Wildflowers Photography

hello there!  we have been working on figuring out our exact destinations for the next six months and feel we have a good enough idea of our schedule at this point to be able to share it!  so, this is (pretty much) our schedule for the rest of the year and what availability we currently have to shoot sessions along the way.  in the past with travel sessions, i have booked up quickly once we announce dates and they are first come, first serve.  being with my family will be so very important to me while we are traveling so i will be taking limited sessions in the cities along the way.  so, all that to say, please don’t hesitate to email me at joy@wildflowersphotos.com if you are genuinely interested in hiring me to photograph your family and live along our travel route!

our adventure itinerary:

june 3rd  - july 14th:  our journey begins!  northern california, oregon & washington and then back down to southern california.  the month of june is packed solid but we do have a few days in the first week of july where i could possibly book an oregon or northern california session.

july 14th – august 5th:  santa barbara & ventura county, california.

august 6th – 25th:  heading through nevada, utah, idaho and montana.

august 25th – september 3rd:  orange county & san diego, california.

september 6th – 17th:  healdsburg, ca

september 18th – 23rd:  central coast california – s.l.o., pismo, etc.

september 24th – october 7th:  yosemite

october 8th – 15th:  ventura county, ca and then temecula, ca

october 16th – november 5th:  northern arizona & colorado

november 5th – november 20th:  nebraska & iowa

november 21st – december 10th:  oklahoma and possibly louisiana

december 11th:  austin, texas bound!  we are hoping to find a small, humble house with some land to lease somewhere in the texas hill country where we can park our trailer as a guest house, let the children run free, grow a big garden, get our first puppy and raise chickens, sheep, goats and maybe a cow (so a barn would be a bonus on the property too, lol).  i will still be shooting sessions and teaching mentorships and workshops out of austin and donny will be starting his own pool business in the area.  life will be slower and much more intentional.  we will still travel often and hope to visit the east coast in spring of 2014!

if you hear of any folks in the texas hill country with a little country house on some land that may be looking to lease it starting at the end of the year, please let us know!  ;)

hello!  so, here is an update on what we’ve been doing these last two weeks since i blogged about our plans to put our house on the market and sell all of our belongings in an effort of simplifying our life and living on the road for a while (check two posts back to read about that if you haven’t already)!

we had our estate sale last weekend and we sold pretty much ALL of our stuff.  hundreds of people showed up to support us at our sale and buy our belongings and we felt so very loved.  there was a moment right before the sale started when i walked outside with the baby and meant to just welcome everyone, but when i opened my mouth to speak, only tears came out along with the kind of loud crying that doesn’t even make sense.  there haven’t been many moments in my life where i’ve been so overwhelmed with joy that all i’ve come up with is tears and it was a beautiful moment.  i looked around at all the faces of the people there just smiling back.  i saw old friends, new friends, past clients, my family, dancing children, daddies feeding their babies, and faces of friends i’d made online and finally got to meet for the first time in real life.  it was overwhelming.  i was mush.  and then to watch everyone just stream through our home and gather up things from our past, it was pretty surreal.  i remembered all the stories from the items we were selling and the happy faces of new owners and the homes they would all now be going to.  it felt so freeing!  when it was all over, donny and i sat down on the couch as the breeze was blowing through the house and we just looked at each other and smiled so big and cried again.  we agreed that we both just felt like we were doing exactly what we were supposed to be doing.  that the big picture was so much greater than all the stuff.  and that the weight of the world in having to manage all the stuff was suddenly just gone.  that saying is so true that less is more, so much more.

when people are asked if a fire was to start in their home, what would they grab first, the answer is usually their family and pets, the photographs and the things that are the most special.  and, well, that’s what we are doing.  we’ve got our babies, our old photographs and the equipment to take lots of new ones along the journey, and our most special belongings (quilts i’ve made for each child, their favorite toys, etc).  we’ve got enough clothes and household items for everyday living and we have the dream of living our happy life right in front of us.  we hope the kids remember this.  we hope that they don’t have to wait until they are “grown ups” to realize how beautiful simplicity is.

we have had so many beautiful moments in this bittersweet time of packing, sorting, boxing, giving and selling.  the kind of moments where the most important things in life are so blazingly clear.  it feels good to have less and to know we are that much closer to being free of the burden of debt and maintaining all the stuff.

and as for selling our house… we are in escrow!!!  it’s amazing the way that God works.  we always said that if we were meant to do this that God would allow our house to sell quickly.  i got an email randomly from a family that said they wanted to buy our house!  they came over and everything fell into place before we even got a chance to put it on the market.  and it is just the perfect fit for their family!  we put so much of our hearts into making this house a home and it feels so great knowing that this family will love all those details too.  pretty crazy how when you take a step in the direction you are supposed to go, that God aligns everything perfectly.  we close escrow at the end of this month, then shoot two weddings and then we will be living in the trailer, seeing the country, shooting family sessions and weddings along the way until the end of 2013!  i will be posting our travel dates and openings for family sessions along the way next week so stay tuned!  :)

here are photos from the day of our sale…

and some more photos of life around here the last week or so…

 gracie has spend lots of time in the backyard.  i know she will miss this happy space but we talk a lot about the amazing nature we are going to travel to soon! we planted these pink roses in our backyard when my grandma nina went to heaven.  it started as a tiny plant and it now taller than gracie and flourishing!  we will have to get us a little tiny rose bush for the trailer.  :) this son of mine… he is a baby lover.  he is absolutely crazy about his “Mabel Darling” as he calls her.  he loves to wear her in the carrier anytime i let him.  it melts me.  we are surely savoring our last few weeks in our home.  lots more photos coming soon.