It’s the season for lots of baby deer. We have three fawns that have been hanging around our yard a lot lately.
These two were relaxing in the shade yesterday.

We had our first weekend off in quite a while and we were ready to pack in all the fun. We started out the weekend by going to Springhill Camp in Evart, MI with our church (Kensington).
We had the whole camp taken over. Springhill is an AMAZING place. It is a non-profit christian camp and retreat and there is SO much stuff to do, it is amazing!!
As many of you know, we are in the process of adopting two boys, so we now have 3 young boys in the house!!
Unfortunately, since they are not legally ours yet, we can’t post any photos of them on our public blog so those of you that are facebook friends can see some of those.

Anyway…so Springhill is pretty crazy, they have zip lines, kayaking, “the blob” which is a giant airbag that you sit on while someone jumps on the other end to launch you in the water, they have skateparks, archery, high ropes courses, climbing walls, and tons of other fun stuff to do.

Actually those all would be fun things to do if you don’t have three little kids with you. We spent most of the time trying to get the corralled and wait for the tram to take us around. Pretty much all things I mentioned we didn’t get to do BUT…we still had fun just being together.
Overally things didn’t work out super smoothly so we ended up leaving early and heading to Cheridy’s parents house for a fun-filled Sunday of water sports. The boys all had a chance to swim and play together. Grandpa let them all sit on his lap and drive the boat which was fun. We also got to watch cousin Willow on the tube and I got a great photo of her catching some serious airtime…I’m not sure how she didn’t wipe out on the this one!

For photos of our family, you’ll have to checkout our facebook page!

James 1:27 tells us to care for orphans and widows. I’m proud to be part of a church that makes MAJOR impact all over the world. One of our partnership churches in India is run by a man named Jaya Sankar who gave up all his personal wealth to take care of children. He has personally adopted over 100 children.
This is a video about one of those children who’s life was changed because someone decided to live for others rather than himself. It was shot by a friend of mine from church (Seth Stark) and it’s one of the most beautiful pieces of video I’ve ever seen and I hope it wins some awards.
A team from our church went to visit partners in Kenya and India, interviewed and photographed all the kids and started a sponsorship program. For less than what it costs to take your family to lunch at Max and Erma’s, you could provide a child with food, water, shelter, medical care, and education for an entire month. Please consider sponsoring one of the beautiful children at the link below. I know many people are hesitant to sponsor children through the massive organizations because most of the money never makes it to the kids. This is different. Please help:
http://nochild.org

The Dancer from Kensington on Vimeo.

Shot on location in Dowlaiswaram, India, this short film explores the life of Kengava Satish Kumar, a young orphan in India.

At last week’s Ballroom Bliss event that we attended, there was an amazing table designed by the Linen Hero’s that followed the theme from the movie “UP”. There was a cute little house being lifted off by giant balloons provided by Crystal Balloons.
I had the brilliant idea that I would be a hero if I could bring those awesome balloons home for Mayz. After they event they let us bring home the balloons so we were super excited. Then we got out to the car and realized they were WAY too big to put in the car.
We had to have them hanging out the window and then drive home at 25 mph. On the way home we could occasionally hear a POP and knew that we were losing a few but there was nothing we could do.
When we got home, Mayz was still up and he saw the giant balloons and lit up. Problem is…they were too big to get inside the house. We had to basically jam them through the door. During this process, balloons started popping like a machine gun and Mayz got totally freaked out and started crying. By the time we got it inside, half of the small balloons were popped but the giant balloon in the middle was still intact so we decided to keep it around. However, at random times, a balloon would just pop for no apparent reason, further traumatizing Mayz.
We put him to bed and hoped when he woke up in the morning, he would have fun with it. I took the second pic below of him just looking at it but then he kept saying “balloons are scary” and running away. For the rest of the day, we realized that he was so freaked out by them that he wouldn’t even go in his play room.
So…I went from hero to zero pretty fast! What a bummer!!
Oh well…it’s a funny story to look back on!

This weekend we enjoyed a wonderful getaway with some friends. It was a chance to get away from kids and better yet, get to BE kids again.
From Friday night to Sunday morning, pretty much all we did was laugh. It was a great time and a refreshing few days.
We rented a house in Port Sanilac right on Lake Huron and got to enjoy the beautiful morning sun shining down on the lake.
We went for walks, played some games, and ate way too much junk food.
Thanks to everyone who made it a fantastic weekend!!

Here’s a painted image of the nearby lighthouse:

On Saturday May 22nd, there will be a soccer fundraiser for Jonah Chrisman, a 15 year old battling bone cancer. He was diagnosed in 2007, had to have an above-the-knee amputation in 2009 and continues to under go treatment to fight this disease. All proceeds will go to assist the Chrisman family with travel and medical expenses to help Jonah battle this disease.
Here’s a link with more information:
http://www.ayso190.org/Miscellaneous/Jonah%20Chrisman%20Flyer.pdf

With the weather being so nice, we were excited to take Mayz and go to the zoo especially after getting an invite from the Prukner family who has a little one close to the same age as Mayz.
We got to see lots of neat animals and Mayz definitely enjoyed himself.

Last week, we wanted a bit of family time which when you work from home and love what you do…that can be hard to come by. So…we took off and went to the Kalahari Indoor Water Park in Sandusky for a couple days. It’s basically 3 football fields in size and has everything you could want in a water park in a nice heated space. We definitely enjoyed our time out there!!

This made me laugh so much I wanted to share it. I recorded Mayz singing a bunch of different stuff on my iphone and distorted it using the “voices” app. He was singing these songs all normal but the app made it sound really funny:

This past Saturday, Cheridy, myself, and Mayz headed downtown to hang out at one of the barbeques with the homeless. Every Saturday a group of dedicated people goes down there and brings food, clothes, etc. to a park at 2nd and Selden.
Some of you might remember that about a year ago we got involved and were doing interviews and photo shoots with some of the folks down there. We didn’t know why we were doing it, but God told me to do it.
Recently we were contacted by an organization (Rackham Choir that is planning on putting on a benefit concert for the homeless and they want to use some of my images and stories as part of a multimedia presentation for their event….how cool!!
I also found out recently that one of the guys who’s story we told last year (Terry) had been shot twice a few months ago. He had two bullets in his arm and when he went to the emergency room they wouldn’t take the bullets out and said that since it was his arm, it wasn’t life threatening so they just gave him bandages and sent him on his way. What a world!

Anyway, while down in Detroit Saturday we met a bunch of people including the Glen who is in the first photo below. Glen has an amazing spirit. He grew up in a good Christian home and he has 8 brothers and sisters. He said that he was really tempted with peer pressure in high school which led him down the wrong path. He felt like the black sheep of the family because he always messed up. Hanging out with the wrong crowd led to taking drugs and then dealing drugs. He did this for a long time until he got busted for it. There were many times that he wanted to quit but it was easy money and since he never graduated high school, there weren’t any other opportunities good enough for him to stop what he was doing. Thankfully for Glen, he has a great family and brother who loves him enough to take him in. Glen is currently living with his brother downtown. The house they live in is owned by his brother but a while back, he wasn’t living there. While it was vacant, he asked the city to turn off the water but apparently they didn’t and in the winter the pipes exploded and the house was flooded and water logged for an extended period of time. Now the two brothers are back in it and trying to fix it up and make it livable again. They have electricity but no heat since the hot water heater had been underwater and ruined. Glen’s brother led a very different life and just retired from Chrysler but with the bad economy and some bad investments, he’s not in a great spot either. Together the two of them are tackling life and hopefully Glen’s brother will help to get back on track. We had the opportunity to spend some time with Glen and it was great to get to know him and hear is heart and his struggles. He can quote more bible versus than anyone I’ve ever met and at one point he said “I know too much to be doing what I’m doing today….God gave me this knowledge so I can make a difference.” So, we’ll just pray for Glen and pray that he can conquer the things he’s struggling with and start doing some of the things he’s called to do.
This first pic is Glen and the others are some more nice folks that we had met downtown.

I had posted a few of the pics from the photo shoots with Cheridy, myself, and Mayz a few weeks ago. Here are video slideshows that show quite a few more.
Thanks again to John Wiley, Monika Caban, Ben Pancoast, Denise Demarchis, and Jenni Vorderman for the amazing photos!!

The “Wedding”:

The Family Shoot:

Many of you might be surprised to know that Cheridy and I never got great wedding photos. When we got married, it was before we were in the industry and we didn’t know what was available or what was possible. It’s been really difficult for us to see all the amazing things that we get to make for our clients because we didn’t have any of those things for ourselves.
A couple weeks ago, Cheridy and I had a once in a lifetime opportunity that we are greatful for. We were able to finally get those wedding photos done…8 years later.
A group of photographers were getting together on the west side of the state to hang out and take pics for a week. They needed people to photograph and we needed photographs so it was a great match.
The first day we did wedding photos and the second day we did family pics. The photographers out there were gracious enough to provide me with high res files that I could edit the way that I like. Thanks to the amazing photographers for the pics, this is a treasure that will last a lifetime! Their names are above each image (John Wiley, Ben Pancoast, Monika Caban, Denise Demarchis, Jenni Voorderman)
Thanks to Bryon Botorwicz for letting me borrow his suit! I’m not as suave as Bryon but I loved the suit and it was a perfect fit! Thanks to Craigslist for Cheridy’s “wedding” dress!
There are a lot more photos than this but too many to post here so I’ll be making a slideshow with them shortly.

Ben Pancoast:

Ben Pancoast:

Ben Pancoast:

John Wiley:

John Wiley:

Ben Pancoast:

Denise Demarchis:

Monika Caban:

Denise Demarchis:

Ben Pancoast:

Day 2 we got to hang out with Mayz and get some family photos taken which was also an amazing blessing for us! The weather in the morning wasn’t great so we did some fun photos indoors:

John Wiley:

Denise Demarchis:

Denise Demarchis:

John Wiley:

Denise Demarchis:

John Wiley:

John Wiley:

Denise Demarchis:

John Wiley: