Happy Monday! Hopefully all of you blog-stalkers had a wonderful Easter weekend and aren't on too much of a sugar hangover. We've been blessed with some crazy weeks and we'll be blogging every day this week! Some awesome stuff that we can not wait to share with you!

Last week we headed up to Bucks County to meet the Granoffs and shoot for their family (as well as the two of them). These guys live in the mountains, beside a state park, cliffs and a whole bunch of awesome scenery. They quickly skyrocketed up our favorite clients list by giving us some homegrown, organic eggs. People like them are so cool... we just hope to make them look that way!

Earlier this week we headed across the bridge to Jersey to shoot for Madison, who just celebrated her first birthday. It was just like most of our birthdays: few clothes, cupcakes, eating with no hands... you know, all the normal stuff. Here's a few of our favorite photos from the shoot...

Late last week we packed up the car and road tripped out to Johnstown, PA to shoot for an old friend (and some new ones). Crista and I (Tony) go way back. I used to cheat off her homework in Biology. The cool thing about old friends is finding how what they're up to now, what they're like, where they live. It's fun to reconnect with someone that's brand new but still very familiar. In the process, we got to meet their new baby boy Jude, to see their AWESOME and extensive collection of antiques, and to get a taste of Johnstown weather (hint: it was 50 and sunny driving in, 35 and snowing there). Here's a few of our favorites...

We're back baby! Although we thoroughly hope you enjoyed the last few weeks of blogstalking, we took a mini hiatus for the holidays. It was a full two weeks without touching our cameras, something that literally hadn't happened in 5 years. It was great and excruciating at the same time... especially during all the mild winter weather...

Last week we finally got back out there and this week our blog with be chock full of new stuff. Our first shoot back was for the Lenzo family. We've known their daughter Rachel for a long time now (she was part of our Portrait Project last year). Her brother Tim is a marine and they wanted to get some shots of them together as a family just before Tim was deployed for Afghanistan. We got to go to the wonderful town of Ellicott City, MD to shoot for them, got to wander around the property of some kind strangers and Amy got to know what it's like to get hit on by a giant yellow lab ('hit on' is putting it very mildly). Enjoy...

It's hard to believe 2011 is over. As I was writing the title of this blog, I had to double-check to make sure it was actually 2011 that we were commemorating. It's been an absolute whirlwind of a year. We did some things we had never imagined, met some people we wish we had met years ago, and ate much more food than any human actually should. But now with all of our shoots wrapped up, it's officially time to share our annual slideshow of our favorite photos from 2011. But before we do...

Amy and I owe you guys a huge debt of gratitude and thanks. This year, we hit the 5-year mark with our business. Back when I started the business, my father-in-law shared a book with me that had two stats I've always remembered since: 80% of businesses fail within the first year. 80% of those that survive fail before the 5th year. For those scoring at home, that means that we're officially part of the other 4% now... and it feels great. But it really has very little to do with us.

From the beginning of the business until now, there are a few things that have stayed the same. While we've grown, expanded and improved, we still have never had to pay a dime to advertise anywhere. And we owe all of that to YOU. If we're being honest, we owe this whole business to YOU. From the get go, we learned just how amazing our clients are. The fact that you guys take your time to look at our work, share it with other people and recommend us to friends still blows our minds. We have some people (other than our parents) who have been looking at our blog for almost 5 years now... and that was an UGLY iWeb site back then. We honestly cannot thank you enough times for what you mean to our lives. YOU have given us a career that we love, and made us so happy to do it for you. From the bottom of our hearts, we say thank you.

2011 really was a remarkable year for us. We had 148 shoots (that's one more than last year if you're scoring at home), delivered around 50,000 finished images and met hundreds (maybe thousands?) of new people. We shot everywhere from our own living room to Munich, Germany, for newborns and in hospice facilities. made our way across the country a few times and even out of it... and next year promises to take us even further away!

So without further ado, here's some of our favorite shots from the year. We're sorry in advance if we didn't include some people/favorites. We had to at least attempt to keep this to a reasonable length... I recommend you watch on full screen in HD mode :)

If you're curious, the music was (in order): Mat Kearny, Count on Me • Breanne Duren, Gold Mine • Brooke Fraser, Something in the Water • Josh Garrels, A Far-Off Hope

From the bottom of our hearts, we thank each one of you for the very important role you play in our lives. God has blessed us tremendously by having you support our work and we can't thank you enough for that. We hope everyone had a great 2011, and we can't wait to see you all in 2012!

A couple years back Andrea and Ryan won one of our first ever Shoot Me for FREE contests and we did a trash the dress shoot with them. Well my mom once told me that sometimes married people have babies. And they did. They called her Lena and they gave her lots of apples to eat. A year later, here she is on our blog...

Oh, and before I forget, if you're interested in this year's Shoot Me for FREE contest (which will be the biggest and best yet), you should probably make sure to check our blog next week between Christmas and New Years.

Last week we were back in our adopted second city (Washington DC) to shoot for Anja & Brynn. You may remember a maternity session we did a while back for a mom with twins... Well here they are! We haven't seen two more smiley babies in a while. It was a huge help too. Getting two babies to look happy isn't always the easiest thing, but Anja & Brynn are going to turn pro any day now. Here's a few favorites, lots more blogs to come this week!