Announcing the winners of my 1st annual photo contest!!!

I was suprised at how many entries I received! Thank you all for taking the time to look at my site and enter my photo contest. There were so many adorable kids, it was REALLY hard to choose the winners. Without the help of my judges, I never would have been able to choose, so thank you judges! Ok, so we have decided on six first prize winners. I had to split up the 1-3 age group into two, because it was impossible to choose with all those cuties, so there are now six categories instead of five. These first prize winners each received a gift certificate for a free session and a $100 credit toward their order. Congratulations! We also decided on a 2nd prize winner for each category, who will each receive a free session. Runners up are listed with the second prize winners below, because they were the ones we had narrowed it to in the end before choosing the winners, and I thought they should also be mentioned. Ok, here you have it!

Abigail Mary Block
1st prize for 0-12 month category

It was those big blue eyes and adorable smile that won over our judges!

Rilynn Reed

First prize for 1 yr category
That innocent face and great sense of style is what took Rilynn to the top!

Aurora Jacobson
1st prize for 2-3 yr olds
That little pout and beautiful hair made our judges melt!

Gavin Joseph Vetsch
1st prize for ages 4-7
Something about those eyes and that smile - he looks like a sweet kid!

Kaitlin Schiltz
1st prize winner for 8-12 year olds

The whole girl next door look got this cutie in the door!

Dillon Waldoch

1st prize for 13-17 year olds

Hardly even 13, this boy will soon be quite the heartbreaker!

And now announcing our second prize winners and runners up:

Blake Maher

Ethan Sutliff

Dominic Carlton

Amanda Peterson

Tyler Ketzmacher

Sam Ganyaw

Ashlyn Grace Vetsch

Andrew Lee

Ethan Behun

Sammi Rae Odegaard

Emma Lindsay

Sydney Holm

Emily Hannon

Kiera Newcombe

Jackson Navarro

Gabrielle Nelson

Connor Severson

Emmet Sutliff

Gabe and Blake

I just wanted to take a moment to share a very interesting article from MSN on what my type of business is all about! Please take a look: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15401287/

Let me know what you think!

Happy Holidays!

I can't believe it's already the middle of December! Crazy! I have been busy processing holiday card orders and prints, all that fun stuff! Anyway, I wanted to share my holiday card with you this year! If you look below, you'll see 3 images. The first is the front of the card, the second is when you open the first tab, and the 3rd is when it's open all the way. It's a 3 fold card. I was testing this type of card to see if I should offer it, and I just love it! It will soon be added to the Greeting Card/Announcements that I offer. Have a happy holiday!

Hi All! I just wanted to let you all in on a few things. First, if you look at my website under "rates", and scroll all the way to the bottom, you'll find my new baby milestones program! It's basically a great deal for those of you who want to document your baby's precious stages in a special way. There is also an option for a "mini session" which is basically a shorter session for a fun occasion where you don't need a full shoot, but want to capture something for a holiday card, a halloween costume, trip to the beach, whatever you want. This is available at a discounted rate, with the purchase of two full sessions in one year. Take a moment to check it out!

One other exciting thing I'm doing, is a photo contest. Submit a photo of your child that you have taken, age 0 - 17 years, and I will have a few friendly judges help me choose the favorites, one for each age category (0-12m, 1-3, 4-7, 8-12, 13-17). Photos are judged on the potential photogenic quality of the child, not your photography skills, so don't hold back because you're not a fabulous photographer. The winner from each category will recieve a free session and a $100 print credit. That's a $200 value! The photo you submitted will be posted here, and some of the photos from your session will be featured on my main site. To enter, send an email to KariLayland@gmail.com with a recent photo of your child, along with the child's age and the city where you are located. Must be 18 and older to enter, and live in the Twin Cities Metro area. Winners will be chosen on February 1st, 2007. Last entries must be recieved by January 20th, 2007. Good luck!

Alright, so I need your opinions! What do you think of my new header? I was just tired of the gigantic picture of me on there, that I had to do something. I was going for a vintage look, but I'm not sure it really goes. Let me know what you think! This is my tricky way of getting people to make comments, since I'm starting to feel like my blog has an audience of one and I need to feel popular. Come on, help my ego out, just a little?

Well, it was a fun weekend on my end! For Thanksgiving I went to my aunt's home in Northfield where part of my mom's huge family got together. It was definitely a full house. I tried to get involved in some card games, but it was a bit tough since Nina was one of two children in the house and demanding attention! She ran in circles almost the whole time, climbing under the table and grabbing people's feet, getting tickled and bonking her head more than once. Man, when they say toddlers are a handful, they were being nice! She's my little sweetie, and it was fun watching her see the Christmas tree when I set it up last night. Poor baby though grabbed a branch and scraped herself in the face. She has such soft baby skin and it's really sad to see her scratch it up :( I'll have to take a picture and post it. Maybe a little later. I will show you some photos from yesterday morning. I went to my sister's house and took some pictures of her two boys in front of the Christmas tree. It was quite the challenge, but we got it done! Jacob, her youngest is the same age as Nina, enough said. Anyway, here are some pictures!

Ok, so I finally had some time to get my product page up and running! Here's the link: www.kariphotography.com/products. I'm now offering handbags and canvas wraps, which is very exciting for me. I am loving those bags, so I'm going to have to stalk Nina again and get "THE" shot of her to use for a bag. That'll probably make for good advertising too, don't you think? I'm sure a great bag like that will stand out in the mall! Anyway, this last week was fun for sessions. I think my favorite was a little newborn boy named Blake. He was a sweet little blondie just over a week old. His hair was so soft! He had just gotten out of his first real bath, so he was freshly shampooed and so cuddely! He had a thing about his hands being in his face, so that was a little challenge, but with the help of his mommy with her finger/pacefier and Daddy's soothing voice, he fell asleep and I got to work my magic! They had an awesome dining room with contemporary black furniture with windows on both sides, so I was in heaven with that lighting! The family was great to work with and the pictures turned out great.

I had a family this weekend with two boys, 6 and 8 who had me laughing pretty much the whole time. Great personalities! I'm sure these two know how to work together and give Mom and Dad a run for their money! The younger boy took it upon himself to make everyone else smile, as he would snort like a pig right before every shot, of course making everyone bust a gut. The other, well, he had other methods, but his mom asked me not to write about that..... Hehe.

So I've been missing again, sorry about that. I have some good news though. I'm finally cured from the never ending cough! Yeah! That's very exciting news for me. Anyway, two more days until the new products are introduced. I'll give you a sneak peak. I'm going to be offering very classy leather handbags with your photo on them. They actually look very sleek and not at all cheesy. I'm going to have to get one for myself next time I get a good shot of Nina, which is increasingly difficult these days! Last weekend I did a mini shoot of her just to get some funny expressions to use in a storyboard to send to her long distance grandparents who don't see her often. Man, was she a little stinker! I didn't really plan for it, so as a spur of the moment thing, I set up the backdrop and put her in her sweater. If her hair's all messy, oh well. That's what she looks like most of the time anyway! So, here I am trying to get some pictures of her and what does she do? Well, the same thing most 16 month olds would do. RUN AWAY! Over and over again. That's ok, I have a game plan. I grabbed her stacking blocks and built a big tower right where I wanted her. What toddler can resist that? So here she comes, over to knock over my tower and there's my chance - snap, snap snap. UH OH! Did you knock over my tower? As she giggles, I get more pictures, yippy! It's amazing the things you think of when trying to get pictures of your kids. I have yet to take out the bubbles with Nina, I'll have to save that trick for a special occasion...

Ok, back on topic. New products. I just found an excellent vendor for canvas wrap prints, so now I'm proud to offer canvas prints! I will be working on designing some sample storyboards and senior collages, and will have an entire website devoted to specialty items. Watch for the link!

I went to the doctor today and they gave me steroids to ease the inflamation in my lungs. Does that mean I'm going to get big muscles? Haha, no really though, I have to take 9 pills tomorrow! Doesn't that just sound insane??? And now my throat is starting to hurt. It didn't hurt before. Will this ever go away or am I just going to have to live with this forever? I guess I should probably go to bed since Nina seems to be waking up extra early since daylight spending time last Sunday. Mama is NOT too happy about that! Anyway, I'm going to be ordering business card wallets with each order now that clients can pass out to their friends with their kid's picture on them. Here's a sample:

So I published my new price list online, and it is now in effect. For those of you who already had sessions based on the old price list, you still have until November 15th to finalize your orders and still get the old prices. Anyway, it seems like this cough isn't going anywhere, so I think I'm going to have to break down and see a doctor. I always feel like I'm wasting the doctor's time because every time I've gone in the past, it's just a virus and I'm supposed to drink lots of fluids and get rest. Well, I could have figured that out myself, but I guess it's good to have assurance from a pro. The whole rest thing isn't so easy when you have a 16 month old demanding your attention! Ok, on to some pictures, because I know that's what you read this for anyway! This one was actually a couple weeks ago, but I wanted to share some because I just loved the little hat and bootie set they had! Have I mentioned how much I love newborns?