Parties & Concerts

DeVreeze Wedding

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Earlier this year, some very wonderful friends of mine finally decided to tie the knot. Knowing that I enjoy photography, I talked things over with H & J and offered that instead of actually buying them a gift, I’d save them some money and do both their wedding portraits and the wedding event photography. I wanted to document the day from beginning to end – and make sure that their memories were saved – and also not based on a time limit. (Here in Dublin, for 5 hours of wedding event photography it costs about 600 Euros – and that doesn’t even include prints nor a cd/dvd of the images taken!)

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It’s not the first wedding that I’ve photographed – but it was the most intense and wonderfully gratifying experience that I’ve had in a long time. I got there at about 10 am, and left around midnight. Over the course of the day, there were some 1500 pictures taken – which were later parsed down to about 350 that were kept as good enough to put in the photo book of the event. I think they were delighted – because I managed to cover everything from the moments of the family getting ready together, through the bus to the registrar’s office, to the first kiss.

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I also remembered to get the decorations, the cake (which was decorated by a baker in the family), and then both the wedding brunch at the Crowne Plaza and the Barbeque in the backyard where the first dance, flower toss, and cake cutting ceremony was performed.

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I also found the opportunity to get the quirky things that perhaps another person would have missed, but that I really was able to pick up on because I know them as individuals and as a couple. Things like the two of them kissing – and their shadow merging into one, The bottom of H’s shoes as she went into the registrar’s office (she’d pasted stickers of hearts and the words I DO),

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The teasing that happened at the wedding brunch (balancing spoons on their noses)

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And the naturalness of them walking down the street, holding hands – J carrying the picnic blanket and H carrying the beautiful red cups – as if they were walking into the rest of their lives.

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Sure, I was exhausted when it was all over, but after 2 days of photo processing and then turning over the photos to them- I feel not only blessed to have been there, but also blessed to have been allowed to take the photographs of such an amazing event in their lives.

Congratulations, H & J.

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Guinness World Record Attempt

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Are you Drunk Yet?

Back in March, I turned 35 years young. Because my birthday falls in March, right around St. Patrick’s day I wasn’t sure I would be celebrating much. That all changed, however, when I heard about Jason’s idea – He wanted to try to set the Guinness World Record for the largest number of people in a Pub at one time dressed as Leprechauns.

Strangely enough, that world record attempt fell ON my birthday.

It's not easy being green
Leprechaun girls in the courtyard

Figuring that it would be a hoot (what did you do on your 35th birthday? I helped to set a Guinness World Record) and something that only comes along once in a lifetime (as well as a great way to usher in officially being middle age), I went out and bought a Leprechaun hat with a beard, a green sweater, and recruited some friends to go with me to the pub.

Playing the Part
Tony, the Scottish Leprechaun

The event was held at a place called The Living Room, and we needed about 200 people dressed in costume to meet the World Record requirements. There was press coverage here in Ireland of our attempt, and let’s just say that it was a bit surreal – people walked in looking like regular individuals and walked out looking likeā€¦bizarro, drunken, leprechauns.

Leprechaun 31
Jacqui the English Leprechaun

There were two amusing things about the evening. 1) In the beginning, we were having alot of trouble getting people to be Leprechauns. After much convincing, we got one of the Judges to dress up:

We even got the Judge involved

2) Without even trying, I went up and signed the book, commenting to Jacqui how neat it would be if I were the 35th Leprechaun on my 35th birthday. We were split up in the jumble of people – and she was number 31. When I went up to sign the book, I wound up being number 35, purely by co-incidence. When I told the folks handing out the numbers, they thought it was pretty awesome too!

I was leprechaun 35, for my birthday!
Yes, I was really Leprechaun #35, as luck would have it! How cool is that?!?

In the end, this little Leprechaun did manage to participate and help Ireland to get the Guinness World Record which was temporarily held here in Ireland – for about 12 hours – with 210 leprechauns:

Pondering pondering
Pondering the state of Leprechaun Life

The problem, of course, is that as March 17 hit around the world, the record was broken – by Jay Leno on the Tonight Show in the USA – with only 224 people.

It was a good birthday anyhow -and, despite the record being now held by the USA (USA! USA!) instead of Ireland – I couldn’t have wished for a better time!

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Mardi Gras for Charity

Voodoo Mardi Gras for Charity Poster

Last Saturday, March 5, I worked with Fibbers on Ormond Quay to put together a New Orleans Style Voodoo Mardi Gras Party. The goal was to have some fun, and raise some money for Our Lady’s Children’s hospital (Crumlin) here in Dublin. For my friends in the US, they are essentially the equivalent of Primary Children’s Hospital in Salt Lake, or Eggleston Children’s Hospital in Atlanta.

The Bar Servers

Jason, (Above center) the bar manager of Fibbers put together a great night – he organized the raffle, he got a fabulous band called T-bone, and printed off the poster and flyers for the event.

Mardi Gras Queen

Meanwhile, I did the poster (top) out of a bunch of creative commons images and some of my own from Mardi Gras, made the No Sew Voodoo dolls, and created the bar decorations including a pair of huge poster sized theater masks in frames, decorations to hang from the ceiling (about 20 violet music notes on yellow and green curved backgrounds), and purchased a bunch of masks that were supposed to arrive in time to decorate and sell with the price of admission. It was a lot of work, but in the end, it was worth it – we raised about 500 Euros – despite the hiccups. (The 80 masks and about half the beads didn’t come in time for the party, so we wound up raising all of the money solely through the raffle. Also, not all of the decorations got hung up because there wasn’t enough time in between the underage gig and our fund-raising event.)

Most of the pictures are up here in my Mardi Gras set.

I do have some video of the band to upload if I can get my video media maker working again, but it’s a bit dark, so it may not work. Otherwise, by the time I got home and to bed (nearly 4am Sunday morning) I was completely wrecked. Apparently, so was my Mardi Gras dog.

Tuckered Out

Here’s hoping your Mardi Gras was as successful and fun as mine!

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