Maggie's senior session

Yesterday I photographed Maggie's senior pictures. Maggie was referred to us by another one of our former clients and a classmate of Maggie's, Chloe. Maggie's a bright and spirited young lady and an accomplished athlete. As we photographed and battled the wind and cold we visited about her signing to play college basketball and her dreams to pursue a future as possibly an sports phsycologist. I know whatever road she goes down, she'll do a great job. She's was named to the Oklahoma All-State in Basketball this year and I know what an accomplishment that is.

Maggie was the last session of the day of a marathon afternoon of sessions - but certainly worth the wait! She wanted waterfalls, but with all of the rain last week, we were only able to get rushing water rather than a gentle cascade of waterfalls. She was so good natured about everything - even braving the cold water and wearing cute summer dresses in I'm sure about 55 degree weather! These are just a few of our favorites....

I loved this picture only because it shows how much fun we can have during a session - just being silly and waiting to capture just the right moment.

Have fun at prom this weekend!! Be careful and soak up every single moment of your senior year!

Prom Season is here!!

Prom season is now here....and we do offer pre-prom sessions. There is no session fee charge and you only order the pictures you want in the sizes you want. All images are posted online in a password protected gallery and you'll be given the access code during your picture session.

Reserved Dates:
April 19
We will be taking pre-prom pictures for Eisenhower High School's prom starting at 4 pm. If you're interested in joining us on location - please email, text or give us a call at 351-8648.

May 2
We will be taking pre-prom pictures for Bray-Doyle High School starting at 5 pm. If you're interested in joining us on location - please email, text or give us a call.

If you would like to reserve your pre-prom session date - you need to call ASAP - many of our remaining April dates are taken and several in early May are too.

Todd Anniversary

Over the weekend, I had the opportunity to photograph a very special milestone for two very special people - LA & Phyllis Todd celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary Saturday. The Todd's are collectively a very special group of people and are truly like a second set of parents to me. Their daughter, Sue Ann, was my best friend and as kids we were inseperable. In fact, my own daughter bears her name.

On display were 50 year old wedding photographs, Phyllis' actual wedding dress, head piece, gloves, hankerchief, and going away dress. It was amazing that she'd saved all of that for so many years. Their boys had even had an 8mm film of the wedding converted to DVD for everyone to watch.

There is not a time in my life that I can remember not being involved somehow in the Todd family. In fact Saturday - the moment that I pulled up, one of Sue Ann's many cousins was parked in the car next to me. We jumped out and hugged forever - both sharing a special secret - we had both named our daughters after the same girl. I could hardly hold back the tears. The tears fell freely Sunday afternoon when I made my monthly trip to the cemetery to lay flowers at Sue Ann's grave and I had found that Alicia had beaten me earlier that morning, leaving her own set of Sue Ann's favorite signature pink flowers with just the sweetest note. I knew I shouldn't have read it, but I just couldn't hold back. I felt even closer to that family at that very moment and so honored to inadvertantly be a part of it.

While the faces have changed and matured over the years, the good, kind loving nature has never faltered. The Todds - all of them - from Oklahoma, Texas, Colorado, Missouri and beyond are all just extended family of my own.

Just as Phyllis said - there aren't many people who can say that at their 50th wedding anniversary their 3 aunts and own 90+ year old mother attend. What a precious, special honor for them to have what I'm sure was over 200 people come and share & celebrate their day with them. It was a true testament to the incredible people they are and the amazing family they belong to.

I love them all from the bottom of my heart.

Honoring Destry

I graduated from Rush Springs High School many moons ago and had the opportunity to get to know Destry Horton and his wife Brandy. Destry was a year ahead of me in school and Brandy was a couple of year's behind me. They were both incredible people and while I don't keep up much with people from Rush since I graduated and moved away, when I learned about Destry's accident 2 years ago, I was heartbroken. He was a firefighter. He lost his life trying to save the lives and property of others - what an incredible gift he gave for people he didn't necessarily know. I couldn't imagine losing my husband and trying to raise two daughters without him. Brandy is truly a courageous and strong sprited young woman. What a life milestone she has had to cross even before her 30th birthday.

This morning on the news, I heard where his widow Brandy was spearheading a fundraising effort to update the ICU ward at the Integris Burn Unit in Oklahoma City. Unfortunately hundreds of families have to use this unit each year and the 23 days Destry spent there sparked the idea for Brandy and her family. The family has to raise $500,000 and then a matching amount will be made by an outside foundation. The ICU ward will then be renamed in Destry's honor. What an honor and long-standing memorial for such a fine man and firefighter.

If you would like to help the Horton family in their efforts - the address and phone numbers on where to send your donation are mentioned below. I know the family would be greatful for any donation of any size.

It only takes a little to make a big impact in the world.

How to help Send donations:
•By mail: Integris Baptist Medical Center Foundation: 3030 Northwest Expressway Suite 1600 Oklahoma City, OK 73112
•By phone: 951-5005 or (888) 567-3433

Sky's Senior Pix

Meet Sky - our latest senior! She has this beautiful spirit about her and after she finally loosened up - she realized we really could have a lot of fun! She brought her equally beautiful younger sister along to keep her company and we had a blast. She plans on being some sort of an accountant after graduation - she says shes great with numbers - I'm certainly glad someone is because I'm NOT! And if you have a hankering for one of the best hamburger's in town...stop by Waynes and Sky will hook you up! It was a pleasure to meet you and we wish you the very best of luck in your future!

Busy March...

Wow! We've had a very busy March - I can hardly believe it's almost April! Where does the time go?? I've got some great Easter pictures to post, but just haven't had the time this week. We've met with 3 different brides on some wedding dates this week and met with 2 last week. Whew! I was very exicted to meet each of the couples and get to know them better.

It's been a crazy month for us with the bulk of the craziness happening this week. I had a routine dr's appt. Monday that resulted in some not-so-routine news...for once, I was IN FRONT of the camera and had an MRI done yesterday (I now have proof there really IS something inside my head). I go see another specialist on Monday where I'm hoping I hear some 'decent' news and hope the fix to my quickly disappearing vision is a fairly simple and pain-free cure. I've been on pins and needles all week wrapping my mind around my inital diagnosis and the options that lay in front of me. But I'm optimistic and refuse to let anything get me down for too long.

Updates....
Graduation Announcements: As a reminder, if you're going to order your custom graduation announcements from us - orders are due by Monday March 31st. We will accept orders after this, but we cannot guarantee they will arrive in time to be sent out. Please call and ask before placing your order.

2009 Weddings: We've already started getting requests for 2009 weddings and have started booking dates for that time. As a result of the many requests, we have posted our 2009 pricing on our pricing website www.bwdweddings.com . To access this gallery, you will need a password, but just shoot us an email or quick phone call and we're happy to share that with you!

Holiday Closings: We will be closed during Memorial Day weekend May 23-26 to enjoy the time with family.

Web Specials: For 2009 seniors - we will be running a special through May 31st. This is our annul early bird special where you can get an extra $25 print credit to use as you want and is you have a year to use it! Just mention our 'web special' when you call to book your appointment.

Referral Program: A little known fact to our clients - we give a referral credit to anyone who refers senior or wedding clients to us. For senior referrals, we give you a $25 studio credit and for wedding referrals we give you a $50 studio credit. There is NO LIMIT on the amount of referral credits you can receive!! It's just our way of saying thank you for sending clients to us!

Girl's Day

Today Kal and I had a 'Girl's Day' - Shawn decided to have a 'Dad day' and headed up to watch a multitude of basketball finals - Kallie and I decided we'd do something a bit more creative. We started at the pottery painting place 'A Pigment of Your Imagination' where we proceeded to paint an ice cream cone, a flower and a mug (all of which Kallie picked out). They won't be ready until Thursday and we'll have to post some pictures of our special art pieces. We had an absolute blast and I have a feeling, it will become a much more frequent event for the two of us. Below isn't our exact ice cream cone, but enough for you to get the idea....we had way too much fun! (I do not recommend you wearing good clothes though - especially with little ones).

Then we decided to walk over to Hastings where a friend of the family, now both an attorney and author, was signing his new book - 'The Oklahoma Scrananimal'. Larry Derryberry, a native of Altus and close friends with our Nana (Mitzi) and my late Papaw (Calvin) signed a special book for us along with several others who stood in line. The book is something I will highly recommend if you have little ones - a CD comes with it and features great voices of Jayne Jaroe, Barry Switzer and Gov. Brad Henry to just name a few.

We rounded out our girls day with a trip to one of Kallie's favorite places to eat - Wayne's Drive in. We ordered our hamburgers and cherry cokes (our fav), came home and had a picnic in the living room. We also did a few loads of laundry which weren't nearly as fun, but a necessity. We had to call Dad and tell him he missed out on all of the fun. Maybe if he's lucky, we'll take him along next time.

Girl's day is one of my favorite things to do with my daughter. We spend some very personalized time together. We've discvoered it doesn't matter what we do - just as long as we're together. Typically, girl's night is a pizza picnic on Mom's bed as we watch a Strawberry Shortcake movie. What can POSSIBLY be better than that??

Chesnei & Derrick

Their's is an American love story. Football star falls in love with cheerleading beauty. Yesterday we had the opportunity to shoot Chesnei and Derrick's engagments. They met at college at Northwestern State in Alva - she cheered him on from the sidelines and the rest is soon to be history. They are one of our couples getting married this June 14 and we couldn't be more excited to share their day with them! Chesnei is such a camera person and God love Derrick for going along and being such a good sport with everything yesterday! They are so cute together!! Here are just a few of our favorites from their session - we tried to incorporate so much of the things they love to put their own love story into images. Congratulations to both of you!

With heart...

Wednesday I took a huge cake to my husband's basketball team to celebrate their accomplishements this year and to get them all pumped up for last night's game. I gathered the girls together and told them that typically Shawn does something really nice for me for my birthday, but since my birthday was yesterday (Thursday) he wasn't going to get to do something because I had to share him with all of them. I did tell the girls though that the very best birthday present they could help him give me was a win in the Area semi-finals. We had cake and celebrated my (cough) 30-something birthday a day early.

Last night - I have to hand it to my husband, his coaching staff, and his girls. We played the late game in Edmond last night (and yes, 8:00 p.m. is LATE for me). I have never watched his girls play with more heart, more dedication and more effort. At half time, we were up and I felt good about the game. I yelled and cheered so much, I'm still hoarse today! It was a magical time to watch these girls - many of which I've watched since they were in 7th grade work so hard for a goal that many of them set for themselves back this fall. The girls came back from half time and didn't have a real good 3rd quarter - but they rallied hard none the less. Fourth quarter, we regained our lead and held it up until about the last minute and a half. Then a few bad turn overs, Choctaw got the ball and made some key free throws - sending them point by point ahead as the seconds ticked down. With just point something seconds left on the clock, the final blow was delivered with yet another made set of free throws solidifying the end of our girls' season this year.

It was a heartbreaking loss - made even more so by the fact that I've hardly ever - and I mean EVER - seen my husband get tears in his eyes over a ballgame - but last night he did. As did most of the girls. They all tried so hard and did such an amazing job all year long and last night was no exception. I'm so proud of all the girls!

So to the seniors - Ariella, Jazzy, Alex, Jacqueline and manager Brandi - you've had a great four years of high school basketball. Some of our seniors have all had many phone calls from college recruiters and Shawn and I are so excited at the prospect of continuing to watch them grow as young women and athletes and traveling to whatever college they select to see them play. To all of our other girls - Tiffany, Brittany, Tita, Kierston, Erica, Bridgette, Shayla, Cydni, Znobia, Bridgette H. - we are all so very proud of you!!

I couldn't have asked for a better birthday present yesterday than to watch you all play with the heart you did last night! I wish there had been a win at the end of the night - but I'll take heart over a win every single day of the week. I'm so proud of all of you!!

Cool new music....

I stumbled across this gal a month or so ago and love some of her stuff - didn't think much about it again until the DJ I listen to in the mornings got to talking about her today....I was pumped I was 'cool' before he was!! I'm finding myself drifting towards some of this Indy-esque type music lately and am really loving it. I know my husband won't be a fan - too slow and sultry for his taste! But thought I'd share b/c you might like it!

The musicians name "A Fine Frenzy"


Here's a copy of her latest video ....you can also find her on the net @ http://www.afinefrenzy.com/