I grew up in Southern Illinois and have lived in Benton for about 17 years. My husband and I have been married for 30 years. We have 2 grown daughters and 2 little doggies.

I am pretty sure I drink too much coffee and watch far too many crime shows.

I am introvert and when I first started seriously doing photography I honestly didn’t know if I could. I mean I knew I could take and edit the photos but I didn’t know if I would be able to talk to people. It’s kind of funny to think about now because I am pretty sure none of my regular clients would think of me as shy or introverted, photography brings out a different side of me.

I always say it began because I was so obsessed with getting my girls pictures taken every time I turned around but my love of pictures started long before then.

In grade school I did my 4h project on a photography story board. Armed with an old 35mm film camera with a flash cube on top. In highschool I talked my sister into helping me take some self portraits and make posters. When my husband and I started dating we would travel all over the Shawnee National Forrest hiking and taking photos. The amount of film we used to send in was crazy.

When we had our girls I was obsessed with getting their photos taken. We didn’t have digital cameras yet and Sears was the studio of choice. At the time my husband thought I was really over doing it but I do not regret all the photos I have of them as they grew.

I truthfully never planned to be a photographer. I had went to school for Early Childhood Ed when I was young but didn’t finish. While my girls were little I almost always had at least one extra child that I was caring for and I worked in our church nursery or Sunday school almost my whole adult life. Working with children is something I have always enjoyed.

In 2010 when my niece was almost 2 and was just way too shy to get her photos done at the local JC Penney I got the bright idea to try and get a couple photos of her that we could at least print and hang up.

This one thing turned in to something I never dreamed of. I began finding every class on line that I could. I asked friends to photograph their kids. Then friends started asking me to photograph their kids.

When 2012 rolled around my calendar was starting to fill up with photo requests. At this time I wasn’t charging as I wasn’t a legal business. The more requests I received the more I began to think I should file for a business license.

In June of 2012 I became official. Opened my fb page and never looked back. Being able to capture all your family’s memories is truly the best job in the world. I am so blessed to be able to do it for a living.