Spring | KE365 | Day 123

I think spring might finally really be here...

and then I look out the window here in Ohio and see snow flakes!

Relief | KE365 | Day 122

Something about those first days back at the park in spring time, such a relief.

As a mom, it's amazing to go back to the park after being stuck inside all winter and see all the new things your child can do this year compared to the year before. Just another reminder to me of how fast life goes.

Two of My Favorite Things | KE365 | Day 121

My daughter's eyes are two of my favorite things. I'm sure it's the same for most parents with their little ones.

She can light up any bad day I'm having. She is perfect, just the way she is.

Super Moon | KE365 | Day 120

I'm thankful my husband pulled over for me to get these shots on the way home the other night. I photograph the moon so often that it only makes sense that I should photograph the super full moon.

I was also lucky he picked a good spot to stop and decided to do a long exposure because the reflection on the pond was so beautiful.

Sick Days | KE365 | Day 119

My poor sweet thing is so sick. I have never seen her like this and could not resist documenting it.

At least it made her smile when she saw her picture! She is my sunshine and I cannot stand to see her like this!

Dylan & Family | KE365 | Day 118

Dylan came to our Freedom Kids event and his family decided to have a session done. Dylan seemed so shy at first but he warmed up really quickly and turned out to be quite a ham!

He looks like a little man...

One of my favorite shots, Dylan is so sweet.

He's deep in thought, Dylan was loving this rock. He spent awhile throwing rocks back into the rock path and just sitting there enjoying the view, I think he liked being up on that rock.
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Dylan was walking done the rock path and walked right into this shot, what a big boy.

Mom was consoling little Dylan, see... the candid shots again, always my favorite!

Benny & Family | KE365 | Day 117

I had so much fun photographing Benny and his family. Benny is six and he is full of energy. He ran around constantly the whole hour without hardly tiring.

Here he is below, once he had worn himself out a little but as all parents know... it doesn't last long!

Benny found every dead end in the little maze at Cox Arboretum and loved every minute of it. He stopped in one of the dead ends and did his favorite dance with his dad. The shots I really love are always the candid ones, his dad reached out to give Benny a big high five... you can see how proud he is. Definitely one of my favorite shots of the day!

Another candid shot I love...

Leimbachtoberfest | KE365 | Day 116

Amanda and Nick planned a fabulous wedding reception bash they called Leimbachtoberfest. They held the event at Dayton Leiderkranz-Turner in St. Anne's Hill Historic District, which was a perfect location for the German themed evening.

They put a lot of time, love and thought into the attire for the evening...

Nick & Amanda are so in love it is so easy for anyone to see. They had a huge group of friends and family that support them and many made comments of just how perfect they are together.

They even had a German themed cut-out for photo-ops which some of the guests ended up having a lot of fun with.

Amanda looked radiant as she usually does!

Loved all the details they had, from the handmade place cards to the engraved beer steins. It was a fabulous evening and we wish Amanda & Nick the best in their lives together!

3 Girls & The Root Beer Stande | KE365 | Day 115

We headed down to our local Root Beer Stande for a nice lunch with my nieces for Day 115. Our family hasn't been there in years and the girls all had a blast for their first time.

Kailyn was being so sweet giving Natalie some hugs, it's really hard work having to find patience to wait for you root beer float!

Both images were shot at f/4.5.

Ursula | KE365 | Day 114

Had so much fun photographing little Ursula again. She is such a happy kid, always smiling and exploring life. Does she have a gorgeous smile or what?

*LOVE* the profile shot of her, she was captivated my the gorgeous river.

Amanda & Nick | KE365 | Day 113

We set out on a nice fall day to get a few images of Amanda & Nick who are newlyweds. They were married last year before Nick left for service and have planned a fantastic German themed reception for this September to celebrate with family and friends. These two have a lot of fun together, which ends up making it a really fun process to photograph.

Nick might be slightly camera shy but I have to say that I think he did awesome. You can see how in love with Amanda he is by the sweet way he's always looking at her. It's adorable... and Amanda is too easy to photograph, she's a natural beauty and seriously photogenic.

Best of luck to you two in your lives, new home & marriage!

Sneak peek of awesome German themed "Leimbachtoberfest" Reception coming soon!

Santo Sheetmetal | KE365 | Day 112

There was a beautiful sunset on Day 112 which led my eyes directly up to the cupola and weather vane on my parents house. My grandfather had a business called Santo Sheetmetal and this was one of his creations. I love hearing about my relatives that made their way of living from creative artistry. I think it is amazing when you can make something with your own two hands and turn it into a passion that sustains time and is your way of life. It inspires me.

My mom was just telling me this story about when she and my sister were shopping out in Santa Clara, California. My mom looked up and happened to notice a Santo Sheetmetal cupola on top of what had previously been an Old Red Barn restaurant! How amazing for her to be all the way across the country and see something that her dad made years ago still standing strong on top of a building!

It's impressive to realize his work is on buildings all over the country and his company even worked with well known builders, Ryan homes. There isn't much info out there but I found this Old Red Barn link with some photos of one of the restaurants being moved. It makes me wonder if my grandpa made that cupola.

Stop Growing Up Already! | KE365 | Day 111

My daughter is growing up entirely too quickly! She is so tall that I think other kids often think she is much older than she really is. Just like the 6 year old boy below who made 'friends' at the park with her. The two of them were inseparable the whole afternoon. Kailyn cried when we left and asked the boy if he would be back at the park the next time. Really?

Shot at 1/2000s, f/4.0, ISO 100

Of course I knew the day would come when Kailyn would be making 'boyfriends' that would cause her tears, but not at two and a half! If there is anything I've learned about parenthood though it's that there are not too many things that you can expect to have happen in a certain way. Kids and life are way too unpredictable.

I shot the above image with a really fast shutter speed to freeze all those water droplets in motion. I wanted to capture the action of how my daughter stepped on the water to aim it at her new friend.

The Popcorn Festival | KE365 | Day 110

We enjoyed a day at the festival with family for Day 110. This is my daughter and her cousin walking down Dayton-Xenia Rd. enjoying the Beavercreek Popcorn Festival and each other. They are probably in the middle of singing It's a Hard Knock Life or something similar. =)

Shot at 1/320s, f/5.0, ISO 100

I wanted to capture the big scale of the event but realized I would need a good focus point. Having the girls as my main focus in the foreground gave more perspective to the festival in the background.

A Textured World | KE365 | Day 108

Working with textures for Day 108. I took this image specifically to show how the texture changes from foreground to background within the one band of rope.

Shot at 1/80s at f/1.4, ISO 400

Settling for a Simple Day | KE365 | Day 107

It needed to be a simple day for Day 107. After photographing a 5K for Day 106 I forced myself to take a breather and focused on capturing a black and white composition while I concentrated on editing all those 5K images!

Photographed at 1/60, at f/1.8, ISO 800.

Don Lawrence | KE365 | Day 105

Portrait session on Day 105 with aspiring photographer, Don Lawrence. He wanted a portrait session to show put a face with his name. Don opened up shop on Etsy a few months back and has had some great success with it!

Don likes to capture unique perspectives and therefore deserved just that for his portrait session. I always go all out on my sessions, it's not uncommon to see me lying on the ground to get the exact angle I want, sprinting across a field to get ahead of my subject to get two perspectives or even climbing up somewhere high to get a different view. I am not very fond of scaffolding though, something about it screams not a good idea to me. Unfortunate for me, the scaffolding provided the best opportunity for the sweetest shot of the day.

Luckily, I handled it okay and got the above shot! I teetered back and forth on that scaffolding, I can normally handle heights decently but when they rock back and forth I'm not so comfortable! If I hadn't faced my fear, I would never have had the same results.

Air Force Museum | KE365 | Day 104

Both images used a tripod with exposures at 1/5s & 1/6s respectively.

Freedom Kids

I would like to start this post by saying Thank You. There were so many individuals and families that stepped forward to make this happen. The idea started only a short time before the Freedom Kids event but as you can probably tell by the turn out that it evolved into something much greater. I set out to photograph some children and design something to say thank you to all the Veterans that have served our country. I decided to use Honor Flight of Dayton as my gateway to finding these Veterans. Honor flight is wonderful, they work on a donation basis and send Veterans to all the memorials in D.C. that were built for them, in honor of their service. Most of these Veterans have never thought of going to the memorials as a possibility, Honor Flight makes it happen for free.

I was so proud to be part of this community of people that stepped forward, these kids were amazing.

Through the whole design process the ideas started to evolve into doing a poster or large print. With large number of kids involved and desiring for each child to get their spot in the final print and also for the fact that a good deal of the Veterans this was intended for are elderly, doing a larger print just made sense.

I don't want to say too much about the designs itself as I don't want to influence anyone on how they might like to vote. I would love to hear any feedback anyone might have or even just a quick comment to add your vote would be great.

You can find the Freedom Kids Designs here. Feel free to post a comment here to let me know which you would like to vote for or just leave a comment in the design gallery.

50% of profits from all Freedom Kids print sales will go to Honor Flight of Dayton through September 27th so make sure to get those orders in before then to help send area Veterans to D.C.

Carefree Flying Daddy's Girl | KE365 | Day 103

Sometimes the best shots and the best moments in life are the ones that just happen. One of my favorite shots of the day I happened to catch by accident on the way to the car, the 'carefree' image. 

shot as 1/1250, f/5.0 at ISO 100

  

The next image 'flying' will be a personal favorite for me well probably for the rest of my life. My husband soloed his first plane at 16 years old before he could even drive a car legally. So, flying has a big special place in his heart, mine...
and now our daughter's.

shot as 1/500, f/3.1 at ISO 100

shot as 1/250, f/7.1 at ISO 100

I would have to say if I had to come up with one bad thing about the 365 project is that you end up having more images you want for your walls than actual space to hang those images! I designed the shots into some quick album pages which should help with the dwindling wall space issue!

With personal issues that have been coming up for me the past week since I took these images, I have realized that no matter what happens in my future I will always have these two amazing people and I am so lucky and a better person for it.