Well, it's been over a month since I updated the blog.  Time flies when you are busy.  Our business is on the verge of a record year for volume as I hope we eclipse our previous record of clients as we reach early November.  Jodi is doing a great job of keeping up with me and it's a less stressful year for her versus last year.  We are blessed to have so many choose us to document this important year for their family.  

The offroad club keeps me pretty busy too as I am proactive about getting needed things done.  We have grown to 570 dues paying members this year, about a 12% increase over last year.  We have some pretty big events coming up that I'm looking forward to including a couple fundraisers to support local charitable organizations.  

The Kansas Krawl is tomorrow and I'll be heading to Kansas Rocks for that event.  I won;t be participating in the racing but do enjoy watching the carnage and I usually am pretty lucky in the event raffles.  

 We've been super busy with the business and the Offroad club keeps me fairly busy when I'm not photographing clients.  This week I have scheduled a "mental health week" for Jodi as I am only photographing one client and that will give her a little break to catch up and relax a little.  We have a ton of sessions scheduled in September and October so it's game off after this.

It appears we have decided to purchase a Bronco.  Jodi is giving up her Jag for a 2021 Badlands Sasquatch edition.  It isn't built yet but the local dealer has hooked us up with one scheduled to be built shortly and it could arrive by the end of next month.  

Jayson starts kid pitch baseball on Tuesday.  This should be both fun and interesting because this is the year they either hunker down and get into it or they quit.  We shall see.  

 We went to Jeeporama yesterday, a Jeep Show in Paola, KS.  Held at a Drive in theater, our club set up a booth and we hung out with friends and sweated a bit together.  At the end of the day, Jodi's Jeep won Best of Show.  She was presented the trophy at the awards ceremony as I stayed behind at the club booth.  I didn't even clean all of the dirt and dust out of the interior so wasn't expecting that.  We also won several cool prizes in the raffle.  Our lucky day.  

 We had a great time in the Black Hills but it all went to crap when the truck broke down in Sioux Falls on the way home.  Hoping it's just a glow plug but it could be a cracked piston too.  My buddy is going to look at it today for me to see what he thinks.  I do have a warranty so either way, I should be good.  

I'll update more later.  

 We are only 10 days away from our Black Hills adventure. It's been 4 years since we have been there and I'm excited to explore some new trails with friends.  We may get a little radical.  ")

One day that week we have a group of 17 people renting UTV's and we are going to do about 100 miles on the trails through the hills.  That should be a great day.  Custer State Park and Needles highway is also on the to do list.  

We are currently slammed with business and there is no let up in the foreseeable future.  It's been a great year so far and we hope to somehow survive the crush of business we have experienced.  New this year is an influx of clients from the more affluent schools across the state line.  

 We are averaging 4 photo shoots per week right now and rain is a factor today which will cause us to lose another shoot day.  First it is oppressive heat and now rain jamming up our schedule even more.  At least we still have our weekends free.

I finally got my tires and wheels balanced and what a difference that made.  I've been running around with some vibration since the build but now it is smooth as butter.  80mph last night with no issues.  We wound up at a distillery with some Jeep friends and then went to Taps at the Tower at the World War I Memorial.  Great evening.  We beat the incoming storm by about 15 minutes.  We got some serious rain and wind last night but didn't hear any hail.  I took a photo of the city and did an edit on it, shown below.  

 I just don't spend much time on my upstairs computer where I do my blogging from so posting doesn't cross my mind much.

Our busy season has arrived and we are doing 3-4 shoots per week plus consultations and sales sessions. The heat last week was brutal but this week is shaping up a little better.  We are booked through mid-August right now so that is fantastic.   Another great year for our business ahead it seems.

Being President of the club keeps me busy as well.  I do enjoy it though and the members are happy with my performance it seems.  We are getting ready to take 60+ members to the Black Hills next month.  It should be quite the adventure and we are looking forward to it.  

After a Memorial Day trip to SMORR and a trip to Tuttle last weekend, the Jeep seems to be doing well, although I did break a rear driveshaft ujoint at Tuttle.  Not sure what happened as I wasn't doing anything hard.  Things happen I guess.  Click on pics to see them larger.