My Best Christmas Present " E V E R " ! ! ! !

This was something that my kids did for me & Bill today on Christmas that made us happier than anything else possible!!! I just now heard from my daughter & they have made it over half way back to Wilmington N.C. tonite & the baby slept all the way. It is the preferrable way to travel for them these days, when Isaak is sleeping and understandably so. He is so full of energy and doesn't like to be confined to a carseat for long periods of time. I am missing that little guy already and can't hardly wait for him to come back in a few days. We want to share every moment possible with them before they move to Australia again in a couple of weeks. I want to say Thank You to all of my family for making this happen for me & Bill today. It was sort of a group effort to accomplish this.....first off I want to say thank you to my "HUBBY" for being such a great photographer & having all the knowledge to set the camera & lights. Then thank you to both Jason & Natalie, our beautiful children for their loving smiles & helpful caring ways. They were so good at co-ordinating clothes on the spur of the moment. Also I want to say thank you to my son-in-law who was suffering with a migraine headache for being so gracious to allow us to do this while he wasn't feeling so well. Also thank you to Isaak for being just so "STINKIN' CUTE" and doing so good when he was really tired from his nap being cut short today!! Then thank you to my Mom for actually being the one to push the button on the camera & being the photographer for the day. And doesn't she look great?!?! I look like I could be her Mother. LOL!!! And then last of all thank you to my Mother-in-law who was such a good sport for going along with all of this when she had "NO IDEA" that we were even gonna do this. Actually we didn't either. LOL!!!! But that's how our family tends to do things.........we just go with the flow and we're very last minute, spontaneous kind of people. We have tried for nearly the last 5 to 7 years to do our family portrait so I am just thrilled that we could finally make it become reality. That is why this is the best christmas present "EVER"!!! I just want to take this time to wish everyone a MERRY, MERRY CHRISTMAS from our family and hope that your family is equally blessed as ours was this beautiful holiday season.

"OUR RECENT TRIP TO WILMINGTON"

As several of you may already know, we just recently returned from a visit with our daughter & her family in Wilmington,NC. Well we had such a wonderful time down there and Bill accused me of trying to spoil Isaak rotten. "HEY, Isn't that what Grandparents are supposed to do"?!? I was only trying to do my job! No seriously we absolutely adore this little guy or maybe I should say we're C R A Z Y over him!!! He's also very animated, as you can see in some of these. I can't imagine where that comes from now......can you??!!?! The close-up one where Nat is holding him & the sun is just beaming down on his hair is truly a "PRECIOUS MOMENT"......I just love the one where Damon is tossing him up in the air, he loves for his Daddy to do this. Then the one that melts our hearts the most is the one where they are walking away. We were so happy to be able to share time with them and look forward to more times like these. We also went to a local park nearby their home, I will post some images that we took of Isaak playing there in a day or so. Isaak is ate up with cuteness and has the sweetest little smile & personality so I just wanted to share these with everyone. Love, Granna & Grandpaw Whitlock

"The Smokie Mountains"

Last week we were on vacation in the Smokie Mountains and I just wanted to share this story with everyone. Bill always loves to photograph all of the old settlements, and cabins as well as the beautiful mountain streams so that is what we were doing. Along our drive that day I had noticed a particular van parked here & there with writing in the windows like you would normally see at a wedding reception, but this one caught my eye. It read something like "JUST MARRIED AGAIN, 50 YEARS"!!! At the next place we stopped Bill got out of the van to set up his tripod to begin photographing this log cabin & mountain stream. Lo and behold there was a couple stopped at the same location just walking around. I said, Oh Bill I would just love it if you could get some photographs with that couple in some of them. So he approached them and asked if we could photograph them, and explained to them that he was a professional photographer. Also he reassured them that he wasn't trying to sell them anything by no means. We were just on vacation our selves and wanted to do this merely for our pleasure. Well, they were the sweetest couple and we found out that they were the ones driving the van we had seen with the writing in the windows. They were so kind to pose for us and let us "PLAY" and photograph them for at least 30 minutes or longer. Bill didn't have all of his standard equipment with us that we normally use when photographing people outside, we thought he'd mainly be doing landscape photography. While talking with them we learned that they were from around Chattanooga TN & that they were celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary. I hope that both of them & all of their family enjoy the images that we were able to capture. In some small way I hope we've added some memories of this truly special time in their lives. We want to wish Mr. & Mrs. Bice a HAPPY 50th ANNIVERSARY!!! Most people go on vacation to get away from their work, but not when you are in a profession like ours.............this is what makes our work so enjoyable and rewarding. We absolutely love what we do!