21 Random Acts of Kindness

Gratitude, Random Acts of Kindness  //  17th July 2013

July 17th, 1996 is one of those dates we will never forget. Every year July 17th comes around and we are immediately flooded with the emotions of that day. Seventeen years later and we can still remember the details like it was yesterday. I remember waking up to the sounds of my mom sobbing as she watched CNN and heard the newscaster say that a group of High School Students from Montoursville, PA were on TWA Flight 800 when it went down. The devastation and sadness that comes over us whenever we hear of heartbreaking tragic news that happens around the world was magnified by 1 million when we saw our small town of Montoursville blasted across the screen of pretty much every major news station knowing that this tragedy was definitely hitting home. Growing up in such a small town, everyone pretty much knows everyone.

July 17th, 1996 was a day that definitely left an impact on our hearts. Through the tragedy, we witnessed our small town come together and become a stronger community. As the clouds formed the shape of an angel in the sky above our high school where people gathered to come together for love and support, we couldn’t help but know everything was going to be okay. There were now 21 additional beautiful angels in the sky who had a special way of making the hugs a little tighter.

There are no answers to the question “why”… in fact, with the most recent controversy magnified by a new documentary, there are still no answers to “how.” But the one answer that we do have is that everything happens for a reason and we have no choice but to honor those 21 beautiful people in a special way! A few weeks ago we received a facebook invite to join a group of over 200 strong in an effort to do 21 Random Acts of Kindness today in honor of those beautiful people who lost their lives 17 years ago. What an AMAZING idea.

Today, we are so excited to be out and about bringing a smile to people’s faces. With each random act of kindness, our hearts will be with each and every one of the 21 and their family and friends. With every smile, we hope we bring a million more to those family and friends as they remember their loved ones today.

Forever in our hearts… that is for sure.

We would LOVE for you to join us by doing a Random Act of Kindness today (or, I mean 21 would be awesome too! ;) !!!) Feel free to download and print these graphics and leave them with your RAK. Let’s spread those smiles today and hopefully help make those hugs a little tighter too!

Liz and Ryan As Seen In | The Buzz Updated

Gratitude, Saying Thanks  //  5th July 2013

Since yesterday was July 4th (hope you had a sparkly celebration! ;) ), we thought it would be fun to end the week with a bang and celebrate all of the exciting places we have run into Liz and Ryan photos recently! ;) We have FINALLY updated The Buzz section of our website and words really can’t describe how grateful we are for every opportunity we have had to share our photos! Seeing our brides and grooms (and our fun DIY projects) on other blogs and in print sets fireworks off in our hearts! ;) (haha… I am full of it today! ;) ) But the reality is… the more people that see our AMAZING couples the happier this world is going to be because their happiness radiates happiness! ;)

Thank you so much to all of the editors and creators of these AMAZING publications for sharing our work and most especially spreading happiness by sharing images of our AMAZING couples!!

When you have a few minutes, definitely check out The Buzz section of our website and click through to the links of these AMAZING publications! Leave them some love… guaranteed they will appreciate a friendly hello from you! ;)

Thank YOU so much to these AMAZING publications where our work has recently been featured:

Southern Weddings Magazine V5, The Huffington Post, Style Me Pretty, Heart Love Weddings, Bayside Bride, Wedding Chicks, Destination Weddings & Honeymoons, The Baltimore Sun, The Knot, Weddings 411, My True Blu, Bridal Guide, Baltimore Bride, Charm City Wed, and The Happy Family Movement!

So grateful for you all and an extra special thanks to all of our couples too!! Thank you all for being so AMAZING!! We love you! ;)

 

“It’s not happening to you, it is happening for you.”

Gratitude  //  29th May 2013

After two days full of photography fun with Kait and Adam and their AMAZING families, I woke up on Sunday bright eyed and ready to start the day! Crazy enough I was feeling more refreshed than ever, but my body was definitely aching as it usually does after a wedding day (that 70-200 lens definitely gives me a workout! ;) ). Ryan was still sleeping peacefully… so I flipped the TV on for some low background noise and started culling the photos from Kait and Adam’s big day! I couldn’t wait! ;)

As the TV came on, I was greeted by Joel Osteen preaching on a random channel that I am pretty sure we have never seen before. I really wanted to change the channel to the Today Show ;), but something in my heart made me stay and listen. The first words I heard him say were, “It’s not happening to you, it is happening for you.”

Joel went on and shared some stories of challenging events in his life that have led him to some of the most AMAZING moments. In the thick of hard times and challenging moments, it is so easy to question things and take the “why me” approach. However, even when it is not obvious or visible at the time, God is working wonders and has a plan. Always.

There are plenty of examples of this in our lives (both big challenging life-changing situations and smaller questioning everyday moments) and it is so incredible to look back and see where God’s plan has led us. In every situation, there always seems to be an outcome that is so much greater than we ever could have imagined.

This past weekend, we celebrated one of the most AMAZING wedding weekends with such an incredible group of people. Seriously, Kait and Adam’s family have touched our hearts in such a special way and we are so grateful to have had the chance to be there to capture this AMAZING time in their lives! So grateful!!!

The importance of our job as photographers and memory capturers became even clearer for us this weekend! On Saturday, our good friends Natalie and Huey also got married! As excited as we were for Kait and Adam’s wedding!!! (and believe me, excited doesn’t even describe it! ;) ) leading up to Saturday, we secretly wished we could be in two places at the same time so that we could be there for Natalie and Huey too! This little challenge, that seemed so big in our hearts at times, was one of those examples where “it was happening for us.” By not being at Natalie and Huey’s wedding, we were reminded of just how important our job as photographers and documenters truly is!

Days before Kait and Adam’s wedding weekend began, they had a few friends and family who could no longer make it. Every time Kait shared that with us, our hearts exploded knowing we have the opportunity to provide them with the pictures that will make them feel like they were a part of it! Photos have a way of taking people right into the moment… emotions and all! We met up with Natalie and Huey on Monday to celebrate with them on their way to their honeymoon! ;) As they described the most magical day of their lives and shared the few photos they already had from the AMAZING Katelyn James, our goosebumps were HUGE and the happy tears filled our eyes! Memories are so incredibly important and how special it is that we get to capture them and make them permenant!?!?

On Saturday morning, Ryan and I had more excitement than ever to document Kait and Adam’s day in such a special way! Seriously, before we even left our room, we removed our game faces and slapped each other high five and said “Let’s rock this out!” ;) We were definitely documenting it for Kait and Adam and their family and friends who were there… but a special place in our hearts definitely gave us extra energy and excitement to rock it out for all of those who could not be physically present that day!

We are so grateful for the way God works and for those subtle (or not so subtle! ;) ) reminders of “It’s not happening to you, it is happening for you.”

We could not be more excited to share Kait and Adam’s wedding memories with you tomorrow!!!! ;) Definitely check back… there is AMAZINGNESS to be seen! ;)

Love and Service | A Recap of Showit United 2013

Gratitude  //  8th March 2013

“We all say we want to serve others, but are we actually doing it?” – David Jay

Among many other very profound statements (both gut-wrenching and uplifting!), this was one of the statements David Jay started off the Showit United Conference with last week! It was in that moment that everything became very real! We knew in our hearts this conference was going to be something special, but nothing prepared us for what it turned out to be!

Showit is a service based technology company for photographers. We have been using their website and image delivery platform for a few years now and are SUPER excited to be using their brand new upgraded PASS system for our image delivery this year (more on PASS next week)!! (Wahooo! Our brides and grooms are in for a special treat!). But anyway… ;), Showit has not only developed some AMAZING products for photographers, but they have created a community that is pretty darn special! This year, Showit hosted their very first Showit United Conference and we made it a priority to get there! Over the past few weeks specifically, David Jay (the co-founder) and the other hard-working Showit staff have been blessing the photography industry by being true examples of selfless leaders. They are taking action to make sure the industry is heading in a positive direction… where photographers recognize the importance of their craft and the impact we all can have on this world through our gifts that we have to share.

For four days, we were reminded of this incredible message of service! We were reminded that everything that we do is SO MUCH BIGGER than ourselves. We all have very special gifts that we were given and it is our responsibility to share those gifts with others! At United, we were surrounded by 200 AMAZING people who may call themselves photographers… but in fact, they all are SO MUCH MORE than that! We had the incredible honor to speak from our hearts and share our perspective on this topic during a breakout session! This message of Love and Service was echoed over and over again in the best possible way! It was incredible.

Thanks Abby Grace for taking these photos of us during our breakout session at United! 

This conference was AMAZING! It was such a blessing to our hearts! It fired us up and reminded us once again of how much we truly have to share! We are so honored to have been among such AMAZING company. Every single speaker touched our hearts in a special way! Seriously… there were a lot of tears, friends! ;) And as Natalie Norton taught us recently, “in tears comes truth!” There was so much truth discovered in our hearts last week and we are so grateful! ;)

This picture below of our AMAZING friend Mary Marantz sums up so many of our emotions we felt last week! Gosh, we have seen Mary speak about 30 times now (lol… that might be a little bit of an exaggeration.. lol.. or maybe not?!?! ;) )! and every single time she rocks our world! But seriously, there was something incredibly extra magical about her talk at United! It gives me butterflies just thinking about the way she touched our hearts last week. We are SO GRATEFUL!

We cannot end this post without thanking Showit! DJ, Kevin, Andrew, the Support Studs, Dev Guys, … and the whole team!! Honestly, this whole company poured their heart and soul into this conference… Not to promote themselves, but to create positive change and share this message of love and service! It was incredible! We are so honored to have been a part of this! An extra special thank you goes out to Kevin… thank you from the bottom of our hearts for believing in us and encouraging us to share our hearts with the world! We are so incredibly grateful for you!

Side note: We have been so incredibly inspired by the overwhelming messages of love and service that was shared last week that we are trying to figure out a way to share it with all of you! Photographers or not! This is a message that we believe everyone needs to hear! ;) We are planning to host a webinar in the near future (next month… date TBA) with a sampling of the message that came from our hearts during United last week! If you would like to join in on the conversation… please sign up for our newsletters and we will make sure you get the heads up when we announce the date!

Have an AMAZING weekend!

 

You are so much more than a photographer | Showit United 2013

Gratitude  //  27th February 2013

Prior to Monday, I would have told you that I was nervous about speaking at Showit United 2013. My introverted self makes it a little challenging (ok, I lot challenging!) to be at the front of the room sharing a presentation. But, then David Jay said something in his opening session that pretty much rocked our worlds. He said something like this:

Anyone who is feeling nervous about speaking is coming at it from the totally wrong place. They are making it way too much about themselves and not recognizing that it is so much bigger than that!

Whoa! Yes, it stung just a bit. But it stung in the best possible way! It was the perfect reminder of what this opportunity was all about. We were blessed with the opportunity to share our heart and soul with a room full of talented people! It was NOT about us, it was about what we could share with everyone else!

After attending an afternoon panel on Monday at Showit United on a topic very similar to what we were sharing yesterday, Service, I found myself getting more fired up than ever. I still had those feelings that I once considered nerves, but I realized that it was so much more than that! I was fired up to have an opportunity to share our gifts in hopes that we could make a difference in the lives of others!! We were fired up!

Yesterday, we poured our hearts out to a room of new and old friends at the Showit United Conference about making your life about Love and Service. We shared a lot with every one in that room. And they turned around and shared so much more! They opened their hearts and encouraged us more than we could have ever imagined! We are so grateful.

The title of our session was “You are SO MUCH More Than a Photographer.” It is in our hearts to share a message of encouragement to always be in search of recognizing your gifts. We firmly believe that by combining your gifts with your passions, you have the power to change the world! Even though you may call yourself by a title of photographer or teacher or construction worker (whatever your “profession” may be)… YOU have so much more to share with the world than what you are limited to with that title! You have passions and you have gifts that are UNIQUE to you. You were given those gifts for a reason and it is your responsibility to utilize them to serve others! That’s what we believe anyway! ;)

We are definitely planning to share more from our session yesterday… including a very special webinar in the near future that shares the whole thing! ;). But, for now, we will share this Compendium video that we concluded the session with yesterday! It is the perfect reminder that YOU have so much to give! And you should probably go and do it! ;)

To everyone who was in that room yesterday… thank you for listening to our hearts and opening yours to support us in our dreams! We are so grateful for each of you and we can’t wait to see what you do with your passions and your gifts!! And to the whole Showit team… thank you for being an INCREDIBLE example of love and service! AND thank you for the opportunity to be a part of Showit United 2013! ;)