Well at long last I have finally gotten some vacation pictures looking pretty. For those of you who don’t know Heather & I took a much need vacation at the end of November. We did an 11day Eastern Caribbean cruise on the Princess Cruise Lines’ Emerald Princess that sailed out of Fort Lauderdale and stopped at Antigua, St. Lucia, Barbados, St. Kitts, St. Thomas, and The Bahamas.

I tried not to take too many pictures as this was a vacation away from photography but of course I still took quite a few. I’ll try to throw in a little explanation on some of them but if you want to hear more detail just give us a call! Enjoy.

Our ship, the Emerald Princess docked at St. Lucia.
The docks at Antigua, shot from our balcony. Lots of rainbows that morning.

Our first excursion was zip lining, and it was tons of fun! I can’t believe Heather agreed to do it!

We took a pretty long tour on St. Lucia that took us all over the island. The next 9 pictures were taken at their poorest fishing village. This was a little scary because our tour just dumped us in the middle of the village but I got some of my favorite pictures of the cruise here.

I just love this shot. He really wanted to pose when he saw me taking pictures. It cost me $2 but I think it’s worth it.

I would swear this dog was posing for me.

I just wanted to post this so you could see what the scene above actually looked like.

After the village we went up around the Pitons and visited this natural hot springs.

Then on to a drive up volcano. Very cool because you could see the bubbling water and steam. Stunk like sulfur though.

When we hit St. Kitts we realized that we hadn’t actually been to a beach yet. So we got up early and went to shore in search. The tourist desk recommended we go to Frigate Bay, much to our surprise this was the ugliest beach we had ever seen. At least the water was pretty and I got a couple of nice pictures (not of the beach though).

After the beach we took a private 4wd tour of St. Kitts. This was our favorite tour because it was very private and we stayed off the road for most of it. Our guide even stopped and gave us a picnic with local food and rum. This particular shot was at an old sugar cane plantation.

This was at a different plantation but this building wasn’t lived in because they thought it was haunted.

We just thought all these caterpillars were cool.

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Looking up in an abandoned windmill.

It wouldn’t be a vacation with out Heather showing off the bikini. Taken in The Bahamas.

I know we haven’t posted in a while and I promise we didn’t fall off the face of the planet. For those of you who didn’t know Heather and I took a much needed 2 week vacation. It’s been a great year but we really needed to get away.

Anyway, we’re back now so keep an eye out for lots of fun pictures and a report of everything we got to do.

This was one of the most fun couples I’ve worked with this year. They just enjoyed being together the whole time and Tina is extremely photogenic. It was great because they were really open to trying a few new things like climbing through a great old caboose we found in the West Bottoms and hiking all over the Burr Oak Woods Conservation Area.

I love how this shoot turned out and am definitely excited for their wedding in August.

Ah, were to start with these two. We’re really gotten to know Kyle and Laura pretty well over the course of their search for a wedding photographer. They honestly talked to and interviewed a good portion of the studios in not only Kansas City but the midwest. They had a style in mind and wanted to find the right fit. It really is nice to be working with a couple that take photography so seriously and we are truly honored to be working with them.

Now to explain one of the craziest shoots I have ever done. We went all over with these guys, started at the West Bottoms, then to Maple Woods Conservation Area in Parkville, and finally to Downtown Parkville (stopping a couple times along the way). On the way to Parkville we were rear-ended; yes, an accident. Luckily everyone was okay but still fairly shaken-up. Still, being the strong couple they are we pressed on. While at Maple Woods we discovered that Laura was missing one of her earrings (which of course was a diamond anniversary gift). We still moved on and they went back to the Bottoms to look for it later. They didn’t find it right away but after I went through their pictures and figured out where she wasn’t wearing it they were able to track it down.

Even with all the bad luck we really had a lot of fun. They were up for anything, which is important with me I’m really happy with how their shoot turned out and we’re really looking forward to their wedding in June.

Kyle’s poor car.

Chris & Alyson were a laid-back couple. Things started a little late but they went with the flow and had fun. They took us to a wonderful park in Mission, KS and we got some great fall shots. The reception was at the Mission Theater which was beautiful but surprisingly hard to photograph (light was challenging). They had a fun movie theme that really fit the space. Enjoy.

I had quite an experience with Ben & Nicole. As most of you know we never book a couple with out meeting with them first. We made the exception for Nicole though. She is a very busy medical professional and didn’t have time to meet with photographers in person, she was also highly recommended by Moly Shalz (a great coordinator here in town). So I was pretty nervous to work and meet them for the first time. To make matters worse they got a speeding ticket and got a little lost on the way to the shoot. Not surprising that it didn’t put Ben in the best of moods. I also think that Ben may be the only other person that hates having his picture taken as much as I do.

Even with everything stacked against them we had lots of fun. They both loosened up pretty quick and were up for just about anything, including a pretty heated leaf fight! I’m really happy with the results and glad that we made the exception for them, it will be a great wedding.