In 24 hours I will be shoving bags in the car and heading to the airport for a two week trip to the Midwest.  I am looking forward to the visit with my family but first I have to survive a three hour plane ride by myself with my two kids. I am not worried about my son - he’s ridden on a plane enough to know how the system works. He’s a great traveler. Sarah, on the other hand, is the wild card. I am crossing my fingers that she will sleep on the plane (our flight takes off about the time she would normally start getting ready for bed).

But, back to my 24 hour countdown - I am scrambling to get last minute client orders taken care of - I have a couple more to ship out tomorrow and several things that are on order that will arrive while I am out of town.  I will be available by email during my trip, but answers may be a bit delayed. If you need to reach me between now and the 28th, emails are the preferred method of contact. meggan@megganjacks.com

I hope to blog some while I am away - I have some sessions I will be editing while out of town, so I will have some sneak peeks to post as well as whatever crazy pics I get of my kids during my trip. We have a lot of fun things planned, so stay tuned to the blog!

In an online game of tag, I’ve been tagged by my friend and fellow photography blogger Kim of Kimberly Hill Photography in South Carolina. Thanks girl!

The Rules.

Post the rules before you give the facts. Post eight random facts about yourself. At the end of your blog post, you need to tag eight people and list their names. Leave the people you tagged a comment on their blog, letting them know that they’ve been tagged.

1. I was born in the town of Pocahontas, Iowa. I was a big baby - 10lbs 4oz - and my mom tells the story that it was me and some other tiny little preemie (approx 5 lbs) in the hospital nursery - I guess that made quite the picture!

2. I purchased my first camera from the proceeds of my baking business - Meggan’s Muffins. My mom did a lot of computer education classes for her employer while I was growing up and she (and her fellow educators) would order muffins from me to have as a snack during class. I sold the muffins for $5 a dozen. The most popular types of muffins were banana, chocolate chip (my fave!) and blueberry.

3. I’ve been employed as an Ice Cream & Sandwich Artist. There was a small sub sandwich/ice cream shop within walking distance of my house and I started working there when I was 15. I was quite good at making dipped ice cream cones. I moved on after about 18 months to work at Target in Des Moines.

4. I raised rabbits while growing up. They were a 4-H project for me. I raised mini-lops - so cute! Their names were Cadbury, Taffy, Snickers, Hershey, Skittles (are you seeing a trend? LOL)

5. I love cake. I love frosting.

6. The smell that reminds me the most of growing up is the smell of fresh cut lawns mixed with the faint odor of gasoline. It reminds me of my Grandpa Bogard.

7. I cannot stand the smell or taste of coffee.

8. I like to read romance novels. Mostly historical romance novels (but not the medieval era ones!) I am a hopeless romantic and I like happy endings. I refuse to watch Titanic as the outcome is just NOT happy. I prefer to leave the theater in a good mood.

I’m tagging: Kelly Surace of Adair Photography, Angela Calderon, Julia Greer, Deanna Devine, Tonya Marie

I know, it’s only 5. I feel like an underachiever.

My little man turned four last weekend - we had a fun party with all of his friends and Chick-fil-A catering- YUM!

For his big present this year, Scott and I decided to give him a bicycle. He was pretty weary of it at first - he’s used to being closer to the ground with his tricycle, but as soon as he realized that the training wheels would keep him from toppling over too easy, started to enjoy it.

And then today I received a new backdrop for this fall - asked Kev to help me test it out. He was obliging for about 2 minutes.

New this fall!

I am excited to announce the availability of our Portrait Gift Registry! Portraits make the perfect gift for baby showers! We’ve long offered gift certificates, but with the gift registry, things are even easier! To set up a gift registry, simply contact the studio to schedule a maternity and/or newborn session, pre-pay your session fee, and we will send you up to 50 “registry cards” that you can include in your announcements so that your friends and family know that you would like to receive “A Gift of Memories” from Meggan Jacks Photography. The cards include instructions to the gift-giver on how to purchase portrait credits for you to use on your session.

All photos & text copyright 2007 by Meggan Jacks Photography

Well, my 1 year old has two product recommendations: The Bounce & Spin Zebra from Fisher Price and the Song & Story Learning Chair, also by Fisher Price.

Also, if you are planning a birthday party, I highly recommend looking at the Birthday Express website - they have a wide variety of party theme decorations available for 1st Birthdays as well as Toddler Birthdays. Sarah’s party was the ‘Lil Cupcake theme and Kevin’s party in a few weeks will be the Lego theme (He picked it out himself!)

Sarah is celebrating her 1 year birthday today! Like most parents, I can’t believe how fast it’s gone by. Sarah is likely the last baby for us, so all this year I had little pangs of “finality” when hitting milestones, such as being done nursing or watching her move from the crawling to the walking stage. She is really a wonderful baby and made the transition from one child to two a breeze. Here are some images from her last year - newborn, 3, 6, 9 and then 12 months (compliments of her birthday party on Sunday!)

Sarah is my mini-me. The dress below is my dress from when I was 6 months.

All photos & text copyright 2007 by Meggan Jacks Photography

My son doesn’t ask this a lot, so I enjoy indulging him when he does. Today it was playing around by the patio door in the studio and making silly faces while asking him to look for the bug in my camera (about the only trick that still works to get him to look at the camera.) His “feeling photographic” mood doesn’t last long - This time I had three minutes to fire off as many images as I could before he was getting to squirmy.

At the end he grabbed my hand, so I asked him to let me take a picture of our hands together. Someday soon his hands will eclipse mine in size - sort of a daunting thought.

I need help. Sarah turns 1 next week and I have no idea what to buy her. Likely my problem is that she has almost everything already! I am leaning towards something that she can ride around on in the house (until it gets cooler outside and then she can ride around the backyard). Here are my two ideas:

or (now this one would be indoor only - we have other “peek-a-boo block” stuff from when Kevin was little, so this would be a nice addition to our set.

And here are a couple snaps of her from today because it would be rude of me to talk about her with out showing a picture or two.

and maybe I got a little carried away pushing her on the swing this afternoon…

We had a FUN time in Iowa visiting family! Sarah enjoyed showing off her new walking skills and Grandma was so impressed she bought Sarah her first pair of shoes! Kevin spent each day begging Grandpa for tractor rides and catching lightning bugs just after dark.

May 26, 2007:  I just peeked at the Sentimental Silver website and found Christi’s latest creation - a personalized sterling silver key chain! Looks like the perfect gift for the dads!