More Christmas is Coming . . .

We are having more Christmas starting tomorrow when Doug's family comes to celebrate. This week has been one of going through all our "photo business" and we discovered since we got our new 5D Canon we have taken a little over 14,000 photos - not bad for 5 months I'd say. I also made a little B&W slideshow of our Christmas day celebration. Coming soon - I'll post the link on here once we get it up:).

More Christmas

I had way too many photos for one blog so I added tonight's photos here:). And I'd better head to bed since it is now tomorrow. . . An assortment of knights and a few princesses in the background. I told you Jayden liked sampling the wrapping paper. Ok, I owed Ryan a nice photo of him. Here he's hangin' with little Ellis who was imitating everything Uncle Ryan was doing. Pretty darn cute.

Roman Soldier? Knight in Shining Armor? Dragon Slayer? Whichever you choose - Marcus is SOOOO ready for it.

Ellis didn't want to miss out on the fun - he thought the sword was pretty cool too.

Marcus in his new robe, jammies and of course his helmet and sword. These boys played in this most of the evening - it is fun to watch their little imaginations run wild. The girls got to be the princesses and each of the boys "knighted" us adults.

Winding down, Josiah had to show off his new jammies as well (the ones that he commented were fancy enough for church). Amazingly the boys did fall asleep once everyone headed home.

My mom will love this photo:). She was trying to get Marcus to sit still for like 2 seconds for a photo - tough stuff when there are cousins to play with.

Merry Christmas

Hi All,

It's been a few weeks here since I've said hello and Christmas has arrived! I suppose I can say we were getting ready for Christmas in that two weeks of no blogging. We still have some more celebrating to do at the end of the week with Doug's family who are coming to visit but I thought I'd post a few photos of the celebrations thus far. The boys (all of them) were thrilled by everything they received and were excited to give to their cousins and grandparents. As Marcus said while twirling in his new jammies and robe, "Thanks for the great holiday . . ." with a flourish that only Marcus can do. And Josiah was sure that his jammies were good enough to wear to church:). Jayden was content to try and eat the wrapping paper but he did like his other gifts too. (and the cookies) Although it was busy, Christmas has been extra special this year. Lots of reflection, musing on how quickly our children grow up and how we need to enjoy our family and friends more in the new year. And we have no snow - a snowless Christmas in Wisconsin is pretty rare here. But a good one nevertheless. Christ's blessings to you all - and to those who will be coming in a few days to continue the celebration - we look forward to seeing you.Marcus is quite the little boy - he and Josiah liked playing with cousin Frank's GI Joe's.

We visited with Doug's extended family in Cedar Falls. Jayden and Amy hit it off:).

My cousin Angie and her husband Matt got to pass the traditional Ullom heirloom artwork to a new family this year:)My cousin's little boy. What a cutie! And yes ladies, I'm not sure how you missed this adorable brother of mine but he is still single - and maybe is standing under the mistletoe? He'll probably kill me for posting this pose but hey, it's just way too funny not to. And I didn't take it - Doug did;). Santa visited the party and passed out presents from Great Grandma Ullom to the children .The children had a HUGE area to play in and Jayden got in the action before he fell asleep on grandma's lap. How fun!

Bits and Pieces

(this is the face you get when you are playing with your lensbaby at breakfast)

We are starting to get all the pieces of the website assembled and here is one of the slideshows that will be up on it once it gets going. We are learning this new software and hopefully it's not too slow on your computers. Click Here to view it: Slideshow1

The granary is progressing, we'll be adding some photos of it soon - we are trying to get orders done for Christmas as well as making sure WE get our Christmas shopping done.

Hope you all are enjoying the Christmas season as well. - Rain scheduled for today:).

Construction Continues

Doug and I have been updating you on the progress of our granary studio - today they delivered the shingles. And the guys toughed it out in the cold and finished putting new sheathing up! It's looking good!

Slideshow

Coming soon is an album preview I've been working on - I'll add a link here once I get it up to view it! Very cool!

Wedding Brochure

Until we get the website up, here is our new wedding packages. The albums we offer are wonderful - I wish we had one from our wedding:). Cheers

As I finish my wedding class . . .

We are revamping our wedding packages and I am finishing up my online wedding class so I have weddings on the brain. Paul Gero has been a great help during my class and I hope to someday soon meet him and thank him personally! I look forward to learning more and more as we increase our wedding business. This is a photo that I've been tweaking some from a wedding last summer - isn't she adorable?
It rained all day here so the boys and I did fun games and some read some new books for their home school lessons. We did sneak outside to feed the dog, chickens and pick up the yard before we get some snow again. It was warm but wet. The boys played stick hockey and then got me to play some soccer until we all fell down in the mud:) On Thursday we are scheduled to get some things started on remodeling our granary - exciting!
Doug was working from home today and that is always something we love. We can't wait until it is everyday but we try to be patient. All in God's perfect timing!
--Best to everyone!

Happy Thanksgiving

Aren't they adorable? We did a cake cutting sequence for a class I am taking and our models did such a nice job. And I liked the photo of Josiah on the swing and did a little tweaking for another assignment. Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!

Josiah is always a good sport to get his photo taken.

Take a break

It's good to take a break every now and then, to regroup and refocus. I was flipping through some photos of this summer and found some of our neighborhood get-together. I thought I would share some moments:Our host and hostess (Jeff & Nona) taking a break. This was awesome guys!


A nice portrait by Doug of Nona in front of one of their John Deere's.

It was a regular old fashioned party, with music, hayrides, children's games and a sack race. Awesome fun! Josiah caught a bubble & Marcus was trying out the sack race.

Our New Little Girl (Dog)

I was talking with my friend Heather in Missouri and she told me she hadn't seen any photos of our puppy Cocoa. So here she is:
She's quite a sweetheart - a little crazy sometimes but aren't we all. She's grown some since these photos from a few weeks ago . Loves to play catch, chew everything in site and bring in "gifts (aka junk from the yard, broken sticks, garden debris)" to her little den on the porch. A good little dog:).

Winter Wonderland

It's official - the snow season has begun. We got about 3 inches - enough to top the evergreen trees with a pretty frosting and cover the dingy grass and other plants. Of course we wish we had gotten a few more outdoor projects done before it came but I'm glad it's here. It's the March snows that I curse:). Josiah went out for a bit to throw snowballs at his dad.

Building Frustration

Up until lately, we have done almost exclusive "on location" photography with our preference being outdoors but . . . the need for an indoor studio is here. We have been using our semi-fixed up (very semi) granary for indoor shoots but as the cold weather creeps in it has been a challenge to keep it warm for our photo sessions - so we have been planning to build a studio on our farm. We thought maybe by now we would be further along but here it is November and we still don't have a site excavated. BUT, we are getting closer. I think we have settled on removing an old shed in need of massive repairs and building a post and beam structure on its site, with in-floor radiant heating and a loft for photos and an office space. We would essentially double the space we have now and it might actually have real sheet rocked walls (as opposed to what we currently have). The picture in my head of the studio looks great, now to put that vision into brick and mortar (or wood and concrete). We'll keep you posted on the progress. I'm hoping to get a dumpster for the demo tomorrow in here so it's starting . . .

It's Late . . .

I am a certified night owl, which would be great if I lived in a tree looking for mice to eat. But, instead I'm a mom with three busy boys who will no doubt be up somewhere around the 6:30 am time zone. Part of the problem is the only time I can get real computer work done is to begin about 8:30 pm - after they are all happily tucked in their beds.

Anyway, working on my photo class (a documentary wedding class) I feel a little like a greenhorn - which means the instructor is a good one. He has managed to move me out of my comfort zone on every assignment - definitely there is lots for me to learn. Here's a few practice photos from the "experimenting with flash" section.

Later--A

So now I have a blog

I suppose it's about time I got a blog - I mean, doesn't everyone have one by now? Life's been busy here, with taking photos and finishing up the garden work. At then end of October we celebrated my grandfather's 80th birthday with a surprise party. Here's the first moments of surprise! More later!
--A