hi-o-hi: oberlin wedding in beacon, ny

I went to Oberlin, a small liberal arts college tucked into the flat farmland of northeast Ohio. Its compact campus boasts an eclectic mix of architecture—from 1800s stonework to Cass Gilbert’s red-roofed buildings, to the hulking concrete slab of a library—that magically melds together into something haphazard but beautiful.

The students are also haphazard but beautiful. They’re individual and thinkers and quirky and they love to dance and sing and argue and walk barefoot and occasionally dress in drag. Obies are a unique breed, which is why so many of them marry each other (one apocryphal number has it at 85%). My daughter’s principal (class of ’87) is married to another Obie. My magazine mentor married an Obie she got back in touch with at her Oberlin reunion. And Oberlin gave me my husband, whom I met when I was nineteen. So the wedding I went to this past weekend in Beacon—another Obie-to-Obie union—had a kind of magical feeling to it, due in no small measure to the fact that about three quarters of the guests had gone to Oberlin. There was individuality everywhere, from the intricate felt boutonnieres and table flowers hand-made by the bride to the ceremony, which had all of the guests congregated in a circle around the bride and groom, each of us coming forward to bind their hands together with a blue ribbon. As the party ended, one Obie (a theater major) plucked out her ukulele and a group gathered in the dark and began to harmonize. Maybe it was the mint juleps, but I felt, in that moment, like I was back on Tappan Square, hangin’ with my tribe.

PS I was not the wedding photographer, these were all taken for fun and under the influence of bourbon
PPS I am totally excited to see the wedding photographer's work. Jesse Anders was super fun and funny and you should check out his work.

mountain top

This sweet, sweet family just moved full time to Garrison (yay!) and I got to photograph them in their amazing home. Seriously, how beautiful is that kitchen? The home overlooks the mountains and the light was so pure and clean. It was freeeeezing outside, the wind was intense, but the warmth inside was incredible. I especially love the photo of mom and dad together. So beautiful. This is a photo-heavy post, and I'm not even covering it all! Thanks so much guys, for such a great afternoon!

thank you notes

I am so tickled by this thank you note I designed for my daughter that I had to share the idea with you. She had so much fun filling in the blanks and I loved sending something off to her friends that captured the essence of the party. (Plus, they're less likely to throw out something so darn cute, don'tcha think?)

maple syrup

My kids love maple syrup. They love it with the kind of passion that degrades into whines when they don't get enough. So we had a great time at the annual Maple Syrup Day a couple weekends ago at Little Stony Point, one of my favorite Cold Spring spots. And, this being a small town, we ran into nearly everyone of our friends plus our village mayor, who played the bagpipes for us. We watched sap dripping out of the tree and then watched while it boiled down into syrup. We capped off the day with a mini hike along the Hudson River. An amazing day. Great thanks to all the volunteers for the delicious pancakes and lively music!







My daughter and her best bud were watching for trains and ended up looking like teenagers in an American Eagle ad. Kind of scary.

in honor of spring snow

It's the 4th day of Spring, my daughter reminded me this morning. We were driving to school in a snow storm. Since the snow is sticking around, I figured I'd post some wintry images today. When we shot these headsots (of my lovely friend and actress Alexa Wolkoff), the makeup artist was wearing a snow bib and the snow went up to the top of my boots. Alexa managed about 5 minutes outside before she insisted on heading back in, but I think those 5 minutes were worth it! And the lovely Hilary and Bob at Cold Spring's Hudson Hil's Cafe were kind enough to let us shoot in their restaurant on their day off, so we had a great place to warm up.

dreaming of ireland

I have a thing for Ireland, even though I've only been there once. The landscape, the accent, and the music (I go goo-goo over an Irish fiddle) makes me feel nostalgic for some simpler way of life that probably doesn't actually exist in Ireland. But we have it here! When I drove up the long, winding dirt road leading to this family's home, I felt like I was in another country. And since these kiddos are half Irish, I was excited to make Cold Spring—with its rolling hills and grazing sheep—look like the old country. The gorgeous knit fisherman's sweater helped! It was cold and windy out, but we loaded up on hot chocolate and managed to have a lot of fun. Baby A couldn't really handle the bitter temperatures (I mean, who's kidding, neither could I!) so we brought her inside for her own little mini-studio shoot, where she was determined to crawl....even if it was backwards.

newsies and news

I knew I was going to have a blast with this family when they welcomed me with hugs. I swear I've never photographed a warmer family and I secretly want them to adopt me. Maybe I can be an auntie? Pretty Please? We had a great time going through old vintage suitcases carrying scary porcelain dolls and old cameras and playing dress-up in vintage fur coats and newsboy caps. When mom mentioned The Newsies (Christian Bale at his Disney best) I new this shoot was going to be amazing. Seriously, I was meant to photograph the pre-teen set! We braved the bitter cold, the kids and their dog skating over 2-inch thick ice that covered feet of snow below it, and I just love the results! What do you think? Don't the outdoor photos almost make you want another fresh dump of snow?

But wait, there's more!! I want all of you to head over to my new website (carolinekayephotography.com) and let me know what you think. It's the reason my blog posts have been conspicuously absent over the past couple months. Every spare moment went into that baby. I'm really happy with the results and hope you enjoy looking through the galleries. I've got a bunch of other announcements, but I'll leave those to another day.