newborn.photos – Sawyer Birkenfeld

These photos were taken a few weeks back when Sawyer was just a couple of weeks old. My fear is that all these kids that I take pictures of when they are newborns are going to have a horrible first impression of me and forever have an unexplainable hatred toward me. We’ll see how it turns out.

I’m definitely learning a lot about what works and what doesn’t in regard to newborn photos. For instance, huge furry rug/blankets (as pictured above) work like magic… ceramic serving trays on the other had look like they would be cool, but just leave children screaming for their lives.

I was really happy with how these photos came out and was glad that I was able to incorporate mom and dad into some of them as well.

Do you have any favorites? Leave a comment and let me know…

Enjoy…

To find out more about Newborn or Family photo sessions, check out my website: www.ryanpricephoto.com

Sleeves or No Sleeves?

While culling through my RSS feeds this morning, I read a quick line that intrigued me to read the full article on CNN about Ted Kennedy.

The line that intrigued me said: “Sen. Edward “Ted” Kennedy didn’t wear his faith on his sleeve, but those close to him say Catholicism was much more than an ethnic and cultural identity.”

The article didn’t have much substance… just talked about how Kennedy was a devout Catholic, despite the fact that many of the policies he advocated for flew in the face of the Catholic church and that at the end of his life, he never asked people to pray for him while he was sick (supposedly a good thing?).

Anyway… this post really has nothing to do with Kennedy. I really don’t know a ton about him and don’t want to pass judgement on his faith or anything.

What I wanted to discuss is that little tag line that so eloquently caught my eye.

I remember back in election season last year those words were thrown all over the place. The Left loved to say that they were “deeply religous”, but didn’t like to “wear their faith on their sleeve”… insinuating that the Right loved to just tell everyone how religous they are but are really scumbags.

Now, I’ll be the first to say that I think there are far too many people (especially politicians) that are only wearing their faith on their sleeve.  However, it’s really comical to me that it is supposedly a better (more nobel) thing to be “deeply religous”, yet live in such a way that people assume that you are far from that. Then, you’re only come back to that accusation is that you are just trying to conceal who you really are.

I just love the things that our culture thinks are acceptable. It’s better to say you believe something and live in such a way that no one would ever guess you really believe that than it is to actually believe something and everyone around you knows that’s what you believe.

Now, it’s really easy to pick apart politicians and movie-stars… I mean, they aren’t even like real humans, right? Rrrr…

Anyway… I have a feeling that down here in the Bible-belt it’s really a popular thing to wear sleeves. You don’t have to go very far (especially in smaller towns) to realize that it is a cool thing to say that you are a Christian. Just like in the strictest of Islam believing countries, the social pressure is definitely for people in the Bible-belt to look like a Christian. Then in response to that mentality, people outside of the Bible-belt look at that with disgust and rip off their sleeves (this isn’t a post about modesty… read figuratively!).

My point with this is simply… if the faith that you wear on your sleeves does not originate in the heart and penetrate to every other aspect of your life, do us a favor and quit trying to draw attention to those sleeves… this isn’t the 80’s!

On the flip side… if you are a true believer that has been regenerated to new life by the Lord (not by just trying harder to look like a Christian), then don’t be afraid to live in such a way that people actually could guess that.

Note: this is something that the Lord is having to refine in me. I don’t want it to come across as me telling everyone how they should act because I’ve figured it out and am doing it perfectly.

family.photos – the mosiers

Back to photography for a bit…

So, a few weeks ago, I was able to shoot some great friends of mine… wait, does that sound wrong?…

Anyway… the Mosiers [matt, erin, cade] asked me to take some 6 month photos of their little guy and include them in a few as well.

I was more than happy to ablige, seeing as they were moving to Ft. Worth the next week and these photos could possibly be the only remnant that we are able to remember our great friends by!

Cade did a great job, and I was allowed to try out some new props for this shoot [the green vintage suitcase thing is actually an old sewing machine box that I salvaged from my great-grandparent's house a little while back... the blue vintage suitcase I was able to score from TwinCity Mission for about $2.50... and the AMAZING orange chair came to me compliments of my friend Brock who snagged it off the side of the road!]

I would also like to give a huge shout out to the Briegers [duane & marylou] for graciously allowing me to use their yard while they were out of town for this shoot. They have a great house, and it totally made these pictures. Thanks again!

Here are some of my favorites from the shoot.

visit my website: www.ryanpricephoto.com

Fact or Crap?

That’s a fun game to play when you’re just sitting around with friends. However, I don’t really like to have to play it when I’m trying to sift through decisions being made in our politics.

As stated in my last post, one of the things that bothers me the most about this whole healthcare debate is that there are just so many lies floating around… from both ends of the spectrum. I have never seen so much fear mongering related to a single issue. And the crazy thing is that people are believing it!

I’m all up for having a civil, educated debate about an issue… and I will even change the way I think about something if presented with solid evidence… but, when half-truths and fear tactics get thrown into the mix, I give up.

With that in mind, I just came across this article that I found really good.

The Most Outrageous U.S. Lies About Global Healthcare.

Basically just hits of 5 different things that have been stated as fact by someone trying to convince us of something, and gives the truth behind it.

And from my experiences talking with people from Canada, the UK, and other countries with universal healthcare (which I have had many conversations at length with such people)… I have yet to hear a negative thing mentioned about how it works.

Enjoy!

healthcare.reform.

Up until today, I have been a complete slacker on keeping up the latest in domestic politics… especially regarding the healthcare reform… Which is kind of funny seeing how that was one of the main reasons that I supported Obama during the election.

Being a Community Health major in school, I learned a ton about public health initiatives as well as the disparities that exist between the rich and poor in our country in regard to health.

During those years, I spent a lot of time reading, researching and writing about all this stuff. It was really fascinating to me. I felt compelled to see our system change.

I honestly never thought that we would be at the point where we are today in our country… on the verge of passing legislation that would give people across the board, rich and poor, access to much needed healthcare.

Anyway… the other day I was having lunch with a friend, and he was asking me what the details of all this healthcare stuff are, because he thought that surely I would know all about it considering my stance on things of this nature. I felt ashamed to be completely unhelpful…

So, I decided to set aside some time to do a little research.

Basically, one of the first things that I’m learning is that there is a LOT of information floating around out there about this reform.

Particularly in our neck of the woods, there is a lot of negative information circulating about how this is going to be the end of all civilization and freedom forever. Like always… on both sides of the spectrum, we really need to take things with a grain of salt and step back and look at the big picture. More importantly, we really need to examine all of these things and check to see if they are facts or not. The reality is, a lot of the things being circulated through e-mails and Facebook in opposition to this reform are simply not facts.

To check your facts… this is a great unbiased site: politifact.com

Most of the things that I hear people being concerned about are basically that you won’t have the freedom to keep your private insurance, and therefore will be left in the cold, waiting in a 3-mile line at the doctor’s office when you need it the most, ect.  A lot of these worries can be dispelled by checking out exactly what the White House is proposing.

They recently released a website that does just that… it addresses the questions that people are raising the most and putting facts behind them.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck/

Now… I know that there are a lot of folks out there… probably a lot of people that read my blog, who don’t trust a thing that the President says… In that case, I don’t really know what to tell you.

To get a more detailed breakdown of exactly what they are proposing, you can check out their official site: www.healthreform.gov

Here is a concise outline of what reform is about:

Reduce long-term growth of health care costs for businesses and government

Protect families from bankruptcy or debt because of health care costs

Guarantee choice of doctors and health plans

Invest in prevention and wellness

Improve patient safety and quality of care

Assure affordable, quality health coverage for all Americans

Maintain coverage when you change or lose your job

End barriers to coverage for people with pre-existing medical conditions

For those of your who are followers of Jesus out there, Sojourners has put together some resources (here and here) about the healthcare debate that I found to be rather helpful. I definitely feel that in every aspect of life, as a follower of Christ, we aren’t given the option to let some things be guided by our faith and some things not.

Which brings me to why I even care at all…

First, let me say that I don’t know every line item that is listed in this reform. I’m most certain that there are things included in this that I don’t agree with and would not want to support… as with anything involved in legislation.

So, if you know of some FACTS that I am probably unaware of that make you adamantly opposed to this, I would really love to hear about it… really.

But, for me… I am left with the reality that our country falls at the bottom of the list when compared to other countries regarding our healthcare.

Now, the sad part is that for some Americans (myself included) who have always had healthcare at their disposal, we’ve never had to think twice when it comes to medical treatments. I know that the sky was always the limit for me. So, it is honestly really difficult to imagine a life where that isn’t the case.

I feel that when it comes to taking care of people in our society, the Bible (and Christ) do not give us the option to simply think about what benefits us as individuals the most.

The Bible speaks clearly about how we treat the poor among us as well as the people who are simply travelling through our borders. We are to look beyond what is fair and what is mutually beneficial and simply realize that we are all human… in need.

Unfortunately, this is not the tone I hear from most Christians that I talk to about this subject. Instead, I hear that “people need to not be so lazy and support themselves” or that “we have no responsibility to care for people who aren’t our citizens but are in our country”.

Take Christ out of the picture and I am in complete agreement with you. It doesn’t make any sense. But, I feel like you’re going to have a real hard time arguing these points with the words of Jesus.

It seems that at the end of the day, followers of Jesus are simply more concerned with how this affects us than how it affects others.

That’s not OK.

I’m not saying that I think that this is going to be mutually beneficial for everyone. I believe that the ultra-rich in our country will probably take a hit. But, again, if we take our eyes off of ourselves for a minute and think in a more community mindset, where we actually care for the people in our society, I am comfortable with that hit. I’m comfortable with slightly less quality healthcare if it means that others will be given healthcare where they had none before.

Now… this definitely just addresses one issue… our attitude toward reform in general. What it doesn’t address is how this will play out practically and what policies will be tucked in with it that are hard to swallow.

I’ll be honest… I haven’t done my research here. I would love for you to use the comment section to inform people on FACTS that you have discovered.

At the end of the day, it’s important that we are educated on what is happening to us. But, we must also let that flow through a lens of compassion, justice and grace. As Christians, we have to approach these debates with gracious words… not haughty attitudes and slander.

---

I realize that this post is not real “meaty” in terms of actual facts. So, I’m trying to do some more research and give you resources.

• Here is a summary of the proposed bill [link]
• Here is the full length bill [link]

philadelphia, pa . 2009

It’s official… we are adults now.

Not because of the rings on our fingers.

Not because of the legitimate jobs that both Sara and I have.

Nope… we’re adults because for the first time ever, we took a real vacation without asking permission or having our parents book flights or hotel rooms.

Heck, we thought about not telling them at all just because it felt liberating… but, that would be just stupid.

Thanks to Sara’s sister and her husband, who graciously donated some frequent flyer miles, we were able to escape for a few days to Philadelphia!

We had such a great time while we were there. There was so much to do around the city, but it didn’t feel overly touristy, like some places.

Part of the fun of going on vacations together for the first time is learning about what each of us likes to get out of a vacation.

The results were kind of surprising.

Sara enjoyed sucking the history out of the city (which it is FULL of)… I think that she enjoyed getting to know the map really well and scheduling us so we could be sure and see important things.

Me on the otherhand, preferred to look as much like a local as I possible could with a big camera constantly around my kneck and my Canon backpack on! I’m the one who really likes history a lot and prefers to read non-fiction… but on vacation, my priorities were to eat at cool places, find a live music venue, and capture some cool photos of things that weren’t necessarily historical… more urban.

I think we managed to find our niche and both of us left the trip satisfied and thinking that we could probably do vacation together again someday!

[sara eating her first cheese steak]

We flew in on Wednesday and realized that Sara’s bag was either flying in the air somewhere or sitting back in Houston looking very sad and lonely. This did not seem to be a terrific start to our wonderful vacation. We took the subway into town and then walked about 20 blocks or so to our hotel… and then thanked God that we didn’t have her huge bag to have to carry that whole way!

That night we found this really cool place to eat called Warmdaddy’s.

It is kinda a soul-food type joint with an urban twist. They have live music every night with an R&B feel. Instead of bringing bread to the table or something lame like that for an appetizer, they bring you an iron skillet of sweet cornbread that tastes like it has icing on it. It was the most amazing cornbread I have ever had before. I was smiling ear to ear the whole time!

No… this wasn’t a worship service… this lady was just really into the music!

After the first night… I didn’t know if we would be able to top it.

Thursday: we just kinda got acclimated with the city a little more.

And that afternoon, I met up with a guy from a grad program that I wanted to check out. It was really cool to hear more about it and get to meet this guy. After we chatted it up at a coffee shop for a while, he took us on a personal tour of the part of the city we probably wouldn’t have gone as tourist. We learned so much during this afternoon.

One of the coolest parts of the city was to see historical mixed with urban…

Friday: we decided to get a car and head out to Amish country. This was one thing that Sara and I both thought was great.

We were completely fascinated by the Amish and their way of life.

The town that we spent most of our time in was Intercourse, PA. Yeah… you read that right INTERCOURSE… is where the AMISH live. Irony.

We asked what it would take for us to convert. We realized pretty quickly that we probably don’t have what it would take to completely convert. And by the end of the day, we had thoroughly analyzed them enough to recognize some discrepencies that we weren’t too sure about.

I have a feeling that I would be one of those Amish people that after a few weeks would just completely rage against the system and show up at church meetings in a graphic tee, castro cap and a beer. So, we decided that we like things better on the side of the spectrum where we reside.

Sad thing though… Amish people don’t want their photos (graven images) taken. So, I had to just take photos of the countryside and stuff.

Saturday: was our touristy day! We were really excited to have Emily come up from DC for the day to hang out with us…

We started off at Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell…

Emily was really upset about the Red-Coats coming over the horizon…

Then we went to south Philly to the Italian Market and just browsed around like we knew what was up…

… Emily actually bought some fresh produce to bring home… we just wished we could.

After we saw Emily off to DC that night, I was in the mood for taking some city shots. So, we walked across this bridge…

And waited for the sun to go down…

Sunday: we met up with Sara’s cousin and her boyfriend who are in art school at Temple and toured the Philadelphia Museum of Art. It was pretty cool… and we enjoyed having professional interpretters at our disposal.

Then, later that afternoon we were able to visit a church that I was interested in checking out. Just so turned out that the recruiter for the school that I met with actually is involved in the church, so he picked us up and made us feel right at home. We were really encouraged by the believers at Liberti and just refreshed to see the gospel lived out in different ways than what we’re used to in the Bible-belt.

Monday: we got up super early and headed back to Texas.

It was a really amazing vacation… and I really only hit the highlights here. It was great to get away… great to evaluate where we are in life… great to see friends…

Distractions

I just read this article from Al Jazeera a minute ago.

Basically, there are some new testimonies emerging from people who escaped from the oppressive regime of North Korea a while back. They are telling horrific facts about how the North Korean regime is using disabled (mentally and physically) children as guinea pigs for testing their chemical and biological weapons.

The government says that their “best contribution to society” is to be guinea pigs… and without much choice of their own, they are ripped away from their families and thrown into gas chambers and other horrible devices.

When I read stuff like this, I really get pissed-off/discouraged.

I think of a line from a great Sara Groves song that says: “Lord I have a heavy burden of all I’ve seen and known, it often overwhealms me“.

I mean, seriously, what do you do with crap like that?

I refuse to believe that you can just ignore it because they live on the other side of the world, look different than us, sound different than us and have closed themselves off from the rest of the world.

Does that mean we can just count it as a loss?

What’s even more depressing are the crazy other things that are happening in North Korea (and numerous other countries for that matter) that we aren’t really aware of.

Does it seem a little odd that we get all worked up and freaked out about things that only affect us and are rather insignificant to the rest of the world?

Healthcare overhaul?

Whether Michael Jackson’s death was foul play or not?

Whether your church has a children’s program or not?

Don’t some of those things just start to seem a little insignificant when we consider what’s going on around the world?

Is it just me, or are those things merely distractions that keep us from seeing things that are really important?

I find myself facing so many distractions. I really do.

At the end of the week, if I’m not careful, I will find myself consumed with: cooking a good meal and savoring it with my wife and a nice glass of wine; editing a photograph all night until I’m happy with it; reading a book about how church should/could/would/must be and letting it end there; imagining how we can make our worship/creative ministry better and cooler and more effective at our church.

If I’m not careful, I will wake up the next Monday and start all over again.

I will have taken all these good things and have made them into ultimate things. The only things that I do.

I strongly believe that life is a balance.

I believe there must be a place in my life for savoring good food and drink (especially with other people in community).

I feel alive when I have the chance to focus on photography and make images that will inspire.

I am all for revisiting how we do church and making sure it is in line with what Christ intended.

And I feel that the church should be a place where creativity happens, and am passionate about seeing us get there as a Body of believers.

However, if at the end of our lives we look back and say that we enjoyed good things with good people, were able to create and foster environments of creativity and in the end make a church that looks super-cool in our culture… yet the world is still full of horrible injustices and we didn’t even pause to pray that the God of justice would come and make things right.

Restore things to how they should be.

Then, have any of the other things even been worth it?

Don’t get me wrong… I am realizing the truth that humans (no matter how hard we try) will never be able to cure the injustices in the world. To set out on a mission to do that would be highly prideful and self-righteous.

I’m not talking about forsaking all things to make the world a perfect place. That’s not going to happen.

I’m talking about being aware of the realities that are occurring in the world that God has placed us in and then realizing that we have the ONLY hope for this world living inside us (if we are reginerate follower of Christ… not just humans with happy hearts).

Are we being good stewards of that hope?

Do our hearts break for the things that break God’s heart?

Do we even see the things that break God’s heart, or are we too distracted by our attempts to make sure we’re doing everything right?

They Call the Thang a RODEO-oooo

Culture.

I really like culture.

I think it’s interesting.

I like to think about, experience and ponder other cultures.

And as a result of living among a variety of other cultures, I have really honed my skills at disecting the culture in which I come from.

Which brings us to the 2009 Bryan, TX Rodeo Extraordinairre!

I went.

Last night.

Yep… you read that right.

I… went to a RODEO… last night!

It was quite the cultural event.

Lots of people in tight jeans and cowboy hats. Lots of Coors Light.

There was even an American flag that produced flames. Could you ask for more??

It was actually a last minute decision that brought me to this great event. I was planning on visiting my great friends and their tiny new baby in the hospital and then heading home for a night of solitude (my wife has left me alone for a few days while visiting family… tear) and editing pictures. Then a friend from out of town convinced me that the photo opportunities to be offerred at a rodeo far surpassed a short night of editing photos by myself.

And I agreed.

So, we met up with a big group of other great friends and enjoyed ourselves.

Here’s the fun part. Because this was a last minute decision for me, I didn’t have time to go to Wal-mart or Cavender’s and get me a new outfit. In fact, I was probably wearing the most opposite of what people would consider “rodeo attire”. I had my converse shoes, cut-off pants, recycling t-shirt and castro cap. Added to this was my Canon backpack full of lots of goodies and my big ole camera around my neck. Much more fitting for a venue like South By Southwest rather than a rodeo.

Here’s your proof!

The night was complete with shocking comments from the clown man, lots of patriotism and America-ness and great fun with friends.

Here are some of my favorite shots from the night. I think I have really expanded my portfolio with this shoot.

..before..

..after..

It’s OK Emma… I was scared too…

Contending for the Gospel

I just read through this article on CNN a minute ago.

Basically, the Episcopal Church has decided to proactively move forward in “regularizing the status of gays and lesbians within the church”.

Not a big shocker.

That’s not really what this post is about.

What was a shocker to me was a line toward the bottom of the article.

“It is bringing the church’s position in line with civil society’s.”

I am saddened by the fact that churches across the world are going back to the drawing board, if you will, and rewriting truth in order to “bring the church’s position more in line with civil society”.

Somewhere along the way we have lost sight of the fact that Christ has called us to be holy and distinct. Mocked by the world.

We are to be different than the Rotary Club.

Inclusion is not our goal with this thing.

Holiness is.

But, before we just stop here and go to bed tonight thinking how much we disdain the Episcopal Church, we really need to take this a step further and go to the heart of the issue.

Like I said before, I’m not that shocked that the church is working toward inclusiveness of homosexuals. I don’t agree with it… but, I’m not shocked.

What I’m really worried about are the thousands of other churches that, although are refusing to gloss over the sin of homosexuality, are lining themselves up with “civil society’s” position on a number of other things.

Let’s bring this home to us (mainstream/Bible-contending Christians).

Where are we revamping things in the name of contextualization or in order to reach more with the gospel? … or just not look wierd in the world’s eyes?

There is such a fine line there… mind you, I’m not saying I know exactly where that line resides. But, I do think that we need to be careful. We need to adequately fear the Lord and his perfect ways more than we do man.

We also need to be reminded that, in all things, Christ did not establish His church to be in line with civil society… He established her to be a beacon of hope. A light that offers a better way than what our febel and broken minds can conjure up for ourselves. A standard of truth that is to be preserved for generations, so we can aways come back to what is right. A reminder that, left on our own, we will always screw things up and follow our bent toward sin, selfishness and destruction.

The church was meant to show a world that is looking for something to fill the eternal gap in their hearts where true life is found… it was not meant to adapt to whatever inherently-sinful people think is best practice for their day and age.

Happy 1-Year to Blair!

So, my neice just turned 1 last week. I feel like the past year has really flown by… hard to believe that she is already running around and stuff.

Lucky for me, I really started take photography seriously right about the time that she was born… so, for the past year, I have had a constant subject at my disposal to try new things out on! I have had a lot of fun photographing her through her first year of life and then looking back on different photos and thinking how crazy it is that kids change so much during that first year.

Here are a few photos from the last time I was in Austin a few weeks back.

Enjoy!