When Chris and I started dating it was hot and heavy right away. We spent every waking second together and immediately started dreaming about our future. We had kids names picked out, watched a million movies until the wee hours of the morning, played trampoline football, went on walk&talks and there are still songs I will hear that will take me right back to that time in our lives. We were 18 and idiots really, but man was that first summer amazing!

Then in college we went our separate ways for a little while. For about two years we were on again off again with lots of drama. We had our own experiences, met new people and lived our own lives even though we were still in the back of each others thoughts all the time.

But then one day Chris walked into the place I was working and said he had moved home from Spokane for the summer. And he wanted to see me. Seriously. With intention. But I was guarded and not-trusting, having been hurt one too many times. I kept my distance and went into our new friendship not really believing it would lead anywhere. I was filled with doubt even though Chris seemed so sure of where our relationship was heading.

Three kids and almost 6 years of marriage later obviously I was wrong and Chris was right. Thank goodness.

And that about sums up my relationship with Lightroom too! HA!

When Kim first made me start using it I was all excited (although a bit nervous) and worked endlessly to learn everything I could.

But then we got busy, and my workflow was so much slower, and I couldn’t get it to do what I wanted, and I was frustrated and hated it. So I sort of stopped using it for the most part. Slight tweaks here and there but really I relied heavily on Photoshop.

Until last week when I asked Kim to just give me some more help. Because I always love her edits more than mine! And for the last two days I buckled down and edited Kalen’s wedding shots fully in LR first before taking them into PS for some final tweaks. It took me more than twice as long, maybe three times as long to get them all done. And I’m not talking 500 photos. I’m talking about 100. Because these are just my portraits and doesn’t count Kim’s shots, the ceremony, the reception or the photobooth. Two solid days in front of the computer to get 100 images edited is crazy.

But OMG. Me and LR? It’s the beginning of a beautiful friendship! Seriously! Talk to me again in 6 years and thousands of photos edited… we’ll be humming along like an old married couple!

Here are two shots that were edited completely in LR with just one edit done in PS to finish it off…

The slower pace is HARD and it’s making my personal photos+blog suffer b/c I’m just trying to keep up with client images right now but I know if I stick with it it will be WAY better in the long run! I’m already ecstatic at how far I’ve come in a week!

So the reason for this post? (Besides to encourage you to step a little away from PS and buy LR? HA!)

Well, after last week’s Fresh Class I have been thinking a lot about starting from scratch. And how far I’ve come since I first was gifted my original DSLR the day I gave birth to Bailey, five years ago. How many photos it’s taken me to get to here. How many times I missed focus and used bad lighting and tried terrible posing. And obviously tons of bad edits!

Learning something new is really hard. And there will be a million times you’ll want to give up. But if you push past each and every one of those defeating moments, in the end, you will be so glad you did and amazed at how far you’ve come!

So to all the ladies we’ve taught this summer, stick with it! Hang in there! And email us anytime you feel defeated… we’ll talk you off the ledge and encourage you to keep working!

And to Chris, who put up with me strapped to my computer for the last two days… thanks for being an amazing dad and keeping the kids busy for me! I’m so glad it’s you that’s on this ride with me!