Photography

If there's no contact you got no legal recourse. I'd level with her.

"Look, you missed two deadlines. Give me another one but give me a real deadline you're comfortable with, not one you think I want to hear. I just want my photos and you're I see you're busy so let's agree on a date and time you can deliver these photos to me."

Then it's on her if she doesn't deliver instead of you feeling like an ass for pestering her. It's on her for the previous missed deadlines but look at this kind of conversation as a restart. Nothing before matters.

What's the contract say? If there's not one, your options get reduced. Other than continuing to ask her, there's not really anything you can do to force you to give you photos quicker, even taking her to court would just get you your money back.

As far as "is this acceptable?" No, obviously not. I'm assuming you went with her because she was a good deal, this was the risk that went along with that. You didn't mention when the photoshoot was done, but amateurs or budding pros are famous for underestimating the effort to deliver.

I understand that the holidays are a busy time, work and family obligations and all,

I also understand that editing can take a lot of time, and even experienced editors can get overwhelmed;

If you honestly aren't able to get around to the pictures before [REASONABLE DATE], would it be possible to get the unedited pictures in the interim, just for peace of mind so we both won't be stressing about them?

I would still appreciate seeing your full vision come to fruition when you have time to do the editing, though.

Best of luck

[ I can already hear the hellfires Roar for suggesting that somebody send unedited pictures in the interim X0 ]

Sometimes I just don't understand why ppl give deadlines they can't make. I literally tell ppl they won't see anything in 2 weeks, cuz I know I won't even open those pictures in 10 days.

Are they really that bad at planning or are they just hoping a miracle happens between their schedule?

Anyway, sry for the rant, your situation is not acceptable, I would start to be very mean to this photographer, cuz that won't cut it in the professional world in any industry.

I had a guy like this photograph a recital for me and one of my friends in college. Turns out he was just like “yeah I just book shoots and worry about when I’ll edit it later, lol” and routinely had MONTHS of old work backlogged and just not getting done. We felt bad, but, like you we already paid so we kept badgering him and eventually got the photos like 10 months later. It was an hour long event that produced an album with like 30 some images. By the time we got the photos it was completely irrelevant and we didn’t even end up posting them anywhere because it felt silly.

I am a photographer now and I will never do this to a client. I have done similar shoots and I know it would have taken him like 2-3 hours total to get that done but he chose not to do it/do other projects for all that time. I’ll stay up all night to get an album done when I said it’ll be done because I know how people get excited to receive their photos and it’s also my responsibility to manage my time. This kind of photographer will only ever have one-off clients unless they change their ways. You should keep asking, maybe she’ll feel bad and learn.