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Month: June, 2014

Vainieri Family

A few favorite images from a recent family shoot with one truly Eph-tastic family. (P.S. I’d love to take YOUR picture (or pictures of your loved ones))

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Currently Gawking

This was an incredibly special event and I feel fortunate to have played even a marginal role in making it come to life. hastagephlove hashtagfrozenforlife

#LikeAGirl

I watched this video for the first time last night. When they start asking young girls what it means to do something “like a girl,” I openly burst into tears. After watching, I asked Sunny to show me what it meant to her if I told her to “run like a girl.” She stood quizzically for a moment, and then sprinted down the hallway as fast as she could.

I proceeded to cry even harder.

May my girls always see their femaleness with such strength and pride.

26/52

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“A portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2014.”

Sunny: She split open her chin this week at school due to play park antics. She avoided stitches thanks to newfangled medical glue, but has had to be limited at the pool all week. Fortunately, kids heal quickly, and by next week, she’ll be back to her usual aquatic tricks. Her teachers told us that she never shed a tear, despite all the blood and the gapping wound under her face. James reported that she was a champ at the pediatrician’s, and Kaki and I rewarded her with homemade ice cream.
Kaki: This hair cut was done on a whim, in the back yard, with an itty bitty pair of nail scissors, one late evening a week or so ago. It just suits her so very much, and I was sick of battling snarls and knots and shaded eyes and sweaty necks. 

More details about The 52 Project here. To view all the portraits in the series visit here.

Celebrating K

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Last weekend, in addition to shooting some pictures of a dear friend’s new babe (images forthcoming), I stayed at a college friend’s parents house and enjoyed a Sunday morning bridal shower in K’s honor. This weekend, I’m headed to the Norwich Inn in CT for some “girl time” with her and her other closest friends, a weekend at the spa with delicious meals and perhaps a hike or two. And then in two weeks, we’ll all gather in New Hampshire for her wedding! James and I are the photographers for the event, so we’ll be doing double duty, but I am grateful for the trust and experience that will come with the responsibility.

Hope your weekend is equally relaxing!

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How adorable is Bernie, Andrew and K’s cat, complete with Brooks Brother tie?

Currently Gawking

I recognize that this video is pretty terrible from a technical stand point. Shaky and blurred and honestly a fairly sad capture of that circle of nerdy, fantastic, a capella love. One of my favorite moments of Reunion weekend was standing on the outskirts of that circle watching James, some of his dearest friends, and various students and alums that over generations have claimed a space among that circle, band together for a half hour of “doo woops” and “ba das” and “jsun jah nos” representative of the collegiate days of yore. I stood with the significant others of three of the guys in the circle who had met their loved ones post-college and were giddy to witness this display of nerdy, adorable awesome.

One of them leaned over to me, grin smeared across his face, “I had no idea there was a CIRCLE involved. This is even nerdier than I suspected! I love it!”

See if you can spy Lucas of Netflix’s “House of Cards” among that band of arms – and note that his kind, talented, and delightful spouse (a Broadway star in her own right) similarly circled the group, truly smitten by what was playing out before her eyes. Despite singing with the likes of Indina Menzel, she was nonetheless enthused, dare I say, thrilled, to witness Seb sing with his collegiate a capella group.

This was a very happy, memorable moment indeed.

Rufio

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Meet Ru-fi-OOoOOoOOoOOO! The Chicken Formally Known as Mohawk Baby. He is an ode to “Hook” and awesome mohawks everywhere.

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He is proof that saying ‘yes’ to offerings of a random, free exotic chicken breed is absolutely the right choice. Turns out he is a Golden Polish. And yes, he is one of the more ridiculous creatures that I’ve ever seen.

We are assuming he is male because he is so dang ostentatious and fancy as male birds are wont to be.

James has some competition for best flow on the farm thanks to this guy.

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In related news, the chicks are nearly full grown and our coop is a noisy, messy, furtive affair. Penelope keeps ’em in line, and we all delight on daily trips up to the barn to play with our growing array of farm critters. Even Kaki is coming around to holding the chickens. Namely Elsa, because well, is there a more honored name that my preschoolers could give their favorite hen?

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Currently Reading

Whatever the nature of your experience in high school or college, I strongly urge you to return to the people and places of your past mindfully — not for the sake of the past, but to touch the richness of the present. These people and places continue, as do our relationships with them. What remains raw can heal, and what was marvelous then can evolve now. Graduation is neither an indelible end nor a totally fresh beginning: it is a turning point inextricably linked with what came before, and followed, and is yet to come.

Full post here by Deborah Schoeberlein ’89, an Eph who just returned to campus for the first time since her graduation 25 years ago.

Summer

Our days are spent in the light of the sun, in the fresh of the air, begun with crisp, green leaves pulled from the garden’s grasp. We run through sprinklers. We dance through wild flowers. We monitor the growth of blueberries and cherries and limbs. We laze in hammocks. We muddy our hands and scorn our manicures. We delight in the simplicity and vibrance of worms in compost. We taste of sun screen and strawberry popsicle. By sun’s decent, we collapse on cool grass.

And in the evenings we go fairy hunting. We catch flashing twinkles in jars and hold the magic in the palms of our hands. Sticky and sweet from a day well spent, we ache from nostalgia and gratitude. Childhoods revived by the pull of the youth in our care.

We ease into cotton sheets and sleep to the sounds of whirring fans and croaking frogs. This is the gift that we give them, so that one day they too may pay it forward.

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24/52

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“A portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2014.”

Sunny: Graduation day at preschool. So grown up.
Kaki: Blue popsicle tongues. So very silly.

More details about The 52 Project here. To view all the portraits in the series visit here.