And now…. I am so sad to say…. we are leaving Hamilton. We are waving goodbye to friends, family, and clients… and saying hello to a new home… Auckland. I’m scared, and worried, and …. did I mention scared? But I’m also excited.

How did this happen? Two weeks ago, Nico was made redundant. We went through feelings of fear, terror, nausea, hope, excitement, tension, stress, wonder, and horror… and that was only in the first 5 minutes. He came home from work that day, and we hugged each other, in the middle of the lounge, for what seemed like hours… my mind was moving too fast for me to even pick out any coherent thought. I wish I could say the 2 weeks since have been better, but they havent… I flick from one emotion to another in the matter or minutes, and both Nico and I have felt suspended the whole time. Very unnerving.

He began applying for jobs straight away in Hamilton. I told him to branch out, just in case. And wouldnt you know it…. the only interviews he was offered were in Auckland. We both felt the universe was pushing us up there, so went with the flow.

And now, today, he has been offered a position in a fantastic company. It is right up Nico’s alley… coding coding coding and more coding And he came out of the interview so excited about the staff and the job. And the pay is more than what he was getting down here in Hamilton… though… I have to say, the extra pay is going to get chomped up quickly by the extra costs to live in Auckland, but who cares…. he has a job… a PERFECT job him. This couldnt have gone any better.

Now we are feeling a little overwhelmed, we have to move up there and try and come up with 2k moving costs, while making sure we have enough money to live on till his first pay comes in. Not sure how we will manage, but I know we will, we always do So next week we are off to look at housing, wish us luck.

I want to say a HUGE thankyou to all of those that have cheered us on and up, that have given us financial  gifts to help us out, that have sent us positivity energy and thoughts. We so appreciate it all… we couldnt have gotten through this in the sane way we did without such wonderful family, friends, and clients. YOu guys are AMAZING.

Now… on to the sad news. I have worked my tooshy off building up my business, and I was only just starting to feel like I was getting somewhere. But now… now I have to start ALL over again. It IS worth it, because now Nico is set up with a career, and he wasnt before, and he is so very excited. But it means a big change for me, and that terrifys and saddens me.

Firstly, I will not be taking any new portrait bookings for the next month while we settle in in Auckland. All the ones in my diary are fine, we will be zipping back to Hamilton every weekend for almost 2 months for my work lol. All the weddings I have booked in Hamilton for this year and until April 2011 are absolutely fine, again we will just be travelling down for them, so do not worry if you have booked with me, nothing has changed

Once we are settled, I will relaunch my business, and try and make a place for myself in the Auckland photography market. It wont be easy, there are a lot of photographers up there… but… hopefully my unique craziness will make me stand out I do not want to lose the friends and clients I have over this though, so never fear We will make an effort to come down at least once a month, and that way if you want a session with me, you just need to book in on the weekend Im coming down Or you are all more than welcome to visit me in Auckland…. I might need the company Promise to share some milo and choccie bikkies with you

Lastly… weddings… I should really do a seperate blog post about this, but…nevermind.

Weddings. I love them. I do. But I find the pressure hard. Wedding photos are so so so important, and the thought of messing them up terrifies me. I havent had anyone complain so far, but… one day who knows. That one day scares me so much. Im… mental lol.

I am so looking forward to the weddings I have booked for this season, I have some wonderful couples to photograph, and I will love and enjoy photographing their special days, and their photos are gonna rock

But I will be backing off from weddings after this season (ending May 2011). This is a big step for me. But it means I can focus more on my love… Portraits.

I will still be happy to do weddings for family and friends, or special friends of friends. But I wont be taking on many at all, and will no longer be booking people I dont know.

SOOOOO that was a scary scary scary post. Thankyou so much again EVERYONE for being so amazing in the last 2 weeks, and all my Hamilton clients for being just… so freaking incredible over the last few years… makes me cry while Im writing this because I am just so honoured to have met you all and photographed you, and so thankful for the love and support I have received while working on my art/photography… building it up etc. Sniffle, love you guys so much, and breaks my heart to have to leave so suddenly and out of the blue.

I will miss you Hamilton. I will miss you Rose Gardens and Lake. I will miss you Chartwell. I will miss you Smith & McKenzie. I will miss you friends. I will miss you family. I will miss you clients and career.

I will miss you. And I am scared. But I am happy. We are happy.

We are about to start a new life.

And last but not least, my favourite:

Love Jen

Sorry I haven’t posted much on the blog lately, Ive been editing my tooshy off doing mini session after mini session. I am having a blast though, and if you want to check out how they are going, feel free to pop over to my facebook fan page, I post preview photos reguarly. I’ll be sure to post some of my favs on here also when I get a chance

Also, wow, wedding season is almost upon us, one more month and Im in to it. So if you would like to book your wedding with me, be in quick, I only book those 2 weddings a month, and I dont want you to miss out Just email me a bit about yourselfs, and your photography budget, and I’ll email you back with ideas on how I can give you some amazing wedding photos

And because we are empty without a photo, here is some mini session awesomeness:

Love Jen

But now the secret has been revealed and Jo has kindly allowed me to show some of the photos here on my blog

So the reason behind the below photos, Jo wanted to give something special to her husband as a gift, and thought some super sexylicious photos would be perfect. But it all had to be done secretly, as it was going to be a surprise!! One the photos were edited, I worked on an album layout, and we got it ordered. It arrived looking amazing!!! But after months of planning and work, Jo couldnt just plonk the album in his hands. So she planned another secret… a special weekend away. Her poor husband didnt know anything as he got dragged to the car (his suitcase secretly packed in the car).

Nico and I got baby sitting duty for that special weekend…. see, I always go the extra mile for clients haha…. of course it helps when the client is my cousin!

So all in all the photos and the album were a big success, the lovely couple got an awesome weekend away, and Nico and I got to spend some time with three crazy but fun kids  :D

Right, on to the photos. Just be aware before you scroll down that these are Boudoir photos, so not fully clothed. Just a selection from the many photos

Enjoy

Love Jen

Ps. I’m sorry for the faces I made you pull, and for Nicos dancing. I hope we didnt traumatise you toooo much

Love Jen

Anyhoo, here are a few photos from her recent maternity shoot

Love Jen

I will start with portraits. Firstly, you can now choose between four different kinds of sessions, all with different and affordable prices. There are also new kinds of packages to purchase after your session, so there should be something there to please everyone. As always, if you dont want a package, you can just order loose prints or other products seperately. And if you download the PDF to see the full prices, there are some special deals down the bottom.

For July and August only I am offering 25% off the session prices, to celebrate the shiny newness

On to weddings. You will notice I no longer have any prices on my wedding page. Thats because I no longer have any set packages or pricing for weddings. To be honest, I had new prices all ready to go, and they were creeping up there in price…. but while I was on holiday I got to thinking.

I started photographing weddings for many reasons… but the main reason? I wanted EVERYONE to have nice wedding photos… no matter what their budget was. I feel like if I raised my prices too high, even if my work was worth it, I would no longer be doing what I wanted, and in the long run it would not make me happy. Happiness is better than large wads of cash. I NEVER want to hear these words again- “I can’t afford a photographer, I will just get friends to take my photos”.  Let ME take them. No matter what your budget, I can do SOMETHING for you. And if you are a bride/groom with a higher budget, I can cater to you also… I have beautiful albums, prints, engagement sessions, etc etc…. not to mention my crazy self So now no one has to miss out, and I still feel good about myself lol. Making people happy makes me happier than anything.

So all a couple has to do is email me with their photography budget, and tell me a bit about themselves, and I will email them back with a few different options of what I could do for them with that budget Easy Peasy!

The other change is I will be doing less weddings, as I really want to be able to focus on each wedding, and give them the magic they deserve! It also allows me to book more portrait sessions on the weekends over Summer!

So lots of exciting changes, I hope they make people smile!

If you have any questions about any of the changes, please do not hesitate to email me at jenniferjcphotos@gmail.com

Just a note to any couples that have booked me already, and are wondering about their prices. There will be no change to your packages, dont worry

Love Jen

Then we came home and I tried to resist working… its hard when you A) Love your job and B) Run your own business.

On our actual anniversary we headed to Raglan, to stay the night at the Holiday Park (run by my uncle and aunty). We didnt have any plans, maybe just a romantic dinner in our cabin/room. But then… the fabulous uncle and aunty of mine offered us their spa pool, since they were going out for a few hours. Mighty generous since we had no togs lol. Their spa is out on their deck overlooking the whole park. So we jumped in, turned on the jets, and snuggled in the warm water as the rain poured down on our heads. It… was… SO ROMANTIC and totally made our holiday. I know thats weird, because its just a spa… but it was the first time in the week since our holiday had started, that I relaxed, and stopped thinking…! So awesome PS…. to all holiday campers in Raglan… forget what you saw on the deck that night, there was NOT two naked photographers climbing in and out of a spa pool!!!!! It was probably just a plastic bag or a whale or something

Anyway, back to holiday talk…

Last night Nico and I babysat for 3 kiddies. Overnight. 24 hours of kid watching. We are tired haha. But it was totally for a worthy cause (which I will so have to blog about in a couple of days), and the kids had an awesome time, so we’re happy

Now we just have one day left of holiday (Monday)… then I will need to dive in my emails and try and reply to all the people who have been sending me messages while I lazed around doing nothing lol.

I just want to say this… Nico… baby… Happy Third Anniversary. I love you, my rock, my shoulder, my heart, my soul, my companion, my best friend, my tickle monster, my fun and laughter, my hero. To another year of absolute love

Love Jen

So… Nico and I have turned our lounge into… a studio … well… as much as we could lol. And it has been an absolute blast! I offered free mini studio sessions for a couple of weeks from my facebook page, and got an awesome response. I had families, babies, children and more through my lounge in the last few weeks. And I have loved the challenge of doing something new!

I was only going to do studio type photos for a couple of weeks. But because of the huge response… Ive decided to keep them. So Ive been out shopping for more things for it… poor Nico hehe.

Anway if you want to see some samples of my studio shots you can view the all new galleries on my website

Love Jen

I can’t wait for this wedding, to take more photos on that gorgeously green grass of such a funky couple…. awesome

Anyway, here are some of my fav’s from their session, enjoy:

My absolute favourite:

Love Jen