MAN did we have a good weekend! I haven’t sat at the computer since WEDNESDAY! That was amazing! I did have a session on Friday BUT it doesn’t really count because we had our good friends come with us, it was at a winery, we were kid-free over night (thanks GoGo and Bubba!) and we had one of the MOST amazing dinners EVER afterwards (Tony’s on Main Street in St. Charles was SO good!). Plus the family couldn’t have been sweeter even in the midst of freezing cold temps, WIND, a 13 day old cold baby and Grandparents who weren’t huge fans of being outside in the cold! HA! Truly, some families get so super stressed out when things aren’t going well, and while I totally understand that, it’s the families that roll with the punches I love the most! After all, they are just photos! AND to Tressa, Troy and their family… I think you’re going to adore the images!

Anyway, we also had two big firsts here this weekend! I can’t wait to show you the images but on Saturday night we watched National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation in our front yard! Chris rigged the whole thing by attaching a white sheet to our big tree and our tire swing, we had a projector, a fire pit, shared dinner with our favorite neighbors and five kids (and four adults) in absolute heaven! It was a magical night of true memory making! Then today the kids shot their first BB gun! After watching The Christmas Story for the first time this year (it’s a favorite in this house and almost always the Christmas movie requested first!) Gray has been obsessed with the Red Rider BB Gun! So Tim (same awesome neighbor) made it happen today in our back yard! It was pretty cool! Shooting is slowing down a bunch this month so get ready for lots of personal photos dating back to the summer that I never had time to share!

I think the Burke’s have waited patiently enough for these! HA! On to the photos!

I am loving at-home sessions! They are unpredictable but SO honest. And lovely. And true. That’s what I love the most. The truth.

I didn’t do a Black Friday sale or a Shop Small Saturday sale because I don’t think it’s fair to all of my clients that pay full price for my sessions. And moving into 2013 I won’t ever do a “sale” again. However, I want to be honest about something. This business supports our family in a big way. Every Christmas gift we buy this year is from the income Fresh Art provides. Not to mention it helps pay some of the most basic bills. Chris has an amazing job that he loves and gets paid well for it but it’s also true that being a high school teacher can’t supper our family of five on its own. And since Fresh Art is so important to our family the slow winter months are hard on us. Sometimes really hard. SO there won’t be any sales BUT I’m going to announce some Fresh Class dates, some fun new mini session options and a special on in-home sessions and newborn sessions during the winter. I’ve started to really dislike the idea of a sale but in order to keep things hopping around here I am going to offer some specials I never have before as incentives! I hope you guys get as excited about this as I am!

AND I have a HUGE giveaway coming this week too! All inspired by Oprah! HA!

So much more to come this week!