Eight days old-DC Baby Photographer

Photographing newborns takes me back to the early days of being a mom. The time between a baby being a newborn and an infant is so short and they change so much! This little one was only eight days old when I photographed her and her family. She already has two sweet siblings to help care for "Mom's baby". I love how Julie trained them so well. :) Hope you all enjoy your sneak peek!

Julie, I must insist that you get this one done up, huge, and hang it in little M's room. :)

M's brother and sister loved telling her stories about frogs and bugs.

Such a sweet big sister...

Dad and big brother peering over.

Thanks again for letting me capture your family!!

#s-7 and 29-Buy a monitor calibrator and can my own jam

Before I make note of my goals may I please wax nostalgic for one moment? I LOVE tennis and in particular, love the US Open. I was lucky enough to attend two US Opens with my family before I was married and I have such wonderful memories of those times with my fam whom I love. I was so excited to watch Melanie Oudin shoot onto the stage this year. Such a class act and cute girl. My favorite was her shouts of, "Come on!" when she would do well. Can't wait to see more of her. Here are a few images from our last US Open in 2006... it's been way too long.

In 2006 it rained 2 of the 3 days we were there. This is how they dry off the courts.

Got to know my umbrella pretty well that trip.

Pardon the blur, this is what happens when you give you camera to strangers, I mean, my sister. :P Ha ha Em.

Goal #56 is to attend the US Open. Maybe next year? The year after? I only have two years to do it in.

Though I can't cross of that lovely goal above, I did buy a monitor calibrator and was able to can some strawberry jam. I'm still wondering if the calibrator was worth it. Though everyone will tell you to calibrate, there are many who admit that even calibrated, what you see on your screen and what gets printed isn't always the same. I finally resorted to calibrating and then tweaking a bit with images from my lab. I'm happy.

The strawberry jam is fantastic. You can see three jars in the picture. I made five, gave one away and we've already eaten the other. There is nothing like homemade jam and it's so easy to make! Life is good.

Grigg family-DC lifestyle photographer

I've been following a blog I love for quite some time, a photographer's blog whose work inspired me to do this shoot with the Grigg family. When Christy and I were figuring out where to shoot I asked her to consider places that were special to her family, not necessarily places with a great backdrop or stonework but a place her family loves, a place that is memorable.

I spent the better part of four hours shooting Christy and Co. throughout Bi-Centennial Park, the Nashville Farmer's Market and their home. My hope was to capture their family in their own element. I wanted these images to reflect who the Grigg family is, to reflect their family. More importantly I wanted the session to be fun and free of the stress that often accompanies family pictures. I hope I was somehow able to capture their Griggness. :) Enjoy!

Dad and the kids kept busy with Disney's Sword in the Stone while mom finished getting ready.

Love how the kids are glued to the T.V. and could care less that someone's off to the side snapping their picture

Getting the last bite of cracker

This is K's favorite stuffed animal Georgie. We made sure he came along for the day.

Alright, I'll admit it, sometimes as a photographer you just get lucky. This is one of those shots. I was shooting the girls walking out the door to get into the car and when they opened the door, sunlight flooded the entryway. I don't think I could recreate this image even if I tried!

Making sure everyone's buckled up safely.

The globe at Bi-Centennial Park provided for some very awesome pictures. It "floats" and spins on water so you can push it to go faster or just let it slowly move around.

Close up of K. I got a lot of great shots of her near the globe. Too many to share unfortunately.

What day wouldn't be complete without a little "Ring around the Rosie"?

Love this one!

K was a hoot in front of the camera. She always wanted her picture taken and I was more than happy to oblige.

Part way through our session (hot and sticky mind you) we decided to stop for some ice cream and water. Ahh... relief.

Love the ice cream on her nose. Isn't that just a classic?

And don't forget ice cream on the face too.

K finished her ice cream first and C was kind enough to share with everyone. Love K's face in this one.

The farmer's market. Had some delicious peaches and of course the colors were gorgeous.

The lighting was beautiful in this particular location. It's almost as if a light is shining on little C.

I love the unconventional portrait. Check out K's awesome pose. :)

Seconds after I took this shot, C totally fell on top of Christy. I decided it would be best not to show that one.

I love capturing moments like this. The girls were running up the ramp to the fountains on the other side and Will jumped over the railing, right in front of K. He reached down to tickle her. This is the result.

This is a small section of a very awesome map of the state of Tennessee near the capitol building.

By this time the lighting was perfect... casting beautiful red and yellow hues.

And on our way back to the car K decided to randomly take a bit out of these "pillars". Glad I had my 200mm zoom on.

We stopped at McDonalds on the way home and C finished her nuggets inside. Her pants were soaked from the fountain hence the shirt with diaper look. Too cute!

Eating some delicious peaches and K hamming it up for me.

What girl doesn't want to be a ballerina. Side note: check out C on the side.

I asked them to show me their rooms and some of their favorite things. They promptly went and got some books. I loved that mom and dad were in the other room and that for a few minutes I was able to shoot with just the girls. Kids are so much more themselves when "grownups" aren't around. I put grownups in quotes because obviously I didn't count as a grownup.

Pretending to be angels.

Love this one too.

Christy told me that she wanted to get a shot of the girls playing with their toys on the mantle of the fireplace since this is something they do everyday. After the girls helped us get the toys out it was like they were in a different world.

Through the playhouse window.

Christy and Will just looking on.

And then possibly my favorite part: story time.

Christy made note that the girls always put their fingers in the mouths when they're read to. Definitely something we want to capture because I doubt they'll be doing that at 18.

And a final image. Dad and little C playing around.

Thank you Grigg family!! I loved capturing your family's moments. Hope you like your pictures!!

Mini sneak peek-DC Family Photographer

If there is such a thing as a mini-sneak peek, this is it. I would love to dedicate a much longer blog post to this shoot... so tonight, in order to satisfy my own desire to put some images up as well as Christy's desire (the mom of these beautiful little girls) I am resorting to just three images from our nearly four hour session. Enjoy!

The one behind the camera

That would be me. The one, for the most part, behind the camera taking the family shots. My husband isn't all that bad at taking pictures though. Someday I dream of having a husband-wife team and making tons of money and spending our days together shooting, editing, etc. But until then I do most of the shooting.

Ella's life has been very well documented through photographs but there's almost always someone missing in the picture and that person is me. I look back over the thousands (yes... thousands) of images of Ella and there are only a small handful of images that include me.

We have yet to get professional images taken of my family. I know, your jaw just dropped right? My father-in-law who is also a photographer took our family's pictures in June when we were home in Portland but we have yet to pay someone, spend a couple hours with someone, walk around carefree with someone snapping away as we laugh, smile, kiss, squeeze, give loves, run, crawl, pick up sticks, etc.

Each day Ella gets bigger and my heart just aches as I realize that my little baby is growing up. It's time for me to do it, I can't keep putting this off. If you're stuck on the fence or just haven't gotten around to doing a family session don't wait. Your children will grow up right before your eyes. Make sure you've captured that time!

Until then, here are some images I took of Ella yesterday at Belle Meade Plantation here in beautiful Nashville.

A Vandy ball she loves playing with from her uncle

Can you see the ever so subtle lens flair? Love it!

She was more fascinated by sticks and rocks than anything else.

Just had to include this picture. Is this bark not gorgeous? And let me just say one my time how much I love my new lens.

She got blessed with long eyelashes.

It's really hard for me to stand by and watch Ella do anything which causes her to get dirty. Man. I just kept telling myself that she was having fun.