Tag Archives: kevmaydude

Laissez les bons temps rouler

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Monday morning greetings from New Orleans to one and all!!!

It’s always great to get out of town for a few days and to have more then a few days means a much longer road trip!! Being from the Midwest and going to the gulf coast from New Orleans over to the panhandle of Florida has been a family tradition for my family for many years! We spent many a Easter vacation in Biloxi, Mississippi when I was a kid and came to love this part of the country! Here we are all those many years later and we are still drawn to the Gulf Coast!!!! Lots of great food and drinks and that famous Southern hospitality, it’s always a can’t miss time!!!!!

One of my favorite places in New Orleans is Pat O’Briens! If you’ve been there, you know all about Pat O’s!!!! If you haven’t been Pat O’Briens, you need to add it to your list of places and things to do! There’s something special from sitting outside on the courtyard patio to being inside in the dueling piano bar! Their motto is “Have Fun” and I can’t think of a better place to do that!

Here’s one of my snaps of the world famous Pat O’Brien Hurricanes!!!! What a drink!!!!

As they say down here in NOLA, “Laissez les bons temps rouler” and for those of us that don’t speak French, “Let the good times roll”!!! That’s a metaphor for life!!!!!

Have a great week as always and thanks for checking out my work!!!!

Kev

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kmcpob3nov13

Bringing in the crops!!!

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Monday morning Peoria greetings to one and all,

Well it’s that time of year when the farmers are out in full force here in the Midwest getting their crops in! If you’ve traveled at all in farm country, you’ve seen the combines out working in the fields. The weather here in the Peoria area has been perfect for harvesting and we haven’t had much rain so the farmers have been working day and night! They have to take advantage of the good weather because they’d like to get their crops in before the weather turns and the rain will keep them out of the fields!

Here’s one of my snaps of a glorious day of sun and dry weather for our farmers! The numbers should be good and the grain bins will be full!!!!!

It’s time to get to work, so I hope that you’re going to have a great week ahead!!!!

Kev

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kmc1lg20oct13

200,000 hits and SRV!!!

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Monday morning Peoria greetings to one and all!!!!

I’ve had my photos on a website called Flickr since March of 2006 and it’s been a great place for me to share my images! I shared a post back in December of 2011 about how my 2400 photos had passed the 100,000 view mark. It took me five and a half years for me to reach 100,000 views. Now here we are less then two years later and my 3339 photos have passed the 200,000 view mark. It’s amazing to me and it also shows me just how much we as a society are migrating to the web for everything that we do! One of the things that I like is that people can go to my Flickr site and see a wide variety of photography that I enjoy shooting! Here’s a link for the 14 different sets of photos that I have on Flickr, so just pick a subject and enjoy some of my work! http://www.flickr.com/photos/kevinmay/sets

Back in July I was down in Texas for a shoot and I was able to spend a day in Austin before I flew home. In Austin down at their riverfront, they’ve got a statue for their hometown boy, blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughn. I was able to get out and get a few shots of SRV’s statue at night with downtown Austin in the background. I’ve also paired that photo with one that I shot of SRV here in Peoria almost 30 years ago!!! Yes, I have been around for awhile!!! 🙂

Here’s my photos of Stevie Ray Vaughn back in 1984 and today in Austin, Tx.

I hope that you’re going to have a great week and thanks as always for checking out my work!!!!!!

Kev

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kmc2srv15sept13

Tee it up!!!!!!!!

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Labor Day Monday morning St. Louis greetings to one and all!!!!!!

For all my friends here in the USA, I hope that you’re having a wonderful Labor Day weekend!!!!

This past Monday I was out shooting photos for the 2013 “Tee it up for the troops” charity event in Peoria. This was the fifth year that the event has been in Peoria and in those five years, the Peoria area has raised over one million dollars for this great charity!!! We have so many great charities here in Central Illinois and it always amazes me just how generous this area is to all of these organizations! For a smaller town like Peoria, we do pretty darn good!

For those that haven’t been to this event, it’s now held at two local golf courses, the Country Club of Peoria and also Mt. Hawley Country Club. At both courses in the morning they have about 240 veterans at each course that play golf and then have a great lunch and dinner as well (no charge for any of that for the Veterans)! In the afternoon, all the golfers are paying to play and help support the charity. At lunch time at both courses they have ceremonies that honor the veterans and also the active duty military that have and do keep us safe and free! As everyone is playing golf, there is lot of fun and laughs (and a occasional swear word for a bad shot), but when the ceremony is happening and then the trumpeter plays Taps, you realize why we are all there and what the event is all about!!!!

Here’s a couple of my snaps from this years Tee it up event!!!!

Thanks as always for checking out my work and I hope that the rest of your Labor Day weekend is a safe and fun one!!!!!

Kev

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kmctt2Sept13

Women of Faith

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Monday morning Peoria greetings to one and all,

I’ve been working with the Peoria Civic Center this past month documenting some of the events going on and also working on new fresh photos for them to use in their marketing materials. This past weekend the PCC hosted the “Women of Faith” conference in the arena. There were thousands of women there listening to a wide variety of spiritual messengers and it was pretty neat to see! When I first walked into the arena I thought I had walked into a full blown rock and roll concert. An amazing set up with incredible lights, sound system and video projection! First rate to say the least and a very well thought out and produced show!!!!

Here’s a few of snaps from the Peoria stop of the “Women of Faith” 2013 tour.

I hope that you’re going to have a wonderful week and thanks for taking the time to check out my work!

Kev

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kmcwof18Aug13

Avery Island, Louisiana

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Winter storm Peoria greetings to one and all!!!!

Here it is the end of March and we get another winter storm rolling though P-Town once again!!!! We had better weather in February then we’ve had in March and if I didn’t know better, I’d think the two months have switched places!!!

You’ve probably never heard of Avery Island, but I know that you’ve heard of a very famous product from Avery Island, Tabasco Pepper Sauce! Down in Southern Louisiana is the home of Tabasco at Avery Island. It’s one of those places that you have to make an effort to see becuase it’s not on the road to anywhere! Besides visiting the Tabasco plant for a visit, you can also visit Jungle Gardens which is right next door!

Jungle Gardens is a 170 acre nature park that contains a botanical gardens and also a bird sanctuary. I was there last month and it was just a little bit early for spring to really start blooming, but the Azaleas were all ready rocking and there were about 300 cranes nesting in the sanctuary. As well, there is also a 600 year old Chinese Buddha in the gardens!

If you’re ever down in New Orleans and looking for a nice day trip, Avery Island is a couple of hours down the road and well worth a visit to see the Tabasco factory and Jungle Gardens!!!

Here’s a few of my snaps from my day at Jungle Gardens!

I hope that you have a great week to come and thanks for taking the time to check out my work!!!

Kev

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kmcai25mar13

Two years in the making!!!

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Monday morning Peoria greetings to one and all,

I was just able to finish up a gig that we have been trying to shoot for the last two years. The Peoria Park District wanted to do a shoot showing some of the different zoo animals out in the snow to help promote visiting the Peoria Zoo in the winter time. For this shoot, we needed to have at least a couple of inches of snow to make the shots look good and last winter we never really had enough snow to do the shoot. This winter rolls around and we’re waiting for a good snow and nothing of any amount for the first three months of winter. We had come up to the end of February and still really didn’t have any good snow and we were starting to think that we were going to strike out again this year and would have to wait until next year. All at once last week we got a lot of snow and were able to get the shots that we needed!!!!

Here’s a few of my snaps from a day at the Peoria Zoo!

I’ve also got a Facebook cover shot of Lizzy the Lion as well for those that would like to use it! http://kevinmay.com/kmczoofb.jpg

I hope that you have a great week to come and thanks as always for checking out my work!!!

Kev

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kmcpz10mar13

Finding hidden treasures at home!!!

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Monday morning Peoria greetings to one and all!

Sometimes in life we miss things that are right in our backyard. It doesn’t matter what city you’re in, you just don’t always know what little treasures are out there. I found one of those gems down in Manito, Ill. last week at Sand Ridge State Forest. It’s a place that I had seen on the map, but there wasn’t a lot of information out there on it so I never made a visit. Last week I thought what the heck and went out and I was very pleasantly surprised by what I found. Sand Ridge is 7,200 acres and probably has about 70 miles of hiking trails! I picked the “Orange” trail and it’s a five mile hike. I didn’t see one person all day, so I had the place to myself. It was great in February and I can only imagine how great it will be in October when the leaves are turning on the trees!!! I will be back!!!!

Here’s a few of my snaps from an afternoon spent at Sand Ridge State Forest.

Thanks as always for taking the time to check out my work and I hope that you have a great week to come!!!!

Kev

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kmcsr17feb13

Arches National Park Time Lapse

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Monday morning Peoria greetings to all of my friends around the globe!!!!

If you’ve known me for any amount of time, you know that my favorite national park is Arches in Moab, Utah. I guess that for someone from the Midwest to see those red rocks and the formations is nothing like we have here with our flat landscape and cornfields! There is just something about that area of the country that calls me to come back again and again and explore all the different areas of the park!!!!

I was able to put together a nice time lapse from the park at three different areas within Arches; Devils Garden, Delicate Arch and the La Sal Mountains.

Here’s also a link for the image on the right of some tracks going through the snow at Arches! Your guess is as good as mine as to what kind of animal makes tracks like these!

Thanks as always for checking out my work and I hope that you have a great week to come!!!!

Kev

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kmc3anp13jan13

Back in the ball game

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Monday morning greetings to one and all!!!!

Happy New Year and I have a feeling that most of us are now back to work! Wow, It sure was nice to be off durning the Christmas holiday!!!!!

I spent some time this past week at one of my favorite National Parks in the US! Arches National Park in Moab, Utah is one of our treasures here in the US and I feel like it’s my home away from home! If you’ve been there, you might know what I’m talking about. If not, make a road trip there and I guarantee you won”t be disappointed!!!!!

Here’s one of my snaps of Delicate Arch at sundown and to see the La Sal mountains as the background is wonderful!!!

Have a great week as always and thanks for checking out my work!!!!

Kev

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kmcanp5jan13