This post is special because 1) it’s our first post as a MARRIED couple, and 2) it’s a compilation of our favorite photos from 2014 🙂
Every wedding we have the honor of capturing together, Char and I find ourselves whispering over and over throughout the day “is this real life? Can you believe this is our job?” It’s humbling and it’s surreal.
We have also realized that our job as a husband-wife photography team can often be perceived as glamorous. Sometimes I feel like our lives can be comparable to New York. The movies give you the impression that a simple whistle gets you a taxi in seconds, or that you can party with the rich and famous at night and maintain an 8-to-5 job with leftover money to buy yourself a new pair of leather boots. And maybe this is true! Don’t hear me wrong, I think New York is alluring and sexy and totally alive with creativity and individuality. But I think we can all agree that amidst the glamour we always find grit and dirt. After a while, a farm life in Iowa with no neighbors for miles sounds favorable. I hate to use cliche’s but I think in this case it’s ok to just say exactly what I’m getting at: The grass is always going to be greener. Always. That is if we are always aware of the grass on the other side of the bridge and ignore the grass we are standing in.
We truly love our job. We find it crazy that our job is hanging out with awesome people all day and taking photos of fun moments and tearful moments, and real raw emotion! It brings us life. It gives us joy. And with this excitement and joy comes the reality: We fight exhaustion and burn out and don’t know our own boundaries. People often comment on how sweet it must be to get paid to travel all over. Truth is, after three trips in a month, we get sick of the travel and start missing our friends. I look at my friends with “real” jobs, with consistency and a constant pay check, and think how nice that sounds. I heard somewhere that comparison is the killer of joy (can I get an amen?). We as humans do this to ourselves constantly; we compare with other people’s lives to either boost our ego or feel sorry for ourselves. I believe that God is in and all around every facet of our lives, using us to bring His kingdom to those around us. When we agree with the lie that says everyone has it better than we do, we miss what God is doing in the present moment; we miss the way he brushes away some of that grit and dirt until we see something sparkle. Our hope and encouragement to you is that, the next time you look at someone else’s “glamorous” life, rather than compare, you would start to see those areas in your life that shine through the darkness and focus on them.
We find ourselves freshly married and ready for another year of travel and work and of course, many, many more photos. As we sifted through hundreds of pictures picking our “favorites,” we found ourselves laughing and tearing up as we took in the palpable emotion of all the special moments we’ve witnessed this past year. These photos are a tangible reminder of why we do what we do. They remind us to choose to be grateful during the moments when we see the glamour of another lifestyle. Thanks from the bottom of our hearts to all of you who let us capture important life moments and dance with you at your wedding. Let’s go 2015!
