April is Autism Awareness month. Autism has struck us pretty close to home, our son Anakin was diagnosed with it when he was two. It’s been a struggle and a blessing. He’s 8 and non-verbal, but he’s learning new signs all the time. He’s starting to pick them up faster and it’s so awesome to see the progress he makes everyday. He’s such a little sweetheart & his laughter is almost magical.

If you’ve never met any one with Autism, odds are that you will soon, about 1 in 150 American children are diagnosed with it every year.

“Autism is a complex developmental disability that typically appears during the first three years of life and affects a person’s ability to communicate and interact with others. Autism is defined by a certain set of behaviors and is a “spectrum disorder” that affects individuals differently and to varying degrees. There is no known single cause for autism, but increased awareness and funding can help families today.” (From the Autism Society of America Website)

“Here are some signs to look for in the children in your life:

• Lack of or delay in spoken language Repetitive use of language and/or motor mannerisms
• (e.g., hand-flapping, twirling objects)
• Little or no eye contact
• Lack of interest in peer relationships
• Lack of spontaneous or make-believe play
• Persistent fixation on parts of objects “

(From the Autism Society of America Website)

More information on autism

To help the cause for every wedding package booked in April I’m donating $50 to the Autism Speaks.

I’m also giving away a free portrait session* to a Quad-City area child with autism. The winner will receive a 1 hour portrait session in a location (in the Quad-City area) the child is comfortable in, a disk with High resolution digital files from the session and a free 8×10. To enter just send an e-mail to tiffanie@tiffanieimages.com with the following.

• Name
• Phone Number
• E-mail address
• Age of the child

A drawing will be held May 5th to select the winners. If you have any questions e-mail them to Tiffanie@tiffanieimages.com.

Here is an image of last years winner.

If you would like to make a personal donation to Autism speaks you can do so here or to the ASA.

These are some other helpful links if you want to learn more about Autism or know someone with autism and are looking for help.

http://www.autismspeaks.org/
http://www.autism-society.org/
http://www.autismlink.com/
http://www.talkaboutcuringautism.org/index.htm

Quad-cities Support groups
http://www.autismqc.org/calendar.htm
http://www.qcautismcenter.org/page/page/2959054.htm
QC yahoo group – http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/quadcityautism/
Iowa Services – http://www.autismlink.com/locations/view/16
Illinois Services – http://www.autismlink.com/locations/view/14

Gluten-Free Casein-Free Diet information
Recipes, menu planning & info – http://gfcf-diet.tacanow.org/
http://www.gfcfdiet.com/

* Portrait session will be based on availability. No substitutions.

I love this time of year, it really makes you think about how important your family & friends are. I feel so lucky to have my caring & supportive husband, my two awesome babies & a wonderful group of family & friends close by. I hope everyone else had a wonderful thanksgiving!

I thought I’d share a few personal pictures from the last few weeks. Be prepared though, because it should be a weird mix. I didn’t post any Halloween pictures yet, but I feel I should, so I’m mixing ghouls with warm fuzzy Christmas tree moments.

My super studly zombie-obsessed husband.

I’m a vampire, cause that’s what Crystal wanted me to be.

My adorable sweet little vampire bride.

I take back the sweet part.

My cute little fireman! He doesn’t like his picture taken anymore so there’s only one.

Ok, a little bit after Halloween, a friend of mine from work gave me a surprise for Crystal. It was going to be Christmas present, but we would have had a hard time hiding this one in the attic.

Isn’t she just adorable. Crystal named her Raven, although we’ve been calling her “meep” because that’s the sound she makes all the time.

She’s too cute for words!

I love this one because he’s trying to steal her candy & hoping we won’t notice.

I swear our house isn’t usually this messy, it’s just Christmas tree boxes. Ok, I might be lying, I am not an awesome house cleaner. Thankfully my husband’s pretty good at it.

Sadly, this is probably the last year daddy is going to have to lift her up to put the star on the tree, Crystal is growing up way too fast.

About 10 minutes after we put it all up, (and yes it’s a fake tree, it looks bad, but I hate cleaning up pine needles.) trouble here came along and destroyed the bottom half of the tree & then proceeded to climb it like a crazy kitten squirrel.

Anyways, I hope the rest of you have a wonderful holiday season!

April is Autism Awareness month. Autism  that has struck us pretty close to home, our son Anakin was diagnosed with it when he was two.  It’s been a struggle and a blessing. He’s 7 and still non-verbal, but he’s learning new signs all the time.  He has some wonderful teachers who work very closely with him and whom I feel genuinely care about him.  As hard as it has been watching Anakin struggle with communicating, he is a bright little boy with an infectious laugh & a wonderful sense of humor.  I love seeing how my daughter acts with him, she’s so caring and loving. I think our family is stronger because of everything we’ve gone through.

If you’ve never met any one with Autism, odds are that you will soon, about 1 in 150 American children are diagnosed with it every year.

“Autism is a complex developmental disability that typically appears during the first three years of life and affects a person’s ability to communicate and interact with others. Autism is defined by a certain set of behaviors and is a “spectrum disorder” that affects individuals differently and to varying degrees. There is no known single cause for autism, but increased awareness and funding can help families today.” (From the Autism Society of America Website)

“Here are some signs to look for in the children in your life:

• Lack of or delay in spoken language Repetitive use of language and/or motor mannerisms
• (e.g., hand-flapping, twirling objects)
• Little or no eye contact
• Lack of interest in peer relationships
• Lack of spontaneous or make-believe play
• Persistent fixation on parts of objects “

(From the Autism Society of America Website)

More information on autism

To help the cause for every wedding package booked in April I’m donating $150 to the Autism Society of America.

I’m also giving away 5 free portrait sessions to Quad-City area children with autism. The winners will receive a 1 hour portrait session in a location (in the Quad-City area) the child is comfortable in, a disk with High resolution digital files from the session and a free 8×10. To enter just send an e-mail to tiffanie@tiffanieimages.com with the following.

• Name
• Phone Number
• E-mail address
• Age of the child

A drawing will be held May 14th to select the winners. If you have any questions e-mail them to Tiffanie@tiffanieimages.com.

If you would like to make a personal donation to the ASA you can do so here.

These are some other helpful links if you want to learn more about Autism or know someone with autism and are looking for help.

http://www.autism-society.org/
http://www.autismspeaks.org/
http://www.autismlink.com/
http://www.talkaboutcuringautism.org/index.htm

Quad-cities Support groups
http://www.autismqc.org/calendar.htm
http://www.qcautismcenter.org/page/page/2959054.htm
QC yahoo group – http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/quadcityautism/
Iowa Services – http://www.autismlink.com/locations/view/16
Illinois Services – http://www.autismlink.com/locations/view/14

Gluten-Free Casein-Free Diet information
Recipes, menu planning & info – http://gfcf-diet.tacanow.org/
http://www.gfcfdiet.com/

Holidays are crazy, and I’m partially glad to have them over with. I always get stressed out before hand, we have so many places to go, gifts to buy, errands to run and shopping is a pain with huge lines and no parking. I’m always sad when they’re over with though. I love the christmas lights and getting together with family that you don’t see often. Mostly I love how excited the kids get.
I hope everyone else had a great holiday season! Here’s a few pictures from ours.

I love this series of Crystal, I think it would make a cute flip book.

I’m hoping she doesn’t kill me one day for posting her bedhead robe pictures.

Anakin always looks so serious.

My family always had a traditon of getting a new ornament every year, so I’ve continued with my family. Can you guess who’s is who.

It just wouldn’t be Christmas without Missy playing in the wrapping paper.

It’s that time of year again. Cory and I took Anakin out to Vandaveer park to take his school pictures. I know the school does them every year, and the ones the school takes are fine for the yearbook or whatever, but they don’t really capture personality that well, so I’ve been taking the kids out for my own version of school pictures each fall. I probably posted way more than I should have, but I’m a mom and I’m biased this time. Crystal was at Grandma’s this weekend when we did Anakin’s, so stay tuned for her pictures in a few weeks.

I love this one, I think he was trying to eat the flowers, but still cute.

He’s totally in love with that huge fountain, he’d be swimming if we let him.

I really love his “far off visionary” look. Anakin always seems like he knows some deep meaningful secret.

Hopefully this post makes any sense, I just had my wisdom teeth out on Friday, and I’ve been on pain medication ever since. I had been putting it off for quite awhile now, but they’re finally out. I just want to say thanks to everyone who rescheduled appointments with me for this weekend, I really appreciate it. Unfortunately I had to miss one of my best friends art show on Saturday, Shannon had some really fabulous pictures in it ( you can see them here: My favorite “Hope2″, my second favorite “Hope4″, Hope, Hope1, Hope3). I’m really excited for her, Shannon has been shooting weddings and portraits with me this summer and she’s working on getting her own portrait business going, I’ll post a link when she gets her site up!

Since I’m not doing much work this weekend because of the teeth thing, I thought I’d post some updates in my personal life.
August is crazy busy for my family, it seems we have an abundance of Leos. My sister, my daughter, my niece, two of my uncles & me. Crystal just turned 8 last week, and her birthday falls on my grandparents anniversary, which I always thought was sweet, my grandma likes to tell me that they were expecting my uncle to be born around their anniversary, so grandpa promised to get her a dozen roses if she had him on their anniversary, well she did, and he kept his promise. She tells it way better than I do, but I always thought it was sweet, and pretty special that my daughter was born the same day too.
Anyways we just had Crystal’s party last weekend and Thursday she went out & spent her birthday money on a super cute pink guitar (even though she hates pink).

As I’m writing this Cory just came home & surprised me with birthday cake (we’ll see if I can eat it) and ice cream, and some movies! Awe, he’s a sweetie, my birthday isn’t until Monday, and he already took me out to see The Dark Knight a few weeks ago (awesome movie by the way!). Ok, I don’t think I can sit up at the computer much longer. Here’s a few pictures of my other munchkin, Anakin. Have a good weekend everybody!

When my mother-in-law Jean asked me to take Easter pictures of the kids(my two and my niece Autumn) this year I was a bit stumped on what to do. Last year we just did a white backdrop with flowers, so I wanted something different this year, so we headed out to the Pioneer Village out by Scott County Park. Unfortunately nothing wanted to go right, Easter was super early this year and so the grass was still mostly dead and even though it looked nice out, it was pretty cold. The poor girls didn’t want to take off their coats, so most of the pictures they’re doing more shivering than smiling, lol. Anyways it was at least a nice drive out there, and we had some fun playing. I did manage to get a few decent shots out of the whole thing too. The one at the top was my favorite.

My favorite shot of Crystal, she looks a bit grown-up in it.

My adorable niece

Anakin wasn’t going to have anything to do with looking at the camera, but he’s a cutie anyhow.

My beautiful daughter

Proper little ladies.

After sticking a camera in their face the whole trip I thought it was only fair to let the girls throw eggs at me.

Ok, I freaking love that picture. My cousin’s daughter is probably one of my favorite people to shoot, because she is just full of attitude, and adorable. That picture about sums her up. Anyways, had night 2 of “Trick or Treat”. We hit up Moline with my mom and their family again. Anakin didn’t quite make it that long, I think he had it with the whole thing so we cut it short. Which worked for me, because it was way to cold and I actually decided to dress up.

I’m a witch, although you can’t tell because I had to take the picture myself, sometimes it sucks being the family photographer. Although I can’t have anyone else take my picture anyways, I hate having it done and I am always the one in the picture blinking or making some horrible weird face. ugh.

More of the “Gouhls” (yeah, I know that was bad).

We had “Corpse bride”, “Mad Hatter”, and a cat.

Oh and how could I not mention that Jay dressed up their dog as a “glow stick” he’s too cute. Didn’t get a great picture, because their dog is more active than Anakin.

And Crystal had her outfit picked out for months. We were checking out goodwill for photo props (they have some awesome stuff there on occasion) and she found this cool white “veil” ponytail holder thing, and decided she was going to be a Corpse bride. I was utterly shocked when 3 months later she still wanted to be Corpse bride.

This is the first face she wants to make everytime I break out the camera. Total ham.

Oh and we decided to stick with the Tim Burton theme (because we’re huge fans) and have a “Nightmare before christmas” pumpkin. Here’s Jack.

Anyways we had a great time, the kids got a ton of candy, and we’re headed back out tonight for Moline’s Trick or treat with my mom and their kids. Oh speaking of which, my little step brother Stephen went with us yesterday (actually we had a pretty big group of family). He totally scared all the little kids.

This was my favorite of Crystal, she just looks really cute, and didn’t give me one of her cheesy smiles.

And this is my favorite of Anakin. He wasn’t really into the whole thing, and didn’t want to sit still for me, I think he’s sick of the camera. So I just tried to shoot him doing whatever he wanted.

Yeah, she struck this pose all on her own, cause she’s a super model. That’s my goofball, she cracks me up.