Extreme Makeover Home Edition - Here Come the Spectators

Drew is soooo excited to see all the people and see all the big trucks!




Steady line of people walking down Elm Street towards the build.




Twitter and Facebook have been great resources of getting information out to those interested in the build.






Lots of bikes parked outside the build... you can also take Valley Transit right to the corner of Elm and Lauden but check the bus schedule for times.




The people standing in this lawn and on the front porch are spectators - not any of them live at this house. The Extreme Home Makeover team has promised to come through after the crew and visitors have left to fix up the neighborhood lawns that are being trampled.




The crowd is just HUGE!




The celebrities are few and far between. Ty hasn't even been in town at all for the last few days. I guess his secret project woes come from him not being around to get them accomplished!




What a way to bring out the best in the community!




Lexington homes has been giving away tons of free stuff!!!




Everyone came out to see a piece of this...




They got "hats, t-shirts and jerseys"....








This family has come by everyday to sell lemonade - all proceeds go towards the family.




Its gonna be pretty quiet around here next week - we might even hear the crickets again!

Extreme Makeover Home Edition - Night falls on the build

Extreme Makeover Home Edition - Neighborhood happenings...

Lemonade stands going up all over! Be sure to bring your change...




These lovely ladies are burning tons of calories with all the walking they are doing! The ATV on the right is decorated "Paige Style" - gotta love the pink!




Floor joists...





Debris from the demolition of the home... There are about 10 of these lined up - and yes they are recycling.





Onlookers...




Production crew rigging up a camera.




Digging the foundation...




Neenah Fire and Police on hand in case of an emergency.

Extreme Makeover Home Edition - Who's that Bus?

Ever since "the bus" has rolled into the 'hood nothing has quite been the same... actually, it never will be. A deserving family was swept off their feet and the entire community has turned up to tear down, cheer on, and rebuild a statement home that says "dreams really do come true".

The attitude is infectious. Everyone walking by as a forward tilt of enthusiasm in their step. So many people signed up to volunteer that they are turning turning people away. I signed up to do a number of specialized tasks via the online volunteer contact sheet. But since there are no need for more volunteers in blue shirts I decided to do what I could in my own way.

For one I am doing a behind-the-scenes photo essay on this blog and we are planning on putting a giant twitter hashtag (#emhewi) in our front lawn. Another idea we had was to host a water bottle sale on our lawn and donate the money to the build. We are bringing goodies to the Extreme Security and NPD. But most of all just sharing a smile and a wave as onlookers walk by.

Extreme Makeover Home Edition - Welcome to the Neighborhood!

Welcome to Neenah! I've decided to do a little photo essay of things that I see this week during the build. We live on the street up the block from the family that has been chosen to receive this amazing life changing gift.

I've witnessed some amazing things happen so early into it all (and yes, I've already had tears well up in my eyes). I hope to bring an insiders view to help better describe what it is like to live in a 24 hour construction zone and photograph it in all it's glory.

Follow me on twitter for up-to-date information about the build!
http://twitter.com/ardent_photo

or my husband Andy and all his witty charm at
http://twitter.com/andygaerthofner

5 months old....

Tomorrow my baby girl is turning 5 months old. She is such a delight! I've had this past week to spend with her all alone with no big brother around. Emerson loves to smile and laugh... her new big thing is to blow spit bubbles and make baby pteranodon noises.

This week we also found out that our sweet baby girl will need to have surgery in a few months. In late June Emerie had a UTI infection that lead us to have a series of tests. A visit this week with a pediatric urologist explained that she has some crazy stuff going on. In a nut shell, she will end up having part of her right kidney removed as well as some other things that are going on with the tubes that drain to the bladder.

We are hoping this is just a little hiccup in our lives. The abnormality is neither hereditary nor caused by anything from the outside world. This is just how God initially wanted Emerson's cells to form inutero.

Right now we are praying for her and loving her. She is soooo awesome and we know she will pull through.

2009 :: A look back

I'm sooo excited for this new year... before the clock strikes 12:00 I want to recap the wonderful adventures of 2009...

An Ardent Photography Photobooth

2009 was a terrific year for Ardent Photography... I started out the year shooting a wedding with Rachel of www.mergeweddings.com in Key West Florida. I flew to the island in a ridiculously small 8-seater airplane - in the co-pilot seat! I knew from that moment it was going to be a fantastic year!

In March I returned for my second straight year at the WPPI conference in Las Vegas, NV. I had a blast rooming with Molly Michel of m three studio and participating in classes and shootouts all week long. I bought my first "real" purse and necklace at Tiffany's... thank Molly for introducing me to nice things.


That Easter Andy and I took off to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico for some along adult time. It was so very relaxing to have nothing to do besides sit and soak up the sun.

Shortly after our trip to Mexico I was hired to shoot my first destination wedding in the Dominican Republic. I brought along friend and photographer Miranda Zynda-Kneeland of Reminisce Photography to be my second shooter. It was a true honor and privilege to photograph Robin and Justin's wedding in Punta Cana.

My busy wedding schedule only allowed me to take a limited number of High School Seniors. This year I shot 10 sessions and had a blast photographing seniors from Xavier, Appleton East, North and West as well as a senior from Winneconne High Schools.

The summer's weddings brought lots of joyful moments in couples lives - and I loved shooting at many new locations. I especially loved shooting for Tracy and Tim in Pembine at the Four Season Resort and in Door County for Kirsten and Andrew at the family's private residence. Thank you to all of my wedding couples for making 2009 such a fantastic season!!!


The most joyful news of the summer had to be finding out I was pregnant with our second child - a GIRL!!! Drew will finally be a big brother - our due date is March 1, 2010. He wants to name her "Cook"... it's actually quite cute, we are calling her that for now... but we do have several cute girl names on our list!

In other business 2009 news... Unveiled Portraits - my boutique boudoir photography venture has been such a dream come true. I've shot more than 75 boudoir sessions total and in the month of October I raised $900 for my first ever Boudoir for Breast Cancer fund raiser with the help of matching funds from Invitation Consultants.

I was also featured in Wisconsin Bride Magazine as an expert in boudoir photography. I am beyond excited to continue photographing boudoir session in 2010 and continue to make Unveiled Portraits the best boudoir photography studio in the state of Wisconsin. Thank you to all of my wonderful ladies!!! Here's to a new year of loving your sexy-self just the way you are!!!

This year was also a great year for my family. We took our very first family vacation in December to Disney World. Seeing Disney through the eyes of a 3 year old was definitely magical.

Drew had the most fun on the Triceratops ride at Animal Kingdom and getting his face painted up like a dragon. For Andy and I, our favorite part of the trip was getting selected to see the fireworks show as VIP's at Epcot. We were the only people in the entire park that got to sit alongside the people who designed the show and just yards away from where the fireworks are shot off.

To help make way for lil' sister "Cook" Drew said goodbye to his toddler bed and hello to a big boy bed. He is doing great in the bed and hasn't fallen out yet... He also was bumped up in his swimming class at Swimtastic Swim School. He can swim all independently for 3 feet, he is also jumping into the pool and swims to the side - all by himself!

Andy caught the biggest fish at my brother Nic's bachelor party in Pickerel Lake, WI - the thing was a HUGE 42" and very very tasty ;-) He has also been very busy playing in his softball and pool leagues. We are very fortunate his company has been so successful this year and are looking forward to what the future holds. We are both so lucky to have careers we love and a family that we adore!


Have a very happy and prosperous 2010!!!!

xoxo Amy

License to Cruise...

Erica and Eric's wedding party stopped for drinks at Anduzzi's before their wedding reception on Friday night. College Ave. was just revving up for it's annual "License to Cruise" car show the night before the famous Octoberfest.

There was a staff photographer from the Post Crescent taking shots... he saw me setting up the wedding party and took a few shots. I am actually surprised the image was published in the paper... I wish I could have sent them the kick butt shot I took!

Enjoy!

Amy Gaerthofner of Ardent Photography photographs a wedding party in front of a vintage Chevy Impala along College Avenue in downtown Appleton during License to Cruise on Friday, September 25, 2009. Post-Crescent photo by Kirk Wagner Kirk Wagner

Image Source

Happy Friday!

I wanted to share a few images of me and my growing belly... and give you a bit of a status on how my pregnancy is going.

I am still feeling great! In fact, I have two weddings to shoot this weekend and my son's 3rd birthday party on Sunday... It should be a whirlwind of a weekend! My ultrasound is in a few weeks, we will find out if we are having a brother or a sister for big-bro Drew.

Side note: I was really sticking it out here, I'm only about 17 weeks in this image... These photos are going to be used in our Holiday cards and I wanted to look a bit farther along than I was. ;-)

This image was taken during our annual fall photo session. This year the Spottswoods took some amazing photos of my family. I'll post more of these fabulous pics closer to the Holidays.

Have a great weekend!

My pre-wedding season vacation

*** note ***
we are healthy and not affected in any way by the swine flu. We returned to the US on April 16th far ahead of the outbreaks.

In the last 12 months I've traveled quite a bit. I've even been to a few sunny locations like Hawaii and Key West. Even though it might seem like I've been on lot's of "vacations"... none of them can measure up to 5 days of nothing-ness all while enjoying it with your husband.

We stayed at the Riu Palace all-inclusive resort in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. The weather was between 80-84 degrees and the only cloud we saw in the sky was on our last day. It took a good day for us to both unwind and actually believe that we were BOTH on this vacation with no responsibilities. No child to potty-train, no dog to feed, no dishes to do, no emails to write... by the second day I told Andy that I had nothing on my mind. No images in my head and no thoughts coming to mind; this has not happened for me in at least 3 years.

Besides laying in the sun we both read 500(ish) page books. I read Twilight and Andy read a thriller. If you know me, I do not read books very often. I'm more of a magazine or blog reader. So for me to finish a book in that short of time is pretty cool. (I could do an entire Twilight review post...)

We also tried out boogie boarding. My friend Marina Miller from Honolulu would be proud that I caught the very first wave with my "rad moves". We only had a little bit of time in the ocean but it was sooooo much fun!

The Riu Palace was excellent. The food was great, the service was amazing, the rooms were modern and soooo comfy, the room service was so much fun and free... I could go on and on.

The only downfall of our entire trip was on the flight from Chicago to Puerto Vallarta... the airline maintenance crew missed flipping a switch that flowed the water to the plane's restrooms. About one hour into our flight the captain came on "we are headed back to Chicago". We had to land, wait almost 2 hours and get on another plane... United Airlines made good on the blunder by offering us $150 towards our next ticket purchase and a free cocktail.

Here are some snapshots from our trip... taken with an 7 year old digital point and shoot camera.

My next "vacation" is only a few weeks away... I will be shooting a destination wedding in Punta Cana for an amazing Kaukauna couple. I am taking Miranda of Reminisce Photography and Design as my second shooter.

If you are looking to book an awesome vacation check out Funjet Vacations online