I had THEE BEST engagement session EVER this week! Now, I am not saying that my other engagement sessions were not good or anything, but this one rocked! (Sorry to those of you who I didn’t say this about your engagement session….) Shellly and Andy were so much fun. They didn’t want any traditional pictures at all. (I did take a few… I felt like I had to, like it was a photography law or something.) Any way, we went to Holland State park and had a riot. They were so much fun, and the lighting was just perfect. I was afraid with it cloudy, there wouldn’t be a good sunset, but it was perfect! I made them stay to the bitter end… For the sunset. (I got to try out my silhouette pictures again!) They were great sports, doing everything I asked with a smile! Thank you Shelly and Andy for letting me play! This truly was a dream session!

I had privilage of photographing this little sweetie for her 9 month pictures. We had a wonderful time with her mom and Grandma! She was full of smiles!

What is it about kids chasing birds, especially seagulls? Everytime we go to the beach, my kids want to chase the seagulls and make them fly away. Well this week I did a session at the beach. Nolan and Claire were no exception to the kids chasing birds rule! Towards the end of the session, I let them chase the birds. We tried to get a great picture with all the seagulls flying away, but they weren’t too scared. They just kind of fluttered a little further down the beach, and didn’t really fly away. I think they were a little used to people. Anyway, it still made for a fun picture.

Ok, I feel like a huge dufus!
I keep checking my blog to see if anyone posts a comment. I thought no one was posting any comments. So, my mom said she posted one the other day. Someone else told me they did too. So, I decided to check. Still not comments… I thought these people must not know what they are doing…. But, it was me who didn’t know what I was doing!

Well, I just figured out that when someone posts a comment, it goes into a waiting box until I approve it for posting! So, all this time I thought I had no comments, but they were waiting for me somewhere else!

So, if you posted before, sorry I didn’t answer you. Now I know how to get them, and you can still post comments if you’d like!

Thanks!

WOW!!! That is all I have to say about Scott and Lauries wedding yesterday! Ok, maybe not all I have to say, but that is the first thing that comes to mind! I want to say thank you to Scott and Laurie and their families for letting me have such a fun weekend. I love photography, and especially when it is something different and exciting. Well this wedding was different and exciting! They were married at Crystal Mountain, on TOP of the mountain! I had never been to Crystal Mountain in the summer before, and it was beautiful. It was an absolutely beautiful weekend. I don’t think that you could have planned it any better!

We had a lot of fun with the huge wedding party (good think I brought my wide angle lens!) Here are a few images from their special day!

We had a wonderful time at the wedding of Sarah and Cody this weekend. The lighting outside was INCREDIBLE for the bride and groom pictures and the wedding party pictures! We couldn’t stop taking pictures it was so beautiful, and Cody and Sarah were such a beautiful couple! Unfortunately, it was supposed to be an outdoor wedding, but it started raining before the ceremony! Sarah was crushed! The Pinnacle did a very nice job getting the inside ready for the ceremony, and it was still beautiful. A little rain was not going to spoil this special day. Here are some favorites from this beautiful wedding!

Congratulations Cody and Sarah!

I WON A CONTEST! I usually never win anything. But here is the story…. I use a Fuji professional lab it town, Allied Photo Lab. Well, Fuji has a contest going on right now. If you have your stuff printed at a Fuji lab, they give you a code # to enter on a website to see if you win. Well, I won a digital camera this afternoon! I was SOOOOO EXCITED!!!! I read on the website how it worked, and this is what I found out.

The actual number that I typed in, has nothing to do with the prize, it is just an access code to play the game. There are computer generated times, that are winning times. Then, if you are the first one to enter a code after that time, you win! There are 5 grand prize winners, which is a trip to Mexico. There are 25 first place winners of a Fuji digital camera (which I won) and 10,000 third place winners of free prints from the lab.

Well, they are supposed to ship me the camera in 2-4 weeks! I cant wait! How FUN!

It is a lot of work to get ready for a wedding, physically and mentally. I have a wedding tomorrow. I have spent the last 2 hours getting ready.

You are probably wondering how it takes 2 hours to put your camera in the car! Well, actually, I started getting ready yesterday. I use a TON of rechargable batteries for a wedding, so I start charging them all 2 days before the wedding. I even had a bad wedding nightmare last night. I dreamed that the wedding happened so fast, that I wasn’t ready. I was trying to put batteries and a memory card in my camera, and all the sudden the wedding was done. Then it was time for the reception, and I couldn’t find my flash attachment. Come to find out, it was in the kitchen, and they put it in the dishwasher. (It looks like a piece of tupperware.) So, after I found that, and I tried to get it to stay put on my flash (it melted in the dishwasher) the reception was done. I looked at what pictures I took, and I realized that I only took 12 pictures the whole wedding! I’m SO glad it was just a dream.

Back to getting ready… I started out by packing up my studio lights. They were set up in my studio area, for some pictures I did this week. So, I had to pack them up and get them ready to go. Then I brought them up stairs and started a pile. I packed my lights, extension cord bag, camera bag, stools, light stands, umbrellas, tripod, and reception flash kit. Then I had to get my camera’s ready. I put on the right lenses, counted and cleared off my memory cards, put fresh batteries in my cameras and flashes, put my flash on one camera, and double check everything. I have a check list to make sure I didn’t forget anything. Then I printed out cards to hand out at the reception, I think I am ready!

Tomorrow I have to pack the car, double check everything again, pack my lunch, get my directions printed, and mentally prepare for a big day.

Now, hopefully I wont have any more wedding nightmares tonight!

Well, I had a weekend off this weekend. So, what do I do? I take pictures of my kids! I figured I better get their yearly pictures done. Angela loves weeping willow trees, so we decided to stop on the side of the road and take some pictures by the weeping willow trees. You can hardly see them, but they are back there!

Then we headed to the beach at Holland State Park. We were fighting for time with the light. There were some clouds on the horizon, so the sunset was pretty dark. We were hurrying to get in all the pictures before it was too dark! I let the girls pick out where they wanted their pictures, and these were their favorites.

We also did some indoor images too!

Poor Max didn’t get his picture taken. I have an idea for him, and I need to go shopping before I do his picture. So, I’ll have to do that sometime when the girls are at school!

This was the last week before school starts. I was busy doing senior portraits this week, and now I am busy editing them! I thought I show some of the seniors I did this week! I hope you guys had a good last week of no school! I just noticed they were all girls! We’ll call this the girls week!