After standing in freakishly long lines to buy a metro ticket and after an hour fifteen metro ride, we finally arrived at the Restoring Honor rally at the Lincoln Memorial in D.C. just before the starting time at 10AM. Armed with lots of water and my stalker lenses, I tried to get some fun shots of the festivities. Enjoy!

It was a wee bit crowded. And these folks cant even see the Lincoln Memorial.

Crowd shot.

Flag hat, flag shirt, little flag tucked under his arm, large flag in his hands.

All dressed up for the occasion.

After it was over, I was able to snake through the crowd towards the reflecting pool to sneak in a photo of the Memorial.

Jo Dee Messina sang the National Anthem.

Some folks climbed on the pillars of the WWII Memorial for a better view.

Shot of the capitol and all the crowds pouring out after the rally was over.

On the hill of the Washington Memorial, some folks with a 48 star flag.

*The rest of my shots are located here and on facebook. If you know someone in these photos or would like a copy or would like to use them, please contact me. I am happy to share, just don’t steal.

On what were its footings set,
or who laid its cornerstone-
while the morning stars sang together
and all the angels shouted for joy?

Who shut up the sea behind doors
when it burst forth from the womb,
when I made the clouds its garment
and wrapped it in thick darkness,
when I fixed limits for it
and set its doors and bars in place,
when I said, ‘This far you may come and no farther;
here is where your proud waves halt’?

Have you ever given orders to the morning,
or shown the dawn its place,
that it might take the earth by the edges
and shake the wicked out of it?
The earth takes shape like clay under a seal;
its features stand out like those of a garment.

The wicked are denied their light,
and their upraised arm is broken.
Have you journeyed to the springs of the sea
or walked in the recesses of the deep?
Have the gates of death been shown to you?
Have you seen the gates of the shadow of death?
Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth?
Tell me, if you know all this.

What is the way to the abode of light?
And where does darkness reside?
Can you take them to their places?
Do you know the paths to their dwellings?
Surely you know, for you were already born!
You have lived so many years!
Have you entered the storehouses of the snow
or seen the storehouses of the hail,
which I reserve for times of trouble,
for days of war and battle?
What is the way to the place where the lightning is dispersed,
or the place where the east winds are scattered over the earth?
Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain,
and a path for the thunderstorm,
to water a land where no man lives,
a desert with no one in it,
to satisfy a desolate wasteland
and make it sprout with grass?

Does the rain have a father?
Who fathers the drops of dew?
From whose womb comes the ice?
Who gives birth to the frost from the heavens
when the waters become hard as stone,
when the surface of the deep is frozen?
Can you bind the beautiful Pleiades?
Can you loose the cords of Orion?
Can you bring forth the constellations in their seasons
or lead out the Bear with its cubs?
Do you know the laws of the heavens?
Can you set up God’s dominion over the earth?
Can you raise your voice to the clouds
and cover yourself with a flood of water?
Do you send the lightning bolts on their way?
Do they report to you, ‘Here we are’?
Who endowed the heart with wisdom
or gave understanding to the mind?
Who has the wisdom to count the clouds?
Who can tip over the water jars of the heavens
when the dust becomes hard
and the clods of earth stick together?

Do you hunt the prey for the lioness
and satisfy the hunger of the lions
when they crouch in their dens
or lie in wait in a thicket?
Who provides food for the raven
when its young cry out to God
and wander about for lack of food?
Do you know when the mountain goats give birth?
Do you watch when the doe bears her fawn?
Do you count the months till they bear?
Do you know the time they give birth?
They crouch down and bring forth their young;
their labor pains are ended.
Their young thrive and grow strong in the wilds;
they leave and do not return.

Who let the wild donkey go free?
Who untied his ropes?
I gave him the wasteland as his home,
the salt flats as his habitat.
He laughs at the commotion in the town;
he does not hear a driver’s shout.
He ranges the hills for his pasture
and searches for any green thing.
Will the wild ox consent to serve you?
Will he stay by your manger at night?
Can you hold him to the furrow with a harness?
Will he till the valleys behind you?
Will you rely on him for his great strength?
Will you leave your heavy work to him?
Can you trust him to bring in your grain
and gather it to your threshing floor?

The wings of the ostrich flap joyfully,
but they cannot compare with the pinions and feathers of the stork.
She lays her eggs on the ground
and lets them warm in the sand,
unmindful that a foot may crush them,
that some wild animal may trample them.
She treats her young harshly, as if they were not hers;
she cares not that her labor was in vain,
for God did not endow her with wisdom
or give her a share of good sense.
Yet when she spreads her feathers to run,
she laughs at horse and rider.

Do you give the horse his strength
or clothe his neck with a flowing mane?
Do you make him leap like a locust,
striking terror with his proud snorting?
He paws fiercely, rejoicing in his strength,
and charges into the fray.
He laughs at fear, afraid of nothing;
he does not shy away from the sword.
The quiver rattles against his side,
along with the flashing spear and lance.
In frenzied excitement he eats up the ground;
he cannot stand still when the trumpet sounds.
At the blast of the trumpet he snorts, ‘Aha!’
He catches the scent of battle from afar,
the shout of commanders and the battle cry.
Does the hawk take flight by your wisdom
and spread his wings toward the south?

Does the eagle soar at your command
and build his nest on high?
He dwells on a cliff and stays there at night;
a rocky crag is his stronghold.
From there he seeks out his food;
his eyes detect it from afar.
His young ones feast on blood,
and where the slain are, there is he.

*Passage is Job 38:4-41, 39:1-30. Photos were taken while hiking a couple of weeks ago in Torrey Pines State Park, La Jolla, California.

Jaime and her husband Matt let me use them as models to experiment with some new lighting and techniques as well as be my very first maternity shoot! Jaime is a BEAUTIFUL mom, and I can’t wait to meet her new son when he arrives. Here is a sneak peek at a couple of shots from our session. Many thanks to Loews Hotel of Annapolis who kindly allowed us to shoot in their lobby when our original shoot location of Quiet Waters Park was being drenched in rain!

Some little ones remind me that I want to have kids of my own one day. Julie is one just the cutest little girl ever. I got to play with her at our dear friend’s housewarming party. Julie was enjoying some chocolate in case you couldn’t tell.

She loved smiling for my camera and kept saying “take my picture, take my picture, again!”

She also didn’t like that I took a photo of her dirty face so we wiped it clean and then she blew me a kiss.

She also wanted a photo of her Uncle Jeff!

And of course, her Daddy!

I spent two months training, similar to the couch to 5k program, starting from a terrible place of running/walking about 1.8 miles in about 20 minutes to finishing a full 5k in just under 33 minutes. My time for the actual race was just a bit longer than my best training time.

This race was huge! We started so far back, that we could barely see the start line, but our timing was kept by a nifty little chip that was put in our shoes.

All in all, my time was terrible, but I did make my goal of completing the whole race without walking! I ran with two good friends, sisters from my sorority. (Both beat me, by about a minute or so).

Go Kate, Go! I may or may not have purposefully left out the photo of me rounding this same corner. The last part of the race was running through the stadium as you can see above and by this point, both Leanne and Kate had pulled ahead. I was not happy about lagging behind, I was hot and I was tired but as I made it around that first corner in the stadium, I hear someone  call out my name. Since I knew no one in IL, I was a bit surprised and encouraged as I looked up and saw Kate’s boyfriend, Alex (to whom I had bequeathed my camera to get action shots) cheering me on. Thanks, Alex, that really meant a lot!  Silly, I know, but I needed that cheer.

My running since the race has been sporadic at best, but I hope to keep it up on some level. Now that I have gotten to a point where I can run (slowly) for a half an hour, it is time to work on getting my heartrate better, on speed, on improving my form, and hopefully I will lose some weight in the process.
All in all, I could have done better, but hey, I am making progress!

Too bad I can’t get a medal every time I run. :0)

The ceremony was outside, a bit chilly, but beautifully sunny. The students, of course, had a little fun!

The school had a little meet and greet after where the faculty from each department milled about under tents for the students to catch before they left. We snagged a few shots there under the trees.

I am so proud of my sister!

I made cakepops and some other delicious desserts for the party. These, of course, are nowhere near as cool as any of Bakerella’s, but I gave them a shot. Please note that the yellow-y squiggly thing on the white pop on the far left is a GOLDEN TORNADO, Geneva’s mascot. This was apparently not as obvious to others as it was to me.

Yay, Lauren!

(‘Congratulations’ was too many letters to make into a cake-pop message!)

P.S. More photos can be seen here!

You can actually see the bubble mid-burst! Crazy! I will post more photos soon, and yes, I mean soon.

Well, now that I want to carry my camera and all its paraphernalia around, I get it. I need one bag for storage and long travel (flights), another bag for hiking (probably a backpack of sorts), a messenger style bag for casual day trips, something a little more fashionable for going out, easily accessible bags for event and wedding portraiture (one being my shootsac!), etc., etc.

I have finally found a bag that is pretty darn close to what I would have designed for myself. It does NOT look like a camera bag, large enough to carry a few lenses and my body, small enough to pass as a large purse, cute enough to pass as a purse, has a long shoulder strap and handles and is red! I love it. It is called ‘Lola’ by Epiphanie Bags. And fortunately, Design Aglow is giving me a chance to win it! So I’ll be crossing my fingers!

Have you seen all the beautiful new products & contest for pro photographers on http://www.DesignAglow.com?

Epiphanie Bags is also having a giveaway! They are giving away a Cannon 4D Mark II or a $2500 Southwest gift card! Pretty awesome. You should check them out.