So in January when the Shoot&Share contest opened for submissions, I thought about it.

Then I walked away and I thought about it some more.

And the final day that they were accepting submissions, I did it, I did the big scary and hit submit for my favorite 50 photos from the past year.  To a contest that is 100% based only on the images, no names, no watermarks, and no branding (aside from the styles that we’ve all spent thousands upon thousands of hours (dollars) on defining and perfecting).

To a contest that is 100% based only on the images, no names, no watermarks, and no branding”

The next few weeks are spent voting. Obsessively. From pretty much any device that we could our hands on, we voted. (I say we because pretty much of all of the TEN THOUSAND photographers that entered more than 300,000 photos)  were voting.

And working, and, running households, and voting.

I even got my husband into it, showing him different sets, with him talking about how cool the shots were.

This, from the man whose analytical and mathematical mind never ceases to amaze me, but who’s general response to my work when I show my him screen as I’m editing, or have finalized a photo, is “that’s nice” (invariably the same response be it a wedding portrait of a bride, or, one of a set from a recipe that I’m testing.)   He got into these images as well.

It was fantastic.

Top 10% in Shoot&Share 2017. @khalifestylephotography @cookeatexlore Share on X

So then the voting ends. The working and the running a household continues, and in the back of your mind, you know that the results are coming out.   So you watch the results come out, and wait.

This year, this first year that I entered, I was THRILLED whenever I got a new favorite. The contest (Thank you Andrew Barlow) sends out a note letting you know that someone else voting liked your images enough to want to save it to look back at later.

There are photographers who were getting 300 likes, and I’m over here, THROUGH THE ROOF excited when I ended the contest with 11.

For those of us who knew that we hadn’t made it to the finals, but knew that we’d made it a hell of a lot farther than we’d ever imagined (I’m lookin’ at you So Smith Photography (and, BTW, WE DID THIS!)  had to wait until after everything else had been announced to find out where we’d placed.

And today, we found out.

Out of more than 300,000 photos that were entered across the categories,  I had one in the top 10%, and two in the top 30%.

I am so proud of myself, and I’m even more proud that two of those three photos are my shots for Cook.Eat.Explore (the food blog that is the other side of my business)

It’s been a very eventful and interesting past year, and I am so happy to have placed the first time out of the gate.

Stick around, we have fun things coming up this year.