On Thursday, I covered the Take Your Child To Work Day for DaVita. This is the 3rd year I have covered the event and it is always fun to see some familiar faces and new ones as well. Our former CIO Harlan showed up with his horse Buddy.  This is a scene you don’t see everyday in the Denver West business park.

The kids got to sit on Buddy and so did some adults.

Check-in for the 40+ kids for this year’s event.

The day was filled with events such as creating your own business.

The West Metro Fire Department showed up again during lunch.

A little entertainment to end the day with a skit put on by DaVita teammates demonstrating how to create an ice cream sundae (or mess).

Finally, the day is over and everyone is heading home.

–
Mark Mortensen
Denver Colorado portrait and event photographer.
www.MarkMortensen.com

DaVita is my employer during the day and I do a lot of pro-bono photography work for their corporate events.  Yesterday, the request came in to capture pictures of teammates from the business offices that are to be displayed in the new temporary office space in downtown Denver.  DaVita has plans to build a new corporate headquarter building in downtown Denver but that isn’t scheduled to be completed for at least the next couple of years.  The current building in the Denver West area is over flowing with teammates and DaVita needs more space.

Of course it isn’t all serious at DaVita and a few of the groups wanted some funny photos.

This next image was intended to be like a train but they couldn’t stop laughing.  I work with a good bunch of folks.

–
Mark Mortensen
Lakewood Colorado portrait and event photographer.
http://www.MarkMortensen.com

The Denver West Chamber of Commerce had their annual holiday party recently.  I am currently a member of the chamber and volunteered my time to photograph some of the members with our cowboy Santa.  These events are a great way to meet other business members in the community and to see if there is a way I can help provide a service to their company. Here’s a sampling of the images captured.  You might also enjoy the video slideshow of all the images.

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Last March I was asked to start taking pictures of the teams within DaVita. At that time, I captured the images of 3 teams (one included myself) and last week I captured another 4 teams. The schedule is to take the photos of another 8 teams before the year’s end. When all the images are collected they will be printed and hung on the walls around the DaVita office in Lakewood, CO. Thanks DaVita for asking me to capture the images of our amazing teams. To see all of the teams photographed to date click on the image below.

Yesterday, I donated my time and resulting images to capture the events of the 10th Annual Inner City Health Center’s Community Kids Fair at Smith Elementary School in Denver, CO. A co-worker at DaVita was volunteering and had asked if I’d be available to help out. DaVita had also contributed a large sum of money towards the event.

DaVita had another building wide event for its employees (me being one of them). About once a month the special events committee puts together an event to bring the employees together. This time it was a picnic entitled ‘Lodge Fiesta 2008!’. Thanks again DaVita for asking me to take the pictures of the event. Enjoy the individual pictures by clicking on the image below or a slideshow of the event is available here.

Finally got around to post processing the images from the Academia Sandoval Noche Caribeña. I volunteered my time to photograph this event. In return I got a half page ad in the event’s program. Not a bad deal and hopefully I’ll see some business from the ad. Also I donated a portrait session to the silent auction to help out the school. Academia Sandoval or more properly known as Academia Ana Marie Sandoval is part of the Denver public school system. It’s a marriage of a dual language model (Spanish and English) and the Montessori model. Something that is very unique for a public school system. The full collection of images can be seen by clicking the image below. A slideshow of the images can be found here.

DaVita had yet another little gathering for their employees. This time it was called ‘Ocho de Mayo’ or ‘The 8th of May’. Why Ocho de Mayo? Well, Cinco de Mayo was suppose to be cold and rainy and the 8th looked to be a much better day. It turned out that the 8th was the cold and rainy day and the 5th was the warm and sunny day. Funny how things work out. Check out the slideshow below or the portfolio of images here.

Last evening I volunteered my time to photograph a silent / live auction event (Noche Caribeña) for Academia Sandoval. Academia Sandoval is a dual language Montessori school in the Denver Public School system. It’s very unique for a public school. The event was held at the El Jebel Shrine in Denver, CO. Click on the image below to see a preview of some of the images from the event.

I’ve finished processing the DaVita Annual Take Your Child To Work Day 2008. Over 42 kids were brought to work this year. Activities and entertainment included: a general session describing the DaVita philosophy, building tour, face painting, balloon making clown, magician, West Metro Fire Department fire engine and frozen treats. I want to thank DaVita for letting me photograph this event. View the event’s images by clicking the image below.