Wildflowers Photography » farm

Skye & Gary and their homespun farm stand!

Joy — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 13:02:30 +0000

a little over a year ago i was so excited to have my dear friend, skye, ask me to photograph an engagement shoot for her and her hubby-to-be, gary! you may know her as the genius child photographer behind work of heart photography and the inspirational blog, reverie mine! and if you are familiar with her work, i am sure you know the butterflies i was feeling in being given such a wonderful honor of photographing her and her beau! so she told me their story and how they were such farm folks at heart and really loved to get to the heart of simple, organic living… and the theme for our homespun farm stand shoot was born! over the course of time we had some scheduling conflicts and somehow it turned into their first anniversary shoot instead of an engagement shoot! so after over a year of brainstorming, collecting, crafting and getting excited, it finally happened. as for the planning, we incorporated our “new” prop, a 1954 lakewood vintage trailer, and transformed it into a funky farm stand itself (we totally renovated it!). we spent hours wrapping gourds and squash to give it them all sweaters for that homespun crafty feel and collaborated on all the fresh veggies and crates. it really was quite magical, and what a true honor it was to photograph a couple that i know holds marriage so very sacred under God and that are just over the moon passionate about one another. xoxo

The Atkins Family at the farm!

Joy — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 20:42:48 +0000

this darling family contacted me alllllll the way from australia earlier this year to set up a shoot when they would be here in the states for vacation to capture their new little man, kieren and them together as a little family! we had grand plans initially of a shoot at the beach but the weather didn’t want to cooperate so we instead planned for a happy day at the farm instead. lara (the mama) ended up picking this farm because she worked there when she was in school back in her younger years. (i think it worked out as it should have, though, in the end to be able to come back around the world and show her new little family the place now as a mommy!) she pulled her little guy around in a wagon, holding the hand of her love… they picked strawberries, cuddled in the cabbage patch and danced their way through all the dirt rows. their love was incredibly contagious… see for yourself. (p.s. lara, can’t wait to visit you all in australia one of these days and finally do that beach shoot we dreamed about.)

registration now open for “a wildflowers workshop” – nov. 2011 in santa barbara!

Joy — Wed, 18 May 2011 04:07:56 +0000

we are happy to announce our next “a wildflowers workshop” for professional women photographers! the workshop will be held november 8th, 9th and 10th, 2011 in santa barbara, california at a beautiful private farm estate. the workshop will begin at 5pm on tuesday, november 8th and end at 3pm on the 10th. all details about what is covered at the workshop can be found on our official workshop site here. our last workshop in round top, texas was an amazing success and we are so excited to have the demand to add another one to our schedule this year! if you missed the official wrap-up from the texas workshop, you can find it here (along with many testimonials from attendees).

to register for the santa barbara workshop, please email us directly at wildflowersphotography@yahoo.com.

we visited the farm in santa barbara this past weekend where we will be hosting the workshop and are excited to share some images. all i can say is that i can’t hardly wait to shoot there!!! there is an amazing barn with lovely natural light and authentic antique furnishings, a huge vintage chicken coup, horses, goats, chickens running wild, an organic garden (from which some of our meals will be fresh picked!), views of the ocean and the mountains in every direction and many other amazing touches around on the property. can’t wait to see you there!

A little time in the country…

Joy — Tue, 10 May 2011 23:26:34 +0000

we are at the tail end of our trip here in texas and it is oh, so bittersweet to head back home. our three week family/work trip began with spending easter down in corpus christi with family at one of the most special places to me, my grandparents’ ranch, then heading north after that staying in new braunfels, bastrop, austin and ending up at our final destination of round top (the tiniest town in texas, population 90!) where i held my first ever workshop for professional photographers (“a wildflowers workshop!” – stay tuned to the blog for a full wrap up later this week!). it was a trip out of dreams, really (aside from the pure exhaustion of preparing a workshop in the texas humidity and heat being 6 months pregnant with two little monkeys in tow, lol!). somehow, as a family, we always feel more at peace in texas. we spent many evenings on the porch just breathing in the sweet air, watching gracie and brandon run wild chasing butterflies through the fields, eating buttermilk pie and drinking dr. pepper out of glass bottles, singing along to good country music, stargazing, laughing and just plain soaking in the goodness of life. i took thousands of photos and these are just a scattering of random ones of the countryside and the kids to give you a taste of our time here. there will probably be five or more additional blog entries coming later this week and next about the workshop (which surpassed my expectations and was so very humbling and fantastic), the wonderful places we stayed, a family session i did while we were here and one very special shoot i did of my gracie girl.

i have this wonderful piece of art on my fridge called the “daydream list” by katie daisy and i would say that we, for this short time, thoroughly did experience the life that we had only thought up in our most lovely dreams… “hello, daydream: a clawfoot tub, a sunny yellow kitchen, a belly up kitty in the late sun, a painted wooden porch swing, slow dance in the backyard, a cheerful goldfinch song, fireflies in the grass, banana bread & chamomile tea, a sleeping puppy, an old barn for a studio, the baby in a wash tub, the prairie’s morning dew.”

Apple picking with Gracie & Brandon!

Joy — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 01:00:31 +0000

we took the kids down for a little trip to one of our favorite towns, julian, california (julian is also the location of my june workshop for photographers)! it is this adorable and quaint tiny farm town up in the mountains just outside san diego. it is like a hidden gem with salvage shops all along the road, caramel apples and apple pie on every corner and just a feeling of small town simple comfort! it’s not often we take off on a whim with our two little monkeys for endless hours in the car but we are trying to take more adventures and stop putting off the good stuff. :) we stayed in an old historical house that made us feel like we were in a hideaway 100 years ago out in the woods! on our last night there, we sat down in an old wooden rockers in front of the furnace with homemade cinnamon rolls from the corner pie shop and just listened as brandon and gracie chased each other around the house barefoot on the old wooden floor. it’s these simple things that make the most beautiful memories, the ones that i so often overlook in all the busyness, but on this trip i soaked it all in. looking forward to a lot more of this kind of good stuff.

and a few with the self timer of the whole fam…

my boy in his happy place…

Joy — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 21:59:49 +0000

here is my little brandon, 21 months old. his happy place is anywhere he can eat food off the ground, get dirty, pull weeds and run wild. today it was at the farm. still can’t believe he is almost 2. i tell him and gracie every day that they need to stop growing and gracie always responds, “mommmmmmy!!! i will still cuddle you when i am big, okkkk?!” i sure hope they both stick to that promise…

Marcus & his cousin, Dylan… at the farm.

Joy — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 18:19:07 +0000

nothing makes two little boys happier than running around half dressed, riding on tractors, talking to horses and just getting themselves reeeal dirty!

A family at the dairy farm…

Joy — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 19:29:00 +0000

my sweet client, becky, has had her eye on this abandoned dairy farm for ages as an amazing photo spot and i couldn’t have been more excited to shoot there when she told me about it! this place takes the cake as my favorite location to shoot in a long time. it was gloomy on my drive out to the spot but just as i arrived, the sunlight peeked out of the clouds sending light beams down onto the old barns, rusted tractors, lines of fruit trees, railroad tracks and the tumbleweeds blowing in the distance. the light was golden and beautiful and this sweet family couldn’t have been more fun.

(becky, i hope you feel that i did your awesome location justice!)