If you're not in the parade, you watch the parade. That's life. Mike Ditka

Port Townsend 2023 Rhody Parade

"I'm still passionately interested in what my fellow humans are up to. For me, a day spent monitoring the passing parade is a day well-spent." Garry Trudeau 

Another video of one of our Port Townsend Rhody Parades from the past. This is from 2018. I have so many photos that I have wanted to share and this year's parade starts at 1 today. 

Never let the guy with the broom decide how many elephants can be in the parade. Merlin Mann 

I'm having a blast going through hundreds of Rhody Festival photos, some dating back to 2004! 📸 I wanted to share these memories through fun little slideshows/videos instead of letting them gather dust on an old computer.

It's heartwarming to see kids I photographed nearly 20 years ago now bringing their little ones to this cherished community event. The Rhody Festival has deep roots, starting during WWII, and it’s wonderful to witness such a timeless tradition continue.

A huge shoutout to all the amazing volunteers who work tirelessly to make this happen, everyone who participates in the parade, and those who already have their lawn chairs lined up for the Grand Parade this weekend! 

Everybody loves a parade, especially in Port Townsend. 

A little video/slideshow I put together of some of my favorite photos from last year's Rhody Grand Parade. I have hundreds, maybe thousands of photos that I have taken over the years so I had trouble narrowing this video down to just over 100 images. Putting the images together, by year, as a slideshow feels like an easier way to finally share them. I think this video represents the uniqueness of our community and shows the amount of effort and hours of hard work from volunteers to make this parade such a fun yearly event.

I've added a couple of silly parade quotes just for fun. I love a good quote or two. 

And when it rains on your parade, look up rather than down. Without the rain, there would be no rainbow. Gilbert K. Chesterton 

Style is when they're running you out of town and you make it look like you're leading the parade. William Battie 

Parades are man's attempt to make traffic exciting. Demetri Martin 

Never let the guy with the broom decide how many elephants can be in the parade. Merlin Mann 

It is wonderful seeing photos of Moms that people are starting to share on social media as Mother's Day approaches. My friend Skip Cohen wrote a great Blog post last Mother's Day and I asked his permission to share part of his post. 

"So, to all of you who are moms, Happy Mother's Day. And to everyone who still has their mother around, don't waste a second. Cherish your time together, and as photographers, set up a camera and shoot a little video. Plop Mom down in front of the camera and ask her to tell you a few backstories: how she met your father, places she grew up, favorite memories - anything you can watch and smile about years from now."

While many of Skip's followers are professional Photographers anyone can capture special memories of their Mom whether with a fancy Nikon camera or a cell phone. Today would be a perfect day to videotape her responses to the questions Skip mentioned above. I never did that with my Mom and now that she is gone I wish I had. Treasure family while they are here. 

This is the last photo I have of my Mom. It was taken when I went back to Wisconsin to attend my Dad's funeral. My young niece was having fun learning to use my D80 and captured this photo of my Mom. Six months after Dad passed my Mom died. Life can change in an instant. Don't delay photographing/videotaping your family with your own camera or working with a professional Photographer. 

Colorful Port Townsend Video/Slideshow

Throwback Thursday has me going back through some early slideshow/videos I made several years ago. I love the musical beat as the colorful photos move and pulsate on the screen. This Spring I hope to upload new videos to share. Right now I'm working on one from photos I took at last year's Rhody Festival. 

The last couple of weeks I've been working with Clarity Marketing Services located here in Port Townsend. Thanks to Sahrah and Alyah I'm getting lots of great advice on marketing and SEO. So I've been putting that info to use by updating my website, by adding keywords, text to my gallery pages and trying to reduce the number of photos per page. I probably should limit the number of images in my Event Photography Gallery, but I just can't seem to cull any of my images. If you haven't been to my website before check out this Event Gallery with lots of fun photos from events here in Port Townsend. 

Port Townsend Main Street Parade

Find the seed at the bottom of your heart and bring forth a flower. Shigenori Kaneoka

I was unable to attend the Port Townsend Women & Film Festival in April. Being at home had me at my computer going back over hundreds of photos I have taken over the years. I have volunteered for many years taking photos at both the Women & Film Festival in the Spring and the larger Port Townsend Film Festival in September.

This year I really missed the opportunity to take great photos of the Festival attendees and the filmmakers. It is really such a fun event with wonderful unique films and the opportunity to meet and interact with actors and filmmakers from all over the world. Most of the films are shown at locations close to the downtown Rose Theatre so it is easy to get to all the films, take a break for a delicious meal at one of the restaurants in downtown Port Townsend and even do a bit of shopping. This video was from photos I took a couple of years ago and was fun putting together. I'm hoping to add more photos and videos from other years here on my Blog. I'm looking forward to the Port Townsend Film Festival in September. 

I have several deer that bed down daily in my yard only a few feet from my front door. They usually arrive at night and seem to enjoy laying on top of a yard of dirt that was delivered years ago for a garden project that never happened. I think the mound holds the heat from the sun even late into the day so it must be comfy to lay on at night.

I still remember the day this handsome and rather worldly-looking buck walked into my yard and laid down only a few feet from my front door. I recognized him by the scars on his face and realized I had seen him just up the street before only a couple of weeks before. I stopped to just absorb his majestic presence before deciding to grab my camera and before he lay down. The late afternoon light here in the Spring in the Pacific Northwest is lovely for portraits of all kinds including people and animals. The light reflected on him and showed off the texture of his antlers. Counting the points of his antlers led me to believe he was perhaps fairly young. Viewing the variety of scars on his face made me ponder on how tough his life had been and how hard it must be to survive with so many coyotes in our area, stray dogs, and traffic. To stop and take a few moments just to watch him so close to my house was magical. 

Port Townsend Photographer

Jefferson Healthcare made a Facebook post today celebrating Doctors' Day using these photos of headshots I have taken of their providers.  I love photographing professional headshots and working with the staff at JHC. I'm really proud of all these photos I have taken over the last seven years. I appreciate all the providers at JHC and was reminded of this with my recent visit to both the Express Clinic and ER here in Port Townsend. You can use the link below to send a thank you to one of these Doctors' below. It seems like a nice way to thank them, especially after the last three years of their service dealing with Covid. 

From JHC:

Thursday, March 30, is Doctors’ Day, an annual observance to appreciate physicians who help save lives everywhere. To show appreciation, Jefferson Healthcare is asking the community to send a brief note to a doctor to let them know how much their dedication and commitment to healing and helping others means to all of us. Notes can be submitted through this link https://jeffersonhealthcare.org/leave-us-a-note

It seems every day should be National Puppy Day when you look this darn cute. I miss my handsome pup pictured here. I didn't take this puppy photo of Sherman, it was taken by his previous owner. It is such a really sweet photo of this bundle of fur. The owner ended up surrendering him to our local shelter when he was five. I felt so bad for the owner that had to give him up but grateful he came into my life. Sherman had lots of allergies and was on several different medicines daily plus on a special diet. He was the most beautiful dog I have ever owned so he has shown up a lot in my Blog posts. I regret I didn't capture photos of him.

I sadly admit that many of the pet photos I have taken for clients are after they realize their dogs are sick and they will lose them. I know many of us think of our dogs as part of our families so don't hesitate to consider bringing your dog to your family session. I also offer to photograph just your dog and have captured some lovely images over the years. I photographed animals at the Humane Society of Jefferson County for 15 years so I'm very comfortable around animals and photographing them.  You can see some of my other Pet Photography on my website. 

Wow, I just saw Doug Blush, on stage at the Oscars, for the Elephant Whisperers. I believe he was the Executive Producer for this short that just won an Oscar. I have photographed Doug many times over the years at our local Film Festival. Here is Doug with my friend John Liczwinko at the Port Townsend Film Festival back in 2019. Congratulations Doug.