City in the Sky | Personal

There are some things that just make me shake my head and wonder, is this real life? I'm a pretty blessed girl to get to do things that the average person probably will never get to experience. One of these instances was a week or so ago, when we took a short trip to Chicago. I've been to Chicago lots of times, but never seen it quite like this before...

My grandfather is a... shall we say... well connected individual. :-) He has done a lot and been many places, and met loads of people. And some of those friendships turn out quite advantageously for his extended family (aka, us). Thanks to the generosity of one of his friends, we spent a couple of nights in a penthouse at the top of the Trump Tower, with sweeping birds-eye views of the city. The apartment itself was gorgeous, and the view was incredible. I could lay in my bed and look straight out at the Sear's Tower (oops, I mean the Willis Tower... ;-). It was especially spectacular at night when the city lights were shimmering away as far as the eye could see... The photos don't do it justice.

Unfortunately we had a cloudy day when I finally pulled my camera out for daytime photos of the view, but being literally in the clouds made for a neat effect as well!

Phone panorama. :-)

A helicopter flew by our window (a lot closer than it looks from the photo!)

I now have a slight obsession with black and white checkerboard floors.

Anna | Portraits

Ah, my poor neglected blog. Anyone out there still hanging in there with me? :-) Life has been a bit of a whirlwind lately, with lots of socializing, traveling, and... well, living. Travel posts coming your way soon...

It's been a pretty cool summer on the whole around here, which has worked out so nicely for taking pictures. Nobody likes sweltering while they're being photographed! Anna and I have been friends for several years, but have really hit it off in the past year or so. We both love books, "get" each other's sense of humor, and adore a good dose of British wit. :-) Basically, she's a kindred spirit. Plus, I'm a photographer, and she's photogenic, which means photo-shooting is inevitable!

It's fun when your friends have fabulous leather satchels...

Favorite ^

The colors and the light were working together so beautifully!!

Justin & Jessica | Anniversary

Justin emailed me months ago about doing a surprise anniversary session. I don't exactly love having Jessica a lot farther away than she used to be, but in this case distance was useful because it's a lot easier to keep a secret that way... :-) He took work off that Friday, and didn't tell her until she was hinting that he needed to get out the door for work. Sneaky... :-)

I spent the afternoon shooting this very in love couple, eating Kopp's custard (YESSSSS. Best job perks ever!), and spending time with two people I don't get to see nearly enough! We had beautifully overcast skies during the day, and then the sun came out later for that gorgeous sunset glow along the Milwaukee lakefront.

Enjoy!

The park was right there... and the spinny thing was tempting

(there is probably a technical name for it but spinny thing works for me)

Cracked. Me. Up.

Them too. ;-)