the first time because every frame costs money!

It was sort of refreshing, i’ve been shooting digital so long that I’ve not had to think about the shooting aspect of it anymore because it comes so naturally and like I said, if an image doesn’t turn out I know right then and can just redo it with zero consequence.

From the first frame I was hooked, I sat and waited the 120 seconds for that polaroid to process like a kid on christmas morning  and there It was, a print in my hand.. something I could pin on the wall and not on a Facebook page! The colors were a soft pastel, it was the prettiest thing i’ve seen in a long time and the quality of the colors is something i’ve never seen on digital.

I went straight home and started researching film cameras and ended up purchasing the exact kit Cindy has, a Hasselblad 500CM and it’s been my partner for the last two months and literally goes everywhere with me.. I am sure I look like the biggest nerd but I don’t care. In the last two months I’ve shot 5 rolls of actual film and 160 polaroid images for my own personal pleasure. I feel like i’ve found my passion in photography all over again. It’s hard to narrow down the hundreds of images I’ve taken into one blog post but i’ll do my best. Thank you Cindy for introducing me to film and for draining my bank account. We both appreciate you.

My very first film photo

The adorable Olive, Cindy’s baby.

Cindy and Olive

St Baldricks is our families favorite charity and next year our son will also be involved in the shaving process but this year it was just Colin and I don’t know about you but he looks super handsome with a bald head! Not only did he shave his head but his boss also bid on an eyebrow… not both… just one and  Colin being the great sport he is just shaved it off. Luckily his eyebrows are pretty light.

If you would like, you can donate in more ways than shaving your head. Click on the link above to learn more.

Let me start by saying that this is going to be a very long post – The Brocious family is a long time client of mine and every year I look forward to the children’s birthday parties, it’s a big event! The theme is usually a secret until the end and I don’t know how Orousha and her party planner Sam do it but they manage to out do themselves every party. This time was no exception with an Alice in Wonderland themed party for Aasha. I wish I had half the creativity that these two have. My idea of a great party consists of nothing bunt cakes and a fork!

I am always honored to be a part of the festivities – I may have had too many cupcakes… Make that 4 too many.

There were too many cakes to count and all of them amazing… and delicious I made sure to sample all of them.

There was dry ice in the drinks. HOW COOL!

It was such a nice surprise to see photos i’ve taken of Aasha through her life. It’s been so amazing seeing you grow into a little lady. I look forward to photographing your 16th some day.

The Birthday girl… errr…. I mean Alice. 

When I met your mommy I didn’t know that she would become one of my greatest friends. I met you mommy when she asked me to photograph what is probably now the second happiest day of her life, her wedding day. Since then i’ve photographed many things in your mommy and daddy’s lives but none so precious or important as you. I hope that when you’re grown up  and you look back at these photos that you are not mad at me for all of the humiliation that your parents cause you showing these to all of your friends and especially your boyfriends but if you are just remember, Auntie Ashley loves you.