Yes, I am a fortunate lady. Among other things, I write books and create the additional photography that makes them unique. A gig that many are envious of and one for which I am very thankful. Instilled in me at birth was my love for art and my earliest goals were to stay between the lines with my Crayolas in my coloring books. I progressed to spending my childhood days drawing pictures of beauti
ful models (Well, they were to me anyway.) and reading stacks of books from the local library. Those two passions never left me. But life happened, and those talents were buried deep within me for many years. When I finally let my love for art resurface, I discovered my innate ability to draw exact likenesses of people, and I quickly took my show on the road (literally). I traveled the midwest participating in art shows and fairs (many in Chicago) with great success as a portrait artist. But alas, after 15 years, my creative spirit began to beg for more. The challenge was gone, and I laid down my artistic tools and picked up a camera. I fell in love with photography! My natural love for writing resurfaced as well, and I combined the two gifts to create a blog in which I briefly expounded on each photograph with my own unique offering of life lessons accompanying each shot. (www.illuminephotography.blogspot.com) Long story short, my simple blog site was seen by Andy Miller of Providence House Publishers. He, too, had a dream, and it was to create a line of books that would incorporate the written history of a well-known location with beautiful photography. He was very impressed with my photos and writing on my blog, and he offered me the job of bringing his dream to life. My goal had been to simply have one picture published in a real book or magazine. Just one picture! Little did I know that I would be blessed with much, much more!
