Jessica & Daniel: Moab, Utah Wedding Photographer

Finally! Its about time I put up an entire post. Thinking about all the catching up I have to do is a little depressing. ...On the up side, slowly but surely, my To-Post list is getting smaller and smaller. So here's to another post--One down, many more to go!

For ojiichan and obaachan

I miss it already!! I am so glad I was able to go over to Japan this last week to visit my relatives there. It is a very rare occasion to be able to see all of them in one trip with one family living in Tokyo and the others in the Aichi-ken Prefecture. We took Deej with us this time to introduce him to the family (He's so cute--he's been studying his butt off in his Japanese class and also doing Rosetta Stone at home. Gosh I love him!) It was wonderful to see all my aunts and uncles and cousins. I am so grateful for all of them who came and sacrificed their time to have a little wedding dinner with DJ and me.

I wish I had hired a photographer to come with us to capture everything (Heather, that means you, lady!) because from the looks of most of my photos, I wasn't there--My eye was GLUED to my Nikon the whole trip. But still, all these photos make for great memories! Here's a little glimpse at what we did in the land of the sun:

I'd like to introduce you to my Ojiichan. My grandpa that I love so much. He is so amazing. 86 and still going strong! He takes care of my grandma every single day (she was diagnosed with dementia about 7 years ago or so) and still finds time to manage all his gardens, which brings me to one of my favorite things about him. He makes the most delicious breakfasts. That might sound funny, but his Japanese breakfasts aren't the simple milk and cereal in a bowl. We eat toast, salad, sausages, yogurt, fish, seaweed, pumpkin, grapes, fig, Japanese pears, sweet beans...Its definitely weird, but it is ridiculously good. And most of the veggies and fruits come from my grandpa's garden. He is a gardening god!

My grandpa has been doing archery for a long time. It was really interesting seeing how ritualistic it was. They would walk in a single file line, always keeping their feet shuffling on the floor as they walked to their position. Then they would take their wide stance, look at their target, and pause for a moment to think. They would slowly raise their bows and arrows. It was so intricate, all the way down to the movement of the fingers. 

I'm so grateful for my grandpa. He's done so much for me and has been such a blessing in my life. I can't wait to go back to see him again!

More to come from my trip to Japan :) Stay tuned...

À la prochaine...

So the last post was mostly from my few days in Gordes and Roussillon in Southern France. Our next destination that my dad let me pick was Marseille and then finally, Cassis. My images are definitely not up to par with my dad's landscapes, but I did my best to make him proud (we make a great duo--his thing is landscape photography, mine is portraits).

I absolutely miss this trip. It was one of the greatest adventures I've been on. I loved being somewhere totally new and foreign to me, and it was fun getting some one-on-one bonding time with my poppa.

Thanks again, daddio! Love you!

 This was my lovely get-up every day: Film camera around the neck and digital in hand/on my handy dandy tripod.

Also, above you'll see our quaint little hallway to our room in Roussillon.

 Our view from dinner each night.

 Here we are in good ol' Marseille!

I love all the vibrant colors in these towns!

This man was our entertainment while we enjoyed some delicious french pizza on the patio. 

...kinda reminded me of the kidnapper from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, no?...

I LOVE FRANCE!

 Yes. This is a pile of rubbish (as my husband would call it). Piles of rubbish, everywhere! And some piles were well over 5'2, aka, me! I guess the garbage men were on strike or something.

 We arrived to the beautiful Cassis right around sunset. Perfect golden lighting on the hills!

 I can't get enough of the cute little ally ways.

This is the port where our hotel was.

 This has to be my #1 favorite shot of the entire trip. I think its because this is the only shot that really got to me on an artists level. What I mean is, the story behind this bike is, in a way, inspirational. Its the bike of the artist who works in this building--coincidentally enough, he is also a photographer and this is his photo gallery. He said one day he rode his bike to work, locked it up, and somehow lost the key so he was never able to detach the bike. I guess vines started growing and it completely took over the bicycle. Soon enough, it became a tourist attraction, leaving people to think this was a purposeful piece of artwork. He said a while later that he had found the key to his bike, but decided that this new piece of art was worth more than the bike--being a new popular landmark, it brought in tourists to his gallery and was good for business! I thought it was interesting that the simple act of losing a key created  not only success for his photography, but something beautiful by leaving this bike stationary. Pretty neat! So after hearing this story, I decided to grab my camera from the hotel and snap a shot or two.

Above is the view from our hotel window, and below, our hotel! :)

Can't wait to go back someday!