I GREATLY apologize for not posting anything in so long. We have been very busy these days with editing weddings, creating albums, and heck to be honest, catching up with the laundry and cleaning toilets!!! I also lauched my new Raw Website which as much as I love the cause, has taken up more time out of my life...what can I say, I guess I overload myself for the joy of it - ha ha.

Ok, so Heather and I just came back from our trip to Chicago, my homeland!!! It's been 9 years since I have lived there, can't believe it was so long ago! We flew out there last weekend to shoot a wedding in Starved Rock State Park. I've been in Illinois my whole life and never heard of the state park! Once we got there - and let me warn you, it's out in a town called Utica, basically in the middle of no where and is a guarantee to get you lost, yet it was so beautiful!!! What a serene place to just get away from life's busy insanities. It truly pulls you away from society with it's georgous canyons, rivers, lushful trees and hiking trails.

As we were flying into O'hare airport, we had decided on the spur of the moment, to take a detour to downtown so Heather, my big New York City girl, could finally visit her one city she has yet to explore - the windy city! Driving in our rental car towards the big sears tower got both of our adernaline kicked into high gear. For her, she was thrilled to be seeing the city for the first time and for me, I was ecstatic about becoming apart of my city again. I lived in several areas of Chicago and even worked in downtown. We both couldn't wait!









Ok so we couldn't pass up this photo!! I mean come on how many streets do you know that are named WEED STREET.


One of my favorite spots is the Chicago River. I miss walking along this river with the wind blowing in my hair. It's especially breath taking at night with all the city lights reflecting off the water.







Isn't the river stunning!


Here's me taking a photo of us using my fish eye lens. It warrants an interesting perspective doesn't it!


Can't leave the city without doing some kind of shopping! Heather and I bought these adorable little cherries pendant to wear. It's our little token to remember our fun trip by.


For lunch, we ate at Karyn’s Raw Restaurant off of Halsted. This woman is truly an expert at raw fine dining! Everything from the atmosphere, the staff, the extensive menu options, and her adjacent store blew Heather and I away. Our favorite was the raw bread they served!






Heather's a little camera shy!!!


Here's my "burger" sandwhich with "mustard and ketchup". It was super tasty! Yummers!!


And for dessert, we tried this chocolate, strawberry sundae. Can you believe this thing has no white processed sugar and no dairy...and it still tasted superb!






Ok, so here are our goofy selves!!








We just loved this little castle in the heart of all these corporate high rise buildings!


Can't leave out the CTA buses! I spent many hours on these things!!! Oh what memories.


So, Heather was inspired to do something a little daring while we were there! She has been wanting to get some bangs and being that we live in Jacksonville, she wasn't keen on the idea of having it done here, can't say I blame her! You can't beat the salons in Chicago! So here's a photo of the old Heather before she is transformed into this hotty chic with new bangs!


Thank God for Maxine's Hair Salon, they let her just walk in and get on to chopping her hair into some groovy bangs!




Here Heather is discussing with the hair stylist if this a good idea!!


Guess it's too late now! We'll see if bangs flatters Heather or not...






Say good bye to your hair!!!








The new Heather! I'd say the bangs are banging it out for her!!!!!




Our visited ended as we headed straight for Starved Rock. We're on the road to Utica now! It took over 3 hours and with us making wrong turns and ending up on endless highways with no exits, it probably took us more like 4 hours! Heather's butt was soar from all driving - poor girl!!!


So, we went from this...


To this...






Yay, we made it! We actually arrived late at night, this photo was taken the next day as we scrambled to find our way through the corn fields to the wedding.


We seriously got lost from all the detour roads and the lodge's bad directions. Heather kept running out of the car to talk to truckers about how to get where we needed to go. They are not very good at giving directions and the deserted unlabeled road signs didn't really aid us in our journey to the wedding either. Finally she begged yet another trucker to help us and he literally lead us to the main road we were looking for. At first we were relieved, but then we started wondering if we were too trusting, I mean heck, this guy could have lead us anywhere!!! If you've ever see that Kurt Russell movie where a trucker kid naps his wife, you can be sure we were a little scared!!!

We got there all fine, as the trucker turned out to be a great and helpful guy. Stay too for the photos from Maribel and Noah's wedding!

Oh by the way, when people give out directions from the country side and they tell you to "take a jog" it means make a right turn! We got a kick out of "you'll then take a jog" terminology!