Samantha Jo Photography

09/06/2026

2026 FALL MINIS ARE OFFICIALLY OPEN!

These are perfect for families, couples, kiddos, maternity, or even if you just need some updated portraits this fall.

$295
20 Minutes
8 Professionally Edited Digital Images
Print Release

You'll receive an online proofing gallery to choose your 8 favorites, with option to purchase additional images if you fall in love with more!

Sessions will take place at a beautiful outdoor location in Springfield, Illinois, with several dates available throughout September and October.

Spots are limited and once a time is booked, it's gone. Full payment is required at booking to reserve your spot.

BOOK YOUR FALL MINI HERE:👇

Schedule your appointment online Samantha Jo Photography

09/04/2026

A little Farm Girl Knitting Market unboxing 💕
Farm Girl Knitting Market

Shannon is seriously SO talented, and I absolutely love adding her pieces to my newborn collection. Every little detail is so beautiful, and I already can’t wait to use these with some sweet babies!

Do I need more newborn props? Probably not. Will that stop me? Also probably not 😂

09/03/2026

Part 2 of cleaning out and organizing my photography props, and somehow while I was doing this the other day, the Holy Spirit put something completely different on my heart. I don’t say that lightly either. I just kept feeling like maybe there is somebody who needs to hear this because they’re in a season that doesn’t make sense right now.

For the last 19 months, I feel like God has humbled me A LOT. There were things I thought I needed to be successful, especially with my business, and God has slowly shown me that maybe my idea of success and His plan for me aren’t always going to look the same. I remember leaving my studio and literally thinking this was going to be the end of my photography career. I thought I needed that studio. I thought that was what made me look successful. And then five months later, I left my job too. At the time, I really did not understand what God was doing.

Now I can look back and sort of kind of understand it. 😂 I truly believe I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be right now. I don’t know what God is doing next, and I definitely don’t have everything figured out, but I can see now that some of the things I was SO afraid to let go of were things He was asking me to let go of.

And maybe you’re a business owner who thinks, “If I could just get a storefront, then I’d be successful.” Or maybe for you it’s more clients, more followers, more money, a bigger space, whatever it is. I think sometimes we get so caught up in what everyone else is doing that we decide that’s what success is supposed to look like for us too. And maybe it isn’t. Maybe God is trying to take you somewhere completely different.

I really want to use my platform for Jesus more. Not because I have some perfect testimony or because I have any of this figured out, because I absolutely DO NOT. 😂 But because this is what walking with God has actually looked like for me. It hasn’t always been easy. In fact, sometimes I swear the closer I get to God, the harder certain things feel because the enemy LOVES to get in your head. "You’re not good enough. You’re failing. Look at what everyone else is doing. You should be further along by now." And I have had to remind myself over and over again that those thoughts are not coming from God.

Romans 8:1 says, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.”

So yes, this was supposed to just be part 2 of me cleaning and organizing my photography stuff. 😂 But I felt like I needed to say this because maybe somebody else is sitting in a season right now wondering what in the world God is doing. I have BEEN there. Honestly, I’m still there in some ways.

But I also know that 19 months ago, I never would have believed I could leave my studio, eventually leave my job, work out of a room in my house and still have a photography business. I thought I knew exactly what my business needed to look like.

Turns out, I didn’t. And God has been showing me that ever since....

09/01/2026

Come organize my props with me… aka watch me talk to myself, crash out, make weird noises, and question how I’ve accumulated THIS much stuff 😂

This is definitely the ugly side of the business for me. Our spare bedroom/laundry room/my office has slowly become the place where wraps, headbands, props, buckets, blankets and everything else goes to live when I don’t know where to put it.

I’m really trying to get everything organized and give it an actual home because I swear I spend half my life looking for something I KNOW I own.

Also… does anyone else constantly feel behind? Like you finally tackle one thing on your list and somehow five more things appear? Because SAME.

Anyway, here’s your reminder that behind the pretty pictures and perfectly posed babies… there’s a photographer sitting on the floor surrounded by newborn props talking to herself. 😂

08/27/2026

I posted these in a private photographer group yesterday and the photographers of Facebook basically yelled at me for not sharing my work enough....I was blown away by their comments...they were so sweet, so...

Message received.🤣

So here’s some more of sweet Selah because I’m still completely obsessed with this session. 🌈

Also, can we please bring back just LOOKING AT PICTURES?! 😂 I have never been a Reels girl. Half the time they move so fast I feel like I’m going to get sick trying to actually see the photos.

Unfortunately, I have to stay with the times and make the dang Reels, too. But not today. Today you get a good old fashioned carousel of sweet Selah.
🌈