Booked til Baby!

Pssssst. Guess what?
We are officially booked until my "unofficial" photo maternity leave begins around mid-August!

As I've mentioned before, we are going to be taking a limited number of sessions in the late fall, and after looking at my calendar today, I realized that it will indeed be a very limited number. I am anticipating holding a fall mini session event, possibly the weekend of October 24, but I'm not making any promises because I have no idea how my schedule will be with the new baby!

Other than that, I only have a few slots open for sessions between the middle of October and beginning of November, so if you are interested at all in scheduling a fall session, please let me know as soon as possible so we can tentatively plan a date! (I will of course make an exception for anyone who wants a newborn session - those are best within a few weeks of the baby's birth!)

I'll be posting lots of photos from all of the sessions we have coming up over the next month, and after that you might just have to stick around to see the millions of pictures I expect to take of my lil guy :)

We're so excited for his arrival!!

Andy and Amanda: Wedding Details

Andy and Amanda tied the knot on June 27, 2009, and both the ceremony and reception were just beautiful!

They got married in Champaign and had their reception at the U of I Union, on the Quad. Ah, it made me miss those college days!

Here are some beautiful details from their day!

If I recall correctly, Amanda made this for Andy for her wedding day gift to him...

Lacing up the gown...

Beautiful bouquets

This is a treasured family rosary, and it meant a lot to Amanda for it to be a part of her wedding day

Best wrapped present ever?! If you look closely, you'll notice that it incorporates all of their engagement photos!

And finally, their initials were shining on the wall during the reception!

Stay tuned for more wedding pictures to come!

Charles: One Year

Can you hardly believe how much Charles has grown?! If you recall from my blog last fall, Charles spent about four months in the hospital after being born extremely early, and this June he celebrated his first birthday!

We had a great time with little Charles and his parents playing in the park last week, and I just adore the photos we captured.

Family photo

I love this one.

Charles lights up both of his parents' faces!

oh those eyes! makes me melt. little boys get the BEST eyes and eyelashes!

sweet smile!

Charles and Family - so good to see you all again!

Little feet

Is this not the most precious thing ever?! It just makes me melt. :)

This is a sneak peek from my session last night. Can't wait to post the rest, they all turned out so great!

Julie and Joe: Engagement

Julie is my good friend Kristi's younger sister. I used to sit by both of them in 7th hour study hall in high school - wow, that was a long time ago!

Julie had moved out to California, where Kristi lives, but was then transferred to Washington D.C. However, she began dating Joe about a year ago and when they got engaged, she decided to move back to Springfield. It was so nice to reconnect with her during their engagement session!

We had so much fun sauntering around the park and downtown Springfield...

They enjoyed my over-use of the word "canoodling".

They were quite the canoodlers though.

Love this one!

And this one...OK it was just pretty much a great session!
I think this is my favorite...Congratulations on your engagement Julie and Joe, and best of luck with all that lies ahead!!

Welcome to the World: John Patrick!

On Friday, I had the pleasure of meeting and photographing Baby John, or JP, as many have taken to calling him!

I went to high school with John's parents, so it was nice to reconnect and meet their new little guy. It made me even more over-the-moon excited about the impending arrival of ours :)

John was a sweetie and so good while I was there, although he didn't want to go to sleep for us! Guess there was just too much excitement with getting his portraits taken... Mom finally managed to lull him into a light sleep...

Big yawn!

So precious

His nursey is SO cute

Tiny toes!

And my favorite...

Amanda and Aakash's pre-wedding festivities!

Last Saturday, we photographed the Ras Garba, or dance festival, which was part of my friend Amanda's wedding! The wedding festivities were all held in the northwest suburbs of Chicago, and everything was so fun and exciting to be a part of!

Amanda married Aakash on Saturday, June 20, and the Ras Garba was held the night before. Everyone spent hours dancing and celebrating the upcoming marriage - here are some photos...

The bride and groom :)

Amanda's beautiful henna

The wedding party was a good time and up for anything all weekend!

The groom and his twin brother (yeah I can't tell them apart either!)

Amanda and Aakash got the party started!

Let the dancing begin...

Worrrrrrrk it!!

(Is Amanda trying to raise the roof??)

Aakash's mom enjoying herself...next to Amanda's dad gettin down!

After hours of dancing...they weren't ready to stop!!

Thank you guys so much for having me be part of your celebration!