Babschi

I went to visit my Grandma a few weeks ago and snapped a few snapshots of her while we we chatting. She does not try to hide from the lens as much as she used to! I love her so much; my Babschi. :)

EDIT: I thought it would be nice to briefly add some details of the shoot! Babschi was sitting in a recliner about 5 feet away from a window with indirect light. I shot her simply and tried to compose the shot as a classic portrait. Her face is so expressive and graced with the lines of old age, it was easy to create a beutiful image.

As we were talking I crouched down and moved a bit closer for the shot of her hands, also only lit by the light from the window. I love that she still wears her wedding bands, just on her middle finger now that her ring finger has bcome too tiny! :)

Vermont Trip - Visiting Adam & Jen

A new post; YAY! For Valentine's Day weekend this year a few Penn State couples took the journey to Burlington, VT to visit our friends Adam & Jen. they were wonderful hosts and had us on excursions for the entirety of our travels.

First we hit up some ski shops to find some last minute ski gear (as almost EVERYTHING was sold out by February in New Jersey!) and later that same afternoon to Boyden Valley Winery. Which, by the way, has so many good wines Vanessa and I shipped a box back to NJ to share with the family.

On Saturday we got to enjoy our snow-filled winter with a full day of skiiing at Smuggler's Notch. It was amazing! Perfect weather, snow squalls all day and we tried dozens of trails on our way down the mountains. WOW!

Later in the weekend we visited a  "green" restaurant called Pink Magnolia, toured the Magic Hat brewery and finished out trip with a delicious stop at Ben & Jerry's. It was a great weekend. There was so much stuff going on I am almost ashamed to say that my pictures were few and far between! I was able to capture a couple shots to memorialize the weekend. I hope they give you a taste of what we experienced. :)

Enjoy!

Rockefeller Center - Christmas 2010

Vanessa and I try to make it an annual tradition when we leave behind the warm comforts of home to travel into NYC at night to view the Christmas Tree and skaters at Rockefeller Center. :D This year, Vanessa's sister came along with her hubs and our two nieces. They thought that no one's Christmas tree could be bigger than theirs, but their little mouths were agape when they saw the tree!

We always bring hot chocolate and cookies into the city so the grils were be-mittened and hatted drinking from their little cups. It was really funny. :D

A beautiful evening and not too cold. We had a really nice time and I got some fantastic shots. Click any photo to see the set (33 photos).

From Rockefeller & St. Pats 2010

From Rockefeller & St. Pats 2010

From Rockefeller & St. Pats 2010

From Rockefeller & St. Pats 2010

North Miami, South Beach and good Ole' Homestead Florida!

In December Vanessa, Ryan and I travelled to Florida for his baby sister's wedding. We took a few additional days off and visited our friends in North Miami for a day and tehy took us out to a sweet party at the Blue Martini, hosted by a local Miami magazine. After being treated to an evening of pampering, we went back to our sleazy dive hotel (yes, we checked the sheets for bedbugs, as the walls were stained and the bathroom was still dirty). Ewwww.

After we hightailed it out of there the next day we spent our early afternoon in South beach oogling all the fantastic-bodied men and women on the strip. Seriously, in the Northeast people exercise outside to get in shape, in South Beach they exercise outside because they are already in shape! You could have filmed a movie right there!

Also, we saw a bearded homeless guy in a dress and 30 minutes later he walked by our patio seating in the restaurant in a NEW dress and brusquely flirted with the dudes sitting down from us. It was a litle scary and pretty hilarious because he didn't do it to us!

We also had some ENORMOUS Bulldogs; a margarita with TWO full Coronas. They were way bigger than the kind I get in north Jersey!

Last, on our trip south to the Keys, we stopped in Homestead to visit some friends who were also travelling from the Northeast. They were visiting parents who graciously let us tour their tropical fruit farm and gave us some snacks for our trip!

Click any photo to see the full set of images! (43 images)

From Miami, FLA 2010

From Miami, FLA 2010

From Miami, FLA 2010

From Miami, FLA 2010

La Cuba!

La Cuba is a tradition in my wife's family when they make the annual Christmas tamales. When all of the plate sized tamales are made, all the remaining meat and cornmeal and other sundries are made into the mother of all tamales; LA CUBA!

It is a special treat that our immediate family shares the week before Christmas as a celebration for all the hard work that goes in the production of the tamales!

Since my brother in laws have to wait until Christmas to eat some I really enjoy posting pictures on Facebook of us eating La Cuba to tease them! :D

Click on any image to see the full set (11 photos). :)

From La Cuba

From La Cuba

From La Cuba