She Owns THREE Businesses?!

July 13, 2018 by Kcityphotography, posted in Our Silly Family

Many of you already know Christine, but did you know she also owns not one, not two, but three businesses?

Kansas City Photography

The first, as you all know, is Kansas City Photography. She started this business when she moved to Kansas City in 2011, when she was 23.

After years of hard work, the business has grown so much that she has hired on another full-time photographer, Tatiana!

Christine moved to St. Louis in 2016, so now Kansas City Photography also has a St. Louis branch!

Both Christine and Tatiana keep busy year-round taking breathtaking photos for their clients in both cities.

They excel in weddings, engagement, family, newborn, and cosplay photoshoots!

Plus, they get bookings all over the country. Especially in Denver and Chicago!

Kaleidoscope Consignment

The next business Christine owns is Kaleidoscope Consignment, in Pacific. The business closed, and Christine took it over and re-opened it on December 11, 2017.

Here is her wonderful store staff:

Kaleidoscope is a retail shop — it has new & like new clothing, children’s items, home decor, Coach & other designer purses … the list goes on! And since Christine owns it, there’s quite a bit of wine paraphernalia, too!

Oh, and Wine Wednesday — where you get a free glass of wine while you shop, every Wednesday!

And since it’s a consignment store, people bring in their goodies for the store to sell. So many unique pieces — like this re-finished dresser with the NYC backdrop! This piece was sold to a gal who lives in San Diego, California! How cool is that?!

And, of course, the store boasts other obligatory knick knacks:

Scentsy

The third thing Christine does is sling that wax — AKA sell Scentsy!

That’s why Kaleidoscope always smells so good when you walk in! Christine’s house usually smells pretty epic as well. ALL THE WAX! ALL THE SMELL GOODS!

On top of all of this — Christine is also a wife and mom of two.

It’s definitely a balancing act to keep up her businesses, social life, and family time — but she’s able to do so many things because of the wonderful people she surrounds herself with: A supportive husband, family, and many best friends to help her along the way!

#GirlBoss power!

Our New Website!

April 25, 2017April 25, 2017 by Kcityphotography, posted in Photoshoots

I tried to log onto the Kansas City Photography webpage last week. I was met with an error message. I may have panicked a little, but I figured it’d be an easy fix. I reached out to my web person — but it was crickets. My face was probably equivalent to Miss Luna’s:

My bells and whistles started going off — and here’s why. This happened one other time, with the same web person. I reached out to him (the same one, I never switched) and he responded saying I needed to pay him to get it back online. I was confused as to why, and he said it was a maintenance fee, and he had to re-build it. I actually lost a potential wedding client over this — they had seen my site, loved my work, and then got concerned when my site suddenly went down.

You’d think I would have learned my lesson then … but, long story short, I stuck with him and he put the site back up (after I paid him again *grumble*), and it has been sunshine and roses since then.

Then, the error (again). And no response.

Instead of waiting around, this time I decided to go ahead and just build it myself. This way I can make changes and add photos any time I want, without having to pay every time I want an update. It was really a long time coming, I should have done it a lot sooner.

Go check it out and tell me what you think! –> http://kansas-city-photography.com

On a side note, I recently tried to get Kansas City Photography published on Wikipedia, but I need some press coverage for that to happen. They have really strict guidelines, and I meet all of them but that one. Stay tuned!

The Easter With 8 Baskets & Too Much Candy

April 19, 2017 by Kcityphotography, posted in Our Silly Family

My girls somehow managed to get 4 Easter baskets a piece this holiday. I’m not complaining, and I am grateful to those who thought about our kiddos, but I am pretty sure I have eaten about as much chocolate as I do on Halloween … you know, poison control. 😉

We woke up Sunday morning and hid Easter baskets with our cousins Caley and Ezra. Lily and Ezra are little besties, it’s so cute!

From there, we went to my grandpa’s house. Grandma Karen told me every time I went over there that she had dreamt of hosting an Easter egg hunt on their big, gorgeous yard, but had never done it — and then all the kids grew up. Good news! The kids had kids, and now she was finally able to host her egg hunt!

My two girls, Lily & Luna, were dolled up in their Easter dresses. Lily’s favorite color is purple, but pink is a close second. When they didn’t have purple, I knew it’d be ok to go with pink!

Luna’s favorite color seems to be yellow (she’s 2, so it’s hard to tell, but she gravitates toward that color and uses it a lot). My favorite color is orange, so when yellow wasn’t available …

It had started drizzling, but that certainly didn’t slow anyone down! The egg hunt was really clever — each kid was assigned a certain color of egg. This way, they all got equal!

We also made sure to get a shot of grandpa with all four of his great-grandkids!

After that, we went over to Bryan’s (my hubs) uncle’s house for his family get together. More eggs to hunt! Luna considered herself an old pro by this point. Lily also killed it at cornhole. That’s the game where you throw the bean bag into the hole on the other side of lawn. Am I making sense? Haha.

It was a great Easter weekend, I only wish it was mandatory to take Monday off, too!

Want to read more fun stories with our family? Did you know we have a pet pig?

The Crazy Schedule Of A Photographer

April 4, 2017 by Kcityphotography, posted in Our Silly Family, Photoshoots

There’s a reason I had to bring on another photographer to Kansas City Photography. My schedule, especially on weekends, is … hectic.

I am going to give you a peek into the schedule of a photographer / Scentsy lady. Here is this weekend’s lineup, which includes photoshoots in both St. Louis and Kansas City.

Friday:

– Work ( Newsy )

– Maternity Shoot (in St. Louis for Kansas City Photography)

– Mother’s Day Scentsy Party (Online, Christine’s Scent-Sational Scentsy Page)

Saturday:

– Wedding Shoot (in Kansas City for Kansas City Photography)

Sunday:

– Drop off Scentsy (Independence)

– Family Shoot (in Kansas City for Kansas City Photography)

– Meet w/woman about photo restoration (in Grandview for Kansas City Photography)

– Another Family Shoot (in Blue Springs for Kansas City Photography)

– Drive 3.5 hours home to St. Louis. Phew!

What keeps me going? I LOVE what I do. I love capturing people’s special moments, their growing families, and the day they say “I do.” There is nothing more satisfying than walking into a client’s house and seeing your pictures hanging up on their walls!

Not to mention — I have a family that supports me 100%.

Next — getting Tatiana’s schedule this booked! 🙂

Meet Christine & Her Family!

March 30, 2017March 30, 2017 by Kcityphotography, posted in Our Silly Family

I always write about my latest photoshoots, or give tips on “how to” do certain things, but I have never really delved into my fam. The day-to-day. I’m a wife and mother of two kiddos.

Not only do I own Kansas City Photography, which services both St. Louis and Kansas City, I also sell the amazing smell goods known as Scentsy. My house always smells awesome.

My two daughers, Lily and Luna, are 6 and 2. My hands are full with them alone!

We have a pet pig named Penelope (I’ve written about her), and four cats. Their names are Goblin, Shy Guy, Diego, and Marshmallow.

Luna, my 2-year-old, is currently into anything her sister loves, jumping in puddles, Paw Patrol, carrots, baths (she calls them “bubbles”), actual bubbles, Pikachu, the color yellow, snakes, and running outside.

Lily, my 6-year-old, loves Shopkins, Girl Scouts, gymnastics, taking pictures (wonder where she gets that from?), monkey bars, running, the color purple, anything art-related, her print-label maker, Scentsy, and attempting to climb trees.

Bryan, the husband, not only puts up with my ridiculous schedule that’s riddled with photoshoots and Scentsy deliveries, but also instrumentally helps out. He’s the camera holder, the battery charger, the scent-sniffer. He’s my No. 1 man. Since I did “likes” with the kids, I’m gonna do it with him, too!

Bryan loves Pokemon, DBZ, the new Zelda game on the WiiU, anime, the color green (Lily made him pick a favorite, because she said everyone has a favorite), computer engineering (he works for Cerner), computer games, and being a kick ass Dad and husband.

Guess I may as well do myself, eh? I love anime, the color orange, anything Sailor Moon related (total Sailor Moon freak right here), Mary Pickford, journalism (I work for Newsy, too!), photography (duh), Scentsy (double duh), Photoshop, the Little Mermaid, most Disney-related things, and being a momma.

One day I will tell you our proposal story — Bryan incorporated Sailor Moon into my custom made wedding ring, and the proposal itself!

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Anything you wanna know? Ask away!

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The Calm Before The Storm: Jenn & James’ Maternity Shoot!

March 9, 2017 by Kcityphotography, posted in Photoshoots

We got hit really hard with severe weather Monday night. We even had to go to the basement at the wee hours of the morning when a tornado warning was issued for our area. But the good news is — I got a shoot in before all that hail hit! Meet Jenn, James, and baby Genevieve (she’s still bakin’)!

Jenn had a whole Pinterest board for me to look through, and I noticed a lot of those pins were silhouette shots. Some of my absolute favorite shots are silhouettes!! Done!

Not gonna lie, James supeeeer didn’t wanna do the shoot. He just got the Nintendo Switch (the last on in Missouri), so he had Zelda brain. But regardless, he was a great sport, and we got some amazing shots!

You could see how much they love each other just by the photos!

Jenn is very fit. She goes to the gym 6 days a week. It was important to her that we incorporate some workout shots into the shoot. Her favorite hashtag is #fitbump. She lives it!

I saved the best shot for last — this sums up Jenn’s pregnancy. She has been SO hungry, especially for sweets. Since my oldest daughter, Lily, just got her Girl Scout cookies in to deliver … we had quite a few cookie props for Jenn to use!

Congrats, James and Jenn!!

Make sure to follow us on Facebook!

A Day At The Park

February 21, 2017 by Kcityphotography, posted in Photoshoots

I met with Sarah, Shane, and their adorable family this weekend in Parkville. They picked this location based off of our Top 10 Photo Locations in KC post. It was a gorgeous day — in the 70s — in February!!

Their three sweet girls were a riot. They didn’t want to say “cheeeese,” but we could get them to say “Anna,” “Elsa,” and “Frozen.”

At one point, they were dancing on the bridge singing “Let it gooooo, let it gooo!” How cute is that?

Since it was so nice, it was really busy — and joggers kept trying to interrupt our bridge shots. But we still got some great ones!

We walked past the bridge to look at the water, and then decided we may get our youngest princess Aarabella to smile if we used the swings. Who complains about swinging? No one, that’s who!

A gorgeous day for a gorgeous shoot!

The Goofiest Valentine’s Gift Ever

February 15, 2017February 16, 2017 by Kcityphotography, posted in Our Silly Family

I love my husband, and he tried really hard on this gift. Before I get into the story, let me just … show you:

That lady in the picture is supposed to be me. It’s based off this picture:

Sigh. I don’t think the artist’s intention was to make me look 30 years older, but that’s what happened. But there is a backstory here, I promise.

Three years ago on Valentine’s Day, I woke up and found my 21-year-old cat had died in the living room. I was devastated. I had him since he was just a kitten, and I was completely torn up inside.

Now, every year on Valentine’s Day, my amazing husband not only buys me a gift, but also buys Babybun a memorial gift. Here is his gift from a different year:

This year, he thought it would be adorable if he hired an artist to do a digital portrait of me with Babybun on my lap. He sent over the picture of me you saw above, and the one of Babybun you saw above. He sent an example image of how he wanted the portrait (with him on my lap). I think this is where it went wrong. This is the “example” he sent:

This is literally a picture from the board game “13 Dead End Drive.” Look a little closer, in the middle:

I think they took the image just a little too seriously …

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At least they didn’t make Babybun look as angry as the other cat?

And, believe me, I appreciate Bryan’s effort. But even he knew it was a side splitter. He gave it to me and said: “It was supposed to be really cute, but instead it turned out hilarious.”

I mean, Babybun certainly gave me a lot of laughs in life, so what better way to honor him?