2011 has been a whirlwind of sessions, wedding traveling – and only a little over half of the year is done.

ON THE BUSINESS END OF IT: As in any year, it has it’s ups and downs and this year in particular – I have photographed 250 sessions January-June.  We have made the switch from PC to Mac – which I was a little leery about but can now say I love my Mac. We’ve had weddings in Denver, Estes Park, Montrose, and Cancun-Mexico.  We have been in our studio at Ravens Nest in Denver for nearly two years, and now contemplating moving to a different studio in the same location.  We have been with Pictage now for 4+ years, and we have been very happy with that choice.  But I still have my “favorite” lab that I’ve been with for 15+ years back in Minnesota for any custom work I do.  Wendy stepped away from us but I still loved having her with Fototails, and Autumn took the customer service reigns a couple months ago.   We have about 10 more weddings this year, and are predicting about 200+ more portrait sessions July-December.  I’m also finishing up photography for two different cookbooks, and really love photographing the food – it is a little break from portraits and weddings for me; and, although I’ve been doing commercial work for 20+ years I always find a mix of photograph keeps me fresh and I love the challenges of working so many different projects.

August begins the rush to get family photos done, and we will be spending a lot of time getting families photographed before the holidays.  Every year is different for the changing of leaves around here, so we never know when or how long they will stay on the trees – but about 75% of our sessions are done outdoors August-November.  We are now booking September-December for portrait sessions, with September filling up quickly.

ON THE PERSONAL SIDE OF IT: My two boys are growing like weeds… I went to bed one night and woke up the next morning to Eric’s PJ pants being 2 inches too short.  Both kids are in Pre-K part-time, and I still have an entire year until my oldest gets to go to kindergarden.  They are Lego maniacs and as expensive as they are, I appreciate every minute of peace and quiet that they give me (even if it is only 10 minutes at a time).  We lost two of the best dogs ever at the beginning of this year which was really sad for us, but we still have our golden retriever Gwri(RYE) that now gets all of our dog love.  We took a trip to Wisconsin to visit family in the spring – I flew with the kids which I was completely fearful of doing – and they did fine and Mance then drove and we all did the road trip back (not so fine 19 hours of drive time).  But it had been 2 years since I had been to “The homeland” so it was good to see family and friends…and fit in a couple sessions while I was up that way.  I attended two weddings this year, and the 2nd wedding we brought the boys with and they had so much fun dressing up and dancing.

Lots left on the agenda for 2011…. it is one long roller-coaster of a year.

I hope you are all enjoying your year and happy 2nd half of 2011.