An Evolving Endeavor

Someone once told me that just because you're becoming a mom, don't allow yourself to get "lost" in that role...continue with your hobbies, passions, and other things you enjoy. Well, I've had a passion for photography for many years now...ever since my late Uncle Jim let me put my hands on his old manual SLR camera when I was 15 years old, and showed me his photos from their trips to U.S. National Parks, I fell in love with the art.


My Uncle Jim and his family circa 1985-ish

While attending Taylor, I minored in art, and concentrated my studies in photography. It's hard to believe that I graduated 8+ years ago, but as you might expect, the technology has changed quite a bit since then. If you can believe it, digital photography still wasn't quite the "norm" at that point, and it's even harder for me to believe that enhancing and manipulating photos in programs like Photoshop wasn't part of the curriculum (wow, we're getting old).

As far as my knowledge of Photoshop goes, I'm fairly well-versed in the area of graphic design due to my previous positions in marketing, but I would love to expand my knowledge of the program for enhancing photos. I am hoping to take a class or 2 at a community college within the next year. I'm not sure to what degree I'd like to practice the art of photography professionally, but for now I'm enjoying getting some experience photographing friends, family, family friends, and friends of friends :) I have also taken on the role of building a photo library for our church, which has been a fun, on-going project as well.

As much as I enjoy photographing people, I also enjoy still life. My dream job would to be a photgrapher for a magazine...more specifically a travel magazine. Would that not be the best job ever?! I rather think so. Most of you probably didn't know that I interned at a newspaper after my junior year at Taylor. The newspaper allowed me to fill the position as chief photojournalist for the summer, and I loved every single day! I learned a lot and had some wonderful experiences, but more importantly, realized how much more I have to learn!

Now that my life is officially slowing back down to a more normal pace (Kristin got married last Saturday...more on that later), I am ready to sign myself up for other projects to fill my time. Sooooo, if anyone is interested in photos for Christmas cards, I'll take all the experience I can get.

Here's a small sampling of some of the photos I've had the privilege of taking recently:

My friend Heather asked if I would be willing to take senior photos for her cousin, Janna...I was thrilled that she asked. We shot them at Heather's parents' house...so much fun!

This little guy, Alec, just melts my heart. I'm friends with his parents, and he and Graham are only a month apart, so I had a lot of fun with this one :) I learned a lot during this shoot...specifically how challenging this age is to photograph...these little guys don't stop for a second!!

My friend Jen wanted to surprise her husband with photos of she and her boys for Father's Day this year. We probably shot all the pictures within 15 minutes, because Graham was not a happy camper, but alas, we still somehow managed to get a few :)

When our good friends Abe & Lindsay were pregnant, I went to one of Lindsay's baby showers, and all the girls there filled out "coupons" for things we would offer to do to help them once their little Ethan was born. Because I'm always looking for any excuse to hang out with them, I thought I'd offer to take some photos. We had a blast, but I think poor Ethan was a little confused why we changed his outfit so many times in one night :) He was a trooper.