Christmas Day

I can only end my countdown with my favourite shot of my kids this year soon to be adorning our living room wall.

So I wish you all a very Happy Christmas day and year ahead.

Christmas Eve

Well it's Christmas Eve and the kids are already asking to go to bed, the sacks are under the tree and a carrot and a glass of sherry await.

I thought I would choose as festive a wedding shot as I could find for today's entry and that's no easy task but I was fortunate enough to remember this one. It is still a talking point as to how this outfit found it's way into the wardrobe at an October wedding but it helped keep this little bridesmaid warm as the bride got ready in the morning.

2 days - Moggarthur Cup

Way back in 2000 when Katie and myself got married I set up a golf competition between my new Father-in-law and his family and friends and all of my family and friends. It's run like the Ryder Cup with five teams of pairs playing matchplay with the most points for the team winning the trophy.

For the last five years I've had to suffer losing this tournament and deal with the jibes of Father-in-law and Brother-in-law amongst others. But not this year, my team actually won it! The only problem is that I wasn't actually playing as I was injured, so now I have to deal with the constant reminder of being told I'd better drop myself from next years team etc. Anyway, I've consoled myself with winning as non playing captain and am looking forward to the tenth running of this event which we are hoping is going to be a two round overnight stay on a great hotel course. Could be messy but as always it's sure to be fun.

3 days - First Dances

This year had so many brilliant first dances, it was virtually impossible to choose just one to highlight here. I had a bride and groom do the Uma Thurman and John Travolta Pulp Fiction dance which went down to a rapturous audience and I even had an entire wedding party interupt the first dance in a zombie like fashion and proceed to dance Michael Jackson's Thriller routine, amazing stuff. But one of my favourites had to be from Gemma and James wedding reception that was held on a fantastically hot day in a marquee in their parents back garden. As the couple made their way to start the dancing no-one expected the party would start with such a thumping dance song. All hell broke lose and the bride and groom just went nuts. The song has been on my youtube playlist ever since. It's not Christmassy or even weddingy (if thats a word) but it sure gets people dancing.

4 days - AGWPJA

Two important milestones were reached for me this year. One was that I was accepted into the Artistic Guild of the Wedding Photojournalist Association, the quality of the work produced by the members of this association is simply amazing and to now be a part of it still blows me away. If you want to see some truly beautiful wedding imagery from wedding photographers across the world then I thoroughly recommend going to check out their site. AGWPJA

The second part was that as a member you are open to enter their competitions and put your own work in comparison to all the members from across the globe. So to then win an award in one of the categories was the icing on the cake. I'm looking forward to entering more of my images in the next set of competitions and to being continually inspired by my contemporaries.

5 days - Christmas Greetings

We tried to avoid the classic photographers card of the family group shot as our greeting this year and instead had some fun building our message from what we'd spent all year tripping over. Happy Christmas from us all.