Scouting family adventure!

I have an upcoming engagement session for a couple who love hiking and picnicking together. They requested their engagement session to take place at Parkville Nature Sanctuary. So as I always do when I'm unfamiliar with a place I went on a scouting trip. The family came with me on this gorgeous Saturday and we enjoyed our outing as a family.

 

After Spending some time looking at a confusing map we ventured out to find this waterfall.  A ways down the trail we hoped led to it there was a fork with a sign that told the waterfall was to the left. We followed that fork and after some hiking we finally came to the waterfall. Its not big, but its pretty and has plenty of "posing" spots for good ideas. My husband and son were adventurous enough to climb over to that rock for some posing. 

I stayed out on the rail with our daughter in her stroller but this is the view from me without my zoom lens. Still pretty! The bride and groom are having a fall wedding, however we are doing the engagement session in the spring. The theme of the wedding is going to be "Fall in love" (So cute!). So I played around with some ideas on photoshop and I can make the pictures look almost "Fall" like by removing the green and changing the contrast.

I edited this photo to give it some "fall" color by removing the green and adding some contrast. 

Of course I won't want to do all the pictures like that but it will be fun to have a couple that way, like I always do I will keep the original files as well as the changed image for the bride and groom to choose what they like best.

A little further down we came across a 2nd waterfall.

Perfect! With a bench and everything! There are so many great possibilities at this place I could feel my creative juices flowing!

A little further down the trail you come out of the wooded area into an open area and a large hill.... Actually from the looks of it and seeing on the map I think its actually a dam, if we hiked up that way we probably would have seen the lake. But that was a really big hill for us to be pushing a stroller up so we decided not to.

Just before entering the clearing my son wanted help walking on the trail logs.

I can totally see a bride and groom hand in hand as she walks along the logs and or leaning in for a kiss.... *sigh* So romantic.

Husband and son walking in the field, they went up the hill a little bit then came back.

I love the contrasting colors of the bright green grass and the bright blue sky! Couldn't be more perfect.... Oh wait, yes it could. The sun could be lower behind some tree's to get rid of the harsh shadowing on their faces... But that's just being nit picky.

Regardless of this being a "Work" trip for me, our whole family enjoyed it and it was a great family outing. Next week I can't wait to take photo's of a happy couple totally in love. What a great time in their lives!

Our first Bridal show

Yesterday, Sun April 1 2012 we participated in our first ever bridal show! We were so excited to have this opportunity to meet new people and make new friends while getting our name out there. The Perfect Wedding Guide hosted the show at the Overland Park Convention center.

Saturday we went in to get our booth set up, since we have never done a show before we weren't sure what to expect other then a 10x10 space with 1 8ft long table and 2 chairs. We planned a little modestly for the display due to not knowing for sure how everything would lay out. We paid a little extra to get a "corner" booth which I think was a good thing. As we were setting up and starting to look at what we had to work with I realized that we could make our booth look even better if we added something. So after we finished setting up what we had we ran over to Hobby Lobby and got one of those privacy type half walls that had places to place photos. The "photo frames" were an unusual size, not something we could get a picture to fill. The frames had mat boards in them and the biggest opening they had was a 5x7. So I thought it out and decided the best thing to do would be to cut some of my black backdrop paper off the roll and cut it to size to place pictures on and create like a large "floating" frame type look to it. Of course being such short notice I wasn't able to use my professional print lab to make the 8x10prints for me and had to settle for less then perfect quality prints. But they still looked pretty good and I got a lot of compliments on the display.

Sunday we woke up bright and early and after leaving instructions for Grandma headed to the convention center to finish with the final touches on the set up. Finally the moment came when they opened the doors and brides and grooms started filtering past our booth. Being in the very back it took a little longer but we finally saw some of the happy couples and began talking with them as we could. The turn out was a bit smaller then expected but we still connected with several people and we are hopeful to get a few clients.

At our booth we also offered a prize drawing, the drawing consisted of 1 free engagement session and 100 free wedding invitations. Our drawing box that we got was super cute, it was a big "book" that opened up into a box. It had magnetic closers so we decided to cut a slit in the top of it and have it standing like on a bookshelf for the couples to drop their entry forms into. Several of the brides and mothers LOVED the box, in fact we got more compliments on that then anything else! Of course every time someone complimented the box my husband would beam with pride because HE was the one that found it and got it. Job well done hubby!

So while the day was long and a lot of standing in one place it was overall a good day. We love getting to know our brides and grooms and really hope to be able to be a part of a few couples special day.

Our beautiful daughter chillin while we set up the booth. I think its funny how she was chewing on her diamond "engagement" ring at the bridal show.

A shot of our postcards and business cards.

Lots of cards ready to go!

Our booth all set up and ready to welcome couples for a visit.

Our last minute late night project... Turned out really great!

Our giant poster sized sign we made. Featuring my good friend and her husband.

Our drawing box... So cute!