Guess who has a birthday today?

Here’s a hint – this is a photo of the birthday girl enjoying some cake during a shoot:

Happy birthday, Rebecca!

I hope your heart center is feeling soft and open today, because I’m about to throw some love at you. 19 photographs of it, in fact! But don’t worry, they’re optimized so they should load pretty fast. Just keep reading while that’s happening.

Emily and Matt got hitched at the Cathedral Basilica of St. Joseph in San Jose, a stunning place to launch into married life if ever there was one. That place is gorgeous. We were worried about the light, wondering if there would be enough, since we couldn’t use flashes during the ceremony and wanted to avoid using them anyway (we are big fans of natural light). As it turned out, the light situation was challenging but not impossible. We got plenty of great shots just working with what was there.

The Red Bats had the pleasure of following these two throughout their wedding day, starting at 7 am (yes, we will get up early for our clients!) and ending up at the Capitol Club in the afternoon. It was a small wedding, just the family and some friends, and this made it easy to focus on the bride and groom and their delight in every detail of getting legally wed. They were so happy about the whole thing, so sweet to each other and everybody else, that they made falling in love and getting married seem like the only logical thing for anybody in their right mind to do.

It was easy to see they both felt they’d hit the jackpot in the romance department. Working on their photos later, I kept getting teary-eyed looking at the two of them together. (Have I mentioned yet what a cheeseball I am? Well, now you know for sure.) I’m not including the most touching photos here because some moments are too private for a blog post.

But I will reveal, in words anyway, that the bride’s father cried during his first dance with his newly married daughter, and almost everybody in the room cried too (including me) and I am sure the ones who didn’t were either not paying attention or holding it in. I told you these were some sweet people.

Congratulations, Emily and Matt!

The night we elected Barack Obama to be our next President back in November, I didn’t have to leave the house to know that lots of people in Santa Cruz were happy about it. From my back steps I could hear fireworks, car horns, chanting, singing, laughter, and general woo-hooing. The noise and excitement continued late into the night.

For some reason, I didn’t expect Inauguration Day to be quite so exciting.

But I should’ve known better. After all, the previous Inauguration Day in Santa Cruz was an occasion for mourning, with everyone walking around near tears, evidence that Inauguration Day really does mean something in this town. This time around, Santa Cruz was ready to party.

It was a wonderful surprise to me when I walked into the inauguration rally downtown last week, and boy was I glad I had my camera with me. Lots of cool people showed up to celebrate and represent, including the Reverend Deborah L. Johnson of Inner Light Ministries, the Watsonville Brown Berets, the Santa Cruz chapter of the Raging Grannies, and numerous other local activists, performers, artists, parents, children, pets, dancers, sign-wavers, and friends.

I’ve included several photos in this post, and you’ll see many more if you click the link below. Also, if you were at the downtown Santa Cruz Inauguration Day party and you see a photo of yourself or your group that you’d like to have, email me at redbatphotography@gmail.com and I’ll be happy to send it to you.

Congratulations Obama and Santa Cruz and the USA and everyone who made this day happen!

WANT TO SEE MORE? CLICK HERE.

WANT TO SEE MORE? CLICK HERE.