If you're wanting to follow my work, and see more pictures, you can see most of it via my facebook page. This blog will mainly be to share all the quirky stories I have to tell of my photography & cake baking adventures. Let me start by telling you a little bit about myself for those of you who don't know me personally. My name is Lori Latch, I am a cake bakin', picture takin', crafty crazy lil' mother of 2 gorgeous girls and wife to one good lookin' Army boy! I'm blessed beyond measure and love the fact that I get to (for the most part) stay home with my girls. Payton is 5 (almost 6) and Taylor is 18 months old. They keep me on my toes and are my best lil' buddies and favorite photo subjects! My husband Dave is more than I could ever ask for in a husband and loves me way more than I deserve. I'm not one who likes to portray that I have some sort of happy go lucky picture perfect life. My life is flawed. VERY flawed but, hey, it's MY life flaws and all!
My Family & I:
This is me (photo by my amazingly talented photographer pal Mari Annelise, edits by me, green grass provided by my best friend Jennifer Bartlett, haircut by my fabulous brother in law Brad Swift @ Chrysalis salon, nails by Stephanie Reece @ Lucy's cottage, & makeup by the incredible Ashlee Fugett) Yes, I have an entourage or like to pretend I do anyway. Let me run with it okay!?!?!?! bahaha
This is Payton Faith. Pretty stinkin' gorgeous right?!?! She's my little mini-me. We pretty much enjoy all the same things and she wants to be a photographer and cake baker just like me when she grows up (or so she says!).
This is Taylor Grace. Yeah, I know, I do good work what can I say! ;) This one is trouble but I wouldn't have her any other way. She's stubborn like her Daddy and is quite expressive of her opinions even at this age. She melts my heart, they both do. Come on, you know they melt yours too!
This is Dave with his girls at the airport the day he left for Iraq :( I wish I had a really good picture of him in Uniform to share. He has these eyes that are pretty much mesmerizing and this smile that just sort of turns me to mush. He's my very best friend and I can't wait for him to come home where he belongs! He's a goof ball (wonder where the kids picked it up?!?!?). Oh how I love him!
Piece of Cake: Photography & Cakes (a not so brief history)
It's sort of hard for me to define what department of this company started first because I've been charging for cakes longer but taking pictures even longer than that!
I guess we will start with the photography side. I started taking pictures in high school when I convinced my father that I needed a $500 SLR for photo journalism. I LOVED that thing and used it until I finally decided to join the technology wave 2 years ago and get a DSLR. Anywho, I was always taking pictures for friends and family when I was needed but never really had intentions of making a dime off of it. It was just something I enjoyed doing. I'm not sure when it was or who it was exactly that decided they would pay me for a session for the very first time but, I'm gonna guess it was about a year ago. I was shocked and said, "oh, I don't charge for that". I sort of laughed to myself I remember. As time progressed, I became a lil' better and am most definitely still learning and hoping to improve. In the beginning I was taking pictures, doing some basic edits, releasing a disc to the "client" and then never really saw the photos again so I don't really have any to show but I can tell you one thing, I have drastically improved since those early days! lol I'm actually a little sad I don't have any of the first few weddings I shot or the very first paying session. Oh well, lessons learned.
I do know that this was from my first paying maternity session about a year ago.
The cake thing started about 3 years ago. My best friend Jennifer had ordered a cake for a friend's graduation party and was slightly disappointed with it so we decided to spruce it up a bit. Nothing fancy just a few additions. Later, Jenn took a cake decorating class and learned to make homeade icing and what not. For Payton's 3rd birthday I decided we would do some cupcakes ourselves. We made 2 cupcake trees and a min tiered cake for the birthday girl
Everyone at the party wanted to know where we got such cute cupcakes and we were feelin' pretty proud. We then of course began to get requests for all friends birthdays, showers, etc. After a few months of cake bakin' we decided we might be onto something. So Jennifer, Lauren, & I decided we would slap some of our cakes on a myspace page and see what the general public thought. We were pretty shocked at the response and were super booked every weekend that year! Lauren became super busy with work & life and didn't have time for cakes as often so it was mainly just Jennifer & I. When we both became pregnant in 2008, the sheer smell of cake sent poor Jenn into a nauseous kick so then there was just ME! I keep insanely busy with this. I'll be honest, it isn't my passion. I DO like the creative decorating part of it but I don't like to bake (at all) and I really really hate the mess it leaves in my kitchen. The good news is, over the years I have become in such high demand that I can afford to be selective of the orders I take. Currently, I'm not taking any orders under $100 or (50ish servings). Truthfully, making a $30 birthday cake just isn't worth the hassle and mess it creates. One day, I will have a big fancy bakery with people to clean up after me and I will do every order big or small that comes my way!
Here are just a few of the hundreds of cakes I've done over the years. I wonder how many I've done in all... How many eggs I've used, gallons of icing, icing bags, bottles of icing color?
Well, that's the jest of it all. My life and business in a nutshell! Sadly, lately my life has been so hectic and insane that the photo takin' cake baker, often forgets to take pictures of her own cakes before they make their way out the door! lol I've made a promise to myself to get better about that! You can stay tuned for some recaps of some of my most memorable sessions, pictures of cakes, maybe even some cake decorating tips!
