Where I am Now

As I sit and reminisce about 2011 I realize I have come a long way. I have always (and of course, still do) pour my heart into every single photograph that I make. However, seeing where I used to be compared to where I am now makes me realize that no matter how much heart you put into your art, it just won't reach its full potential until you learn the technical aspects of it.

I am so thankful for all the friends and family who allowed me to "practice" on them - especially my own two children. Without these opportunities I don't think I would have been able to grow as much as I have. Of course I am thankful to my fellow photographer friends and mentors who have provided me the opportunities to reach levels of achievement!

So, I decided to pull out the archives and see just how far I really have come. I definitely still have a lot to learn (I am a firm believer that you will NEVER stop learning - anything) but I am so proud of the progress I have made over the past year. Almost all of the photos below were taken in 2008 and some in 2009. I did not really photograph too much in 2009 or hardly at all in 2010 - I had two kids under the age of 2 and was just way too busy for anything extra!

In all of the photos, the 2008/2009 image is either on the top or left of the set. The 2011 image is on the bottom or right.

I hope to provide a good laugh to anyone who can relate to pulling out their "old stuff" and to inspire those of you who are up-and-coming all-star photographers!

Enjoy!

Ivy {3 Months}

Ivy's back! This time she is a three month old! I received special permission to take Ivy to an apple orchard for some of the photos. Was I lucky or what?! Look how great these turned out!

This one just cracks me up. Her face and expression totally adds to the image!

We also did some studio portraits of the little beauty queen. She brought along her pink bear rug that her big cousin Jillian gave her!

Look at the happy girl!!

Previous Ivy Sessions:

Maternity 

Newborn

Cousin Session

The Holcomb's {and Makenna is ONE!}

The Holcomb's are long-time friends of my husband (I have been lucky enough to call them my friends as well for the past 7ish years). I was super pumped when they asked me to be their photographer! They are such sweet people and amazingly BEAUTIFUL! Could their outfits be any more amazing? I am seriously jealous that I cannot be this coordinated with my own family. GREAT colors! I had just got this background a few days before their session, so I was thrilled to get to use it!

Little sister was turning one, so of course we included a cake smash! At first she was ok with it but when she was done, she was DONE!

The Simsa's

It had been raining all day long. Brooke (the beautiful momma) was texting me back and forth all day long wondering if we should reschedule the session or not. Finally we decided just to do it. On my way to the session there was a GIANT double rainbow - which means double good luck, right?! Of course, once we got into the wooded area, we couldn't see the rainbow anymore.

The kids were cold but managed to tough it out and deliver some amazing smiles. Would you believe they threw their outfits together and did their hair all on a last minute's decision with only like 20 minutes to do so?!

Something that was super awesome about this family is that they didn't want every single image to be super posey. They wanted photographs of them being "them". They had amazing personalities, so capturing that wasn't hard at all!

I knew right away after taking this image that it was going to be one of my favorites!

Of course the children are gorgeous. Look what they were created from!