A little friend...and a big thought

 

"We can all see God in exceptional things,

but it requires the culture of spiritual discipline to see God in every detail.

Never allow that the haphazard is anything less than God's appointed order,

and be ready to discover the Divine designs anywhere."

- Oswald Chambers

- Kelsey

Discovering beauty... 

Kelsey Schweickert  |  San Francisco Bay Area wedding photographer
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Another little "personal project"...

Continuing on the "personal project" theme...

Not to be outdone, my flowers demanded they get their own blog post, after they saw the one about my mom's garden (scroll down, February 10th).  Of course, never one to refuse a flower anything, I was happy to oblige.  Can't deny it, I'm proud of them. They deserve their fifteen minutes of fame too.  ;)

So without further ado: my garden.

 

 

I'm a sucker for pansies. (As you can tell.)  And planting things in whimsical containers.

 

Tiny hollyhock seedlings...

 

Baby cauliflower! Harvested the first full-grown one last week. Yum.

 

If you know me, you know I get very excited when the hydrangea bush starts budding out...

 

And a trip indoors to photograph the gorgeous amaryllis in bloom...

 

Lavendar -- can't live without it.  I already have four big plants. Hehe.

 

Sometimes gardeners get this itch to grow something challenging. I'm not immune to that. Lupines are tough to grow here, but I'm trying...we'll see what happens.

 

First tulips started blooming this Sunday!

 

This row of cabbage keeps getting bigger and bigger...and bigger...

  

  

I have two little "Colonnade" apple trees -- grown in containers on the patio.

 

"Monet's Garden" mesclun mix

 

One can never have too many pansies and violas, right??

 

There.  Hopefully these silly flowers will give me some peace now.  ;)

- Kelsey

Discovering beauty... 

Kelsey Schweickert  |  San Francisco Bay Area wedding photographer
Visit my website  |  Email me  |  Follow me on Twitter  |  Like my photography on Facebook

Austin and Jenna - wedding slide show

A selection of photos from Austin and Jenna's wedding day...one cute and very-much-in-love couple, a bright sunny day, a pretty Jane-Austin dress, and a whole bunch of really sweet family and friends.  :)  Enjoy!

Austin and Jenna, it's a treat to know you!  It's been great to be your wedding photographer, and I love how we've become friends too.  :)  May God bless you two in this new life together!

- Kelsey

Discovering beauty... 

Kelsey Schweickert  |  San Francisco Bay Area wedding photographer
Visit my website  |  Email me  |  Follow me on Twitter  |  Like my photography on Facebook

Rest for your soul...

In spite of the post-Christmas doldrums, there’s something I love about January/February…it’s the time of year when I get to pursue some personal projects!  The photography business gets a little slower-paced, and I have a little more time to refresh and renew those creative juices.  Honestly, the whole slow-down thing hasn’t quite happened yet, at least not the way I hoped; I got sick a while ago with The Cold That Won’t Go Away, and for the past six weeks it’s intermittently reared its ugly head.  So I’m still catching up, finishing one last big (and wonderful) project—Austin and Jenna’s wedding.  (Stay tuned for more of their photos soon!)

Anyways, one of my lifelong simple joys, as you already know if you’ve followed this blog for a while, is the beauty and variety of flowers.  Actually it’s not really a “simple” joy.  They’re tremendously intricate.  And detailed.  And unique, and amusing, and whimsical, and comforting, and just…beautiful.

Growing up surrounded by the many varieties in my mom’s garden, it would be hard not to develop a special affection for these lovely expressions of our God's creativity.  Think about it—each flower was once just an idea in God’s head.  He’s showing us something about himself in these pretty little things.

So last Sunday when I was at my parents’ house, I took some time to wander around the garden and collect a few flower photos.  It’s been at least a month since I last did that, and oh my, it was such a treat!  A garden is a haven for the heart—a place where your soul can rest and drink in the refreshment of its unique beauty.  Hope you’re refreshed by these too…

 

 

It's Daphne time!  Love their sweet, citrusy fragrance.

 

 

 

Little blue rosemary blossoms

 

I popped my head in the greenhouse too...

 

Just look at this pansy-face.  Doesn't that make you grin?

Till next time, friends!  :)

- Kelsey

Discovering beauty... 

Kelsey Schweickert  |  San Francisco Bay Area wedding photographer
Visit my website  |  Email me  |  Follow me on Twitter  |  Like my photography on Facebook

Jimmy and Lisa - slide show

I thought a slide show would be an appropriate post for today...I just finished Jimmy and Lisa's album and these images are so beautiful, they were just asking for a slide show.   (I wish you all could see the album--Lisa and Jimmy love it!!)


Enjoy...

- Kelsey

Discovering beauty... 

Kelsey Schweickert  |  San Francisco Bay Area wedding photographer
Visit my website  |  Email me  |  Follow me on Twitter  |  Like my photography on Facebook

Perspective (with thanks to NASA)

Perspective.  How we need it.  But how often do you step back from everyday life and see the big picture?

It's so easy to get wrapped up in the barrage of everyday stuff and lose perspective.  Take a shower, vacuum the living room, conquer the mountain of emails and phone calls, make dinner, pay the health insurance bill, get the oil changed, get some exercise...yeah, all that stuff.  It's real, it's how life goes, you have to take care of it.

The other day my brother showed me some stunning photos from a NASA website.  Every day they post a photo with an explanation written by an astronomer.  (If you want to blow your mind, just visit that site.)  Here's one that particularly struck me:

NGC 7293: The Helix Nebula
Image Credit & Copyright: Ed Henry (Hay Creek Observatory)

 

Explanation: A mere seven hundred light years from Earth, in the constellation Aquarius, a sun-like star is dying. Its last few thousand years have produced the Helix Nebula (NGC 7293), a well studied and nearby example of a Planetary Nebula, typical of this final phase of stellar evolution. A total of 10 hours of exposure time have gone in to creating this remarkably deep view of the nebula. It shows details of the Helix's brighter inner region, about 3 light-years across, but also follows fainter outer halo features that give the nebula a span of well over six light-years. The white dot at the Helix's center is this Planetary Nebula's hot, central star. A simple looking nebula at first glance, the Helix is now understood to have a surprisingly complex geometry.

A "mere" 700 light-years from Earth?  It's so far away, it takes light (which travels at over 186 THOUSAND miles per second) seven hundred YEARS to get there?  And the inner region is so big that it takes light three years to get across it?

Our world is huge.  Massive.  Mysterious.  Stunning.  Awe-inspiring.  And the God with the power to come up with all this awesomeness is very interested in the goings-on of my little life today, Thursday, January 26, 2012.  (Designing a wedding album, meeting with seven piano students, sweeping the kitchen and making some egg salad.  Ah, such momentous tasks I have today.)

That's enough to make the most important person in the world shrink with humility, and bring honor to the most insignificant.  God knows the workings of your heart today...and he cares about every one of them.

Enough said.  :)  On to my list of to-do's--with renewed gratefulness and confidence!

- Kelsey

Discovering beauty... 

Kelsey Schweickert  |  San Francisco Bay Area wedding photographer
Visit my website  |  Email me  |  Follow me on Twitter  |  Like my photography on Facebook

Tyler - senior portraits

We did Tyler's senior portrait session on Thanksgiving weekend, so I've been wanting to post these images for quite a while!  Tyler is awesome.  He's tough on the outside -- he takes his football and baseball seriously, and he's good -- but underneath he's a sincere, kind guy, and what can I say, I admire this kid.  Here are a few favorites from his session...

 

 

  

 

  

Till next time, friends!

- Kelsey

Discovering beauty... 

Kelsey Schweickert  |  San Francisco Bay Area wedding photographer
Visit my website  |  Email me  |  Follow me on Twitter  |  Like my photography on Facebook