Really, that pretty much sums it up: “Planes, Trains & Automobiles”.  go, Go, GO!!!  2011 was a stellar year and really I can’t even believe that it’s over.  I think my mind is still somewhere back in September.  With all the travel and new happenings here at MSP, I feel like this past year has been on fast-forward, being thrust from one city to the next all the time shooting and doing what I absolutely love to do most.  It really makes me not want this year to be over, can it stay 2011 for a little while longer?

This year, I felt like I lived on planes, trains & automobiles.  I can’t even count how many miles I’ve traveled.  Being a destination wedding photographer, it is part of the job - and don’t get my wrong, I absolutely LOVE traveling for weddings.  I think it is a must for me and my business because I get to see new things, new places, new people and be inspired at every beautiful wedding.  It was definitely the theme of the year, and with opening a new office on the west coast as well as maintaining an office in Atlanta - the frequent flier miles have piled up!  But, I feel like the train is moving just a little too fast and I’m not ready for 2011 to be over.

You see,  most years - and definitely for the last 5 years - I am always excited for the new year.  Out with the old, new beginnings, new opportunities, new friends, new places.  Amazing how such a simple thing, the change from one day to the next can bring so much hope and optimism.  I know last year at this time, that was definitely the case - I was SO ready to begin anew and wash away the last year and get to start over.  Hurry, hurry new year and get here fast!  But this year, it is different.  2011 has been SO great that I just don’t want it to be over yet.  I couldn’t have imagined how great this year has been on so many levels.  So much has happened, but it just seemed to have flashed by so quickly.

So, my wish for 2012 is that it is even better than 2011 - if that can even be possible - and that time slows down just a bit for me and I get to enjoy it more. Wishing all of my lovely, wonderful clients, vendors, colleagues and friends and very, very Happy New Year! Let’s make it amazing!

***REVISION/ADDITION:  After completing this post, and finally having a few moments to breathe after all the craziness of this year…I was thinking about my New Year’s resolution and goals for 2012.  And well……….I had a hard time coming up with resolutions, but the list of business goals was long.  There was a definite theme to the goals I listed…and yes, you guessed it…they all had to do with “Planes, Trains & Automobiles”.  Go figure.  I’ve already booked weddings in some great locations for 2012, but thought I’d list some of the places I’d like to go on my wishlist.  It will be fun to see how many of these get crossed off the list at the end of next year:

Santa Barbara, New York City, Maine, Prince Edward Island, San Juan Islands off of Washington State, Santa Fe, Charleston, Chicago, Rhode Island, San Francisco, Italy - Amalfi Coast, Capri & Bari, Greece, Spain, Ireland, London.

SUMMER IS HERE!!!  And I can’t believe that it’s already July and half of this year is already over?!  Where did the time go?  Well I’ve been extra busy with weddings this spring and have had a crazy, crazy travel schedule.  Let’s recap where I’ve been and what I’ve been up to! 

4,610 Miles Driven
12 States
5 Islands
12 Weddings
8 Flights
13 Cities
Atlantic to the Pacific

I’ve been from the big city to the countryside, remote islands to cool mountaintops, sunny beaches to lush farmland.  So many different weddings all packed into one spectacular year already.  Can’t wait to see what the remainder of 2011 has in store.  Here’s a few more peeks into my travels:

The year started off right away with a beautiful winter wedding in Atlanta at The High Museum of Art - and we even had SNOW!!!

Spring sprung into action with this sweet couple at King Plow in Atlanta:

The dogwood trees were in full bloom for Kelly & Dan’s wedding at The Greystone in Piedmont Park:

In addition to all of my weddings, I also found time to second shoot for the talented Katie Murphy in Nashville.  We photographed at the beautiful Belle Meade Plantation: 

Next, it was back to the big city of Atlanta for this stunning wedding at The Pink Palace:

April ended with a spectacular & charming farm wedding that certainly beat out The Royal Wedding for my top pick of the weekend.  This wedding was so fun and so over the top gorgeous, that you’ll have to wait awhile to see it, as it will be published this fall.  Trust me, it is definitely worth the wait!!!

After the heat arrived in the South, it was a welcome respite to travel up to Highlands, North Carolina for a beautiful mountain wedding at Old Edwards Farm:

Then, it was off to Florida for a gorgeous, gorgeous island wedding in Boca Grande, Florida at The Boca Bay Pass Club:

Then, off to another great wedding with Katie Murphy in Nashville, Tennessee at The Barn at Loveless Cafe:

***Images coming soon!!!***

A beautiful and elegant Atlanta wedding at The Biltmore Ballrooms:

I had been waiting for this Jekyll Island wedding for a long time - so worth the wait.  It was such a gorgeous venue!

Then, to round out the first half of the year, I ended with a fun wedding in St. Simons Island, Georgia at a private residence on the river. Magical! 

What a great first half of the year!  Don’t forget about all of the exciting things still going on at MSP:

-MSP now has an office in PHOENIX!!!  I’ve hit the ground running and am now operating all summer out of the Phoenix office.  If you live in Phoenix or the southwest / west coast, please check out my website and contact me for details on my wedding packages. {There may even be a special going on for anyone who books a Phoenix Wedding - or west coast wedding - right now…hint, hint!}

-To celebrate the opening of my new office, there’s a big GIVEAWAY…check out my blog for more details!

-Editing, Editing and more Editing!  Lots to edit, so I’m keeping cool from the 110 degree temperatures and editing up a storm from all of these beautiful spring & early summer weddings.

-Lots of clients are designing their albums right now too.  I love designing albums and creating heirlooms for my clients to have for years to come.  New sample album photos are coming soon!  Also, don’t wait until the fall to start your album, contact me now to get an early start!

-MSP is currently booking for 2012 Wedding dates now!!!  As usual, May is filling up fast! CONTACT me today about your wedding and to reserve your date!

Well that’s all for now folks.  As you can see things are pretty busy around here and there will be lots of blogging with all of these gorgeous weddings very soon!

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I’m so excited to announce the launch of my new website, branding & blog design!  I’ve been working on this for months and I’m so glad to finally share it with everyone.  It was a long process that not only included a full website redesign and blog update, but rebranding as well.  Here’s a little insight into the process and what to expect from the new site - enjoy! 

Let’s start at the beginning.  When I first decided that it was time for a website update, I thought long and hard about who I was and what I wanted my site to be.  The bad part was, my current branding didn’t really match who I was and the clients I wanted to attract.  So, I enlisted the expertise of Emily Ley with Emily Ley Creative.  Emily created a new brand & logo for my company and did a fabulous job matching the graphic look to who I am and the style of my photographs.  We went through many design iterations before finally settling on this beauty of a logo:

Emily also worked on updating my colors and creating a new pattern for my blog background.  One of my favorite elements is the nature-themed graphic element in my logo.  She designed it so it could be broken into little bits & pieces of the bigger logo.  For example, a part of the stem & leaf is broken off and used as the little graphic next to each of my blogpost titles (see above).  I not only love Emily’s graphic elements, but the words she used to describe my brand, so beautiful:

“Melissa Schollaert Photography is fresh, clean and breathable.  Like her images, Melissa is full of light and embodies the natural style upon which MSP is based.”  -Emily Ley Creative

Now, for the website!  I wanted something very simple & clean that really showed off my images - nothing fussy.  Just like my old website, I created this website myself using ShowitSites.  I am truly a fan of Showit and the ability to create a great looking site myself.  I also love that I can update it at a moment’s notice anytime I want.  It was fairly simple to create a template - it was deciding which images to include that was the hard part!

In addition to the redesign, there are many new features.  Here’s a peek into a few:

1.  LOTS OF IMAGE GALLERIES - I’ve included many more wedding galleries including Featured Weddings & Destination Weddings.

2.  DESTINATION GALLERIES - Since destination weddings are such a huge part of my business, I decided to dedicate a large portion of the galleries to destination weddings.  You’ll also find something BRAND NEW from MSP under this menu as well - Destination Engagements!  I’m so excited to start offering these destination engagement sessions to my clients.  So many clients may be getting married in their hometown, but also have a special place afar that they want to incorporate into their wedding & engagement.  I’ve had many clients request destination engagement sessions, so I’m really excited to officially start offering them to everyone!

3.  INFORMATION - I’ve incorporated much more information into the site under the Information menu of the site.  There is everything from Pricing info, what to expect from your Wedding Experience or Portrait Experience, Destination Wedding information, links to purchase my Fine Art Prints and much more.  There is also a special About section that includes my bio & more information about my style.

4.  STYLED SHOOTS - I’ve done so many styled shoots in the last year that I thought I’d show some of these great shoots to inspire my clients and potential clients.  They are a great source of inspiration and range in feel from the beaches of California, to the snowy lakefront of Chicago to the warm marshes of Charleston, South Carolina.  {To any vendors out there, MSP is also available to photograph your inspiration shoot - please inquire for more information!}

5.  NEW OFFERINGS - MSP is also pleased to offer new services to my clients!  I’ve already mentioned the Destination Engagement sessions & Styled Shoots - I’m also offering a new shoot called the “Love Shoot”.  This session is for anyone, whether you’ve been married for 5 days, 5 years or 50 years, it is a great way to commemorate anniversaries and other special occasions.  The clients shown in the Love Shoots gallery decided that on their 1 year anniversary, they would have a picnic celebration & dress up in their wedding attire again to celebrate.  I love the idea of this shoot because it can be for anyone, any age, there are no limits.  You can wear your wedding dress, your everyday clothes, or even go swimming in your two-piece with your love.  It is completely up to you to have fun and be creative with it.

With the rebranding & new design came a little update to the blog - check it out!

Again, I’m so happy to launch this site and I hope you enjoy peeking around and having a look - don’t forget to GO SEE THE NEW WEBSITE HERE!!!

Enjoy!

As I believe I’ve mentioned before…I’m obsessed with Italy.  I know, you’re probably sick of me talking about Italy, posting photos of Italy and talking about The Italy Girls.  But I just can’t help it!  It is my favorite place in the world and, after The Italy Workshop last year with Jose Villa, Italy holds an even more special place in my heart than it did before.  Most of that is due to the wondeful people I met there and the friendships and business relationships that it created.  One of the amazingly talented photographers that I met there, Molly, recently started a new business venture - Blank My Walls with her husband Ken.  Molly & Ken have been dreaming up this idea for ages and it has finally come to fruition.

Molly is a true visual artist and has a great eye for art.  Blank My Walls is a great vehicle for getting real art by talented artists out into the world.  They have selected 20 images, “The Original 20″ to launch the release of Blank My Walls.  I am so excited that two of my Italy prints were chosen to be in the original 20!  So, as a fabulous continuation of Italy Week, and a way for YOU to have one of my Italy prints…I give you BLANK MY WALLS!  Click on the image below to go to their site, explore their editions & see my two featured images! 

Here are the two limited-edition prints available exclusively on Blank My Walls!

The great thing about Blank My Walls is that the prints are limited-editions, so they only sell a certain amount and that is it - everyone in the world is not going to have the same, mass-produced print as everyone else. Also, every Tuesday & Thursday, Blank My Walls will release a new print - so new images are coming out all the time. Stop by their site and check out the beautiful photographs available.

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Thanks for everyone who submitted their favorite destination in the world!  It was so fun to see what places people selected.  I had a few selections for Bora Bora (which is my personal favorite for a honeymoon destination) and lots of other far-off places.  The great thing about talking to people about their favorite place is that you always find out about new places that you’ve never heard of. 

That is definitely the case for our randomly-chosen winner Betsy who said this was her favorite destination:

“Aberystwyth, Wales…spent a week for a youth soccer tournament. Beautiful landscape and salt of the earth people to engage with. So peaceful and humble.”

Congrats Betsy!  Email me your address at melissa{at}melissaschollaertphotography.com for your print!

So, admittedly, I had to Google Aberysywyth, Wales to see just what it was all about.  (And, of course add it to my list of must-see places in my lifetime!)  It definitely looks like a quaint & charming little town by the sea.  Check out the images below courtesy of Google Images.

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