Dee-AIR-ahh!

We both probably figured this was gonna happen way before it did.

But as it's turned out, it's just a stone's throw from Christmas at this point.

File this under the better-late-than-never category.   And as the pictures will show, the primary request did get covered.

That request came on October 13th when the call from Laureen Keahna finally came to book her daughter's senior session.

I had talked to Mrs. Keahna and her daugher Dairrah, (pronounced Dee-AIR-ah) approximately one week into the school year back in August.   The Keahna's were in to see what all the fuss was about... making sure Stewart Photography was indeed the place to go.   The meeting went well... I felt good about our chances to land the Meskwaki Settlement High School senior, but they held off on ultimately committing.

And they held off.

And held off some more.

In fact, I had begun to figure that Dairrah had decided to go elsewhere.

Fortunely, I was mistaken.

I wasn't told this back in August, but evidently, getting fall color was a priority.   And normally when I'm asked, twenty-two years of experience in this industry and forty-four years of living here tells me that, while it's a crap-shoot at best, most likely the second or third week of October is your best shot.

The only problem?

Waiting until the second week of October to call.

Turns out many others had the same idea as Team Keahna, and I have no doubt that hearing that it would be nearly a month wait to get Dairrah's session in when it was already peak fall color time, wasn't exactly what they were hoping to hear.

Lots of times when we get to mid November, Mother Nature has served up a big brown crud-burger with a side of cold slaw for our outdoor hopes by that point.

So you can imagine how much sleep I lose over hoping against hope for the fall season to hang on by its figurative fingernails in order to be able to produce some semblance of outdoor beauty for our late season seniors.

And in this case... we hit the jackpot.

Really, most of November and now as we've capped off another week with highs in the mid 50s in mid December, we've been truly blessed, and I don't think the handful of seniors we've shot since then will complain, either!

So for Dairrah, her sister Ashley... her 3 year old nephew/helper, Howard and moral support/BFF, Alyssa, we were all thankful that we got a nice morning to shoot... a few piles of leaves hung on seemingly JUST for Miss Keahna's benefit... and our future nurse by way of Oklahoma Baptist College was taken care of.

Granted, I know that she would have much rather not waited a month to see her beautiful fall images finally come to life... but here they are... hopefully worth all that wait.