Two weeks ago, she was a swollen little newborn who could barely keep her eyes open. She’d claw at her cheeks and eyebrows, the sensory experience of her new life too much to handle. Tonight, while lying on my chest, she wiggled her way from my sternum to burrow her face under my armpit, as though she’d find a food source under there, the whole time making ravenous little grunts. I could hardly contain my laughter it was so cute.

Varenna looks a little like me, and she looks a little like Hailey. And yet at the same time, she looks, and acts, not at all like either of us. It’s so incredible to see the individualism of a newborn. She’s mellow, content, and yet capable of incredible assertiveness. Her eyes are blue one day, blue-gray the next, hazel the next, blue again the next. The fact that I can’t peg her personality, let alone her physical traits, down makes parenthood all the more surreal.

Since we’ve come home, we’ve had several visitors come over. Hailey’s parents have visited, and we’ve Skyped Hailey’s brother and sister-in-law in Virginia and grandmother in St. Louis. My mom and dad came by for dinner, and this Thursday, since we were feeling pretty house-bound, we took Varenna to their house in the foothills southwest of town. Four or five sets of friends have stopped by to meet her, and my brother and his family have come by, with his wife Amy spending last night at our place (what a trooper … she even helped with night duty). I thought that our wedding was the once-in-a-lifetime event where gratitude for these friends and family would be the most intense. To have that experience twice is truly a blessing.

Varenna’s room has turned into a neat little sanctuary, complete with woodsy creatures, stuffed animals and a soundtrack of birdsong that we like to play on a compact sound system. Whether Varenna the Newborn eventually becomes Varenna the Outdoorsy Girl is entirely up to her, but for now, she’s got a lot of cuddly creatures surrounding her.

I’ve set up a blog just for Varenna photos. I did it mainly for family and friends to keep tabs on her (and to keep the Tanager Blog focused on travel, portraiture and other photography). My favorite post so far has to do with the many faces of this girl.

So there you go: our little family. Hope you are all enjoying spring …

I’m about to implement a serious revamp of www.tanagerphotography.com, which will include my 2010 wedding and portrait packages, as well as an overhaul of the galleries section by splitting weddings from portraits. While I was at it, I decided to take another look at the travel galleries, which got me thinking about whether I should include Ecuador in my portfolio, which got me thinking that Ecuador isn’t anywhere on the blog, which got me thinking how much I want to go somewhere pretty much at any moment now, which made me realize I’m not going anywhere for a while … what with the baby and all.

Just because I’m not traveling doesn’t mean I can’t spice up the blog with photos of faraway places here and there. Ecuador has been on my mind lately because of the birds and monkeys. Impending fatherhood naturally lends itself to daydreams of future adventures with the kid, and tops on that list is looking for animals in a rainforest, be it Costa Rica, Panama, Peru or some Caribbean Island.

We visited this magnificent country in April and May of 2007, visiting the Napo Wildlife Center in the Amazon, the capitol city of Quito, the Otavalo Indian Market, the rainforests of Mindo and the hot springs of Papallacta. Conspicuously absent from that list are the Galapagos Islands. Too much time, too much money, and being the mountain boy that I am, I’m always going to pass over islands to insist we see something like the Andes.

My lasting memory of Ecuador was a place of insane topography. Ravines inside canyons wedged between mountains with volcanoes on top. Quito’s size and scope was unfathomable because of the way the land buckles and swallows the city. It is amazing place to see from a window seat on arrival.

But right now, I’d bypass the Andes, the volcanoes sitting on top of them, and pretty much anything to do with that dusty wrinkled city, for a little hut in the rainforest and the sound of howler monkeys and parrots piercing the air.

NPR’s Morning Edition ran a great story on a Brazilian farm town’s efforts to restore the Amazonian rainforest and balance nature with farming. The soundtrack alone transported me back to Ecuador this morning. Soon enough, we’ll get back out there …

Things just got a lot more interesting with Tanager Photography. On Wednesday, our new camera arrived: the Canon 5D Mark II, an upper echelon camera with an incredible 21.1 megapixel full-frame sensor and HD video capabilities. Paired with the Canon 40D we’ve been shooting with, we now have even more expanded coverage for weddings, portraits, events and of course, our travels.

So its been an interesting week beyond just the new camera. What’s Halloween in Colorado without 14 inches of new snow … in the city? We carved a pumpkin last night (OK … Hailey carved a pumpkin last night), and I plopped it on the porch to photograph it (above). I was blown away at how the 5D balanced the inner glow of the pumpkin, the moonlit sky, the street light, and the streaking traffic on Holly St.

Hailey is knitting a baby blanket for our child, which made for an interesting test subject. Same with lighting a match. On day one of the blizzard, Hailey baked some beer bread, which I promptly photographed fresh from the over. I feel like I’m just scratching the surface on this camera’s capabilities.

So here’s the big deal with the Canon 5D for me. The camera shoots at high ISO settings with little trouble. ISO basically means how sensitive the sensor is to light. The higher the number, the more sensitive, the better the camera does in lower light (like churches, indoors, dusk, etc.). Many cameras (40D included) do OK through 400 ISO. At 800 ISO, you are pushing it and asking for a bit of post-production work to have less grainy, less noisy images. I pushed the ISO to 3200 on some of these images, and experienced very little grain or noise in the image.

I’m sure I’ll be posting a lot of new stuff in the coming weeks. Hailey and I might even do a maternity shoot together. We’ll try to avoid cliches, but we certainly have a lack of baby bump images. Stay tuned.

Adam Huggins (below) is one of my best friends. We’ve known each other since our freshman year in college, and we really shouldn’t be friends anymore. Nothing personal. It’s just that freshman year was the only time in our lives that we lived near each other. He transferred to Wake Forest, and has lived in Birmingham, Richmond and now Nashville. Friendships normally don’t survive that, even in the era of Facebook. For God’s sakes: we were 18 the one time we hung out consistently.

I’m not bragging or trying to suggest that our friendship is made of brawn and steel. It is what it is. But somehow it’s stayed relevant and significant for both of us over the years (of course, a 72-hour trip to Hawaii to see U2 in 2006 — his idea, not mine — helped keep the glory days going).

So Adam is finally getting on with his life: he just finished his nine grueling years of med school and residency and is now a doctor — which means I expect to fly on his private jet to Ketchum, Idaho in the near future — and he met a wonderful girl, Tess, and married her in mid-August. Hailey and I flew up to Boise and drove to Ketchum for a spectacular four-day weekend to be a part of the festivities. Adam asked that I be one of his groomsman.

So as a wedding gift, we offered to photograph the rehearsal dinner, and these are some of those pictures. Adam was alright with it (he was hoping we’d get him a set of bamboo table runners from Crate + Barrel) as long as we enjoyed the evening at the same time.

First off, Ketchum is a gorgeous little town. It’s a special place for Tess, having lived there after college, and the way they did this wedding was perfect. They rented a big house for multiple families to stay in for the week, and then the backyard doubled as the ceremony and reception venue.

After we went through our ceremonial paces, everyone piled into a school bus for a one-hour ride north to the Galena Lodge for the rehearsal dinner. In the early evening light we passed through Hemingway’s country in all its glory — braided rivers, dense willows, robust pines and rolling mountains. Classic Idaho.

The Galena Lodge is a magnificent property. They ran carriage rides to the nearby ghost town on the hour, and the catering was pretty damn good.

Here are some images from the evening.

Adam’s Dad is also a doctor, and he gave a very moving toast to his son just before dinner. On a personal note, getting to know Adam’s family better was the highlight of the trip for me. Such a warm, kind, compassionate and generous group of people.

So as us groomsmen were standing around waiting for the ceremony to begin the next day, Adam brings up that he has an extra ticket to the U2 show, opening night, in Chicago, in early September. His friend Neil has to take a rain check and “it’s yours if you want it.”

“Thanks man,” I say. “Let me see what’s going on and crunch some numbers and see if I can make it work.”

This being Adam, yours if you want it quickly morphed into you’re coming, it’s been decided for you.

At the end of the night as we were saying our goodbyes and wishing the newlyweds the best, Adam shook my hand and said “I’ll see you in Chicago.” That’s Adam.

<<More on the Chicago trip in another post, but you can view video I shot of “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” on my Flickr page.>>

Well, I’m back. Been a long while since I’ve blogged, in part because of how busy things have been at work, plus, my Canon 40D needed to go into the shop, so I’ve been on a bit of a shooting haitus. And I’m not talking about a three-day stint at Metro Camera Service in Englewood for a sensor cleaning. I had to ship it to Canon’s Main Service Branch in California to have the shutter mechanism fixed. So, all is better now, as these test shots of cabernet grapes and backyard carrots indicate. However, the situation pushed me off the fence on acquiring a new camera, and so, this Wednesday, according to UPS, I’ll be getting a Canon 5D Mark II as my main ax. The 40D, loyal soldier from trips to Italy and Mexico, will still serve me, but as the backup and as Hailey’s camera, too.

So, just to update things, I thought I’d get these pics of our bumper crop online. Hailey faithfully tended to a veggie garden this year, and along with cherry tomatoes, rosemary, oregano and jalapenos, we had great success with carrots from seed. On Saturday, we pulled 50 out of the ground, and only stopped because we didn’t want them wilting in our fridge. Best to keep the last 50 or so in the ground and harvest them for Thanksgiving. And yes, we recommend washing them before cooking them. Less gritty that way.

In late August, we hosted Hailey’s brother and sister-in-law, Jason and Ali, for a few nights. They live in Richmond, Virginia, and they visit roughly once a year now that Hailey’s parents live in Boulder. You know me and my pet portrait projects — while they were here, I asked them to pose for some photos in front of the white backdrop. Something playful and childish … like blowing bubbles. Why? Because we’re working on a series of white seamless portraits for the nursery.

That’s right: Hailey and I are having a baby. March 4 is the due date, and we’re determined to have the little one surrounded by our loved ones every night.

Uncle Jason and Aunt Ali are naturally playful (heck, we even bought the bubbles at the grocery store on the way home from putt-putt golf).

The bubble gun came with a blue hippopotamus-type creature who exclaims “bubbles make me silly!” when you squeeze its stomach. This provided a good ten minutes worth of laughs from Jason.

Right now Hailey is beginning to show and the baby is making a few moves of its own. In 10 days, we find out if it is a boy or a girl. It gets more and more real with each passing day. I’ll do my best to make sure this doesn’t become a baby blog, but rest assured, this will be one of the most photographed kids in history.

We’ll be seeing Jason and Ali again for Christmas in Richmond, along with Hailey’s parents, her grandmother and her aunt and family. Should be an extra joyous occasion this year.

And here is the final set from Jacqie and Ken’s wedding. You can see parts 1 and 2 here. We did portraits at the church and then moved to their reception at The Ridge at Castle Pines North. Beautiful spot.

Congratulations to both of them. It was an honor to photograph their wedding … here’s to many happy years to come.

Summer’s end is certainly weighing heavily on me these days. Not that I can’t handle the cold — it’s that I can’t handle the torrid pace of life. September: it’s next week. My God.

It’s been a snap-happy time for me and my shutter release. There was the trip to Steamboat Springs for the Balloon Rodeo, the remarkable reunion of the Reitzugs, a portrait session with Michaelanne Dehner, and three weddings (only one of which I’ve had time to post just yet). In the midst of it all, I managed to go backpacking zero times. I’m fairly certain I won’t even get a chance next summer either, but “woah is me.” I live in Colorado, one of the world’s most beautiful places, and I’m healthy and so is Hailey, and the future: oh, it couldn’t be brighter.

So, without more rambling, here are summer’s loose ends of photographs — little spare bits that didn’t quite fit into the story line of any blog posts, whether past or future. At the top, glacier lilies near Buffalo Pass. In early July, I went hiking with Tim Lamberton (below right) and bagged my 21st wilderness area — the midway point to bagging all of them in Colorado.

At left is me at my favorite place in Colorado — Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve. We stopped there en route to New Mexico for the family reunion. My cousin Nick, his wife Guilia and their adorable son Lorenzo (below) paid us a visit for a few days before hand, and since they were coming from Rome, well, how could you not see the Great Sand Dunes? We had to go, and Lorenzo had to fulfill his playing-in-the-muck quotient for this trip to America.

Once in New Mexico, we did countless things — among them the ambitious white seamless project, but we also did a half-day bug hunt with the fourth generation. That’s my nephew Isaiah (below right), pointing at the grasshoppers. The Nuggets jersey? His favorite piece of clothing. He doesn’t know who the Denver Nuggets are, let alone the first thing about basketball. He loves it because his favorite food is chicken nuggets. I love that boy.

And finally, a few golf shots from our recent trip to Idaho for Adam Huggins’ wedding. That’s Adam (below left), teeing up on the eighth at Sun Valley’s amazing golf course.

The views from the course — like this one from the second tee — were astounding. I love Idaho. Plan to go back when we have kids.

And as for golf course photography … yeah, I could definitely get into that.

Thanks for letting me have an indulgent and aimless blog post. Coming up: more from Adam and Tess’ wedding, a trash the dress shoot with Jodi and John, and a whole slew of great shots from Jacqie and Ken’s wedding.

(Click on each photo for a larger version)

Last week I was able to get a post up on my Mom’s amazing family, The Reitzugs — mainly, generations 1 and 2. Well, they’re back on the blog, this time, generations 3 (which I belong to) and 4. Rather than try to make sense of this massive family tree, I’ll just do this.

ABOVE: Elsa, daughter of my cousin Holly Rydel … I think I’ll entitle this sequence After Effects of a Blue Raspberry Lollipop.

ABOVE: Aidan, Jimmy and Nick Reitzug, sons of the oldest cousin in my generation, Joe Reitzug and his wife Stephanie.

ABOVE: Mark, Peter and Damian, three of the four Leonard boys (their brother Andrew, couldn’t make it to the reunion due to his house selling). As you can probably note from their choice in sunglass styles, they’re all outdoor-active types. Mark and Peter schooled me in soccer on the final night and they were, um … well, my teammates.

ABOVE: Mr. Andrew Gunnison Day. My nephew, my bud, and popular star of such previous blog posts as Us Kids Know and Christmas Cookie Sprinkle Snitchers.

ABOVE: Byron Lillie and Kate Balerud. Kate took the 40D from me at the tail end of the photo shoot and did a sequence of shots of Hailey and I jumping in the air in front of the white backdrop. Through no fault of Kate’s, they will not be posted on this blog. Let’s just say that I look like a complete bozo.

ABOVE: Alex Reitzug, son of Aunt Maria, trampoline extraordinaire and a fellow photog.

ABOVE: Isaiah and Jeremiah Day, my nephews. See also Us Kids Know and Christmas Cookie Sprinkle Snitchers.

ABOVE: Amy Bierman and Randy Rydel (left); Rebecca Reitzug (right). Amy and Randy are roughly the same age as Hailey and I, and we spent a good deal of time hanging out with them at the reunion, including two memorable meals in downtown Santa Fe. I also got to know Rebecca better this go around … we’re about 10 years apart, but with each reunion, those age gaps matter less.

ABOVE: Quinlan and her mom, Mary Beth TeSelle. At left, Quinlan is showing off her fabulous Fourth-of-July-themed rub-on tattoo.

ABOVE: Nick and Guilia Reitzug with their son Lorenzo (left); Stela Reitzug (right). Nick and Guilia live in Rome, and were kind enough to host us for a few nights when we visited last year. This year, we got a chance to reciprocate in Denver, and carpool down to the reunion in New Mexico (with a stop at the Great Sand Dunes). My cousin Stela is headed to Kosovo right now for missionary work. She’s originally from Albania, so the trip is holding great significance for her.

ABOVE: Elsa with her grandpa Mat (left); my mom Angie with her oldest brother Henry (right). OK, so this isn’t generations 3 and 4 as promised, but I had to include them because they are two of my absolute favorite shots. If you are wondering where my preoccupation with cameras comes from, look no further than the ‘Zugs.

And finally, I have to include a shot Hailey took of me with my mom Angie and brother Ben. Dad had to return to Denver the day before, so we’ll have to do a reshoot to get the true family portrait.

As soon as the family book and family tree are done, you know me, I’ll get another blog post up. I loved this gig, and am looking forward to shooting more family reunions, especially with the white backdrop.

Contact me if I can offer this service at one of your own family reunions.

We were there for the weekend of the Balloon Rodeo, a festival devoted to all things colorful and filled with hot air. What’s a balloon rodeo you say? Well, I’m not sure entirely, but based on attending the event, I think it goes like this: 30 balloons take flight during the first 90 minutes of daylight, and if the wind doesn’t send them down the valley, they compete in goofy games like a beanbag toss. Cattle, broncos and clowns have nothing to do with it … and PETA is no where to be found either.

Many of these shots were taken by my lovely wife Hailey, as she attended both Saturday and Sunday mornings’ festivities. (I went hiking all day with my buddy Tim Lamberton on Saturday…pics of that to come later).

As you’ll notice from many of my posts, Steamboat Springs is becoming a go-to hangout for us. We have access to a condo up there, and since its a good three hours from Denver, it’s right in that sweet spot: close enough to be convenient, far enough away to fully unplug.

Along for the trip were Hailey’s parents, our good friend Jenny Jordan (minus her husband Matt, who was at U.S. Nationals for Fencing) and the Lambertons. We drove up Friday, looked for moose on Rabbit Ears Pass, dined downtown, hiked Saturday while everyone else went to the Balloon Rodeo and the Art Fair, and then Sunday we all went tubing down the Yampa River. Sunday night’s drive home was a bit mournful — I’m increasingly having a harder time leaving the mountains after a weekend like that.

So anyway, back to the rodeo.

The balloons’ mass ascension takes place in a field just south of town. One of the “rodeo tasks” is to lift off, then dip the basket into this lake and lift back up again.

We also learned that the Upper Yampa River Valley is ideal for ballooning because of its “box winds.” At lower elevations, the winds take you down valley, but as you get higher up, they take you back up the valley. Doesn’t always work, but when it does, it saves gas for the chase vehicle.

OK, coming up I’ll have images from my day hike with Tim, photographs from John and Jodi Hardee’s wedding, plus a very personal project that involves the white seamless and almost everyone from my mom’s side of the family.