Business: New Things

As we officially head into fall with the long holiday weekend, I'm in the midst of doing all things business related. Last night I got a fabulous head start on the weekend when I returned home to find a BIG package waiting on my porch. I thought it contained the easels I bought for an upcoming bridal show, so I left it outside to let my BIG husband bring it in. Yep, I played the "you're so strong I wanted you to do it" card. When he got it in, I realized that wait, there was no way three easels could fit in there; it was my canvas! I ordered a large canvas print (beautiful but not heavy at all, I might add) to showcase at the show. It is amazing! I took some pictures but haven't uploaded them to my computer yet, so I'll post them later. By the way, if you're a local bride wanting to check out wedding vendors, let me know and I'll get the show details to you~there are two coming up soon.


I've added something exciting to my Print CD! When you purchase the CD, you'll also receive a Video DVD. I love the software I'm using because each video is completely unique. Even the songs to choose from are only available for one day (I went looking for a song I heard yesterday, but it's gone!), plus I can upload my own music to create a better fit with the video. Check out this one of Andrew, my latest little guy. Make sure the sound is on!

What do you think?

I hope you have a great long weekend. I'll be relaxing a bit, doing some brainstorming, and helping my friend Jessica celebrate her birthday. Next weekend I'm heading to Richmond for a one-day seminar...I'm so pumped about this! More blogs to come...

Andrew: Newborn

Don't let the wild hair and boyish good looks fool you...this little guy was an angel for me at our session yesterday. Little Andrew is about six weeks old and was last featured on my blog (sort of ) when his mom Jessica had a maternity session. I've really grown to like Jessica and Aaron...they make such a cute couple and are open to just about anything.

So of course I had fun with Andrew~we managed to get a whole range of portraits, from happy to hungry, wide-awake to sleeping hard.

Here are a few that stood out to me at first glance~

If only I did captions...

Jessica will have to wait to see her portrait with Andrew, but I couldn't resist this one. Aaron was so excited to be having a little boy. He got a big one!

This is one you'll be seeing on my website soon! It definitely goes on my all-time favorites list.

Vacation: Finally!

No, I'm not going anywhere...I finally have photos from our trip out west last month and even a few from London and Paris in May. It's been a busy few months! My husband I are incredibly blessed to be able to travel as much as we do.

Here's a recap~we began the trip by driving 27 hours to Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota. From there it was on to Montana, where we checked out a couple of towns before heading up to Glacier National Park. We did some backcountry backpacking, visited the neigboring Canadian park, and saw some amazing scenery.

We had just driven through the night, finally glad to be stopping for a night. I think this was after we had a nice dip in the pool:)

Yes, this is snow, and yes, we are wearing shorts and sandals! It was so warm, but the snow stays most of the summer. The problem came when I tried to walk uphill, in mushy snow, in sandals, with my camera.

These were growing right next to the snow. You can see the white in the background. It was a beautiful contrast.

This mountain goat was strutting his stuff when all the cameras came out!

The next two are in Waterton International Peace Park, bording Glacier on the Canadian side.

Somewhere in Montana...not exactly sure where.

So as we were leaving Bozeman to go to Yellowstone, we ran into a HUGE hailstorm. We made it to the park and another hailstorm hit us. I haven't seen hail in years and the ground was covered in white like it had just snowed, so I knew I had to document it. I made Bert pull over so I could grab a few stones.

After the storm...there was actually two rainbows parallel to each other!

The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone

Old Faithful

It's hard to describe these pools if you haven't seen them, and even harder to fully capture their depth and greatness with a single photograph. Yellowstone is home to many of these multi-colored pools, of all different varieties.

Another geyser...smaller.

Yellowstone Lake...I got this shot with my fun new wide angle lens.

After Yellowstone, we made our way just a little bit south to Grand Teton National Park. Bert and I have just about this same picture hanging in our bedroom from our trip two years ago, but I had deleted the file. Had to get another one!

If you read my post before I left, you know how much I love the buffalo. They put on a show for us this time...we had a couple of them trying to rough each other up a bit. And there were baby buffalo!

Just to give you a little perspective.


Last buffalo, I promise.
Right before we headed out to come home. I may have been smiling, but Bert and I were sad to leave. We absolutely love it out there. I didn't post any pictures, but the well-known Jackson Hole borders the Tetons. It's such a cute town~if you ever get the chance, GO! ::BONUS::
Big Ben~London

Eiffel Tower~Paris
Notre Dame~Paris

That's it folks!

Sprouse: Summer Fun

I'm officially back in the swing of things! My first session back was the Sprouse family, and we had so much fun. We had access to beautiful property and a lot of great photo options, including a pond with some cool lilly pads on it.

Mom and Dad, stealing a few minutes away for some shots on their own.
Okay, let me prepare you...the three kids are gorgeous! I like how the next pictures look in color, but thought a series in black and white would be nice, bringing them all together.

The baby...this girl has some energy! This is her "I don't believe that Dora the Explorer is in that camera" face. Anything to get the shot!

The (young) man in the middle...I think we were planning on how he would make his sister smile when it was her turn. He was cracking himself up! The beauty...quiet and easy-going, I think she's going to be a knock-out when she gets older. I could have worked with her all day!

That's it for now, but keep checking back. I've got a busy fall ahead of me, plus I still owe you vacation pics!

Mathis: Family time

Parts of the Mathis family had traveled here from out-of-town, so they wanted to get some nice group shots, as well as updated portraits of baby Evan, who I met in January. Take a look...

This one just makes me laugh. It was almost as if he remembered me from his newborn session and was saying "Seriously? Let me ride my wagon in peace."
Don't you want to eat him up? I'm not sure if it's those cheeks or big blue eyes, but he is adorable.

Home at Last

17 days, 13 states, 6,628 miles, 3 fighting buffalo, and 50+ mosquito bites later, I'm finally home. We arrived home Thursday morning after driving through the night and it has been very nice to get back to a bed! I've been busy catching up on emails and editing, but a couple of things have hit me in the last couple of days.

I went to the doctor yesterday and was diagnosed with strep throat. Soooo not fun! Though I'm feeling much better, I'm still hanging low. On top of that (and probably more stressful for me), I will be without my laptop for another two weeks or so. It was sent away while I was gone to simply have the power jack repaired, now it's not booting up and after getting the run-around from Best Buy all weekend because it was "tax-free weekend", they are sending it out again. Needless to say, they are not on my good list right now. I'm trying to set things up on my husband's laptop so I can get some work done, and thankfully I have most of my files backed up on an external hard drive here at home. For those of you who need your computer often, you know how frustrating this is!

There will be pictures to come!