Music Monday: Days Gone By

While exploring an old abandoned school I came across this beauty. I wondered how many songs had been played on this piano or how many students learned how play those ivory tusks.  

Music Monday: Shane McAnally

We're pretty proud of our local Grammy award winning songwriter, Shane McAnally. 

Shane's a multiple Grammy Award winning country music singer, songwriter and producer. He has written and produced songs for Kacey Musgraves, Kelly Clarkson, Sam Hunt, Kenny Chesney, Reba McEntire, Jake Owen, Luke Bryan, The Band Perry, Lady Antebellum, and Miranda Lambert, just to name a few.  The Academy of Country Music named him Songwriter of the Year in 2014.

McAnally co-produced Kacey Musgraves' 2012 Award Winning debut Same Trailer Different Park with her and fellow songwriter, Luke Laird. He co-wrote nine of the album's twelve tracks including all four singles, "Merry Go 'Round", "Blowin' Smoke", "Follow Your Arrow" and "Keep It to Yourself". He has worked with co-producer Zach Crowell on Sam Hunt’s major label debut, Montevallo, and co-wrote the lead single "Leave the Night On”. 

This is a pretty impressive list of accomplishments at such a young age. I found a great interview Shane did a few months back I thought you'd enjoy.

Shane McAnally has had a whirlwind of a few years. After a more-or-less failed record deal in the early 00’s, he didn’t score his first cut until 2008 on Lee Ann Womack’s ‘Last Call’, but since then things have expanded at any alarming rate, scoring cuts for Luke Bryan, Kenny Chesney, Reba McEntire, Jake Owen and Chris Young.........CLICK HERE for the full interview. 

Personal note:  In grade school, Shane attended Millsap ISD where we went to school together. We weren't friends but in our small school, you are pretty aware of everyone. Of course the younger kids always know who the older kids are.  He later moved  to Mineral Wells and I remember him working for the local radio station as a DJ.  Even at a very young age, Shane was following his passion for music by dipping his toes in any area of the industry that he could. 

 I can remember when I was in about the 3rd grade & going to my best friends house to stay the night.  Shane was also there staying the night with my friend's older brother. Us two younger kids sure thought it was cool to hang out with those older boys. Like young kids do, we stayed up late and watched MTV until the early morning hours. I always had a fond memory of that night. Even though we had a couple of cable channels at our house, I had never seen this new Rock & Roll video station everyone at school was talking about. That was the night I was introduced to MTV. 

I'm proud of the success this small town Texas boy has had.  Glad to see he followed his arrow to make a big name for himself a in the country music industry. CMS's,  ACM's, Grammy's..... I'm not sure how you can top these accolades, but I'm excited to see what's next for Shane. Congratulations on all the success, brother!  

Sunday Funday II

My crazy family! My nieces tried to explain to us what that weird peace eye hand motion thing meant that all the teens do now days... So we did our own rendition of this latest tween craze. 

Mom dad and brother are hilarious! Looking back at my childhood, there was never a dull moment. 

Sundance Square

A few nights ago we visited the newly renovated Sundance Square in downtown Fort Worth. What a great place to see, especially during the holidays. 

Sunday Funday

Well, today is Sunday Funday. I laughed hard at a few of these. Hope you enjoy. 

Wedding Bells

On  Saturdays, I  like to post wedding photos or information about the wedding industry in general.

I recently visited a great new wedding venue just north of Weatherford. The Brooks at Weatherford is perfect for those looking for a country chic wedding venue. I have yet photograph a wedding in this new location, but I have worked with a couple for engagement photos. See video below...

A New Beginning: Closing the door on 2014

When I started the blog almost 6 years ago, I didn't want it to be like most photography blogs. I really wanted it to be half photography & the other half un-photo related randomness.  For the first few years I did pretty fair job in blogging about whatever was going on, funny internet finds etc.  I guess I just lost interest, but my new years resolution is to blog on a regular basis.  Instead of just posting photos, I want to put more of my personality into my entries, just as I had done in the beginning. As I had mentioned from the start I DO NOT claim to be an English major.  I will most definitely use commas where they don't belong, run on sentences, improper grammar etc.  If that bothers you, move on. If you can look past that, I hope you enjoy. Thanks for stopping by!

I work best when I have a structured schedule. I came up with a daily post outline to hopefully keep me on track with regular posts. 

*Sunday: Sunday Funday-  This will be light heartened posts and/or fun photos. 

*Monday: Music Monday- I 'm a big fan of music in general so I'd like to post about whats going on in that area. 

*Tuesday:  Featured Photos of The Week-  On this day I want to post some of my favorite photos.

*Wednesday: Photography Tip of The Day-  If you are looking to learn a little about photography, this would be a great day to hit up the blog. 

*Thursday: Throw Back Thursday- If you frequent social media, you've probably seen this hash tag. I'd like to revisit some of my favorite sessions or wedding photos from the past. This should be interesting. 

*Friday: Funny Friday- I love Fridays and a good laugh, so what a perfect day to bring on the funny. The internet is full of hilarious videos, and photos to share with you guys. 

*Saturday:  Wedding Bells-  Much of our business has to do with the wedding industry. On Saturdays, I would like to post our wedding photos or just discuss the topic of weddings in general. 

I'm so excited about devoting more time to the blog again.  Please share with anyone who may be interested! 

Christmas Funnies

This year at our Felts Family Christmas, we did our usual Chinese gift exchange. I ended up getting a miniature version of the tacky leg lamp from the classic Christmas movie "A Christmas Story".  On the way home I had an idea. I wanted to reenact the scene from the movie when Bob receives his "major award". My family were great sports and obliged to partake in this crazy idea.

Shortly after I posted the video onto Facebook, I received a nice message from a friend. Glad to see my efforts to have fun and act nutty were understood. 

Oh, Is That What You Has Said??

There is a factory in Northern Minnesota which makes the Tickle Me
Elmo toys. The toy laughs when you tickle it under the
arms.

Well, Lena is hired at The Tickle Me Elmo factory and she
reports for her first day promptly at 8:00 am.

The next day at 8:45 am there is a
knock at the Personnel Manager's door. The Foreman
 throws open the door and begins to rant about the new Employee.

He complains that she is incredibly slow and the whole line

 is backing up, putting the entire production line behind schedule.

The Personnel Manager decides he should see this for
himself, so the 2 men march down to the factory floor. When
they get there the line is so backed up that there are
Tickle Me Elmo's all over the factory floor and
they're really beginning to pile up.

At the end of the line stands Lena surrounded by mountains
of Tickle Me Elmo's. She has a roll of plush Red fabric
and a huge bag of small marbles.

The 2 men watch in amazement as she cuts a little
piece of fabric, wraps it around two marbles and begins to carefully sew the little package between Elmo's legs.

The Personnel Manager bursts into laughter. After several
minutes of hysterics he pulls himself together and  approaches Lena .

 'I'm sorry, he says to her, barely able to keep
a straight face, 'but I think you misunderstood the
instructions I gave you yesterday...
 

Your job is to give Elmo two test tickles. 

Here are a couple of more video funnies I put together.

We made this last December when we has all that ice. I asked my son to do the famous Flick pole scene from the movie.  I couldn't believe how much he actually sounded like him as he frantically yelled for his friends help.



This has already been done and definitely not an original idea. My 9 year old insisted we do it and she got a big kick out of Jolly the elf swinging on the wrecking ball.

Tee Time