Best of 2009 Contest

This past year has been amazing and unbelievable because of all of you! I have been honored that so many of you have chosen to invite me into your lives, not only as your photographer but as your friend too. I wanted to pay homage to this year by selecting the best images from all of 2009. It was difficult to say the least to narrow it down this far.

And because I know you will be able to decide way better than me, I want you to choose the The Best Image of 2009! The winner will receive a 10x10 Canvas Gallery Wrap (a $175 value) of the image that wins or an image of their choice from that session! To vote, leave a comment on THIS post, and the image with the most comments wins! Contest ends SUNDAY NIGHT AT MIDNIGHT! Only ONE comment per person choosing up to 3 different images. You are welcome to ask anyone you want to vote for you! Good Luck!

#1 - Elizabeth

#2 - Elizabeth

#3 - Lindsi + Justin

#4 - Lindsi + Justin

#5 - Anna + Mike

#6 - Anna + Mike

#7 - Anna + Mike

#8 - Brody

#9 - Brody


#10 - Jake

#11 - Gilsdorfs

#12 - Gilsdorfs

#13 - Maggie

#14 - Caleb + Natalie

#15 - Grady

#16 - Sayward + Blake

#17 - Sayward + Blake

#18 - Sayward + Blake

#19 - Elizabeth + Justin

#20 - Elizabeth + Justin

#21 - Elizabeth + Justin

Happy Holidays!

With the holidays just around the corner, I wanted to send my love to all of you. I hope this holiday season is filled with warmth, love, and laughter surrounded by your family and friends.

Each year of Trevor and I's marriage, I have taken great pride in our holiday card. At first, it was just because I was so excited to have our own card to send out. Now, it is more because each year it becomes a representation of where we were with life and our family that year. I love looking back at each card to remember what those moments felt like, giving thought to how far we have come from that time and where we are headed. This year, it only felt appropriate to include our new home somehow, and of course, Willie. As crazy as I sound, he is our baby right now, and he makes our family feel more complete than ever.





I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season! I will be taking a little time off from the blog. See you all soon!

Maggie + Brandon | Sneak Peek

When I woke up to a snow covered morning on Saturday my first thought was, "Oh no!". I felt that this was going to change everything we had planned for portraits on Maggie and Brandon's wedding day. But this just shows how wrong I was, and sometimes the unexpected in life is way better than what we have planned. It was absolutely perfect, but perfect does not even come close to doing it justice. Every single detail that they put so much thought into for their special day called for snow.

Snow has never looked more beautiful to me in all of my life. It sparkled surrounded by family, love, and laughter. I felt like I was in a dream world the entire day! Thank you so much to Maggie and Brandon and their wonderful families. Here is a small taste of what is to come. There will be so many more!

A Christmas Gift for Myself

For years I have wanted my very own copy of the book "Family Pictures" photographs by Nicholas Nixon. Walking through the aisles at the Otterbein College Library, I found many wonderful art books to be inspired by, but this book changed my life. And any book that makes an impact on me, opens my mind, or changes the way I think about something in life needs to be on my book shelf. I love to see these books on a daily basis to remember the way I felt, the time in life when I read it, the way the pages felt, and how they changed me. How I became a different person because of the words on each page.

Nicholas Nixon's "Family Pictures" is one of these life changing books. This book found me while I was in my Sophomore year of college. We were assigned a photography project called "In the style of". We had to choose a photographer and complete a series of photographs that were in the style of that photographer's work. I don't think I had ever really known who Nicholas Nixon was until I started roaming the art section in the library for this project. I found this book, this tiny little paperback book. It was not like most art books that are large and extremely heavy. The images attracted me because they were different, natural. Nixon did a series on his family at home, his wife and two children. It was filled with photographs of simple, everyday moments. Moments that were not anything particularly special, just moments in the life.

That weekend I went home to photograph my family, specifically my four little brothers. Nothing happened the way I wanted it to happen. My brothers didn't want their picture taken, then they didn't want to stand next to each other, and then a few cried. I was upset, but I just kept capturing the moment. When I returned to school and got in the darkroom, I never wanted to leave. I spent hour upon extra hour making print after print. I had found my direction. I always knew I wanted to focus on photographing people, but this book showed me how I wanted to photograph people.

I have hinted to Trevor for years that this book would be a very special gift. Finally I decided that I was not going to wait any longer. I bought it for an early Christmas gift to myself. And I love looking at it everyday. It gives me inspiration, and when the craziness of my business takes over, it reminds me what I truly love about photography. I love capturing people's lives, the real moments.

Here is some of the work that developed throughout the final 3 years of my college career all stemming from the single project based on this book. I apologize for the quality of these images. They are all from slides.

I Am My Business, My Business is Me

I love to write. When I have something really weighing on my mind, I journal, because I never want to forget where I have been - happy or sad. I was encouraged in college by one of my professors to take a writing class because I enjoyed integrating writing into my art so much. It was a creative writing class, where there are no rules, and I loved it!

Blogging is another outlet for my love of writing, but I feel like I have been holding back. And the thing is I never hold back with anything, what you see is what you get. I talk about my images, my clients, my business announcements, but I rarely have talked about me and my life. And really, I cannot define where I begin and my business ends. The line is completely blurred. I am my business and my business is me.

So, with that being said, I am going to start saying more. Saying more without holding a whole lot back. It is not going to be easy. My stomach is in knots just saying it because when you put yourself out there like this, it is easy for others to judge you. But I want you to know me because when you schedule a session, me is exactly what you are going to get. I want my blog to be a journal of my life, loves, art, photography, and my business. Maybe not exactly like my seventh grade journal, but just as personal without so many juicy details.

And because a post is nothing without a picture, here is a couple of personal images from October. Trevor and I took two of my brothers, Sam and Gabe, to an apple orchard. It was so much fun! It was the first time I had ever picked my own apples. And boy were they delicious. I wish I had one right now!

Our Home

This blog post has been a long time coming. Finally, my house feels like it is in order. And, actually, I feel kind of lost without any projects to be working on in the evenings. Knowing me though, I will begin another project soon enough.

I'll never forget the day we got the keys to our first home because it was my birthday, August 23rd. From that moment until the last week of September we were working on the house 24/7. There was always someone here. It was a form of exhaustion that I have never felt before, and it seemed like the longest month of my life. But we made it, and like everyone told us along the way, it was definitely worth it.

To fully appreciate this post, make sure to go back and look at the before pictures. This is by far the longest post I have ever done. I thought about splitting it up into two, but I have promised this to you for so long that I decided to package it up as one big present! So grab a cup of coffee and enjoy a tour of our house!

Living Room:

I love these birds. Everything about them makes me happy. I got them at Green Awning Gallery in Stryker, OH.

Luckily, we had all of this furniture somehow squeezed into our apartment.

This print hanging on the wall was given to me from a fellow classmate at Otterbein, very close friend, and one of my very first brides this summer, Anna. I absolutely adore it! The lamp, I fell in love with at T.J. Maxx and just could not go home without it.

I made a major trip to IKEA right after we moved in. The hall tree and magazine hanging rack are both from there.

Kitchen and Laundry Room:

One of the major projects was painting all the cupboards. I think it made a big difference to the look of the room though.

My little brother got these for me for my birthday at an auction. They belong in this kitchen.

I am so happy that I added these shelves. They are added storage that will never go to waste.

Sitting Room:

Found these great frames for free, and then I spray painted them yellow. They work perfectly for the images of Trevor and I at the fair that were taken by C Studios.

This table was another one of my great finds. I got it at a garage sale for ten dollars and then spray painted it.

This is one of my favorite pieces of art that I own. The artist is Kelly Goode, and you can find more about her here. I bought this in Savannah, Georgia, and while I was there I actually got to meet the artist and talk to her for awhile. Our lives seemed to be running parallel in so many ways. All of this makes this piece very special to me.

And the lamp is from IKEA.

Extra Bedroom:







Hallway:

Pictures are obviously a very large part of my life. I decided that this was going to be my picture wall. I am going to continue to let it grow and change.

Bathroom:

This is by far the biggest change in the entire house. It went from my most hated room to my favorite. We painted the cupboards and walls, new flooring, new shower, new faucet, and new toilet.

And, of course, my shower curtain from Anthropologie that I chose before we even had the keys to the house. It was my inspiration for the entire bathroom.

Oh, and new lighting fixtures, new mirror, new towel and toilet paper racks.

I got all of these frames for free too and just spray painted them.

Office:

It is so unbelievable to finally have a room that is completely dedicated to my business. I love it!

The art on the wall is mine that I did in College. I had them framed because they were accepted into the Ohio State Fair Fine Arts Exhibition. Ever since then I have had no where to hang them since they were so large until now. I am so happy to see them everyday now. They are acetone photo transfers that I did from images that I had taken of my brothers.

I got these chairs at a garage sale this summer for $4 a piece. Then I found this fabric, and my mom recovered them for me.

Tables from, of course, IKEA. I have seen these on just about every show on tv because they are only $7.99 a piece. Amazing! And somehow, Willie slipped into one of the pictures.

I got all the office furniture from Sauder Store and Outlet.

All of the vintage cameras on the book self are from garage sales, and each one has some kind of story behind it. The green boxes and the curtains are both from IKEA.

Bedroom:

This definitely has become my favorite color of paint in the entire house. I just love it.

I took these images on a road trip through Virginia and thought that they would work perfect in this room. The shelf and the frames are from IKEA.





This is more than a house now, it is our home.