So in addition to Jack Handy’s awesome thought for the day, I thought I would leave you with this - so you too can lose sleep over it…

So MK and I were visiting with some awesome clients we will be shooting next year at Center Point Station in San Marcos. When ever we go to Center Point Station I always like to get a burger and MK gets fudge. So I was denied a burger this time but MK still got her fudge. So as we’re ordering this alleged fudge, it dawned on me that they had all these different flavors - maple, snickers, vanilla etc. How in tarnation can they call vanilla fudge? It just seems like there should be a law against this kind of thing…

Anyway, now you too can enjoy thinking about that, like a bad song you can’t get out of your head… :)

Brian

Have you ever met someone and just knew right away you are going to click with them? That is how it was when I met Mandy back in January. We just had the best time working with these two and I wish I could shoot their wedding again, it was that cool!

My dad said to me once, when I was just a wee little Sprayberry - ‘A bad day on the golf course is always better than a good day at the office…’. I always wondered what that meant for people that golfed professionally. Now I wonder how that affects MK and I, since Mandy and Andy were married at Canyon Springs Golf Course.

A little known fact about this wedding, one of our favorite things to do at weddings is to try and get really creative with the ring shots we do. This wedding is hands down my favorite ring shot we’ve ever done. Add to that the fact that I totally stole the golf ball in the ring picture and gave it Andy when we were done shooting it. I am pretty sure that makes him a felon.

Good times man, good times!

Brian

Ok, so it seems that there is at least one procrastinator out there that would rather read this blog than work. Surprisingly, that person is not my mom. So I will give a little update on what is going on in our world AND then bury this post beneath a new post with a wedding featuring the gorgeous nurse Mandy, and her doctor of a husband, Andy.

So as some of you may or may not know, MK and I have acquired a new studio - pictures forth coming. We are really excited about it for several reasons, the least of which being that I can blame my inattentiveness to the blog on the fact that I have been painting and laying hard wood flooring. Who knew I had skills like that? I sure didn’t…

Speaking of business related stuff and mad building skills, I am putting all those really expensive power tools in my garage to good use and building a photobooth. Yep, just like the ones you used to clown in at the mall or skating rink when you were a nutty little teenager. Unfortunately for some of you, we will only be making this photobooth available to our wedding couples and, of course, all of our parties at Casa Sprayberry.

Speaking of parties, feel free to go ahead and mark October 31st off your calendar this year on the off chance you get an invite to the most awesome Halloween Party EVER! The Second Annual (except that we took two years off) Sprayberry Halloween Extravaganza! Details coming eventually…

Also, miracle of all miracles, it has actually rained enough in San Antonio over the last two weeks to cancel not one but TWO softball games. How about them apples? Plus, my lawn probably needs to be mowed. Our dog won’t even go in the back yard anymore to take care of her business because the grass has gotten so high, it allegedly rubs her belly. She is finicky like that I guess.

In honor of the fine folks at Budweiser selling their soul to the Belgians, this week’s (actually this month’s) poll has to do with beverages of the malted hops variety. I like beer. In spite of this fact, I am still dominating MK at the Wii Fit. Current weight for yours truly, 220. That is a sveldt 15 pounds less than the last time you saw me. Seriously, you might not even be able to see me now!

That is all I have for now, unless you count Mandy and Andy’s wedding which was awesome! Guaranteed to be posted before 5:00 PM CDT.

Brian

So in my never ending quest to get caught up on this year’s weddings, today we have Nicole and Ryan’s wedding. Nicole and Ryan were married at Umlauf Gardens up in Austin. Can I just say this place is gorgeous? So much there to shoot - so little time…

We had a great time partyi… ummmm working with Nicole, Ryan and all their friends.

So after their wedding, as I was packing everything up, I was bright enough to leave one of my light stands in the room where the girls were getting ready. Leaving something behind is nothing new for me - the lesson here is, as always, I am a dork. Anyway, Ryan was nice enough to return the stand to me after he got back from his honeymoon. Wouldn’t you know it, as we’re getting the light stand out of his trunk, I notice a softball glove and some cleats!

So while we’re on the subject of softball, let me just say that this season has started going downhill in an eerily similar way to last season. Last season we started out by crushing our first opponent only to lose about 40 or 50 consecutive games.

With that in mind, I am wrestling with the idea of starting my own team on different night next season. I am thinking about recruiting the best of the best and that is potentially where Ryan comes in, even better if Nicole can play too! I can just see it now - a dominant team, winning every week by 20 or 30 runs… wearing sprayberry photography jerseys… :)

Anyway, here is Ryan and Nicole’s wedding. I encourage you to all leave comments here encouraging Ryan and Nicole to join our team!

Brian

Traci and Chase were married so recently, it almost doesn’t seem like I am behind in posting their wedding. Traci is an actress working in Los Angeles and Chase is a graphic artist working for ABC in L.A. They met while they were both taking guitar lessons - how cool is that? So Traci and Chase don’t know this yet but I submitted some of the pictures from their wedding to the Hill Country Wedding article that will be in an upcoming issue of San Antonio Weddings Magazine. There is a good chance one of their pictures is going in with the story but we will just have to wait till it comes out to see if it made it!

Chase grew up in the San Antonio area and they were married at his father’s ranch out in Comfort. They had the ceremony set up right down by a bank of trees along the river and they couldn’t have done a better job decorating. This is back to back weddings with gorgeous locations and beautiful brides. People are going to look at these pictures and think being a wedding photographer is easier than it actually is!

Congratulations Traci and Chase!

Brian

Next on my list of weddings I am behind on getting on the blog is one of my favorites, Angela and Justin. Justin is also a Harley owner. In fact, he and I have the exact same model - different colors though. Angela was just a gorgeous bride and so much fun to work with. This may not be their fondest memory of working with us but one of my favorite things about working with them was during their engagement session, they brought their dogs along and I got to shoot the pooches out in the lavender fields at Becker Vineyards. The dogs were a little amped and they kept Angela and Justin on their toes but it was a blast for me!

So here is their gorgeous wedding - sunset at Becker Vineyards. Plus you get the added bonus of the BEST song choice for a wedding slideshow - EVER!

Brian

Here is a wedding we did a few weeks back. Some people might say April is more than a ‘few weeks back’ but those people probably got beat up a lot in school so I won’t be listening to them…

Some of you may remember Kirstin and Mike from their portrait session we shot in Landa Park. I just love these two and not because Mike has a sweet Harley. Well not COMPLETELY because Mike has a sweet Harley…

Their wedding was out near Comfort at The Marquardt Ranch. Beautiful venue, perfect weather and a fun crowd including a very John Travolta-esque ring bearer. How could we miss?

Brian

Who doesn’t like Neil Diamond? Anyone? Bueller? Anyone?

So here I am keeping up with my pledged monthly update. HA! I tricked you there didn’t I? It’s not supposed to be a monthly update at all! Anyway, as luck would have it, June has turned out to be an incredibly busy month which is a good thing. MK and I haven’t had a free weekend since early May and we won’t have another one until late July. I would say that is awesome but my home owner’s association probably wishes I would mow my grass more often - so it’s only kind of awesome.

We’ve been meeting and shooting some really cool couples lately - you should be seeing them here over the next few days. We’ve also got some big news for the business that we’re not quite ready to announce yet so stay tuned for that. I am sure you’re also dying to know how softball is working out this summer. Well, I missed the first two games of the season. The first game, which the team won, I was still resting the injury. The second game, a loss, I had a portrait session. This week’s game, my first game back since rehab (the injury - not Betty Ford) was this week and we lost 7-9. I am happy to say though that the injury is 100% healed and it felt really good to be out there. Unless you count the losing part (which that Parks and Recreation Dept. does) that part didn’t feel so great.

I am also not so proud to report that I took a solid 3 weeks off the Wii Fit. I did get back on today though and it was nice of the Wii Fit to not only chastise me for taking so much time off but also to make fun of me for letting my balance slip a little. Gotta love technology. Anyway, for those keeping score at home, even without the intense training of the Wii Fit, I somehow managed to knock seven pounds off the ole frame which brings me to a not quite sveldt 226. Still a few cheeseburgers away from my sub-200 goal but better than where I was a couple of weeks ago.

So there you have it ladies and gentlemen - a Cliff’s Notes version of where we’ve been for the past three weeks. While we’re here, I would love to get some recommendations for new polls I can put here on the blog. Maybe we can mix in a prize for any poll suggestions we actually use…

Brian

I am having a Wii fit this evening. So unless you live in a cave, you’ve probably heard of Nintendo’s new Wii game, Wii Fit. It’s basically Nintendo’s valiant effort to get hardcore gamers like myself to be a little more active and a lot less fat. So like all really cool video game stuff, of course there are lines of people waiting to buy the latest and greatest the day it comes out and today was no different for Wii Fit.

So I took a little break from work this morning and ran over to Best Buy when it opened only to find a pretty good size line of people waiting to bogart all the Wii Fits. I got in said line and waited my turn only to come up second in line when they ran out. That was below average. Not one to be deterred in my mission to get skinny, I went to my secret weapon and I was able to score one of those little holy grails.

So there I was, staring at the Wii Fit all day waiting for MK to get home so we could set it up. When she finally did get home we went through the whole setup process. One funny thing, for those of you that own Wii’s and have created your own Mii, when you enter your height information and weighing yourself, in spite of your efforts to control your own physical appearance, Wii will modify your Mii’s appearance to match your actual height and weight. What was NOT so funny is apparently, according to the Fitness Gestapo at Nintendo, I am obese. Needless to say, instead of having a sveldt, studly looking Mii I now have a pudgy little Mii.

If I could return this game I might. Heh, just joking… probably… So far, Fit is pretty fun. Because I love and trust both people that read this blog, I am going to report my weight in what I intend to be weekly Wii Fit updates so you can follow my success and failures.

Week One - 232.

Here are some pictures of our first night futility for your viewing pleasure…

Brian

So a few months back MK and I had lunch with Molly and Brad who were in town to scope out locations and vendors for their upcoming wedding. Molly and Brad live in Chicago and I am still not sure what made them chose San Antonio as the place to get married but I am really glad they did! They were a blast to work with and I was really pleasantly surprised by how many of their friends and family made the trip down with them.

One of the things that was so cool about them was, I think everyone that came down was genuinely surprised and somewhat disappointed that all of us Texans weren’t riding horses all over town and wearing cowboy hats and boots. Those people up north are fun like that, aren’t they? Of course, no one was disappointed when they left snow at the airport in Chicago and came down to sunshine and low 80s in San Antonio.

They just had an awesome wedding with quite a few firsts for me. It was my first time shooting at the Arneson River Theater. It was my first riverboat ride and tour. My first time where the groom was also the DJ. First time a kid stripped down butt naked (except for his cowboy boots) and ran across the dance floor. Actually it wasn’t the first time that happened but it was funny so I had to bring it up. Also, I am pretty sure he was getting a diaper changed and made a break away just like I would have done if I was still a kid.

Congratulations Molly and Brad. Next time MK and I are in Chicago, lunch is on you! :)

Brian