A New Companion.........

Okay, enough already, I'm not posting another picture of another random date!...although I did trade in my old flame for a newer, sexier, younger model!! Do you hear that sound thats playing?? Thats the sound of young love!! This weekend, Chris found a smokin deal on a 2004 Honda VTX 1300C, and when I saw it, it was love at first sight! So after some finageling, I talked it out of him, and now I have a new leading lady! The color is a Burnt Orange with metallic in it. I'll have to take some pics during the day when I get it all shined up, but I couldn't wait to post it, so thus, the night shots! Last night when Tiffany and I went for a ride she said to me, "What girl in her right mind wouldn't want her man to have a bike?" Good question Tiffany, and......what do ya say to that??

Heeellllloooo sexy new machine!!

The old 2001 Suzuki Volusia 800

Maddy's New Home!

Okay, I think I'm over it enough to finally talk about it! About a month ago I came to the realization that my dog Maddy just wasn't living the life that she deserved. I have become extremely preoccupied with living life and not spending enough time with her. When I was married it was really easy cause Karena worked all the time, and when I came home from work or school, I could just play with her and spend time with her. But I have come to the realization that I wasn't spending any time with her, and she lived her life cooped up in her kennel. So I decided that as friendly as she is, it was time to find her a home with plenty of children to play with, and a yard to run around in. So I posted an add on KSL.com and about a half hour later I had found a family to take her!! She now lives in Spanish Fork with a great family of 3 children and a big fenced yard. It was bitter-sweet, but I know she's much happier! So here's to Maddy!!

I'm a model ya know what i mean.............

So my cousin Kim brought this picture to the reunion and gave it to me, and I thought I was going to die laughing! So here's the setup.....It was 1985, White Nike's were still cool, as were Wranglers (In Idaho anyway!).....or maybe they were Sears "Toughskins" jeans......oh, but wait, at least the popped collar has made its way back!! So my cousin Kim worked at one of the stores in the mall, and they were doing a back to school fashion show...so at the ripe age of 7, I began my modeling career! But havn't been able to book a gig since!!...alright peeps...laugh it up!!!

Grandpa Oram turns 89!

Just got back from a short weekend trip to Idaho to have a small family reunion and to celebrate Grandpa Oram's 89th B-Day!! It was so much fun to see the family again. Although I must admit, that the older I get, it seems the less I know who belongs to who! In fact, my Cousin Kathy totally busted me out on it, cause I was trying to get some little kid out of a photo I was trying to shoot, and she told me, "ya know, Cody, If you knew their names it would make it a lot easier!" Oh well, what do ya do, right?! Anyhow, we had a great time, and I was able to get family pics of I think every family there....so here are some highlight of the weekend.....

Okay, first things first.....Jed and I never know when to quit teasing each other.....but I'll admit, it usually ends by me burning Jed so bad all he can do is smack me around a little!!

Grandpa is quite the character!!...Dude, you gotta expand this one and check out his nifty napkin holder!!! Believe it or not, he may be old, but he can sure still bark orders from this position!!

I love the look in Jed's face!!!

I sure love my little nephew Quinn...he's such a cute kid!

Here's the whole fam damily!! Our family now spans 5 generations!!

Us kids with mom and dad.

The two that started it all. Happy 89th Grandpa Oram!

A night at the mall

Monday night, Tiffany, Gavin, and I met up with Nalani & Jed, and our friends Cade & Carriann, and their daughter Peyton. We ate at the good old California Pizza Kitchen! (Thanks for the hookup Shandi!!) After dinner, Tiffany and I took Gavin down to the play area. They have a big treehouse playground in the middle of the mall, and Gavin sure did eat it up! I loved a few of the pics I took! I had a funny experience carrying Gavin back to the car... Tiffany ordered him a kids root beer, most of which ended up on my shirt via a soaked diaper. As I carried him back to the car I kept thinking to myself...my stomach feels wet.....hmmmmm....what can ya do but laugh!

It took some careful study from the bottom of the slide for Gavin to get his courage up to go all the way to the top and try what the other little kids were doing!

One foot at a time....slowly but surely....you can do it kiddo!!!

Okay....he finally has the courage.......

Whew....we made if safe and sound!! I was really getting a chuckle out of this whole sequence of events, and I guess I had forgotten how intimidating something like this can be to a kid! Its been so fun though to be around this little guy. He's really opened my eyes and brought a lot of perspective to many things. Crazy how that works!.....oh yeah.....and just for good measure, ...........Tiffany got ahold of my camera and just had to show off her amazing pedicure!!

Squaw Peak

Today I went over to Tiffany's house after church for dinner. She had made Cincinnati Chili, and it was freakin tasty! She also makes some dang good peach cobbler! Anyhow, we played some cards with her parents. They are great people, and a lot of fun. Her dad is an Athletic Director at BYU and her mom is an MA at a Doctors office. Tiffany's little boy Gavin is 1 1/2 and he is sooo into climbing anything and everything! I got a good chuckle watching him climb all over everything and getting into everything! Definitely mischievous! Anyhow, later on we went for a ride up Squaw Peak to watch the sunset. It was tons of fun, and she hasn't told me to stop calling her, so I guess our "friendship" is still progressing!!

Looks like she chopped her hair, but its just in a pony tail!

The Sunset was amazing tonight! Looking West over Utah Lake.

Silver Lake Creek

This afternoon Luke Isley and I drove up American Fork Canyon, up Tibble Fork, and eventually to Silver Lake. A mile or so past Silver Lake is the creek that feeds silver lake. We got out of my truck and hiked through the brush to get to the creek, and into some spots to take some photos. We hiked maybe a quarter mile up the creek bed photographing. We gave ourselfves the assignment of water. It was really pretty up there, and I'd love to go back up both in fall for the color, and in spring to get more water! Anyhow, these are a few images I captured.

Luke and I in the Creek Bed.

TOBY KEITH!!!

I went to lunch today with Amy and Melissa, and was informed that i'd be attending the Toby Keith concert tonight....okay, okay, i actually begged until they gave in and agreed to take me! So it ended up being Melissa, Jeanette, Amy, Chari, Sam, and I. It was a fun filled night of music, drunks, and hoochy mammas with not nearly enough clothes on! What more could ya ask for, right??!! Toby put on a great show, and aside from the $8.00 Hot dog/Drink combo, I can't complain! Heck, we even saw a girl poppin a sqwat under her boyfriends truck after the concert! Haha, gotta love the good ole country crowd!

Great shot of the girls!

Chari & Sam (or as the kids will soon call him..... Officer Sorensen)!!

The gang!!

The Man!!

His flippin sweet setup...notice the Ford Super Duty grill behind him!

A night well spent!!

A Ride Up The Canyon!

Okay, so I have many things I need to update on my blog, but I'll start with my favorite as of late!..A while back a met a girl named Tiffany, and she's a freakin blast! We've become good "Friends" quickly and she's a stinkin laugh a minute. She's 24, also divorced, and has the cutest little 18 month old boy named Gavin. We've had some fun times together already, and tonight we went on a motorcycle ride up and over the Alpine Loop. I thought maybe by bringing her over to meet Nalani, Maile, Kami, and Mom in one shot one of two things would happen:

1. They'd tell me to kick her to the curb......or

2. She'd kick me to the curb in fear of my sisters.......

Well...neither one has happened, so i guess so far so good!

Gettin Ready for the big ride!

Once at the top, I couldn't help but cackle at the sight of Tiff so concerned with helmet hair and looking just so, for all the people that weren't even up there to see her!!!...Oh how vain!!

And of course a quick potty break before we could take any pictures.

That setting the camera on the fencepost thing never seems to work out right, so ya might as well laugh about it, right??!!

Strike a pose Tiffany, ham it up!

Tiffany kept heckling me..."Come on Mr. Cameraman, don't ya know how to use that thing?" So this was my simple response to her taking over the photography!

And Tiffany requested I put this up, its her favorite!

Grandma & Grandpa Oram

Thursday night I went up to Blackfoot to shoot a wedding Friday morning at the Idaho Falls Temple. I called ahead and booked a room at the Oram Inn...AKA Grandma and Grandpa's place. I had a lot of fun chatting with Grandma, cuz we all know Grandpa cant get a word in edgewise!! J/K Okay, really its true, but thats why we all love her so. And not to worry kids, she made a nice big breakfast before my big day of work! Anyhow, I snapped this pic with my point and shoot, and touched it up a little in photoshop. Fun visit!

4-Wheelin' in Victor, ID

After the wedding I shot in Idaho Falls and Blackfoot this weekend, I went and stayed the night at Charlie Messerli's home. He, his wife, and their 3 kids live in Rexburg. On Saturday morning, I woke up to Cody (Charlie's 4 year old) patting me on the Cheek saying, "Wake up Cody, time to watch cartoons"! So being the good Uncle I am, (afterall, he is my namesake) I cuddled up to him and watched some transformers! Good times! Charlie and I left later that morning for Victor, ID which is over by the Wyoming Border off Highway 33. We parked at Charlie's cousin's home that is at the base of the Mountain range and unloaded our 4-wheelers there. Jason, the cousin, got his quad out and took us for an amazing ride up through the mountains that are on the South end of that valley. It was a really fun ride, and of course, I took some pics!!

Getting Ready to unload

Takin a rest at the top

This is the view from the top, overlooking Victor, ID facing North

This is us starting down the mountain and facing west, there were some cool meadows up high.

A Clean Shave!!!

Yesterday I got a new position at work. I'm all done estimating, and now i've moved into the service department to help with dispatching and scheduling our technicians. I'll also be in the field helping from time to time, so it should be a whole new challenge! As part of dealing with homeowners more now, our service technicians and staff are required to be completely clean cut. So the owner asked me yesterday to shave off my goatee! Dude, i've had that little champ for about 6 years now, so it was rather traumatizing!! I hate not having it! But I did have one of my office girls tell me I looked younger, so maybe its a good thing! Anyhow, here's the before and after pics!

Before!

And after!

Ya learn somethin' new everyday!

Those who know me well, know that I keep a stack of magazines in the bathroom for a very good reason......I like to read.....why else??!! Okay, so today I was reading a cool article on photoshop, and read about a new technique I hadn't tried yet. It is a technique used by professionals to create a "Dreamy" feel to a photo. This technique in film was called the "Orton Effect" and took a skilled person a very long time to produce a single image. Now with the magic of photoshop it takes less than a minute! We have it so easy with computers!! I played with an old image of Maile's son Canon. I used an image that I already quite liked, so I thought I would show you all the before and after just for the fun of it!! Go ahead people, i'm open for critique!!

P.S. Does anyone know why my pics wont expand when you click on them??

Here's the before

And after!

A Manti Wedding

Today i went down to Manti, to shoot my first wedding at that temple. I really love the Manti Temple, it is so majestic the way it sits up on the hill. After the wedding I dinked around for a few hours before heading to Mayfield for the Reception, which was held at Town Hall! I seriously had forgotten how fun it can be to be in a small town, so I took some pics to shed some light on my day!

This is Mayfield Main Street. I swear....i'm not even kidding!!

This is the Mayfield 24th of July Event Calander...any takers to go with me???

Seriously...does anyone really want me to elaborate on this one???!!!!

Okay, now that i've poked a little fun at Mayfield, here's the scene as I was leaving town.

As a funny side note, as I ran into my old college roomate at the temple and found out he is really good friends with the groom. His name is "Chewy", but few call him by his birth name of Brian Call! It was a lot of fun to see him after 6 years. He lives in Rexburg with his wife.

This is my friend Katie King "The Bride"!!

And here is the happy couple Katie and Chad Westover! They are so much fun together, and Chad couldn't be half bad cause he rides an '05 Yamaha Roadstar Warrior! I texted Nalani after watching how cute they are together and told her I didn't know whether I should be hopeful or suicidal!! haha!! J/K!