So, what have I been up to? WORKING! Yup, that thing that we have to do so that we can afford to do the things we want to do! I know, lame excuse but it does mean that I've manage to save up significantly more money than I had expected for my trip to Florida in 27 days (it's not as if I'm counting or anything...)

It's going to be a fantastic trip, everyone else is getting really excited now too! I finally got my passport sorted, after a great deal of hassle including them rejecting my photographs because I had my glasses on (which weren't obstructing my eyes - the reason they gave for rejecting them) so I had to re-submit my application with photographs without my glasses one, where I'm squinting like crazy to read the instructions on the screen in the photo booth!

So I look like a mole on my passport. Frigging great.

Anyway, in other news I have some new Timelapse videos to upload, and some photos too, which I'll try to get sorted out this weekend!

I also have a new addition to my family, her name is Charlie and she's a Chilean Rose Tarantula. Phoebe absolutely adores her and keeps wanting me to get her out of her tank!

I guess that's all for now, going to settle down and carry on reading my book until I fall asleep!

Aaaanyway, I went up to Darwen in May to see my cousin (who's wedding I'm photographing in September) and her family. We had a really good weekend and I managed to get some lovely photos of them. Take a look below for some of my favourites!

Went down to the park with Phoebe and her cousins and had a really good laugh tearing around the park chasing after them all! Very tiring though, or maybe that's just old age creeping up on me!

In my defence I did spend 2 evenings trying to work out why all of my posts had Cialis ads in them, which broke all of the code in the posts... Ended up rewriting all of the posts and optimising the site at the same time, load times were excessive at best especially as I've got some cheap (and therefore slow) hosting!

Aaaanyway! Had a fantastic photoshoot with Abby today (you should definitely check out that link, she's an amazing artist).

She had this fantastic idea about butchering an old clock, covering herself in gold paint and using the clock parts for decoration! So, a quick trip to the fancy dress shop this morning for paint and glitter, and the parts from the clock she bought last week and we were ready to go!

The shoot went far better than either of us had expected, and despite being roasted alive by 2kW of lighting, we persevered and got some amazing shots! Enjoy!

Well 2010 was a pretty interesting year, 2011 is going to be even better. Expect a massively increased number of updates to this site as I ramp up my photography work, and *gasp* start getting paid for what I love doing!

My biggest plan for this year is photographing my cousins wedding. A fairly small affair, guest-wise, which will be a nice starting point as I'm rubbish at organising things, especially other people. One minor thing, it's 4,300 miles away in the Sunshine State of Florida! It'll be the trip of a lifetime, there's no denying that. 14 nights in a private villa and all I have to do is take a metric fuck-load of photo's! I can do that! I'm going to work my ass off to make sure I capture every fantastic moment of it, not only for myself but as an amazing wedding gift for a fantastic couple.

Anyway, enough ramblings from me, time for some pictures!

My Auntie Denise and Uncle Roger came down from Cheshire to visit, and seeing as they haven't seen her in nearly 2 years I thought it would be fun to bring her along... and I was right! They were over the moon to see her again, after such a long time it was basically like meeting for the first time as Phoebe didn't remember them and they'd only seen her as a toddler. Enjoy the photos!

Anyway, here are a couple of pictures from Christmas Day!

My cousin Charmaine looking fantastic on her wedding day!

My niece Alexa giving me a wonderfully cheeky grin!

Mum, Lewis and Sarah, doing a little posing! The weather wasn't great and it was very overcast, so I did my best! Lewis looks a lot cuter and less scary than earlier!

Lewis pulling his scariest face with a blue torch shining on him. I love this photo!

Just a couple of portraits I took whilst my cousins were down!