My mom always told me that everything was better when I was there. That experiences were more fun and that she enjoyed herself more. That I brought something to the atmosphere like no one else could do in her world. She always made me feel so good about myself.

And then yesterday, Bella, Luke, and I played cards. Bella has recently learned Old Maid and Crazy Eights and Go Fish. Coming from a family whose core includes playing games, it melts my heart to see how much Bella loves to play. As we played, Bella kept cracking Luke and I up. She is wonderfully expressive, and the way she would squeal when someone took took the old maid from her or when she had just the right card to play, made Luke and I laugh so hard. She got excited about everything. She laughed hard. She played well. She was kind.

After I finally stopped laughing at one of her squeals, it came out naturally. “Bella, you make everything so much fun. It is always so much more fun when you are around.” And then I actually heard myself. I heard my mom in myself. And I remembered how my mom made me feel. But in that moment I was also aware of how my mom must have felt. I had to take a pause to feel this. To feel how much I adore this treasure of a child. How amazing I think she is. How terribly proud of her I am. How my life is 1000 times better with her in it. How she makes me laugh. How she teaches me new things. How she helps me know my mom better even five and a half years after her death.

I could go on and on here about how I adore Bella. When I asked God for a daughter, I never imagined that He would bless me with one so great. My life with her is better than I ever knew could exist. And on January 30th, she turned four. In the week before her birthday, out of the blue she would squeal and clap and shout “I am going to be four!” Oh to be excited about getting older!

At one of her three recent birthday celebrations, she received cowgirl boots. As grandma Lisa and I were sitting on the couch visiting, Bella was enjoying her new boots. Once she noticed me taking her picture, she came alive with a variety of unprompted poses. All these photos were taken within a minute and ten seconds of each other! She is a natural…

Grandma Lisa arrived with a party hat she made for Bella as well as a Tinkerbell cake and fairy wings. She knows how to bring a party!

We have a local favorite place to go called Stabby’s Cafe (awesome breakfasts!), and we went there for a birthday breakfast. Bella and Abe were both sick and tired and it was not what we had hoped for, but fun nonetheless. Abe did not want to cooperate for the camera, and two seconds after I took the shot of him creating a fork/glass tower, he flung his fork across the table and spilled Bella’s entire glass of juice everywhere, making us the restaurant favorites. This parenting thing is a piece of cake…

Our final party of the weekend and Bella requested a princess cake (of course!)…

I know it is a lot of images of my Bella, but sometimes I have just got to be an over-proud mom who wants to show off her kids! Thanks for hanging in there with me.:)

I have known Brian for a while. Actually, he was my professor when I went to the U of MN to finish my degree. {Before you find yourself doing calculations, I was an older student and he was a young professor which made us about the same age.} We developed a friendship filled with mutual respect.

And then there I was, photographing his engagement session to Jessica. And their love was so true and joyful that I had to stop for a moment because inside I was incredibly happy for my friend.

Happy that they share true-love laughter often. Happy that Jessica looks at him with the most beautiful googly-eyes I have ever seen. Happy that I got to spy on their private moments and that they are wonderful. Brian and Jess are companions and friends and really two of the nicest people I have ever met. They are considerate and intuitive and kind and smart. And madly in love. And it shows.

It was a joy to photograph them alone, and with Brian’s son, Gavin {who, by the way, is three days younger than my Bella!}. They are an exceptional family and I am so excited to photograph their wedding in January!

A special thanks to Brain and Jess for braving the cold. We made a perfect plan in the summer to do a fall shoot with the beautiful leaves. We had no idea that it would snow so early this year and be in the 30s during their shoot. I do not know how they managed to look so happy and comfortable while shivering. I guess that’s what love does to you…

How could we resist cupcakes at Cupcake? We had so much fun and I am pretty sure that Gavin will only want to go there with me in the future as I was encouraging him to eat more and put frosting on his nose! If only my kids were so lucky.:)

I just want to say one more thing…Gavin is one of the nicest little boys I have ever met. To use Jess’s words, he is very disarming. He made me feel so welcome, and even though I was behind the camera, he insisted on me being a part of the cupcake-sharing rituals too. He is definitely a special and much-loved little boy and I cannot wait to see him again in January!

When I first decided that I wanted to do photography professionally, my plan was to take awesome photos and hand over a disk of images to my clients for them to do what they would like with them. 

A month after I purchased my first digital SLR, I gave a CD of images from Christmas to one of my sister-in-laws. I printed out a few for myself, they looked great. Then one day I was at my mother-in-law’s house and I saw a terrible picture. It looked kind of like one that I had taken but it was orange and dark and blurry. My mother-in-law said that my sister-in-law had printed out a few of my images from Christmas at Costco and had given them out to our family. So there were my images, with my name on them, in the hands of people I love…and they looked terrible!

And I saw so clearly how much I love photography and think of my images as my babies and how I want them to be the best they can be.

I saw what a difference a professional printshop (and Photoshop) made on my images. That neon sign said that I needed creative control from start to finish. I knew that I wanted to be more than a photography chop-shop. I wanted to give my clients full service. I wanted to spend quality time with my clients and not try to squeeze as many sessions in a week as I could. I wanted to make sure that all images bearing my name were as good as they could be. I saw clearly the direction I wanted to go and never looked back.

I can’t show you the print quality until you come to my office, but I thought it might be fun (and a little nerve-wracking on my end) to share some before/after Photoshop images with you! 

Although a good image needs to be well-composed and exposed with great lighting and expressions right out of the camera, every image needs a little tweak before I share them with my clients. Some tweaks are so minor that no one would ever notice but me. And some images just cry to be played with a bit more like two recent images below.

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I liked this image. Beautiful Dani. The pose. The lighting. The blues. The wind in her hair. But straight out of the camera it deserved a little something. A little special Photoshop effort…

This is now one of my favorite images! So warm and soothing and I cannot take my eyes off of hers.

Again, right out of the camera this had potential. These two were so full of affection and they were having a great moment (on a cute bridge)…

But this Photoshop technique made this image even more special! This is also one of my new favorites!

I hope you enjoyed seeing a little behind-the-scenes and saw how I came to run my business the way I do. It was really guided by the love of photography and commitment to quality (that sounds like such a warm and cozy corporate moral phrase!).

This may be the first time I have publicly shown my straight-out-of-the-camera shots (I hope you still like me!). I am feeling a little naked at the moment but I know I will get over it. Maybe I should have paid attention to the flashing buzzing sign in my window now that says I should keep some things to myself! What fun would that be?

And the images of Megan and Ben’s engagement session were beautiful. 

Of course, as their photographer I will take some of the credit for the beauty of these images. I work hard. However there is the big beauty in these images that comes directly from Megan and Ben. It is in their joy to be with each other. It is in the comfort of their touch. In the sparkle of their eyes.  The clutching of their hands. They have such joyful easy laughter that shines through in their images, and that makes them beautiful. And…their good looks certainly help too!

It was an absolute joy to photograph Megan and Ben. They are so full of kisses and laughter. They are true naturals in every way – with the camera, with me, and most importantly, with each other. 

I am so excited to photograph their big day in August! Does your dress have a pocket for tissues, Megan?

Aren’t they a good-looking couple? They will have some beautiful babies together someday (that one was for you, Ben!)?

No shortage of affection between them…

Megan happens to live next to one of my favorite hang outs. If you have not eaten at Broder’s, then you are really missing out in life. It is one of their favs too so we had to include it…

And of course we also had to hit up the bridge where Ben proposed. How romantic…

My favorite image of the day…

Megan’s daughter, Abigail, joined in on the fun too! To see her excitement for the day and her love for her mom and Benny were touching to say the least…

Abigail loved this worm (and the two others that she found during the shoot)! She was excitedly chatting about taking them home as her new pets. She wasn’t so excited, however, when I suggested she put one on her nose (everyone has their limits I guess). A little patience and persistence and we had success. Of course afterward, this was the shot she was telling people about! 

I must admit however, that I would be more than happy for a Freya-Abe crush because Freya’s parents are our dear friends. There’s no doubt they are beautiful on the outside, but they are even more beautiful on the inside. Yes, I have high hopes for Freya…from the inside out.

I thought I would share a fun spontaneous mini-shoot from the weekend. The combination of this beautiful family and my new video software was way to much to resist!