Sunday, June 24, 2012

The Many Faces of Gay

I went to the Gay Pride parade in Houston & here are my shots. I got a lot more of course, but you know... not all were appropriate for this blog ;)

I loved seeing all the faces of this world there. Brown faces, white faces, black faces, & every other color face. Female faces, male faces, & tranny faces. Christian faces, Hindu faces, Jewish faces, & agnostic faces. Heterosexual faces, homosexual faces, & bisexual faces. There were wrinkled up old faces who could tell you what it was like nearly a century ago, & shiny new faces full of wonder & possibilities.

When my older sister told me her daughter, my niece was gay she seemed sad. I was confused since my older sister is the last one to care about something like that. When I asked her how she felt about it she said she was a bit sad that, by claiming the life of a lesbian, she was leaving out 50% of the possibilities for love. If she were bisexual she would be able to find love everywhere.

My niece found love just fine, and I, as a heterosexual, have not only found love just fine, I have also witnessed all the love shared by multitudes, from every walk of life, right here on these few streets in the center of Houston.
 
Oh, did I mention Little Bigs? Awesome mini-hamburgers & chicken sandwiches!



I am too short to see over the crowd. So I raised my camera & shot blindly. The next morning I loaded the collection of images I gathered there on to the computer & saw this group of teenagers across the street in the tie-dyed t-shirts. My camera just randomly chose them to focus on. Out of over 90 thousand people at Houston's Gay Pride event, & my camera found it's way to a group of MY OWN DRAMA STUDENTS! Seriously? Yep, it happened. I had no idea til I saw the photos on the computer!

"T" is for transgender

Meet our Mayor

I absolutely LOVE these white balloon costumes!

This is a float of Herman-Memorial Hospital

Saturday, June 16, 2012

Texas+Japanese=Grilled Yummies!

We enjoyed a wonderful evening of food last week at the HB Japanese Steak & Sushi in NW Houston. Just wanted to share some photos we got as we celebrated my nephew Jim's birthday. Does it make you hungry????


Saturday, June 9, 2012

What do you do with your time?

Really? It's been over two months since I blogged? Where did the time go? In all honesty I have had enough down time to maintain my blog, but have had no inspiration. The house smells like a zoo & looks worse, the computers at work didn't want to work all the time, ...and other issues that brought me down. Two sinus infections later, & a bout with food poisoning, I am realizing that if Hellen Keller, could do it so can I. People survived the nazis because they fought every minute to hang on. I don't have any problems when I look at it that way. Since March I've had shows at work, shoots with clients, drama club car washes, family & friends in town, celebrated the successes of friends, and so much more. But celebrating the success of my son was the best!

Things were so busy the last week of school with my students that is was a week before I realized I had not opened my son's backpack. Among the projects & gifts from his teacher I found his report card! Oh yeah, I totally forgot to look for that when school ended. It was a great one too! He made me proud... his lowest grade was on "Completes Homework"... it's my job to help him with that but I was gone so much after school, working late at my own job, that I can't blame him. Despite my lack of support, he managed to keep above average in it though!

In April we celebrated Easter, hosted Joseph Kahn, a former JVHS theatre student (from before I began teaching there) as he came to speak to us about living the life of a big time film director, & our annual Broadway Revue, with guest Andrea Rivette & Chuck Wagner. They are such generous people, sharing so much wisdom, support, & even friendship with my students.

But first, the Easter celebration at home...

This is me. Working at my desk at school when Joseph was in town. My nephew, Wren, is also a filmer in LA. He came in town too. He shot this & others you see me in so I could actually get IN a shot or two! Check out his You Tube channel & tutorials on video editing. Thanks Wren!


Yep, that's a DETENTION movie t-shirt I'm wearing, & Joseph is wearing one too, only his has Josh Hutcherson on it. This is Joseph's latest film.

We had a great dinner full of stories & laughter with Joseph's former teachers & friends. You might recognize the two guys in the back. They were the opposing coaches in Joseph's U2 video "Stuck in a Moment".

The Broadway revue started with a week of rehearsal... we always need more than we get!

Look at these cookies! The booster club parents had them made for the reception after the show! AMAZING! It's a shot of Chuck & Andrea in their Jekyll & Hyde characters from the Broadway tour they did together!We also had our annual sword fight training with the guys from ARMA. These guys are the BEST when it comes to historically accurate medieval & renaissance martial arts!

Check out this guy. I got a sweet afternoon shooting nature after a much needed rain shower.


 In the end of May we had sr. directed one-act plays and the annual Drama Banquet. The Parent Booster Club, the Backstage Players, transformed our little black box theater into a great banquet hall! We inducted former JV Players, Desmin Borges, into the JVHS Theatre Wall of Fame & heard some seriously funny stories from his years at JV - going commando in MacBeth, only to get kissed by a girl he liked right before his entrance for his death scene, was a great laugh!

One senior directed Rosencrantz & Gildenstern are dead...

Another senior directed The Frogs. You can't imagine how thrilled I was when this "Skater dude" walked into my office and asked if a Greek comedy would be ok to do for his show!


 The JV Players awards banquet... Desmin's induction


Have you ever taken your car to a drama club car wash? You will get serenaded with Broadway musical numbers while your car is getting washed!

I tried my hand at editing a shot into something fun... with the help of Wren who held D2 up there.

I also enjoyed shooting client sessions for families, parties, & graduating seniors this spring. Meet Sarah. She can ride a longboard in high heals!
Meet Ally, she loves all things Disney!

You might recognize these adorable girls, regular clients of mine.

I grew up with the Ellis family, though it's been years since I've seen some of them, I've photographed a couple in this group before. The sexy red head on the left has been a dear friend of mine for over 35 years!

Remember this great couple? I did their wedding 2 years ago & we finally got time to do a trash the dress shoot! They are a RIOT!

We bought furniture From Nana at Star Furniture & a year later she called me to shoot her baby shower! It's great to pick up clients where you don't expect it! Nana is an immigrant from eastern Europe, so these shots were the only way she was able to share her first pregnancy with her family over there. Talk about validation for lifestyle photographers!

Meet Joshua. Such a handsome graduate!

WELL, THIS IS RANDOM. My nephew, Wren made this for me. Origami! Speaking of Origami, I went to my first Comic Palooza. I saw lots of celebrities, & saw some amazing costumes! Check it out... oh, the origami too.

I shot new head shots for both Andrea & Desmin while they were in town, and also for Tyce Green, a former student, now successful actor & voice coach. He is an amazing person and such a loyal friend to those blessed to know him!

Meet Desmin! You might remember him from Mr. Popper's Penguins, or many other film/tv moments!

Meet Tyce... Tyce was a student as well, & he is acting and doing vocal coaching. Check the link here to see more on Tyce Green.

 And you know Andrea Rivette!


And through it all we enjoyed awesome food!


Now it's summer. We took D2 to his first ever big screen movie. He didn't even know movie theaters existed. We saw The Avengers in 3-D & he fell asleep 1/3 the way through, but he loved it anyway.

I got my first set of the new LOTR legos, which my son quickly put together. I have a great mother-in-law who spoils me!

It's time to arrange my son't birthday, enjoy the pool, work on the house, and at some point before school begins again visit my family in the Pacific N.W. I can't wait to eat fresh blueberries off the bush & camp in whatever mountain range my dad selects for us to get of the grid a few days!