On this blog I try to keep things centered around my life and the weddings that I photograph, which means I have yet to share these images. It’s time to catch you up on just a fraction of the work that I’ve done for my alma mater, Houghton College over the past few years. While I’ve done a variety of photography documenting events, people, and things… it’s documenting the place that stands out the most to me. It’s a unique location tucked in the rolling hills of western New York just south of Letchworth State Park. It’s secluded, it’s small, and it’s absolutely gorgeous. I’ve amassed quite a library of location imagery for them and it is always a pleasure to go out and document the surroundings, take in their beauty and enjoy life. I think the country does that for everyone. Here’s just a small selection of images and I hope you to enjoy!

It’s Thanksgiving Eve and our house is enduring a steady stream of cleaning in preparation for the arrival of family this afternoon. Spearheaded by my husband, preparation for anything usually begins with cleaning, and I am happy to let him take the lead on that. I mean, he has a gift people. I try not to interfere… aka he does most of the work while I watch in awe. You should see our house, it’s sparkling and I feel super lucky to have a husband like him.

Now that Thanksgiving is here I think we can all agree that Christmas is upon us and officially start any preparation if we haven’t already. If you’re like me, you do some things last minute, and might not have decided if you are sending out any holiday greetings. Stop right there. This Sunday, 11/27, I’ll be offering a few mini portrait sessions that include either digital files or custom cards. If you’re interested, don’t take too long to think about it as I’m only offering a few sessions and would love to fit you in! Read a little more info here or send me an email : hello @ marydougherty . net and reserve a spot!

happy thanksgiving!

I’m back from Portland! Jet-lag and all and forcing myself onto EST and the schedule I need to get things done. Since you already know Barista is my favorite, you can imagine how elated I was to find they were offering thick, heavy duty mugs in their shop. I’ve been a fan of these for a while (you may remember our favorite mug?) and it probably stems from the fact that it always reminds me of the navy mugs my dad has at home. Branded in a custom script we walked out with two – so we no longer had to fight over one – and an extra for you! Of course, by you I mean just one of you… so let’s find out who it is.

If you want to win the mug above I’d love to give you my extra souvenir!

Just leave a comment on this post below, and head to my facebook page to prove your love by liking Mary Dougherty Photography if you don’t already! Entries are open until Thanksgiving! 11/24 at noon… so you have just enough time to duck out of food prep or take a break from family and post an entry – one per day, per person. Just another reason to let the countdown to Thanksgiving begin!

update! Congrats to Emily Last, the winner of this mug + to everyone else for entering!

I thought I would give it a try. After dropping my phone more times than I care to remember the current case I had was hanging on by a thread. It had sacrificed for the sake of the phone, but it’s noble life had come to an end. I found out about uncommon from D*S and decide to give it a try and order a custom iphone case. I couldn’t help but use a detail from the monarch photos I had recently taken for the design, and waited patiently for it to arrive.

My review: 4/5 Overall the case looks great, seems to be fairly sturdy and will be a good outer layer for my phone, but it’s slippery. Granted my last case had a little texture, but the smooth exterior throws me off. I will just have to be extra careful I suppose.

When the case arrived in the mail, it came with a $5 off coupon for future orders. I’d love to send the code to the first person who wants to order their own and leaves a comment below… so let me know if you are interested!

I love the color orange, and I think I like it best in nature. The changing leaves, warm sunset, or brilliant wing of a butterfly is simply stunning. I saw this monarch on my porch yesterday and it was still there this morning. It doesn’t seem to be doing well and if my quick research is correct it should be on it’s way down to Mexico for the winter instead of hanging around New York. Since it decided to stay and live it’s last days on my porch, I brought out my camera and macro lens to photograph it’s intricate beauty.

While I could easily get sentimental and philosophical thinking about this butterfly, I will leave that for another blog post when I have hours to write and rewrite my thoughts. Until then enjoy these few images, and let me know if you would like a limited edition print of your own by commenting below on this post, commenting on facebook, or replying @marydaph on twitter. I will choose a recipient from each to have their choice of print from these four tomorrow at noon.

They had contacted me about photographing their wedding, and wanted to know if I could meet in person. Approximately half the couples I work with are out of state (either traveling back for their wedding or I’m traveling to them) so I don’t always get to have first meetings, but I love when they work out. We sat and talked for 45 minutes as I told them how I got my start and how I approached the weddings that I photograph, while they told me about their inspiration for the day and how they met and fell in love. It was a great conversation, and it wasn’t until we were getting up to leave that Mylee and I noticed we had the exact same purse. Kate Spade, mine in a chestnut brown and hers in a deep blue. It was serendipitous, and just seemed like another reason why we were a good fit. It’s funny to talk about a photographer client relationship like that but it really is one of the most important things. I was so happy when they contacted me a few days later to say they definitely wanted me to photograph their wedding next August, which is Kate Spade inspired.

With each wedding I am challenged to reconsider how I document love. This is not to reinvent the wheel, but to approach each wedding personally and with a specific interest to document the love shared between two people.

This requires work…

and practice.

Helping two people become comfortable in front of the camera and letting them know it’s okay to show emotion is an acquired skill. I would like to feel like I have mastered it, but I learn more with each couple I photograph. I have found it goes beyond asking couples to exchange a simple kiss as I did when I was first starting out, and capturing the kiss that naturally occurs when you are close and can’t imagine not being together. It means adding in unexpected elements that invite people to have fun and enjoy the process. It means distilling the images down to the essentials and teaching people to embrace those first few awkward minutes when they are not used to the spotlight. Most of all, it’s about reminding people that in the midst of whatever schedules, timelines, and conflicts of the day they are in love.

Dan and Alaina were married yesterday and it was a beautiful whirlwind.

I’m so excited both to share this news with you guys and for the reality that I have my first intern. Yes, Hannah is going to be joining me to learn the ropes of what I do – both photography and running a business and I am super excited for her help. She is one of those well rounded art majors that is versed in many different disciplines and on top of that has great taste in music & food and is fun to spend time with. I promise we will be working though, and not just having fun. Well, maybe a little of both? Since she is my first intern I know it will be a learning experience for both of us so I’ll keep you updated on our adventures. Or maybe she’ll give you a behind the scenes look at working with me – yikes!

Fresh peas are one of my favorite summer vegetables. It wasn’t until last year that I discovered how delicious they are from the vine, and now I’m hooked. I waited all winter for a chance to go picking and last week Matt and I went. Yes, last week when it was 90+ degrees and you didn’t want to get out of the house, Matt and I thought it would be a good idea to bake in the sun while picking veggies. We could have planned that better, but it was nothing a little ice cream couldn’t fix.

While we shelled and froze most of them to use this winter, I wanted to use some of the peas in a delicious summer recipe. Something must have been in the water because I couldn’t stop thinking about egg salad and knew peas would be the perfect addition. This is the first time I’ve made egg salad, and probably only the 4th or 5th time I’ve eaten it, so I went in without many preconceived notions. I didn’t have bread, I didn’t have mayo, but I had fresh peas and local eggs (can’t wait until our chickens start laying) and I went to work.

I started by shelling some peas! Just a handful until I had a bowl of about 1 1/2 cups…

I love making pita bread and it’s super easy so I decided it would be the perfect holder for the salad. The pita bread recipe I use with much success is listed here but I’ll include it below as well. One of the tricks is baking it on a pizza stone, and while I typically use an oven to bake the bread this time I used the grill to keep the house a bit cooler.

• 1 teaspoon dry yeast
• 2 1/2 cups warm water (approximately 105 degrees F)
• 2 cups whole wheat flour
• About 4 cups unbleached all-purpose or bread flour
• 1 tablespoon salt
• 1 to 2 tablespoons olive oil

Sprinkle the yeast over the warm water in a large bread bowl. Stir to dissolve. Add whole wheat flour, one cup at a time, then 1 cup white flour. Stir 100 times (one minute) in the same direction to activate the gluten in the flour. Let this sponge rest for at least 10 minutes or as long as 2 hours.

Sprinkle salt over the sponge and stir in the olive oil. Mix well. Add white flour, one cup at a time. When the dough is too stiff to stir, turn it out onto a lightly floured bread board and knead for 8 to 10 minutes, until dough is smooth and elastic. Return the dough to a lightly oiled bread bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Let rise until at least double in size, approximately 1 1/2 hours. Gently punch down. Dough can be made ahead to this point and then stored, covered, in the refrigerator for 5 days or less.

Place large baking stone on a rack in the bottom third of your oven or on the grill and preheat to 450 degrees. Roll out a small piece of dough to a circle 8 to 9 inches in diameter and around 1/4 inch thick.

Bake 2-3 at a time directly on stone. Bake each bread for 3 or 4 minutes, until the bread has gone into a full “balloon” or until it is starting to turn lightly golden, whichever happens first – no need to flip it over. Remove from stone and cool on rack + enjoy.

If you read this blog you probably know Matt and I like to cook, and we like to make things from scratch even if we end up eating an hour later than planned. I’m not a big fan of mayonnaise at all… but when I make it from scratch it’s another story. It’s nothing like the jar that sits for years on a shelf. I used a recipe from joy of cooking that’s similar to this one over at food network. It’s basically egg yolks, lemon juice, oil, vinegar and s+p. Our mayo didn’t emulsify correctly to as thick as it should have been, possibly because of the heat and humidity, but it did the job.

I hard boiled some eggs, cooled them, peeled them and chopped them.

Then combined the chopped eggs, peas + mayo. More salt and pepper to taste.. and if I was going to do it again I would probably include a little chopped red onion, bacon, or celery – whatever you like. Then I simply spooned the salad into the fresh pita and voila! Summer lunch.

I’m one of those people that can over listen to music. I can’t help rewinding, replaying or repeating a song or album. So I listen and listen until I move on to something new – but if I listen to that song for long enough, it sticks with me and becomes associated with that time in my life.

Like when Matt and I first started dating, and the first summer we spent together driving across New York to attend friends weddings and see each other we would blast black eyed peas with the windows down since the air conditioning was broken in his car. Or when I was in college and would spend late nights in the art building darkroom and to the almost discarded Ace of Bass cd from a roommate and danced to it over and over as I developed prints in the dark. Or maybe way back in elementary school when I went camping with my dad and sister and we had the tape of Michael W. Smith’s Go West Young Man and drove the whole way to the UP singing along. picture perfect. rocket town. oh, rebecca.

So the other day Matt came home from a trip to the store with a record player. It was somewhat of an impulse buy, but I think I could trace back his train of thought if I had to. It would go something like this: -I love the Tour de France, I need to watch the stage today – team Radioshack hasn’t been doing that well with so many crashes – I haven’t been to Radioshack in a while – I’m going to go to Radioshack, plus they sponsor a team at the tour so that’s cool (enters radioshack) -I’m just going to look around and see if there’s anything cool – look! a record player that’s cool! – oh and I have that stack of records from my grandfather – done. I’m buying the record player. Mary will like this.

Not only did he come home with a record player, he soon purchased three new records – John Coltrane, Bon Iver + Foster the People. He won me over, not that I wasn’t down with the record player in the first place – it can connect to your computer and make mp3′s from your records! Also as a side note with the new records we were also given digital downloads of the files with the record purchase – so you really get double. Since I had already been listening to Foster the People it has now been playing for long enough that I think it will stick as the soundtrack of summer 2011.