There’s this “rule of 7″ in my family that went for a full 49 years before it got broken. But starting with my mom’s oldest sister, my aunts, mom and most of my female cousins on my mom’s side are separated by 7 years, including my sister and me. It’s kind of a neat thing if you ask me.

Speaking of years, I’m really proud of my sister Stephanie for a lot of reasons. We have a lot of stories between us, ranging from leaving her at a Cracker Barrel once in Ohio (she tells that one every chance she gets) to her having the fattest steer at the Jr. National Hereford Expo in Montana one year. Then there was the time that she didn’t get accepted to the theater department at U of I, so we drove around campus for half a day talking to the admissions office and the art department trying to get her into one of the programs at Illinois. I think I told the admissions lady something along the lines of “She WILL go to school here eventually, whether it’s this year or down the road.” I guess we did something right because within a couple weeks she was accepted to the art department and she’s been there ever since.

Mostly though, I think she deserves the most credit for graduating in 4 years while raising my nephew for 3 of those years. Steph jokes that Nevan (now two and a half) is also graduating from college so he got to be a part of the photo shoot. And if Aunt Holly has anything to say about it, Nevan WILL go to Illinois someday.

The “safe” headshot in case Mom doesn’t like the other more artsy ones. Haha…

Special thanks for Scott and Barb at Memory Lane Photography for letting me borrow the cap and gown for a few hours!

My friend Elizabeth asked a few weeks before Christmas if I could get a few shots of her, her mom and her sister before they add her fiance Mark to the picture next October. Mark and Elizabeth are both good friends of mine and Aaron’s so we’re very much looking forward to photographing their wedding and partying it up at the reception (they are adamant about me putting down the camera and enjoying myself once my work is done!).

It was a FREEZING afternoon between Christmas and New Year’s and I don’t know how they all 3 stayed out in the cold so long without their coats, but we got in what we could before their noses all turned too red!

I have been a total blog slacker since before the holidays!! My apologies, loyal blog readers.

Here are a couple favorites from a family session I did one cold afternoon a few days before Christmas.

On Sunday I got to take a short country drive to rural Lovington, Illinois, to do some family portraits for my friend Sarah and her husband Kyle’s family. I actually showed cattle with Kyle and his brother Joel (they showed Shorthorns and I showed Herefords) too. And I was so excited that Kyle knew what my license plate (named after one of my favorite steers) meant! I was also excited to get to shoot pictures with corn, straw bales and a CaseIH combine. Everyone knows that red is the way to go, whether it’s tractors or cattle.

Here are my favorite images from the session:

The three farmers of the bunch:



So adorable! Gotta love those blonde curls and blue eyes!

The R family ordered both a metal print and 2 canvases following their family session. I love ordering new and big stuff, so this order was a lot of fun for me to tackle.


20×24


16×20

For Father’s Day weekend, I was able to do a family session for the R family and also hang out with my dad back in my hometown area. Nikki became a fan of my work from everything that I post on Facebook and wanted some pictures of her boys, their family and her parents. Despite the heat, it worked out really great.

Nikki’s brother, Chad, was one of my classmates from kindergarten all the way through high school, and I have to say that the oldest brother looks a lot like his uncle to me! I had a great time hanging out in Easton with you guys!

The whole family–including Grandma & Grandpa and excluding Dad–are St. Louis Cardinals fans. They all donned their redbirds jerseys and wanted to make sure that we got a back shot of them all wearing Pujols #5.

Some trampoline action:

haha…

This guy was so cooperative even though he kept looking away from the camera!

And finally, a dip in the pool… cannonball!

I ventured home for the weekend to hang out with my dad’s side of the family and have a cookout on Saturday. We had a mini Easter egg hunt for Nevan (a whole 5 eggs!) and subsequently gave him a sugar overload. The next day, I went to church in Mason City with Dad and Nevan where we had some amazing biscuits and gravy (my favorite!). Then my siblings and Nevan and I headed to Havana to have lunch at my grandma’s and then go to the annual Roat Easter Egg Hunt. Aunt Katie is amazing herself and decorated and filled and labeled hundreds of eggs! There were 75 people in attendance and each child gets his or her own egg that they have to find. There’s also a prize egg every year which is a big incentive for the kiddos.
This is Uncle Jerry with his Easter Bunny hat

Look, it’s me!

Papa Joe gave the kids at Grandma Roat’s each a bubble wand

Jack kept saying “Die, bubbles, die!”


One of my favorite photos of the day. This is Trevor trying to not get his picture taken, running away from me. Didn’t work!
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This kid is going to break some hearts. Of course, I’m biased.

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Getting the candy goodness from Grandpa
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