shoulder shrugs and coffee mugs

2012-02-10T19:33:00.002-05:00

better late than never... here's a few from the boudoir marathon at the end of january (the ones that are blog-appropriate, of course). such a great day spent with beautiful fun gals!

we'll have to do it again sometime...

2012-01-30T12:26:00.003-05:00

a few years ago, i was working full-time overnights for the department of natural resources in indiana at a campground. i was also working for IU's school of fine arts in the photo lab and working as the tour guide program student director in the office of admissions. i was also smack in the middle of the best few months of college spent living with my two best friends, rachel and erin. i also had this long-term guy in my life and we were pretty happy also. needless to say, i wasn't sleeping much in general, but things were busy and life was pretty full.

one morning, after getting off work at the lake, i plopped myself on the back porch of our house, watched the sun rise, and had this fantastic feeling. i was suddenly overcome with this feeling of intense fullness, and contemplated my life and decided that i had achieved what all people aimed for: i had it all. i did. i had EVERYTHING. great friends, great jobs, great boyfriend, a great college experience, great bike, my dream car, really everything. i spent 15 minutes or so basking in this feeling and feeling so happy and grateful that i had it all, and then I went in the house and continued on with my day, feeling fabulous.

right now, i remember that feeling. i remember how it washed over me, and it really affected my whole outlook on things.
more importantly, however, i remember what happened afterward almost as intensely.
it seemed like once i recognized that i had squeezed the juice out of life and made the best lemonade ever, the world stopped.
everything i had felt so grateful for was almost immediately and abruptly ripped away from me. within a week, my fabulous expensive bike was stolen from my house, my best friend officially moved away, my boyfriend had unceremoniously dumped me, and my car was broken due to an unfortunate run-in with a deer on my way home from work.
my happy world literally fell into a thousand pieces.

it took quite a while to rebuild my life after that, and, i'd say in the years since, i have never really had that feeling again.

well, boys and girls, i had it again.
i was driving to colorado springs this weekend for a photo shoot with carrie, and follow that up with a great visit to caroline and clayton afterward, and i was smacked immediately again with that uncanny feeling of sappy pure contentedness with my life, and that the sky really was the limit and that the world was just full of possibility just for me, and that i have it ALL.
only this time, i was afraid of that feeling, dreading the impending doom of when that feeling goes away, and being afraid of when the sky falls in on me again.
i realized that i have become wary of that feeling and didn't want to let myself feel it. and then... all of a sudden... baz luhrmann's song called "everyone's free (to wear sunscreen)" came on my ipod. and i chose to let myself feel that feeling, grateful for all that i have, even if it is only for 15 minutes.

here's to making that 15 minutes of having it all last a lifetime.

i've got it all.

Jenny+Jesse!

2012-01-19T00:24:00.005-05:00

these two will be getting married this coming summer, but Carrie and i had a great time with them this past weekend photographing their engagement photos in Golden Gate State Park. so looking forward to their wedding in Vail this summer!

r

2012-01-09T00:22:00.000-05:00

waking up to erik on the rollers, it will never get old.

2011-12-31T22:08:00.017-05:00

a man asked me at work the other day what my New Year's resolutions were. i was abruptly hit with the fact that i don't have any.

i'm going to spend a little time doing something that i am very good at.... and that's focusing on the past. 2011 has been a hell of a ride.

[january]
i really had it with indiana. the weather, some terrifying medical testing, and a serious lack of travel all contributed in a big way to what I would consider the worst month of 2011... it really is all uphill from here, i'd say. it wasn't all bad, though.... alycin organized the fabulous roll n bowl evening, so much love. the roll n bowl was the highlight of my january:

[february]
i hit my milestone birthday, the last one for a while... i turned 25, and my friends threw me the best surprise birthday party; i just love having all of my favorite people in the same place! among other things, i forged an important bond with one of the kids at the shelter, met our fabulous wedding planner, morgan, for the first time, and decided, once again, that math really is not the subject for me. february favorite, a night spent with friends at the vid:

[march]
my talented friend, emily, wrote a play that depauw university's theater department decided to stage. it was my serious pleasure to visit greencastle and see it live, and celebrate with her afterwards. erik and i took some us time and visited asheville, north carolina, and knoxville, tennessee. march was a great month!

[april]
what can i say about april? it's always one of the best months of the year! little 500 happenings: another cutter win, another big cutter family celebration (AND teddy's first birthday bike ride!). it would also turn out to be the last team rev race, so happy to be coaching in the pit for them.

[may]

april really set the stage for may and the rest of the year, because may was just full of more celebrating. the stewarts got hitched and graciously allowed me to be part of their day, i got to shoot an event for summit city bicycles, erik and i went to arkansas for the second year in a row for a big race, and we sent mike off with a bloomington-style upland goodbye when he moved back to chicago.

[june]

june was a hard month, but still a good one. june saw the departure of more of my nearest and dearest friends... caroline and clayton moved off to colorado, and kristen moved to phoenix (but not before goodbye packing slumber parties and goodbye boats on lake monroe). june also saw most of erik's racing (and i saw the least of erik!), including nationals in Georgia.

[july]

let's be real, july was a serious blur wherein all i did was take care of anything and everything wedding related. we also had a major land-lord induced mold-problem that caused a last-minute move, so july was a whirlwind. ricketts visited, though, a july bright spot! July also saw the annual Bloomington crit, and the going away of another part of our Bloomington family, Hank.

[august]

i mean, august was a banner month, everyone i love (with the exception of very few) was all in one place to celebrate erik and i getting married. august was the beginning of something really grand! this is from our fab photogs, nate and amanda reynolds:

[september]

my fabulous friends kelly and josh got married in september, and it was fantastic!! september was also spent anxiously anticipating our visit to see caroline and clayton in colorado. little did we know, once we got there, a job would plop into erik's lap and we would become colorado residents when october hit. the ball was rolling really fast in september.

[october]

we tied up loose ends, and i did my best to say goodbyes to everyone inindiana. this may be the hardest thing i've ever looked forward to doing. and in october, i'm not gonna lie, i pretty much regretted moving for the entirety of the month. i struggled to find a job and feel in any way at home, even though we had fabulous roommates and were living next to mountains.

[november]

i started assisting carrie and we shot our first wedding together. every day of november was better than the last, and i got hired at the YMCA right after spending a few days in colorado springs for friendsgiving with caroline, clayton, mike, and kristen, and renee.

[december]

december saw our first murried christmas, and also the first without any family. i got promoted at the Y, and, most importantly, i finally started to feel like i fit in and colorado was really home. welcome to my home.

that's enough backward looking.

2012 is going to be the best year yet, and i am so looking forward to it.

2011-12-18T23:54:00.000-05:00

i have a real thing for christmas. i got to make a trip home to fort wayne from boulder to decorate the tree at my parents' house, and here's a tiny baby bit of what christmas time looks like at our place. we always put up a HUGE real tree, and tree-decorating is an allday process full of egg nog, classic christmas music, and my fabulous organizational skills at unpacking boxes and repacking them back into the closet!!!

i was doing a search for something in a closet upstairs... behold what i found there, one of the things that makes my dad a total badass (that's a master's national championship jersey, in case you're wondering):

christmas is a big deal, i told you. my parents instilled in me this weird love for all things antique when it comes to christmas. when my grandmother (who was a saint) passed away, we got all of her antique ornaments and they are some of the most cherished things in my family.

this is the aluminum foil star that was atop the tree every year since my dad was a little boy:

we have a thing for the pickle ornament in my family; the first one to find the pickle on christmas morning opens the first present. as i am bad at seek and finds (and bad at functioning in the morning), i usually lose this game. also, a nice side note... my grandfather planted a walnut tree when my dad was a kid, and it only ever bore ONE walnut, and then the walnut tree died. my grandpa painted that one walnut gold and hung it on the christmas tree. it still goes up every year on our tree.

my mom's choir boys, always a christmas staple!!

a great weekend.

2011-12-04T15:59:00.004-05:00

i convinced the roommates yesterday to take a trip to the denver art museum for the day (it was free admission day, no less!) the boys decided that we should start roommate field trips (which i love!), and the first one was a smashing success. the highlight of the trip was making our own postcards in the western art exhibit which are now the first pieces of art to grace our refrigerator. yes, it was an activity meant for small children, and yes, we did sit next to several children whose drawings were notably better than mine. stay tuned for the next field trip, but enjoy this one for now:

feeling more at home every day.

2011-11-28T14:36:00.007-05:00

so here's a smidgen of a friendsgiving.
okay, it's more than a smidgen, it's so much.
i love it.

2011-11-20T01:08:00.005-05:00

So, we kind of got married backwards of how everyone else does it; normally, everyone gets to go to the ceremony, and then less people go to the reception because it expensive to feed and water everyone... we did it the other way around; very few people got to be at our ceremony (i'm thinking that it was right around 20 people all said and done, but EVERYONE got to go to the afterparty.

The point of all this is that not everyone knows that we wrote our own vows, and we both thought of them probably less than 24 hours before we actually did the getting married thing. Obviously, e-ham had to show me up and have more thought-out, longer vows than i did... but my vows have been in my thoughts a lot recently, especially this week. It was very simple for me; I said, "Every day is full of triumphs and tragedies, and, whether it be a triumph or tragedy, I will be by your side every day."

I've been thinking about all of this just in terms of how life works, and this week has been the epitome of little triumphs followed by tragedies. I'm working on balancing it all out with each other, because tragedies tend to draw out much more sorrow from me than the amount of joy that comes with triumphs. It's been so incredibly up and down lately... I was elated early this week when I got a third and fourth interview for this incredible job, and crushed beyond belief when I got my rejection for that job on Friday. We were fortunate enough to go to the Garmin-Cervelo Team Presentation on Thursday; we also went to Colorado Springs to visit Caroline and Clayton Friday and Saturday, but the realization that my unemployment wasn't enough to sustain activities for me beyond bills hit hard right as we were leaving (also known as it ran out for the week, AHH!).

Every day is filled with little triumphs and tragedies, and I am really working hard to make all of those little triumphs far outweigh the little tragedies we encounter.
Things will work out, this I know. I'm adhering to the philosophy that "you can't miss what you never had" when things don't work out the way I wanted them to.

Little triumphs for the week include discovering what kind of monster really resides in the attic (Ralph the squirrel) and Carter's homemade (and improvised!) pumpkin pie, and the puppies loving on each other, erik and clayton racing together once again, and time spent with good friends in Colorado Springs. Celebrate my triumphs with me.

2011-11-17T19:49:00.005-05:00

big ring cyclocross, a great (but windy) last Saturday.

happiness is e-ham getting 4th!

it's been really great to have time to get to all of Erik's races lately, I can't remember the last time that happened.

shannon & kevin.

2011-11-16T22:26:00.008-05:00

I had the fun of second shooting a wedding last Friday, so good! say hello to Shannon and Kevin! They had the coolest wedding, in a commercial airplane hangar, at XJET just south of Denver in Englewood. Feast your eyes on their love!

kevin and his groomsmen had a lot of fun getting their ties right, they can be so tricky!

so much love.

2011-11-06T15:23:00.003-05:00

spent the better part of a saturday afternoon in Brighton at a lovely cyclocross race.

highlight reel:

2011-11-06T14:57:00.002-05:00

i'm always looking for wonderful inspiration... i happened upon the painter Kim Piotrowski's blog and i LOVE what she does! please enjoy it, she is so talented.

http://kipiboo.blogspot.com/

i love a good brainstorm session inspired by all of that.

2011-11-02T18:06:00.003-04:00

so. we have these fabulous friends that are more like a family than friends. in fact, everyone calls it a family. we had a wonderful dinner with part of this family, erica and jason fowler, a couple days before we left bloomington, and hursh (aka erica) gave me this card. what was inside was one of the most fabulous gifts anyone has ever given me. i will share it with you all now, because i think it is a masterpiece:

Hursh's Top 10 Things to Consider when Moving to a New City/State

1. After you get all the boxes, bags, and laundry baskets into your new residence, set up and make your bed ASAP. You can do many things with your floor covered in newspaper, packing tape, and cardboard. Sleeping is not one of them.

2. When in doubt... drinking while unpacking is always a good idea. It will also help soothe the blow when you break your favorite trinket from growing up. Slippery bubble wrap!

3. Go up to the door, knock, and introduce yourself to your neighbors in the first few weeks. If they are great... then you can ask them to get your mail when you are gone; if they are really weird... you know who not to borrow a cup of sugar from.

4. Find out what the local magazine, newspaper, website is. I'm not talking about the Sunday times; I am talking about publications like NUVO and Indianapolis Monthly. Theytell you what are cool things to do, new restaurants, local events, etc.

5. Go to said things you find in magazine/newspaper. These places and events are

a. cool and mostly local.

b. cool and local people go to them = FRIENDS!

6. Don't change who you are because you are in a new place, instead find people who like to do what you do too. Sometimes it takes a few tries...but you will find it. Stay persistent!

7. The best way to figure out where you live is to run the streets. You can drive places, lace up, and go!

8. Get involved with something outside of work. Could it be the IU Alumni Association-Boulder edition? What about a local Photographer Meeting? Or the local running group? Find that group that is a Labor of Love. It will help keep you sane and busy!

9. You will cry at least once in the first few weeks and think.. "why did I do this to myself?" At this point, you have to suck it, make lemonade out of lemons, and remember that "happiness is a choice".

10. Above all else... remember that you can always go Home again. And Home is INDIANA! Those same people who loved you when you left, will still love you when you come back. Real friends pick up right where they left off.

Today has been a real #9 day. and i'm so thankful to have this wonderful gift and all of our wonderful friends. thank you hursh.

2011-11-02T16:38:00.002-04:00

i spent last saturday at the Boulder reservoir, and got to watch the fabulous Katie Compton school the entire field of the elite women's cyclocross race (as usual, she's a beast). plus, it was so great to go to such an awesome race and it was only ten minutes from our house! WIN!

can i just say.... i cannot believe i live in colorado.

in case anyone hadn't guessed, erik and i made a major life change.

erik got offered a job at university bikes and it was the reason we'd been waiting for to move out of indiana.

anyone that knows me will know... i love all things as they were; i might be the most nostalgic person you've EVER met. film will always trump digital for me, my grandma's christmas ornaments from the early 1900s are a few of my most cherished possessions, and the day my aunt gave me her old record player was the greatest ever.

this transition was harder for me than i ever thought possible, probably because of my severe nostaligism (i made that word up; i definitely have that condition). who would think that moving to a state where the sun shines for more than 300 days a year would cause me so much grief?

all i have to say is...

thank goodness for skype.

i've never had a real reason to use it before, but now i relish my little alycin skype date breakfasts and all the times i call kristen on skype and she's not fully dressed.

i'm just spreading out the love over the whole country now.

2011-11-02T14:51:00.002-04:00

also, thanks mostly to the urging of caitlin #2, i decided to FINALLY upgrade my darn phone. i've long been drooling over the iphone, mostly because of the camera. i mean, i love my mac computer and all, but the phone has the nicest camera of any cell phone, ANYWHERE. i finally got one.

and with much happiness, i started a new mobile-photo-only tumblr of "iphoneography".

http://takingitallwithme.tumblr.com

enjoy please!

obviously, i still have the other tumblr at http://caitlinrhamilton.tumblr.com if you want to see photos and none of my blathering on about them.

much love!

2011-11-02T14:11:00.006-04:00

thanks to clayton and renee at carmichael training systems for being pro VO2 testers!

this is the part of his vacation where erik had to torture himself on a bike for over an hour.

totally shattered at the end of it all.

i think my favorite part of carmichael's facility was all the quotes on the walls, BIG...

imagine looking up at one of those when you're smashing it on a test.

2011-11-01T16:32:00.005-04:00

I'm going to reference back to Chase Jarvis' blog, yet again, and his 7 creative habits:

1.Get into adventures. Instead of saying no, say yes. Whether it’s agreeing going to the South China Sea or to Sundance festival or the grocery store.

2. Devour popular culture. Examine the work of other artists, movies, books, magazines, the interwebs.
3. Take pictures of things. I photograph things I see in the world that inspire me and usethem for reference.

4. Scribble ideas. On a notepad, ipad, or whatever.
5. Share your ideas with others. Better ideas often comefrom a conversation. Give and receive. It’s a dialectic.

6. Ask Questions. Lots of other people know more than you do.
7. Listen. Try to listen carefully. When other people talk, you should listen. Ideas are everywhere.

fabulous advice, don't you think??

a november resolution, to do a better job of harnessing creativity when it comes along instead of pushing it to the side.

rocky mountain high

2011-10-12T13:11:00.003-04:00

much more of colorado to come, but a tiny piece of our vacation to see caroline and clayton:

kelly&josh.

2011-09-20T12:51:00.001-04:00

too much fabulous, all in one day!!!!

kelly is a bachelorette!

2011-09-12T12:47:00.003-04:00

just a sliver of kelly's bachelorette party, this girl and all her maids are just WONDERFUL.

anthony&adrienne

2011-08-29T12:14:00.001-04:00

a tiny bit of anthony and adrienne... so much FUN! groomsmen's matching tattoos, rambunctious wedding party, and morphsuits. so much love in the craziest way.

2011-08-28T17:40:00.002-04:00

adrienne and anthony got hitched yesterday.

a little thing right here from that..

so so wonderful, they are!

2011-08-26T14:21:00.001-04:00

i'm feeling very inspired today.

veeeery veeeery inspired.

i just have this intense need to set up a very elaborate scene and shoot the heck out of it.

i will round up some models. mmyes!

2011-08-25T14:28:00.003-04:00

just so everyone knows... unless i have a particular thing or event to post loads of photos of on the blog, i've been posting single photos to my tumblr pretty regularly.

http://caitlinrhamilton.tumblr.com

much love.

2011-08-16T12:29:00.003-04:00

it's been a whirlwind of a summer.
it all went so quickly.
lots of love all around me. lots of love, i'm so grateful.
i was going to give a rundown of all the things that happened, but it was just a lot of work. as in, excessive amounts of work. it was really just work and mini tragedies all throughout july. wedding nightmares: lost the reception venue, lost my veil, had to write off a real honeymoon; life happened all over the place. personal nightmare: found out i'm highly allergic to mold when we discovered our house was full of it, causing a last minute hectic move the week before our wedding (which i'm still not sure everything is moved in really) and a lawsuit from us to them, thankyouverymuch.
somehow, SOMEHOW, i managed to stay sane, but barely. i only have everyone in my life to thank for helping me, helping us. with all that chaos, i made important time for important people.

this is all for now.... the great jim kirkham officiating our wedding, making us "11" (way better than just 1).

i love love.

2011-07-25T14:30:00.000-04:00

blogger's small image quality is not the best, but whatever.
rickettsvisited!

and it was good.

2011-06-24T22:25:00.009-04:00

the best of the mess from usac time trial nationals! so great. congrats to erik on 13th, he's just the greatest! also, nuvo's jacobs took home the win and that is big doins as well, congrats to him!!

on a sidenote, augusta is HOT.
oh, and strom thurmond lake is surprisingly gorgeous.

2011-06-22T22:11:00.002-04:00

I love moving walkways.

I can’t help it, I just do.

there are many things I love about airports, but I think moving walkways might just be the best thing.

2011-06-02T14:30:00.003-04:00

my time in Bloomington, like pretty much everyone else that I know, is quickly drawing to a close. I've been thinking a lot about next steps recently... and I realized that, in bracing myself for everyone leaving and trying to plan our own "what's next", I forgot how many things I've meant to do over the last few years and just never got around to. I think I'm dedicating my days off (and the off-half of my work days!) to completing all of those things.

the list includes, but is not limited to:

*doing "boats" on lake monroe (THANK YOU DOMEY for making this a reality this weekend!!!)

*riding out to the quarries (and maybe jumping in!)

*riding to the porthole inn on lake lemon and eating their famous catfish and hushpuppies

*winetrials to butler winery

*see a movie at the drive-in (been there, but not for a movie!!)

*go to karaoke at the office lounge

*drink a WHOLE yard (not a half) at the lion

*eat at hinkle's

*go to the taste of bloomington

*introduce bella to water at drool in the pool

*eat at the scenic view

suggestions are welcome, as i know there's so many things i want to do here! i'm going to repeat a few of my favorites, like going to the speedway! hell, maybe i'll race the bloomington crit for the first time! it's going to be a great summer, and capping it all off with the biggest first on august 6!

2011-05-30T23:16:00.002-04:00

i hate to boast. i really do.... but gosh I just have the best friends in the whole world.
i'm really lucky.
really REALLY lucky.

for a time, it was super rough. i had willingly submitted myself to this symbiotic life with erin, rachel, caity, and everyone else i had come to fully depend upon for love, laughs, and commiseration... and then, it was gone. everyone moved, things changed, and everyone went out to live in new places and have new adventures after college. i was completely miserable. i'll say it. it was terrible. i was absolutely sure it was the end of the world. we're all still friends, and close. but it's so hard being split up, like you have to shred up your heart, pass it around, and hope it comes back again. it always does, of course... but it just required a little extra effort and more vacations, i've found. :)

and now, everything flipped around again, and i wasn't so alone in the place where i lived.
the next little world we all built seems to be doing the same things all over again.
caroline, clayton, sasha, alycin, kristen, sherer, hazel.... everyone is moving to different things and new chapters in their lives. and it's so exciting and so wonderful!! i have just been struggling within myself so much to be supportive when all i really feel like doing some days to do is just cling to their legs like a scared kindergartner on my first day of school, like anchoring their legs is going to make them stay here.

looking forward to the next little world and the next chapter that erik and i start in august, as i have not forgotten that i have the best man in the whole world right next to me for everything.

there's a book i always take with me when i travel. because you never know what line in that book is going to jump out at you on the page and help you along... i find new ones every time i read it. and there's a line that never fails to help me recognize the real significance and meaning of endings and goodbyes.
"What is that feeling when you're driving away from people and they recede upon the plain till you see their specks dispersing?--it's the too-huge world vaulting us, and it's good-by. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies."
a little kerouac always seems to do the trick.

looking forward to everyone's new ventures.

Summit City Bicycles Ladies' Night

2011-05-30T22:36:00.005-04:00

I got to go for a short visit with the parentals and had the great fun to shoot the women's only event at the bike shop, SO fun!! These womens' camaraderie was just absolutely wonderful to be a part of. Also, they all were just SO complimentary towards my dad, who was one of the people behind putting the event on and who is just the best dad ever!

wonderful.

2011-05-30T17:43:00.004-04:00

mr and mrs stewart.

the stewarts.

2011-05-30T13:09:00.001-04:00

a small bit of STL

2011-05-16T00:43:00.002-04:00

the little rainy day photos i love from tour de grove...

upland patio

2011-05-02T10:55:00.000-04:00

sherer's going away at the upland patio.... so wonderful but so sad all at the same time!!

2011-04-21T14:41:00.002-04:00

small goals, small accomplishments. they mean everything.

i ran a 23:40 5k today.... one step closer to the goal of sub 22 i made myself a month ago.

awesome.

but this leads me to an absurd realization.

somewhere along the way, i became very rigid and schedule oriented.

...for real? i had no idea i was capable of such a thing.

my parents will tell you.... they couldn't PAY me to use a planner in high school and middle school, and i'm pretty sure i did without one for the first couple years of college.

but oh my god if you saw my google calendar now, you'd probably break out into a cold sweat.

i schedule EVERYTHING.

i even made my own excel file with to-do lists for wedding-related crap each week up until we get married.

i have a "work" gcal (that encompasses all the jobs i have), an "erik races" gcal, a "personal" gcal, a "little 500 events" gcal, a "school" gcal and a "wedding" gcal, all in the same space.

and today, kristina and i decided to attempt our first half-marathons. which means another schedule for running to make sure i'm doing it right up until we run.

i gotta tell you...

it's getting pretty cramped.

i love to fill up my time.

but i think it may be time to start emptying my calendar of some things and prioritizing everything else to unclutter my life and make sure i'm living just a little simpler and with a little better quality.

here's hoping.

2011-04-18T16:58:00.006-04:00

a small selection of goodness.

2011-04-18T16:38:00.002-04:00

there aren't enough words to describe this weekend.
maybe that's not true. i think i just don't know the right words offhand.

so proud of my team rev girls and their excellent race friday despite an early setback... they truly raced like a team.

heather said that one of the most important results of having been a part of the cutters team is that they are all good men.
and it's a fact. bikes for the rest of their lives or no bikes, each one of them is a good man.
this family is the most incredible accidental family i could have ever hoped to blindly stumble into, and one that before i could only dream about being a part of.

thank you to everyone who made this weekend a great one.
a smattering of photos to come.

2011-04-17T14:59:00.002-04:00

there are some other pictures to come from this wonderful weekend, but this is all for right now.

this whole big cutters family is just full of love, and that's the most important thing of all.

2011-04-11T23:20:00.000-04:00

samantha.

2011-04-11T23:07:00.002-04:00

Teddy's birthday bike ride was a great success. good friends, good times.

2011-04-08T11:49:00.001-04:00

the list of go times for cutters' ITTS.
hilarious and so wonderful... no real names here!

2011-04-08T11:29:00.003-04:00

had to resurrect this one... went on a SEARCH for it!

my brother, circa 2008. so good.

2011-04-04T23:25:00.002-04:00

look at how wonderful linda and little teddy freddy are, cheering at quals:

the cuteness is just too much!!

i have so much to say about this recent barrage of awful and hateful comments on BVN... but i will refrain and instead direct anyone who cares to know how i feel about all of this here. that is all.

2011-04-01T21:56:00.002-04:00

I went into the co-op the other day like i do about every other day for a cup of wonderful coffee, and, like every other day, they ask if i have a co-op member number. i don't, so i say, "no, i don't... one of these days I'll get one". Instead of just ringing it up, the guy says "oh man, one of these days, huh?" and i instantly replied "i know it, such a dangerous response to default to for your life". and right then, RIGHT THERE i realized that for the last 6 months, i've been saying "one of these days" to important things i want to do someday.

"one of these days" is now "today".

love this.

2011-03-31T12:02:00.000-04:00

it's that time again.

the best time of the year.

little 500 season is now full blown.

i've always had good reasons to love spring in Bloomington, and i'm thrilled that I just keep adding on to those reasons every year.

qualifications were saturday, and although i felt like crap towards the end of the day, it was magical to see everyone i love all in one wonderful place. i'm going to skip a coherent review of everything and leave you with a list.
*nicks
*the fowlers!
*hipster glasses
*jimmy kisses
*"are you sure? hamilton LOVES you"
*revstrong!
*ZBT quals and calling their lawyers
*anything that was said in the pressbox
*"can we share body heat?"
*PATCHES!
*bennetti
*"osterman is my hero"
*"My quals run is 'Kilroy's, Nicks, Upstairs, Kilroys'."

it was just a wonderful day (and a wonderful night before) full of wonderful people.

2011-03-27T12:26:00.003-04:00

so in light of my long electronic hiatus, i had to neglect the blog and photo editing... so this comes a little late, but here it is anyway.
remember my wonderful friend emily? well. i couldn't be more proud of her (as usual!).... she wrote a play that was so good, depauw theater decided to bring it to the stage. a selection of wonderfulness from afterwards:

she's just the best thing.

2011-03-23T19:40:00.004-04:00

i'm returning from a major electronic hiatus.

major for me, anyway. i just... got into this horrible stagnant funk.

i turned 25, and started my quarter life crisis.

i made a realization that it had been 2 months since i left the state of indiana.

and after realizing this, i became mentally obsessed with leaving the state as the only thing that would help me; i think i actually had a downward spiral directly related to my lack of travel.

and then my dad and i couldn't go to the grand canyon, (poor guy had a disc in his lower spine degenerate!!) and i almost lost it!

thankfully, a couple weeks ago erik and i made the spur of the moment decision to go to knoxville and north carolina, our first "us" trip in pretty much ever.

2011-03-12T23:50:00.001-05:00

cherokee, north carolina.

2011-03-02T11:19:00.000-05:00

a little bit from a wonderful saturday spent with friends and big sweeties.

2011-03-01T14:31:00.005-05:00

i've said before, i'm always amazed at what brings people to my blog. someone googled ' "plobvs" means ' to get themselves here at some point this week. those of you who know what plobvs means, you probably know zach osterman. those of you who are unaware.... i would urge you to get the full effect and talk to osterman. but short and sweet, it's a combination of "please" and "obviously". it's the new "duh", only 10 times classier.

anyway. onward.
session at the vid:

that last one isn't the vid, but it's next to the vid, so i thought it counted.

love.

2011-02-20T14:02:00.001-05:00

i got to spend my birthday with the best people on the planet... there were a few besties missing (thanks to geographic disparity between us all) but it was a good day. some select photos from the surprise party at caroline's house...

not sure.

DOMEY!

mike claims that layla loves beer, and that she has a long tongue. this proves both:

the wonderful jim kirkham came!!!!

layla = spoiled.

all our dogs make out with each other, no big deal.

this is lovely.

sadie jo loves peanut butter!

their friendship, no words necessary, haha:

sasha brought me a wonderful present... he has been experimenting with melting and reforming crayons in silicon molds (it's that teacher in him!!), and he brought me some pieces of roman architecture in convenient crayon form. that guy:

sadie jo looooves mike!

a good birthday.

2011-02-18T19:03:00.000-05:00

25.

2011-02-12T12:51:00.002-05:00

Sometimes I feel like I'm drowning

Actually its more like most of the time

But every now and then when I am sleeping

I still have a dream that I'm flying

no matter how much time passes or how much my music taste changes, i can't help it: i default back to freshman and sophomore year of college. alexi murdoch, beulah, ted leo (with or without the pharmacists), old rilo kiley, imogen heap, bright eyes, old muse, a little of the weepies, sometimes iron and wine, a smidgen of decent death cab, anything spoon ever did, and a little helping of random punk mixed in.

i think it's great.

my oldies but goodies.

steady as a rock.

2011-01-27T23:39:00.001-05:00

get ready for a cuteness overload....

and he claimed he was mad at her, not an hour before this.
so wonderful.

2011-01-25T21:41:00.002-05:00

i'm back.

well, i never really left, i guess.

i started a new year, started back in classes, went back to two jobs instead of one, and just got BUSY. too busy.

i've been feeling just...bored in general. no travel, no money, no real way to do much else but work (which i also think is thanks largely to a dreary indiana winter.... here's hoping this is my LAST one of these atrocious snowy messes).

but being bored always lets up, you know... and tonight i had another realization: i'm becoming boring. which was a terrifying thought.

gotta pick up a camera, gotta create, gotta dance around... i gotta make something of all this i have inside of me.

today is my day.

i just want to do everything.

this is me, getting back to my end goal of always being happy.

and, of course, creating an actual endless summer. (it IS possible)

late-night

2011-01-06T00:08:00.003-05:00

I remember when late-night used to be late but lately its getting earlier and earlier. I guess its just a product of age but I always heard you're only as old as you feel and if that's really true I must be around 12.

I'm itching to get away. This time last year I was getting ready to spend a week in L.A. but I think I have to wait until March. 4 days backpacking in Arizona at the canyon is worth the wait, I guess but it just seems so far away.

At some point last spring I felt this... this ripping inside myself. I don't know what caused it or what precisely changed because of it, but I know I felt it. It started quietly, gradually, and slowly it went from a slight lack of balance to an all out tug of war. I feel it again now.

I just had this abrupt thought to myself that I've shared quite enough of my thought process... I'd have handwritten this but I was unable to locate a pen.

Big ideas are brewin. Big stuff. I need a new project, this was a useful brainstorming session.... welcome to my brain; may you never get lost in here.

2011-01-05T10:41:00.003-05:00

so blogger has this fun feature that you can tell where traffic is coming to your site from, if it was referred. this includes google searches. i enjoy reading the things people search for that lead them here. today/yesterday, someone searched for "shrugsmugs.blogspot.com cutter family". it reminded me of something i think everyone should read, particularly those who harbor needless bad feelings towards the cutters (ahem, 75% of the commenters on Bloomington Velo-News). when i was doing the updating of my blog right after little 5, i posted this entry and i feel it more strongly now than ever. maybe that's what whoever was trying to find, i don't know.

i was going to start a new thing on new year's that i did this certain photo thing every day.

apparently i'm incapable of STARTING resolutions, let alone keeping them going.

whoopsy.

also, i needed to book a room in the IMU, as we're getting hitched about 10 feet from the union, buuuut they're all full. now i found a place called the showers inn, but have never heard of it, nor heard anything good or bad about it. research, morrre research, argh! it never ends.

i'll leave you with the only photo erik managed to sneak into last night when i was playing with photobooth... the man hates cameras pointed at him... and it had to be one covering my face(s?).

sheesh.

2011-01-04T14:16:00.002-05:00

i rode yesterday. for almost 3 hours.

it was, in a word... abysmal. i can't remember the last time i had a ride that slow. or the last time i bonked that hard.

i have a long way to go to get back to where i was. but i'll get there.

thanks be to fullmer for dealing with my slowness for the whole ride.

on a different happy note, i spent my afternoon after my ride making a funny little wedding website... go visit it and tell me how absolutely cheesy it is, ahaha. also i finished up our invites. wonnnderful!

i don't have a picture for today, sadly. perhaps later. but good things all around!

2011-01-01T15:26:00.008-05:00

a great new year's celebration with great people. everyone was super-photogenic, but alycin was just EXTRA photogenic :)

good year ahead.

happy new year.

2011-01-01T15:11:00.003-05:00

should old acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind
should old acquaintance be forgot,
and old lang syne
for auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we'll take a cup of kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.
and surely you'll buy your pint cup
and surely I'll buy mine,
and we'll take a cup o' kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

happy new year to all my friends, near and far.

2010-12-14T10:56:00.003-05:00

better than christmas... is the day my parents put up their tree!!

(mom opened the good wine!)

(tinsel master)

warm and fuzzies!

2010-12-10T17:48:00.004-05:00

it's the return of the emily.... such a wonderful incredible gal, inside and out, and someone whom i'm proud to count among my nearest and dearest.

look for her name in lights... this gal's gonna be famous some day.

2010-12-08T12:56:00.004-05:00

wonderful but chilly time with adam and shannan!

2010-12-07T12:15:00.001-05:00

cold shoot. warm pictures!

2010-12-04T06:26:00.003-05:00

brave new world...

2010-12-01T23:46:00.004-05:00

a little something else for today...
some goodness from jared's birthday recording time:

happiest of happy?

2010-12-01T11:50:00.008-05:00

i had the pleasure of helping caroline and kristen prepare clayton's surprise birthday party! i dont even know if i did anything at the party but run around with a camera and document. it really was a super happy event. more to come, complete with baby teddy freddy absolutely STEALING the show with his cuteness...

srsly... so many more happy photos to come. i grinned ear to ear looking at all of them.
here's to a many more for clayton!

2010-11-28T23:03:00.005-05:00

i spent tonight mentally searching for inspiration.
i found a little... followed shortly by a couple of composite images to go along with the personal project i'm working on. pandora did wonders for me... "la vie en rose" by louis armstrong and "sweet and low" by augustana.. songs i had forgotten but love nonetheless.

no project preview though, it shall come as a surprise when it's all done.

2010-11-20T13:10:00.006-05:00

ryan had his exhibition's opening reception last night downtown at blueline's gallery/studio... a great time was had by all... great people, great place, great art.

wondrous.

2010-11-20T12:57:00.001-05:00

fashionable lights are all the rage.

2010-11-15T08:24:00.003-05:00

this morning i have some musings. it's nothing incredible, but something i like.

So i found this on chase jarvis' blog and i just love it. he says it's 7 creative habits, but i'm pretty sure it's a good 7 rules for life. please, enjoy them:
1. Get into adventures. Instead of saying no, say yes. Whether it’s agreeing going to the South China Sea or to Sundance festival or the grocery store.
2. Devour popular culture. Examine the work of other artists, movies, books, magazines, the interwebs.
3. Take pictures of things. I photograph things I see in the world that inspire me and use them for reference.
4. Scribble ideas. On a notepad, ipad, or whatever.
5. Share your ideas with others. Better ideas often come from a conversation. Give and receive. It’s a dialectic.
6. Ask Questions. Lots of other people know more than you do.
7. Listen. Try to listen carefully. When other people talk, you should listen. Ideas are everywhere.

i told you they were sage advice.

spent the weekend in e-ville on my first visit there with the awesome chelsea sanders helping her out. it was lovely and i just haven't done enough things for me like that lately. it was just what i needed!!! we also went a run that was further than i have been going. so so so cleansing!

also, i realized that i have, disturbingly enough, missed 3 race weekends in a row. that hasn't happened in... ever? oh NO. lexington OVCX next sunday, here I come! long drives for a good cause.

i saw "the social network" friday as well.
i was checking my facebook WHILE watching the movie, and the first thing i had the impulse to do upon leaving the movie was to update my facebook status.
you know you've changed the world when...!

i'm working on great things for YSB also today. I'm creating a "logging 101" to help people figure out logging and stuff during school time today while the kiddos are doing quiet projects.

2010-11-12T14:31:00.003-05:00

i cannot tell a lie: i love that it's 70 in november.

also. very excited to attend ryan's opening @ blueline's gallery next friday. STELLAR.

had a wonderful cookie date with the little today at the bakehouse.

it's a friday night tonight. what to do?

shootshootshoot! i'm thinking a trip to a parking garage, i love them so.

2010-11-11T11:49:00.008-05:00

this is the good stuff.
traverse city, michigan.

this is the plan for iceman:

warmup at 21 degrees:

i ran into neff and it was so cold!:

start:

waiting around for results, chatting it up:

winner winner chicken dinner:

winery hopping!
peninsula:

Brys estate:

(CRAZY ABOUT THIS CEILING):

little ol lighthouse way out on the peninsula:

last winery:

great weekend.
plans in the works for another trip to the grand canyon in march. eeeeeexcellent!!!!!

a lesson in time management...

2010-11-08T11:19:00.006-05:00

I've been threatening/planning to do this for a long time.

i finally spent some time figuring it out.

i sat this morning and counted up days.

i have been dying to know how many days i've really been at home in the last calendar year. i took the liberty of also calculating how many days i've worked too.

so. there are 312 days of this year gone so far.

80 days were spent in travel mode. that's 25%.

this leaves 232 days left that i was in bloomington for a full day.

200 days of the days i was home for a full day, I was working. that's a solid 65% of my FREE days I was working.

32 days, I was off. that's only about 10%.

(however, i only counted the days when i worked but didn't travel up until work or travel after leaving work. if you count those days that overlap (there are 14), i actually worked approximately 214 days, which is about 69% of my year so far i've spent working).

simple breakdown is:

65 percent of my year was spent working.

25 percent was spent traveling.

10 percent was spent having days off at home.

this is all so crazy to me.

i can't decide if i should reevaluate how i spend my time, or try for more travel days and less days "off" next year!

life is good.

this is a little of what my time management got me this weekend in michigan:

2010-11-02T10:56:00.004-04:00

the shelter kids showed me this fantastic rock formation yesterday, and i promptly went immediately back after i got off of work to haul a bajillion cameras up there to shoot.
it's so funny, my gauge of how great something is is very dependent on if photos can be shot there.

win.

2010-10-31T10:11:00.005-04:00

did up some photos for bikereg.com and passed them along to fred yesterday (that's this guy):

for the record, i really dislike watermarking photos and have avoided it as long as possible.
i can't avoid any longer! oh well. it was a good run.

this is the first sunday in....months? that i haven't been at a race. it feels weird.

yesterday, i became obsessed with emptying the storage unit i have had for more than a year. you would think i didn't need all the stuff in there if i haven't touched it in a year... but it was more of a space issue of combining 2 people's stuff together than not actually needing it.

i discovered that i had temporarily abandoned my mamiya 645 pro in there, all perfectly packaged and in it's own bag. with all 4 of those lenses settled in with it.

that camera. incredible. gifted to me by the also incredible tom galliher a few years ago. GIFTED TO ME. while i couldn't believe it was really being given to me at the time, it is, if possible, even more baffling now, knowing how much in love you can fall with a particular camera that does exactly what you want in certain circumstances. it is, of course, shocking on a financial level too, but less so (he's pro, i'm sure he's trading in and trading up fairly frequently. i don't know).

i feel the need to publicly thank him again for fostering my love of photography and for contributing to fostering whatever talent i have in my trigger finger... his selfless gift to me, someone he hardly knows, has never been forgotten or taken for granted.

rediscovering the mamiya has given me an obsession to return to film. so pardon me if waste a little extra money in the months to come... it is necessary for my sanity to cultivate whatever creativity and patience still reside in my brain.

i also decided upon development of the preposterous amount of rolls of film i have discovered upon (finally) unpacking boxes. this is the stash so far:

i also discovered that i have ABSOLUTELY NO 120mm take up reels. it's ridiculous because i used to have about a hundred at any given time. now i have none. i have been away from film too long, and that right there proves it.

This next week promises to be a little more relaxing than this past week was (overtime at work, much?), but i will be traveling to iceman in traverse city, michigan, to cheer on my wonderful father, who is my personal favorite cyclist that has ever lived. (and neff? if he goes... i'm thinking he usually does maybe).

2010-10-28T11:43:00.001-04:00

those hands are just too good not to love.

(one of many photos i have of him covering his face)

j.pow... enough said.

2010-10-24T22:48:00.002-04:00

this is all for now of the USGP in louisville this weekend....j-POW.

a genuinely nice guy who does genuinely amazing things on a bike.

UCI Cincy, Day 2

2010-10-20T11:03:00.007-04:00

more from cincy... day 2. for some bizarre reason, i have more photos of the masters' race than the pro race. okay, well, that's not true. but it felt true when i was going through them all.

Messer & fred:

f.rose!

mr. webb, aka flowy locks:

father!!

i told you, she's just too wonderful to NOT take photos of:

daddio again:

fred!

messer

fred wins the award for most photos in this entry, i think:

i almost didn't see hubbel, that skinsuit is so blendy-inney:

pro race.
trebon:

jpow:

sweet.skinsuit:

wicks:

erik!

the bunny hopping begins:

knappster & sherer:

his face is always ALWAYS a pain face.

more and more coming.

UCI Cincy, Day 1

2010-10-20T10:08:00.004-04:00

So I'm long overdue, it's been a crazy few weeks. AFTER the eggelston-kimpel wedding there was that little thing called the UCI3 weekend in Cincinnati. nbd. day 1 evidence:
fred:

DAD!

a shameless few photos of bella will sneak in here... i'm not even sorry, she's so cute.

sweet sunnys (like sweet sonne? only not as sweet):

kabush:

sherer!

wicknasty, pre-bloomingcross appearance.

knapp murdering himself:

ham!

j.pow, looking stellar:

knapp:

i think everyone agrees on this sentiment after the race:

more coming from days 2 & the little i have of day 3.

2010-10-17T10:34:00.007-04:00

there's many more i could post, but these are the highlights from the eggelston-kimpel wedding in gatlinburg.

congratulations to you two!!

2010-10-05T21:36:00.001-04:00

OVCX #2, Tour de Louisville. abbreviated photos.

kiel:

ren-jay's sweet ridin:

zee end.

2010-10-01T09:57:00.001-04:00

Ashley, Indiana.

from a very long two days in northern indiana.

2010-09-29T00:33:00.019-04:00

as promised, some lovin from the USGP in Madison, day 2.
also, a shoutout to http://madcross.org and mr. ryan knapp (and, as always, the wonderful fiance erik) for linking to me on their respective sites/pages. it's those little things that get me so excited sometimes!
first, the lovely nicole borem in ye olde women's race:

and please don't mind the weird scatteredness of these photos; they are actually in chronological order, though i'm sure it will look like they aren't... for some reason I started with the middle of the pack and went forward.
neff:

the run up goodness:

i liked this great angle at the barriers, and i just kept going back:

kabush, before getting naked for his post-race interview at cyclingdirt.org:

all in all a great day.

i'm thinking i'll have more to post tomorrow after i spend some time in riveting ashley and hudson, indiana. what? you've NEVER heard of ashley or hudson? ....shocking. not. although i discovered today that there's some very shootable places there; after family obligations tomorrow i may wander around a bit. i just hope i don't come across an extra volatile meth lab (as we all know, rural indiana is plagued with meth labs) and blow up.

something that i found

2010-09-28T09:59:00.003-04:00

so there's this pretty sweet stats section that appeared on blogger at some point... and i just now noticed it. but it tells you referring sites and all sorts of other seemingly useful things. BUT apparently I've been getting traffic referred from mollycameron.com , so i decided to see how the hell that was happening.
i swear, sometimes i wonder how people find this stuff! BUT molly posted a link to my blog here in the photo section of the website because of the photo from this entry back in december when erik and i were at the USGP in portland. incredible! so, a big thank you to molly, and i have more where that came from, especially after this weekend in madison. which i will post today, i promise.

Madison pre-race.

2010-09-27T13:28:00.008-04:00

USGP day 2, a little pre race wonderfulness...

neff!

knapp: "i'm resting."

who needs embrocation? sherer's got it covered.

who wants to smell like tim johnson?

tim johnson or tims johnson? ha.

...drugz... or nose spray.

LAYLA!

z - i told you you'd regret this face... scared:

race photos to come.

2010-09-26T13:47:00.002-04:00

a morning in madison.

also, may i add that there's a better wireless signal at the racecourse than there was in our hotel.
USGP day 2 photos later, when the races actually happen.

2010-09-26T00:22:00.011-04:00

made the long journey to madison, wisconsin...
the fruits of mine and erik's labors, haha:

warmuptime:

racetime:

a.fabulous.day, followed by fabulousness at ~~olive garden~~, i mean ~~chilis~~, i mean buffalo wild wings. someone wasn't thinking ahead, planning a home football game and a USGP weekend at the same time; everywhere had a crazy wait!! it all worked out though.