You know those moments when you feel like you’re exactly where you need to be? Yep, this is one of those moments.

Every year, thousands of photographers who are part of a community called Shoot & Share submit some of their favorite photos to the annual Shoot & Share Photo Contest. Once the contest begins, voters are shown 4 photos from a certain category, and they choose the one they like the best. In the 2017 photo contest, over 330,000 photos were submitted and over 60 million votes were cast by voters in 159 countries. Isn’t that crazy?!

One of my favorite things about this contest is that all photographers are on the same playing field. Some photogs have only had their camera for a short time and others have had a lifelong career behind a lens. None of that matters in this contest though. I entered the contest for the first time last year and I was blown away that we placed in the Top 100 in a category. How does that even happen?? I had only been shooting for a few months at that point and it was so amazing to see my photos among so many other incredible photos.

When the contest opened again this year, I immediately submitted my 50 photos and jumped on the voting bandwagon. You have no idea how your photos are doing during the voting period, but every once in a while you get a small glimmer of hope when someone goes out of their way to favorite your photo. We went through a period of  few weeks where I hadn’t been favorited, so I was pretty sure we were out of the contest. However, on the very last week during the best of the best round, a few favorites came in – WE WERE STILL IN!

It is such an honor to have 26 of the 50 photos we submitted make it to the top 30%. This year we also had two photos in the finalist category, and one photo in the Top 100 of the LARGEST category in the competition – The Wedding Couple. That photo placed 77th out of 35,527 photos in that category. I still can’t believe it when I see that. I’m so grateful for this journey and all of the people that have been there along the way.

Okay, want to see the photos that placed?! Scroll down to see them all!