Braxton, Bella, and Berkley

Today I got to hang out with Braxton, Bella, and Berkley...

I had a lot of fun spending a little one on one time with each of them - they are a very talented and energetic bunch. Braxton is quite the athlete and wanted to show me his basketball skills. Very impressive!
Lovely Bella is an excellent little dancer and wanted to show me some of her moves.

And little Berkley had a wonderful time traveling all over the house with amazing swiftness. She's also a great clapper! :-)

Princess Evey

Evey is 3 months old today! Let's see, what is new with Miss Evey? She is having quite the love affair with her cute pudgy little fists these days - gnawing on a fist during most waking hours. She is sleeping great at night 98% of the time, for which I am incredibly thankful. She is starting to let out squeals and what is beginning to sound more and more like laughter. She is really a very fun and happy little girl. Oh, and she LOVES big brother Maddox. She finds him very fascinating and very funny - as we all do.

So we celebrated with the usual photo shoot for the baby book. Here are some of my favorites:

Probably my absolute favorite - I love the jowls:

And Grandma Nita dropped by to visit while we were finishing up her pictures. She brought Evey a party favor from cousin Olivia's princess birthday party. I couldn't resist...

The Garringers

Yesterday I met the Garringers for a photo shoot. Holly, Katie, and Michael are planning to surprise their mother with portraits for her birthday! We had a lot of fun shooting the pictures - and it was great bonding over our favorite tv shows. Apparently we all watch way too much television. :-)

Here are some of my favorites from yesterday - a little sneak peak for the Garringers.

Meet Holly...
Katie...
and Michael...

I must say, Michael was a great sport. His sisters picked on him quite a bit during the shoot - but it was all for the cause. I wouldn't have gotten that shot of Michael without his sisters off camera making him laugh. So thank you Holly and Katie!

Their 2-year-old cousin Sean joined us at the Nelson in the hopes of getting a group shot with all 4 of them for their grandma.

Don't let that shot fool you. Sean ran pretty much non-stop once he arrived. All heck broke loose! :-)

Thank you Garringers for a great photo shoot - you are a very cool, fun family! ;-)

Giving Thanks - Part II

I am by far the most thankful for my two wonderful children, Maddox and Evey. There truly are not words to describe how much I love them and how much joy they bring to my life.

I have signed up to become a member of an organization called Celebrating Adoption. If you are an adoptive family and have adopted your child within the last year, you qualify for a Celebrating Adoption session. You will receive a complimentary portrait session and 20 (4x6) proofs. Contact me for details and availability - and please pass this along to anyone else you think may be interested!

Giving Thanks - Part I

Thanksgiving is a time to reflect on one's riches (not the material kind) and consider ways of giving to others. One of the things I am most thankful for is my health, something that is often taken for granted. It is my health that allows me to fully enjoy life - and what I love most about photography is that it allows me to capture life. I would like to introduce you to an organization I recently joined called Think Pink Photography. This organization will allow me to use my photography skills as a means of giving to others.

"Think Pink Photography was founded in October 2007 to support individuals and their families who have been touched by breast cancer. It is a non-profit organization that serves two main purposes - celebrating life and supporting the cause.

Through our photography network, we are helping breast cancer survivors and their supporters to celebrate life with charitable photography sessions.

Through donations and various fundraising efforts, all profits from Think Pink Photography will be donated to The Beverly Family Foundation. As a 3-time breast cancer survivor, Danielle Beverly and her husband Eric joined together to form a foundation dedicated to promoting education, increasing awareness, and providing support and resources for families who have been touched by breast cancer.

As Think Pink Photography grows, so will the opportunities for you to become involved and support this important cause. I encourage you to sign up for the newsletter (on the Think Pink website and Think Pink blog) and tell your friends and family about Think Pink Photography. Awareness is everything and we can't be successful without you."

I encourage you to view the website, make a donation, or hire a photographer that supports Think Pink Photography. If you hire me for a portrait session or wedding, mention Think Pink and I will make a personal donation to the organization!

Bloopers

I often find photo bloopers very amusing. Some of you are familiar with this classic Maddox blooper:

It's been so long I honestly can't explain what happened here. First and foremost, I have no idea why I was taking pictures with his hair in that condition. That is a seriously bad hair day. Thanks to the black blanket, he appears to be a floating torso with amputated arms. And then the facial expression just really seals the deal here.

Anyways - the reason I got to reminscing about this shot was the following blooper from the other day...

For some reason I enjoy the combination of her funny face, matrix arm, and Maddox's blank expression in the background. Thought it was worth sharing.

For those who appreciate a more traditional image - here is a better shot of Evey from that day :-)

Different day...and a different perspective:

And the lighting for these shots really shows off her gorgeous baby blues:

Autumnal Bliss

Fall is my favorite season of the year - I can't get enough of it! And yesterday was one of those amazing perfect fall days. I admit it was unseasonably warm - but that just made it all the better!

Before I go on - here is Maddox's new hair. I love this look - even though he appears so much older!

So we spent most of Sunday at Grandma Nita's house for Aunt Abbey's birthday. The kids had a great time playing around in the yard. Here is Olivia workin' it for the camera...

I got some great action shots of Louis and Maddox. Unfortunately I didn't realize until now that I never seemed to get a shot of Bryce. I was shooting all manual (flexing my photography muscles) and Bryce was a little too fast for me! That boy can move!

And this is my favorite shot of the day:

Happy autumn!

Happy Happy Joy Joy

Sometime last week I got Evey all gussied up in this adorable outfit (shout out to Aunt Chris - thanks for the gift) to get some pics b/c she will soon no longer be able to wear it. :-(

I laid her down on a blanket in her room and she promptly fell asleep.

After a short nap...she woke up in a fabulous mood and ready for pictures.

And you have to see it with the hat to get the full effect of the cuteness here...what is this? Bohemian chic?

And here is Evey excited to see Grandma Donna!

It's wonderful to have such a happy little girl.

Tatted Out

I scored a huge collection of temporary tattoos for Maddox. I was so excited to find them since I was almost out and Maddox does not like to go very long without a tattoo somewhere on his body! The collection claims to have more than 500 tattoos...though that includes a couple of different alphabets and some rinky dinky tats that Maddox would probably not be interested in. But still! It's a sizable collection - and most are pretty cool. I was particularly impressed with this dragon tattoo:

Admiring his tattoo:

Sticking out the gut:


Take a good look! I'm pretty sure the next time I post - Maddox will be sporting a new 'do. He has a haircut appointment on Saturday. His mop is starting to get rather unruly.

Take care!

Same Stroller, Bigger Boy

Maddox, Evey and I enjoyed the beautiful weather yesterday by having a picnic and taking a walk on a local trail with PaPa. We had a great time and saw quite a few little critters: lots of grasshoppers, several fuzzy caterpillars, a snake, a large spider, and two great blue herons to name a few. Maddox wore himself out and fell asleep in PaPa's arms out on the trail. We ended up carrying Evey and pushing Maddox in the stroller. He barely fit! When I saw the photos of him sleeping in the stroller - I had a flashback to the zoo when he was just about a year old. Check it out - same stroller but a much bigger boy:

Here are some of my favorite shots of the day:

Happy Trails! :)

Results

Thank you so much for your feedback on the self portraits. After tallying all of the votes, comments, and emails I received, the winner is...well, the winning photo is obvious because I have added it to the blog!
:-)

Option #4 (the simple black and white shot) came in a close second and several people suggested I find a way to use both. So I think what I will do is have Scott (of Scott Barnez web design) add that photo to my photography website when he updates it for me...hopefully in the near future (whenever I can manage to make final decisions on what photos to include in my portfolio - again with the indecisiveness).

And because I have never blogged without including a photo...and certainly don't want to start now...here is Maddox "standing like daddy."

Post Halloween Post

As planned...yesterday we made delicious cupcakes. After they cooled - I was in charge of icing and Maddox did the sprinkles. He takes this responsibility very seriously - so he did sample the sprinkles to make sure they were fresh.

He started off doing an excellent job - meticulously sprinkling each cupcake with an equal amount of sprinkles. However the job apparently became tedious...he ended up ditching the sprinkles all on one cupcake.

Here I think you can see the lack of consistency:

:-) They are delicious nonetheless.

Jay and Maddox carved the pumpkins. Maddox requested one good and one bad jack-o-lantern.

Then it was time for costumes and trick or treating. Maddox had insisted he wanted a skeleton mask - so I made him one. He wore it for about 5 seconds and then wanted it off and asked that I paint his face instead. I had predicted this would happen. So Jay wore the mask instead. Apparently a little kid came up to Jay while they were out and about and appeared to be frightened of him - but then walked up and hugged his legs! Too funny.


Notice that Maddox's scary skeleton face is quite similar to his scary ghost face in the previous post. ha

Maddox came back with a lot of sugary loot! Evey trick or treated to our next door neighbor's house (where she got 3 kit kats!) and posed for some pics.

Other than a bit of a costume malfunction (in addition to the last minute face painting...I had trouble getting the bones to stick and stay on the costume of a fidgety 3 year old) we had a very successful Halloween. Maddox said several times last night that he loves Halloween. He was so worn out that he was literally falling asleep in the bathtub - even trying to lay down to go to sleep in the water!