Yesterday, I was at the Hyatt Regency bridal show. As always, it was great fun to meet and greet all of you who are currently planning your weddings. As promised, I’m announcing the winner of today’s drawing for a complimentary engagement session. And the winner is….. Jennifer Vogler who is getting married on July 5, 2008! Congratulation Jennifer. Please contact me to arrange your engagement session.
Author Archives: magical@mmpix.com
Shira’s Bat Mitzvah at Carnivale near Downtown Chicago
Today, was a little different paced for me. I had the great honor to photo document Shira’s Bat Mitzvah. I’m told her name means “song” in Hebrew. Anyway, her mom is a cantorial soloist and Shira did a great job herself. Rather than being held in a temple, the ceremony was at Carnivale (BTW, check out their website. It is one of the best I’ve seen in a while). We started upstairs and then we moved into another room for the party. It was truly a unique event and the food was great. If you need a location for a rehearsal dinner (or even a wedding), I would recommend this place!
From the outside, it does not look too big, but looks are deceiving!
The religious service was held upstairs. All of the rooms are painted similar to this!
These were the fried banannas and cheese. Wow, did they taste good!
Chocolate desert. Do I need to say anything?
Holiday Deadlines Approaching
I know, I know, who can think about Christmas when it is 90 degrees out and the calendar says it is still summer. But if you want your wedding album to show your family at Christmas, then we’ve got until the end of October to complete your design. Once I receive word from the album companies, I’ll try to pass the word along to you.
I realize, I’m a little backed up but I’m working as fast as I can to catch up. If you’ve already received your preliminary draft, then just let me know what changes you desire and we can get your album moving.
April and Tristan’s Wedding
It was a crazy day! But at the end of it April and Tristan were married! April was very late getting started this morning, so we did not get a lot of the usual getting ready photos. Then when we arrived at the ceremony/reception site, more disorganization followed. Despite all of the chaos, love reigned supreme.
I’m am just too tired to post any more about this wedding. I really worked my butt off today to catch up and make sure all of the required images were captured!
Family Visit
As I mentioned earlier in my previous post, my dad, brother, Rick and nephews, Benjamin and Nicholas arrived Saturday morning for a quick visit. They returned to Syracuse Sunday evening. A few minutes before they arrived, the power came back on. The moment they arrived, Meghan ran upto Uncle Rick and asked him if he could save her “swinging tree” That is our apple tree that had been uprooted in the storm days earlier. Unfortunately, Rick took one look at the tree and gave Meghan the bad news.
We had a nice visit. Saturday, we caught up and visited. On Sunday we took the whole clan to the Brookfield Zoo. What can I say? It was a nice family visit.
Rick and Dad napping after the long trip.
The clan as we entered the zoo. From left to right: Nicholas, Benjamin, Michah, Mathew, and Meghan.
The Storm
The last several days have been absolutely crazy. Last Thursday around 3:15, right around the time Meghan was due home, I looked up and noticed it was pitch black out. I’ve never seen it that dark during the day before. The wind was howling and the rain was just coming down as if it was being poured out of a big bucket. I’ve never seen a storm this bad.
I ran upstairs, grabbed Michah, Baloo, a bottle of milk and threw them into our new bedroom closet. I thought it was the safest spot in the house. Then the terror began. Where was Meghan? Where was her bus. What was going on? I went from window to window and didn’t see a thing other than rain and more rain. I opened the garage door to see if the bus was coming no bus. The storm kept up. I had to shut the garage door to keep the water out. Then the power went out.
Eventually, the storm subsided. I looked out the front and there were trees down all over the place. I looked in back and saw one of our apple trees was uprooted. It was a mess everywhere. Still no Meghan. The phones were out. I called on my cel phone trying to get through to the school. Nothing. Finally a hour late, I saw a bus on the street behind us. I walked over and found Meghan. The bus was not able to get through due to all of the downed trees and power lines. But that was just the beginning of 3 days without power.
When Sheryl arrived home, she had Mathew who had been at daycare. I was not real worried about him as I knew they would move him to a sheltered location. We got everybody settled then started to clear the mess. I worked with some neighbors to cut the downed trees blocking the street. We also removed some of the dangerous widow makers so they would not fall on any of the kids.
Friday morning, I discovered our neighbors accross the street had power. So I bought 200 feet of cord to power our refrigerator and freezer. By Saturday morning the power was back. Fortunately, I did not have any events this weekend. Just a visit from my Dad, brother, Rick and my nephews, Benjamin and Nicholas. More about that later.
2nd Grade Starts
Wow, hard to believe that another school year has begun. Today marked the first day of 2nd grade for Meghan. It seems like just yesterday that we put her on the bus for the first time and now she seems like an old pro at it.
When the bus arrived, Meghan had a pleasant surprise! It was the bus driver from her kindergarden bus. Jackie really likes the kids and goes out of her way to help them. During rainy weather, she would even pick Meghan up in front of the house. The best thing about Jackie is that she does not assign seats on the bus. So Meghan can sit with her friends.
Well, it is a school night and I’ve got to get the kids off to bed.
Patricia and John’s Greek Orthodox Wedding in Arlington Heights
Saturday was Patricia and John’s wedding. Being a Greek Orthodox wedding, it was a little different than I’m used to. Despite the rainy weather, it was a great day. There are just so many great moments from the wedding that the only way you will be able to see them all, is to visit their on-line gallery.
We had originally planned to visit a park for some bridal party photos. But when the rains came, we went to plan B, the Schaumburg Renaissance. I had been waiting for an opportunity to photograph at this great one of a kind location. Now I had my chance.
If it is going to rain, then what a great spot. There will be even more photos available in Patricia and John’s on-line gallery.
Houston, We have a Problem!
Oh No! I’ve just discovered a technical glitch. It seems that posts I thought were being made, have disappearred. I’ve managed to restore many of the missing entries, but I still have some work to do.
I think I lost about 3 months worth. So far, I’ve managed to fix about 5 weeks of missing entries, which brings us to mid August. I will have to continue working on this later when I have time. Rest assured, I will catch up and you will not miss a single item of news.
NACE
I’ve joined NACE. What’s NACE you may ask…. it is the National Association of Catering Executives. Now what the heck is a photographer doing by joining a bunch of catering people. Learning and networking. This is an opportunity to meet the catering managers I interact with on wedding days. Unfortunately, at weddings, both the catering executives and I are too busy to really get a chance to talk and exchange ideas. Fortunately, there is NACE.
Each month’s meeting is at a different location. This month the meeting was held at Now We’re Cooking. Now We’re Cooking is a combination commercial, demonstration and instructional kitchen located in one facility. They can cater, you can rent the kitchen or host an event right there. We had an evening where we learned how to make some of the dishes found at a Tapas Bar. As you can see the best part was eating our class project!
