A little while back, I had the the pleasure of photographing the Peaslee family. I met mom, Elizabeth through a silent auction to benefit the Lakewood Montessori School in East Dallas. In fact, Elizabeth organized the event... on top of her regular job... on top of raising two beautiful girls along with her husband Chris. Move over, Wonder Woman. I got to know Elizabeth as she and I met to exchange a sample print and the package I was donating to the event, and then - as proverbial fate would have it - she won the auction for my photography. How cool is that?! Not too long ago we headed down to the Deep Ellum Arts District to create some beautiful images of this beautiful family. I love how natural and relaxed they are, and I think that's the story their images show. Elizabeth is coming in for her viewing today, so here's a little sneek peek of what she's in for. This is little Leah. All adorable. All the time.

Enter big sister, Hannah... best friends already.

Such a sweet look on Leah's face.

I love this image. This is one of those images I imagine Hannah and Leah looking back at and cherishing many years from now.

Ditto for mom and dad.

This series cracks me up. I told them there was a bug in my lens, but they didn't buy it for a second. It was a lame attempt on my part, and they saw right through it... literally.

BTW, for anyone keeping track, yes, I realize my day count is all over the place lately. I'm jumping around a bit as I catch up. I'd say there's a method to my madness, but I'd be lying. One of these day's I'll get back on track... probably Day 1 of next year.

Today is my sweetie's birthday. Thanks for being my best friend. Thanks for being my "ness". Thanks for being my wife. Hope you have a fantastic day, and Mia and I will see you tonight. We love you!!

Stayed at a hotel right near Six Flags last week. One night outta the whole week they had this old rickety wooden coaster lit up late at night after the park was closed. Coincidentally, I had a camera. What are the odds, I know.

Just go here.

Last Saturday we had an opportunity to serve and be a very small part of something I think is pretty amazing. One of the couples in our church foundation group invited us to be a part of this project for a few hours, and although I don't know all the details and I'm sure I'm gonna butcher this, the gist of the story goes like this: a while back the city of Dallas busted a drug trafficker and confiscated 42 of his crack houses in and around the west side of the city. Habitat for Humanity purchased about half of the houses from the city and Builders of Hope (whom we were serving with) purchased the other half. Builders of Hope is renovating or tearing down & rebuilding each of these houses to create new affordable homes for deserving community members in those areas. Here's where it gets even better. Along with volunteers, much of the effort to make this happen is being performed by people that have been incarcerated previously but are now trying to turn their lives around. In fact, I heard of one guy who used to sell drugs in one of these houses making ~$40k/month years before who came to help tear down that same house as a symbol that he was putting his past to rest and moving on with his life. Can you imagine how cool that musta been? Here's the house we were working on this past Saturday. This is one of the few they were going to renovate (vs. tear down and start from scratch), so a whole group of guys and girls spent the morning tearing down all the sheetrock and pulling dry wall nails out of the interior framing.

Here's David, Brad and Ray. David and Ray (and their wives) are in the Foundation Group Kylie and I are part of. [NOTE: for the parents of these 3 gents that probably aren't reading this, but just in case... these guys were not part of the group that was previously incarcerated, at least no that I know of. Just wanted to clear that up in case you were thinking your sons had been keeping something from you all these years.]

Another cool texture from this site. This one is available for download for the first 42 people that click here and enter "skidmarks" for the password. BTW, the texture below along with the one that was on the blog as a temporary give away on Monday) were used to created the first image in this post.