Project Share Farm Stand Foundation Laying - Charity Photography

Project Share is in the middle of building a new Farm Stand in Carlisle at the corner of Pitt Street and Lincoln Street. The building is home to food being passed out to recipients three weeks a month as a supplement to the warehouse distribution one week a month. Project Share feeds more than 3, 000 people a month. The new building will cost over $273,000 and donations would be greatly appreciated. Please log on to www.projectshare.net or mail a check (with "farm stand" in the memo) to Project Share, 5 North Orange Street, Suite 4, Carlisle, PA 17013. I am volunteering my photography services by going throughout the entire process from before demolition until the new building is completed for them to have the whole process in photographs.

Oct. 23, 2014

 Oct. 29, 2014

 Nov. 4, 2014

 Nov. 5, 2014

 Nov. 12, 2014

 Nov. 13, 2014

Nov. 25, 2014

Furry Friends Network - Charity Photography

I recently started volunteering my photography services with our local animal rescue, Furry Friends Network to give the animals that they have professional portraits in the hopes that they get adopted to forever homes more quickly. Please check out their link if you are interested in adopting any of these wonderful animals and any other animals that they have that I have yet to photograph so far. I learned about a professional photographer, Seth Casteel (famous for "Underwater Dogs" and "Underwater Puppies") who was on the Meredith Viera Show who started an organization called One Picture Saves a Life to help shelter animals get homes with professional photographers volunteering their services to shelters around the world. So, seeing that show helped me to move forward into contacting our local animal rescue (something I had been wanting to do for years because I have always volunteered at animal shelters through middle school, high school, college and in NYC where I would go and take the animals out of their cages and walk them, bathe them, and love on them which was always an incredible experience. Anyone can do this and I really recommend that you do it sometime in life as well as always adopt your pets from shelters. They make fabulous family members and for the adoption fee they usually come with their shots up to date, spayed and neutered, microchipped, etc. which you can't do all those things yourself for a cheaper price than the shelters get from the veterinarians that they work with). I will be continuing to post photos from time to time of the animals I photograph for Furry Friends and here are the first set of photos of 11 animals - cats, kittens and a dog (there are 2 photos of each animal with the name of each animal above the first photo). I have just loved taking my love of animals (in my home we always had multiple cats and dogs at any given time and my husband and I had a pug and pit bull until just recently when our pit bull passed away at age 13) and my love of photography and doing some good with both of them!

Beatrice - Coonhound

Andrew - cat

Elizabeth - cat

 Frank - kitten

 Hanna - cat

 Joey - kitten

 Lainey - kitten

 Libby - cat

 Maxine - kitten

Winnie - kitten

 Kari - cat

PurpleStride Philadelphia - Charity Photography

On Saturday, November 1, 2014, I volunteered and photographed PurpleStride Philadelphia for the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network. It was the 5th function that I had photographed for the organization (as my free gift). I have also photographed functions in Washington, D.C. and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and this walk/run twice now in Philadelphia. I donate my time and photography (and do it with pride) in honor of my late father, Dr. Samuel Heard, who was an emergency room physician who passed away from pancreatic cancer in January 2006. November is Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month so please wear purple in honor of this cause and spread the word about this horrible disease. PurpleStride is one of the largest pancreatic cancer fundraisers in the country and it raised almost $700,000 that day for the cause. It took place in Philadelphia's Fairmont Park at the Please Touch Museum. Mother Nature wasn't very kind to us that day giving us horizontal rain the whole time I was there and it was around 40 degrees with 30 mph winds. The pictures were very hard to take with me having to put my camera gear in a plastic bag and I was unable to look through the eye piece or manually focus like I normally do or look through the viewfinder screen to see how the pictures were turning out. These are the best ones from the day after a LOT of retouching trying to get rid of a lot of the rain drops from off the pictures from so much water on my camera lens. Many of the photos look like they are foggy or glowing due to all the condensation in my camera. So I apologize. These photos are not up to par with my usual quality of work but I wanted to share them with you for the meaning behind the event. There were still almost 5,000 people that came out and stayed out in the horrible weather because they have lost a loved one to this horrible disease. There is a photo of survivors and sadly that is all the survivors that were in attendance because most people don't survive this disease. In fact most are gone within less than 1 year from being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and 99 percent are gone within 5 years of being diagnosed. So, those of us who are left behind are left to carry on the memory of our lost loved ones and to do all the fundraising we can to bring awareness to one of the deadliest forms of cancer in our country.

The t-shirts worn by the runners and walkers.

 There are contests for people's outfits 

with the most purple spirit.

 Volunteers checking in people at the registration table.

 The survivor's tent with gifts

 People standing in the rain as the opening ceremonies

begin to take place.

The survivor's photo. 15 people out of 5,000 who have 

survived pancreatic cancer. Such a daunting statistic.

 The master of ceremonies - a local news anchor - who

also lost her father to pancreatic cancer.

 A woman giving her story of battling pancreatic cancer.

 Raising the banners - "Know It! Fight It! End It!"

 Runners/walkers at the starting line.

 People watching the race begin in front of 

the Please Touch Museum.

 I loved this runner's creative usage of the color purple.

The purple Teletubby!

 The next few photos are of different teams for the race.

A large team in front of the Please Touch Museum.

 Here is a photo of me at the event - volunteers wear 

white t-shirts while the participants wear purple t-shirts.

I was soaked through all 4 layers of clothing I had on after

being in the cold, pouring down rain for a few hours.

I also had an assistant who carried my camera equipment 

in water-proof bags for me to help out for the event.