The beautiful Drewiske family and I headed out to Butlers Orchard one warm Saturday this October. When we got there, we quickly realized that the Fall Harvest Festival Butlers Orchard was having was more popular than we had thought. All the cars & families made my job a little harder.

Here are a few pictures of the Drewiske family.

This 6 month old sweetie was such a good sport

Once their family pictures were complete, mom & dad changed the baby into her witch outfit.

She wasn’t too happy with the outfit change.

But after a bottle and a few cuddles from mom and dad

she was a happy little witch.

All in all, we had a great time. I was truly impressed how easy and laid back this amazing family is. Their love for one another can be seen by anyone.

Fall is and has always been my favorite time of the year.  The trees turn the prettiest shades of orange and red, the air has a slight chill in it, and the food is rich with flavor.  Plus it is football season -Go Titans!

This past weekend, the three boys  & I went on a hike with our Boy Scout troop.  The pack leader gave each group of boys a treasure hunt list.  Each Boy Scout was to take a picture of each item on the list. Then at their next meeting, they will take the best picture for each item & make a collage.

Needless to say, I had brought my camera with me and took this treasure hunt as a little challenge.  Here are a couple of things I checked off the treasure hunt list.

~ Something Man Made ~

~ Something Red ~

~ Something Curved ~

~ Something that fell ~

~ Something Made By An Animal ~

(Beaver Dam )

~ Mud ~

- Here are three extra pictures that were not part of our scavenger hunt -

At the start of the summer, the husband ( Tommy ) and I thought it would be fun if we could take the boys strawberry & apple picking at Butler’s Orchard. We soon found out that strawberry picking season & apple picking season are at different times of the year, which actually ended up working out well for us.

Up first was strawberry picking.

Strawberry picking season is in May here, and I was still very pregnant in May. But, that was not going to stop me from taking the family strawberry picking. One Sunday morning, we packed up the kids and made the long 5 minute drive to Butler’s Orchard.

When we got there, we got a tray to put our picked strawberries in.

Gavin decided he wanted to carry the tray AND pick strawberries.

Tommy & Gavin had a blast picking strawberries. I ended up not actually picking any myself – big pregnant belly & bending over to pick very low lying strawberries is NOT a good mixture- instead, I just took the pictures and followed Noah around. Luckily for us you are allowed to eat the strawberries as you pick them. This was good because all Noah wanted to do was eat the strawberries. I think he honestly ate more strawberries than he ended up putting into our bin.

Apple picking season didn’t start until September, which ended up being good for us. We went on a weekend when my mom came to town so she could enjoy the fun with us.

I was very excited to go apple picking. Growing up in Florida, you don’t normally get the chance to go apple picking. My excitement soon ended when I saw the size of the bugs!! No one ever tells you that the bugs around apple trees are HUGE!!!!! We saw a bee (and not the nice bumble bee type, but the “I’m gonna sting you” type) that was the length of my thumb!!!

Luckily, everyone else didn’t seem to care about all the bees & flies.

After walking around for a couple of minutes, we found a tree that had some really pretty apples on it. Each of us picked one apple, for a total of 5. The boys thought it was very cool to be able to pull the apples right off the tree. Again, all Noah wanted to do was eat his apple. This time though we were able to hold him off until we got home.

On our way back to the car we saw this beautiful butterfly.  He was so calm that we could all get up right next to him without him moving.

Later on that day, my mom & I decided to make homemade apple pies using the apples we had picked that morning. If you know me or my mom, you would know that we don’t cook. We are not the type of women who can cook an apple pie from scratch. Yes, I can bake cakes and cookies — with the help of the pre-packaged box mix- but, bake an apple pie… that was stretching it.

Somehow we pulled it off!!! The pies were super yummy!

All in all, apple picking & strawberry picking was a huge success. Even if I did have to run away from a couple of huge bees in the process.

Welcome to my new beginning.

This is a new beginning for my photography.  Before I went by Shades Of Grey Studios, but not anymore.

When I first started out my brother and I wanted to open a company that incorporated photography, web design & logo design.  And we successfully did that… for a while.  Then my lovely brother (who was the web & logo guru) got accepted into a master’s program.   As you can imagine he quickly didn’t have time to be designing, which led to us dropping that part of the company.

Shortly after that, my family and I moved up to Maryland.  I started thinking about changing my business name, but I never fully made up my mind.   A part of me wanted to keep the same identity and a part of me wanted a big change.

Fast forward to this past summer – 1 year later- I finally decided I really wanted to take my photography & business to the next level.  It was time to fill out all the necessary paperwork to make us legal.  It was going to be a big, scary, financially (those darn taxes!) draining step. But, I was ready to do it.  I wanted to use “Shades of Grey Photography” but quickly learned I couldn’t because a very talented photographer was already going by the name  ”Shades of Gray Photography.” To me, this was a sign.

I needed to change my identity.  But to what?

I toggled with the idea of using my first & middle name.  However, I never go by my middle name.. so why would I now.

I finally decided that I just needed to go the old fashion route of using my name.  My business identity should be the same as my personal identity.  That is one of the many things I have learned from all the wonderful and VERY talented photographers I admire.

 If I can’t be me on a shoot, or in a blog… then this whole little adventure isn’t going to work.

Once that was settled, the plan was to take 3 weeks maternity leave (after having baby boy #3) and then open Allison Bolsega Photography.  But, like most things in life, my plan wasn’t going to work.  Life ended up getting in the way, and I knew that I had to postpone the grand opening.

Now — 3 months later– things are finally starting to fall into place, and I am finally ready to open Allison Bolsega Photography.

This time, things are going to be more personal.  You will see more pictures of my family, as well as of my wonderful clients.  You will read more random blogs about everyday life as a stay-at-home mom & photographer.

Allison Bolsega Photography will be less formal and more fun.

To start things off I thought I would show you all my super, cool new logo that I made all.by.myself!!

Yes, I know you are very impressed.