This last Monday night, 25 photographers from all over the Seattle area got together for dinner at the yummy Bizzarro Italien Cafe in Wallingford. My best friend from college, Jamie Irene, is one of the owners of this great place. She and Jack bought it almost a year ago (and they also own all the Caffe Ladros in town which is the best place for a vanilla latte! And she has her own line of custom purses and hats which is phenomenal, I seriously could go on and on about her! :)).

Me, Jamie and Shelly

David Jay and Shelly Garcia were up from Southern CA, and they were so great to make time in their crazy schedule for a bunch of us in Seattle. DJ is an amazing guy in how much he gives to the photography community and also his incredible talent. He is ranked as one of the top 15 photojournalists in the world by WPJA. Shelly is co-founder of an amazing album design boutique type company. I can’t wait to send her some of our albums and see what magic she does!

David Jay, the beautiful Jennifer and her goofy, husband Brian Hartman of Photo Elan (a great husband/wife team who have done work for great publications like Elle Magazine.)

As I looked around the restaurant that night, I was so happy inside. We (Brian, myself and Jeff LaPlante) started the PUG groups in Seattle and Tacoma almost six months ago. Before these groups Brian and I didn’t really know many other photographers, and now I feel like we’ve been friends for years. It was so great to see every one having a good time, catching up, sharing helpful tips and just laughing.

The funniest part of all is when we tried to do a “big group photo.” You’d think that with how many group photos we all take at weddings, we’d be able to pull this off. Not even close! No one wanted to be in the front or be in it at all. 🙂 It probably took six shots before we were paying attention and doing the right thing. 🙂 See below!

One of our first six tries…

Another try…probably shot number 10. 🙂

And I’m still on the end laughing and not paying attention. 🙂