October for photographers is like April for tax professionals.  It is when the worlds collide, when weddings are winding down but the editing is all due, and when every family wants portraits with the fall colors.  It is the end of months of no weekends or vacation, where you cram is as much as you can so you can still pay your mortgage in the slow season.  I’ve been attempting over the last couple years to take a fall short vacation since autumn is my favorite time of year.  I usually don’t even have a camera with me…I rarely have it with when I have a family memory to be a part of since I want to be in the moment…but this time we planned to have so much of our vacation include down time for the kids to explore, we brought a camera along.

We had an amazing time visiting with friends in Wisconsin, camping, traipsing through the woods, spying gorgeous old barns, antiquing, talking for hours by the fire, and just hanging with our kids.  We didn’t shoot many images, but did get a few fun ones.  Here are my favorites.

The way I do sessions with my kids is set up an experience and have just a few minutes of actual shooting.  These couple images were after we explored an apple orchard.

These images are from a nature preserve in the Driftless region of Wisconsin.  Simply stunning.

Is there anything more idyllic?

This little trip was the refresher I needed to go right back into editing all these lovely weddings we shot this summer!