Just Peachy Photography – Review and Giveaway

We recently had the awesome opportunity to meet Erika Williams, the woman behind the camera at Just Peachy Photography, and have her photograph our family. I’m so excited to share all the details about our experience and share some adorable pictures with you, but let me give you a little information about Just Peachy Photography.  Erika can give the details best. Here’s what she’d like you to know about Just Peachy Photography:

Just Peachy Photography is a custom on-location photography service that will travel to your home or public location within 20 miles of Palatine, IL. There is no waiting in line since all appointments are made in advance. There are also no time constraints, although most sessions last 1 to 1 1/2 hours. Everything is customized to your family’s needs and Just Peachy Photography will work with you to make it stress free and fun! This custom experience is guaranteed to produce beautiful images of your family that you will love forever!

Just Peachy Photography specializes in newborns and young children’s portraiture but also schedules maternity and family portraits. Specialty sessions and services are constantly being added, and these include:

• Day in the Life of (Your Child’s Name): This is a special 30-45 minute session that captures special moments in your child’s life. Some ideas are riding a bike for the first time, story time, bath time, playing soccer with Dad, baking cookies with Grandma, dressing up in mom’s clothes, playing catch with Grandpa, brothers building blocks, sisters having a tea party, and baby’s first steps. There are so many events you can choose from! These have a candid style and are mildly edited/retouched. They are meant to capture the emotions, expressions, and memories of the event as it happened. There will be no posing or prompting, just FUN!

• One Year Cake Smash Session: This is reserved for babies celebrating their first birthday. It is a short session documenting the experience of eating their first cake. It gets very messy but is a lot of fun for the child and tons of laughs for the parents!

• Portrait Playdates: These are set up like a home party at a public park or a person’s home. The host invites families to the party to get portraits of their children and they earn print credits based on the party’s sales.

• Birthday Parties/Small events: This service is meant for small events with less than 100 people. Birthday parties, showers and Christenings are examples.

We scheduled our session with Erika by email. She was very prompt in responding to my emails and very flexible as far as time and location. I let her know when we were available and where we were and she had some great suggestions for outdoor locations and for the best time of day to get the best pictures.

We arrived for our appointment and had an unexpected glitch – there was an event going on that day so we had to relocate our photography spot. Thankfully, Erika had a great suggestion for another spot – a nearby garden. We met her there and found construction! They had just started tearing up the garden so we had to quickly choose a third spot. Again, Erika had a great suggestion – she had noticed a pretty spot on her way there so we decided to try that out. Despite all the difficulties with finding the right spot, we were being photographed within about a half an hour of our original appointment time. Pretty impressive!

Erika was very friendly and put us all at ease very quickly. She did a great job of setting up the shots – she found great backgrounds and the right lighting, and gave us suggestions on where to stand or sit, but all the shots were relaxed and not over posed. I’m not sure how she did it, but she managed to get the boys looking relaxed rather than like just a blur!

My boys tend to be high energy kids and Cooper was particularly rambunctious that day, but Erika was very patient and did a great job of getting them to cooperate, stay still, and even smile!

And she got the best picture I think I’ve ever seen of Dexter (and John agrees):

We had a lot of fun during the session and we were thrilled with the pictures! We received our prints within about a week of ordering them and they arrived beautifully packaged!

Are you excited about getting some beautiful portraits of your kids? Don’t wait to schedule your session! Fans of Just Peachy Photography Facebook page who book a session (“book” means schedule & make a session fee payment) before the end of the giveaway below will receive a complimentary 11×14 print (a $60 value!). Tell Erika you want the special you saw on Toddling Around Chicagoland!

Be sure you follow Just Peachy Photography on Facebook and sign up for the newsletter (visit the website & click on the Newsletter tab on the left side) so you can find out about upcoming events and promotions. Coming soon – a 12 Days Countdown to 2012 with lots of fun prizes!

One super lucky person will win a mini portrait session! This includes a 30-45 minute custom children’s mini portrait session at your home or another location within 20 miles of Palatine and 10-12 edited proofs to view in the online gallery. The session must take place between January 2012 and May 2012. The winner can also choose one 5×7 print. All other prints and custom products are sold separately.

We received a complimentary mini session and a small print package. All opinions expressed are my own.