Birthday cake!

This darling little guy is about to turn one & his mom wanted a birthday cake session. We originally thought we'd do it outside on the grass, but it was really hot out even though we had a pretty early session. So we used the kitchen instead & I think it turned out really cute. He was perfect with the cake - a few licks of frosting at first, and by the end he was pretty covered with red frosting. So fun! Thanks so much for inviting me - I really enjoyed it, these are some of my favorite sessions.

Botanic garden evening with the girls

We met our good friends at the botanic gardens for one of the evening concerts. It was so fun! We had wanted to get some fun little girl pictures, and they turned out great! The kids had a great time & I did too. What a fun way to spend the evening, thank you.












At first they were "pretend skipping," until I told them that real skipping would also work. Much easier. :)

Sleepy newborn

This little guy is the 4th son in his family - I took his next brother's pictures almost 2 years ago & they have (to me) a lot of resemblance... Okay, I was going to look up a picture of his brother to post, but it was long enough ago that it's been moved to a DVD, it's not on this computer. Oh well. :) Just take my word for it.

He was so perfect - he slept the whole time, let us move him around, no problem. Well, he did open his eyes briefly a few times, but then back to sleep. What a good boy! I haven't had a newborn sleep through a session in a long time. Meeting newborns is one of my favorite things about being a photographer. (And BTW, the newer the better - newborn pictures are best done before they are 10 days old, while they're still sleepy.) That, and 1 year old birthday eat-the-cake sessions, which I'm so happy to have one of tomorrow!

Happy smiles

What a busy summer.... I can't believe how fast it's going! Just a quick reminder about my promotion for a free large wall portrait. Check it out :) - I'm booking about 2 weeks in advance right now.

Now for a new session - this little guy has a really big personality! He moved fast and his smiles were totally captivating. He liked toys of all kinds (which is reflected in his session, showing many glimpses of different toys), loved his mom, and put up with me wanting him to stay in front of the backdrop - with only occasional breaks for freedom. It was such a pleasure to meet you, thanks so much for coming for portraits! I love this session - it's simple & beautiful.

Vacation pictures

I feel like I'm spending all my time playing catch-up with pictures. These are from our vacation to Colorado - it was so much fun! I took a million pictures, knowing in my mind that I was going to have a hard time getting around to processing them all. I actually came pretty close while gone (though I didn't get to any customer pictures like I'd said I would).



I love this one of our youngest and my husband. He is such an amazing dad! I'm so grateful for him every day.

And the rest of these - they are NOT engagement pictures. This is my brother, who brought his super-nice and beautiful girlfriend with him to our tiny cabin stuffed full of family. They are not engaged! I don't know why you would think they are engaged from these pictures. Because they're not! (Unless there's something he's not telling me.... and I do tend to be the last one to know family news...) We all really liked her & were glad she could stand the crowd for a week. So happy to meet you! :)















The whole time I was taking these (and some other family pictures for other family members) I was wishing so much that I had scenery like this in Albuquerque. Nope. I like what we've got, but now I wish for a mountain meadow or lake. Within very short driving distance of course. Ha.

Extended family pictures - in the bosque

I thought I would take a minute and answer some questions that I get asked about my proof processing. So first of all, I take too many pictures. I know this. I'm working on it. :) For sessions with little children or family groups, I feel like I need to get a lot of images because 1) kids move & change expressions fast, and 2) I don't want to end up having to ask for a re-shoot because something technical went wrong & I didn't end up having anything to work with. (This has only happened once & I vowed - NEVER AGAIN!)

So, depending on the group size, I come home with somewhere between probably 50 & 250 images. I go through them all, toss the ones that aren't keepers, and sort though the rest to find the best. Sometimes with groups I will combine pictures to get a good shot of everyone in the picture - sometimes I do that later with help from the customer. My goal is always to get the best possible family picture, no matter how many people are in it, so with your input & the help of Photoshop I make that happen.

With many of the pictures I end up re-cropping (this is also something I'm working on to get right in-camera) and I tend to enhance the colors & contrast. I have some fun photoshop actions that I sometimes use (and always can on request!). When all this is done, I convert them to black & white and build your gallery to post on my website or to view in person. (Another aside - I'm going more & more to viewing proofs in person - it eliminates miscommunications and I think you get exactly what you want that way, because you know what I can & can't do.) My sessions tend to range from 40 to 100 proofs. Then it's the customer's job to pick! That's the best part. So many people have mentioned that there are too many good ones to choose between - that makes me so happy :) that I have a hard time sympathizing.

This session was set up by a great family with whom I've had the privilege of doing portraits before. Their extended family was in town, so this is a big session with lots of different groups & individual portraits. For some reason I'm processing this one backwards (I sometimes read books sort of backwards too, much to my husband's disdain) so the last pictures taken are the ones that are ready to go now. The rest of the gallery will be ready in the next couple of days. Thanks, this one was really fun!