Have I ever mentioned how much I love babies? They are just such delightfully squishable little humans! Newborns are special, but once a baby hits about 6 months old, then the real fun begins. They are completely fascinated by the world around them, and are easily enchanted by the sound of a raspberry… Every little thing is something else to be explored, and investigated. And they don’t know how to say “no” or talk back to you yet!

Now, to hear me wax poetic about babies, some folks might think that I would like another baby of my own. But that couldn’t be further from the truth! Instead, I enjoy spending time with other people’s babies! Just for a little while, when I get to gush over them and help their parents remember just how precious they were when they were very small. And then I can hand them back and go back to enjoying my children who currently sleep through the night (unless there is a thunderstorm, then all bets are off)! And I get to share their complete yummy-ness with you.

Blair is an absolute doll who came to visit my home studio this summer. Isn’t she lovely? Aren’t her eyes just about the prettiest blue you’ve ever seen?

And the best part is that her family may be moving to Mooresville permanently and I will get to take her pictures as she grows up! Thank you for sharing your beautiful daughter with me!

I got together with this gorgeous family on the HOTTEST day of the summer of 2012! How hot was it, you ask? Well, on my way there the thermometer in my car recorded 104F! At 6:45 p.m. And for those readers not from the East coast and not familiar with the way humidity makes things even hotter, let me just say that it was positively sweltering. I brought along a cooler full of waters and a few Frogg Toggs to help keep everyone relatively comfortable and hydrated, and they brought along waters too–great minds think alike! They hadn’t seen the Frogg Toggs before, and were very impressed with how they helped. I don’t know how our family would survive baseball season without them!

Mom did a great job selecting clothes that photographed beautifully–such a nice mix of patterns, solids and color. Navy and white really lends itself to crisp, classic, summery photos.

I love when parents are as relaxed and comfortable with each other as J & D are! They have been together for over 20 years, and D’s infectious smile and mischievous nature made for an enjoyable evening together. Their attitudes really set the tone for the entire session, and it was obvious that their children were so comfortable in their own skin thanks to their loving and obviously affectionate family.

But enough blabbering from me! Feast your eyes on their gorgeous photos:

When AnnMarie called to ask if I would be available to take first communion portraits of her daughter, I got such a thrill — it is just so cool when one of my clients calls me back to do new portraits! This was my first time taking photographs to document such a special occasion, so I was also a little nervous. But Emma made the entire experience just about perfect! I tried several times to have her look more solemn, or thoughtful, or prayerful, but that smile just couldn’t be contained. She was so excited to be in such a pretty, twirly dress! And she did look like an absolute dream.

One of the really cool parts of our session was while we took a few of the photos in AnnMarie’s bedroom, she showed me one of her wedding portraits, and the top of her dress looked almost identical to the one she had found for Emma! In fact, Emma was wearing several meaningful items: a pearl bracelet that her aunt had had made for her using pearls from her deceased grandmother’s pearl necklace; a cross that she had received as a gift, and a customized crystal rosary with her name spelled out on some of the beads.

Thank you for the opportunity to try something new, and trusting me to document this special event!

This photo session was a bittersweet celebration of a beautiful little girl’s first birthday. You see, Catherine has been one of my Little Sprouts babies. For the past year I have had the pleasure of working with this family to document some of the important milestones in the first year of her life. We met just days after she was born to capture the oh-so-fleeting newborn stage; then again when she was a smiley four-month-old, and was just starting to sit up; and then when she was eight-months-old and crawling and just brimming with curiosity. And so while I am so happy for her and her family, I will miss seeing them quite so frequently!

I love that our sessions become a blend of lifestyle photography that is a bit more photojournalistic and catches the moments where the family is interacting naturally with some studio-style images included to just feature our little star.

Catherine’s mom made the beautiful banner in the background to use at her first birthday party the week before, and it made a gorgeous accent for our photos!

I have Maddy’s Fatty’s bakery from Cornelius make all of the cakes used for my first birthday cake smash photos. I love that their cakes are all natural, beautiful, and they taste delicious! Catherine was a little tentative with the idea of smashing the cake, though. She did not like getting her fingers messy, and was much more interested in inspecting the cake and frosting than she was in actually eating it!

Happy Birthday, Catherine! And thank you to your family for trusting me to be your photographer throughout this year. I look forward to seeing you again once you are two!

I think I might have the most gorgeous clients. Seriously! I don’t know if I am just lucky, or if it’s just the love that seems to shine through that makes them appear more beautiful.  This particular gorgeous family has been trying to schedule a session with me for nearly a year now, and we finally got a date that worked with their sons’ busy soccer schedules! M asked me for some suggestions for what to wear, and I gave her my usual tips: Pick two or three colors that go well together; feel free to mix in some patterns but be sure to also mix in some solids; think layers and accessories because they add great visual interest to your photos and look great when converting to black and white (which she tends to prefer hanging in her home).

As you can see below, she did an outstanding job! Look at all that texture. There is so much detail, but their faces are what really shine. And if you scroll down a bit to the color image, you can see she started with her son’s blue plaid shirt that had just a bit of red running through. She focused on the blues, but notice how they are all in the same general palette? Almost as if you were looking at one of those paint strips with the lightest blue ranging to the darkest blue. And then she POPPED by picking a red shirt for herself (layered under the light blue so that the red isn’t too overpowering) that matched the red stripe in her son’s plaid! And POP she should as the only chica in this family of guys.

And as per usual, there is no way I can stop with sharing just two photos of this family! The boys were so playful, and by the end they kept saying “how about if we take one doing ________?” Definitely a fun photo session for me too! So here’s a bit more for you to feast your eyes:

Thank you for trusting me to capture your family as it was right then! I will never forget your “feats of strength” at the end!

As I mentioned in my last post, I am scheduling mini sessions to raise money and awareness for Batten Disease.

Don’t miss out on this great opportunity to experience the fun of having family portraits made in a unique location with a custom photographer!

I met my friend Danielle when we were 5 years old and in ballet class together. She lived down the street from my cousin, and we would occasionally all play together. We became close in high school, spending early morning hanging out in the halls because her dad was a teacher there and my dad dropped me off on the way to his job as a teacher at another high school.

We went our separate ways after high school: she to college at NC State, me to college in Virginia. But we kept in touch by mail (remember the days when you actually had to write a letter by hand and put it in the mail? With a stamp?!). She met her husband at NC State and got married while still in college. I remember going to her baby shower a few years after we had both graduated. She was absolutely happy in the way only a soon-to-be mom can be.

We kept in touch primarily with Christmas cards for the next few years, complete with pictures of her precious son, Eric. We saw each other in 2002 at our 15 year high school reunion, soon after the birth of her daughter, McKenna. Time slipped past, as it has a way of doing while in the midst of raising young children and despite our intentions of trying to get the kids together when she visited her parents in Maryland, we never got our calendars to synch.

A few years later, I received her Christmas letter and it contained devastating news: her son, who had been having visual issues and some learning difficulties, had been diagnosed with Juvenile Batten Disease. Batten disease is a neuro-degenerative disorder that can occur in children of parents who both are carriers for the gene. It is very rare, affecting between 2 and 4 children in 100,000 live births.

Children with Batten disease will progressively lose their sight and their motor skills. They will have increasing mental impairments, seizures and will eventually become blind, bedridden, and unable to communicate. Right now, it is always fatal. A parent of a Batten child once described it like being blind, epileptic, and autistic as well as having ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease), Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Children with Juvenile Batten Disease will usually pass away in their late teens or early twenties.

Can you imagine? I have to be honest that I have no idea how she copes with this information on a daily basis and continues to remain a strong Christian with a keen (sometimes twisted!) sense of humor. How do you carry on with daily life, caring for yourself, your home, your child with the disease, your children who don’t have the disease?

We got together the spring of 2007, after I moved to North Carolina to scrapbook together and to participate in the Our Boys 5K, a local event sponsored by a family in Concord, NC with two sons who had been recently diagnosed with Batten. Can you imagine that? Two children with this cruel disease? It is hard enough to comprehend having one child affected by something like this, but two? How do you do that?

Danielle had recently had a third child, a daughter. She was tested while pregnant and they found that this child was a carrier, like Danielle and Chris, but would not have any symptoms. While we were scrapping, she mentioned that she had some concerns about her second child, but had not yet gotten her tested because she wanted a little more time of “normalcy” with her. I tried to reassure her that she was probably just fine.

The following year her worries were confirmed that McKenna also had Juvenile Batten Disease.

My heart broke for her family. I wanted to do something, but didn’t really know what I could do that would make any difference. I made donations to the Batten Disease Support and Research Association (BDSRA), and supported a friend who ran in the Our Boys 5K, and posted information about Batten on my personal blog and Facebook. Nothing seemed enough, though.

This year I’m stepping up my game and with the support of the Lowden and Hawkins families doing a fund raiser of my own: Family Photos for Batten Disease. I will be offering a day of mini-sessions on March 17, 2012 at the gorgeous Hunting Creek Farms in Hamptonville, NC (Thank you to Kisten Hunter and her family for allowing us to use their farm). The Farm has a huge, finished barn, a covered porch area with rockers and a stone fireplace, and positively oozes with atmosphere–seriously go check them out if you are looking for somewhere to have an event!  For $175 families will have a 30-minute mini session and will receive a DVD with 8-10 edited images for their personal use. In addition, all participants will be able to participate in my professional print lab program that allows them to obtain their prints at my direct cost from a professional-quality photo lab.

All proceeds from the day will be given to BDSRA, so your fee for the session is also tax-deductible.

Help me make a difference. Contact me as soon as possible to reserve your preferred time for this special day.

One of my favorite spots to take photos on Lake Norman is at Stutts Marina. Not only is it close to home, it offers a lot of variety in locations for the pictures. And the sun sets in just the right place to give me some gorgeous light in the evenings! We decided to take advantage of this location for Brayden’s Little Sprouts 10 month session.

When we arrived, we were a little surprised to find some large construction vehicles there as the marina was doing some upgrades. I asked Amanda if she wanted to go to another nearby lake spot, but we decided that the big dump trucks actually would be an appropriate background for some of his pictures since he absolutely loves trucks!

His mom brought two outfits so that his pictures would show a little more of his personality. We started with his classic overalls, then stripped down to his diaper with the hat and socks, took a quick diaper change and snack break, and then put on his play clothes. He has grown so much since I saw him last! He is a crawling machine and he is on the verge of walking. It is so fun getting to see these babies grow!

His smile was absolutely contagious! But trying to keep the hat from his first outfit on his head was quite a challenge… taking it off was just too much fun. Playing with the classic Tonka dump truck that I brought to our session was fun too, but the best part was when we sat him in the soft dirt by the real dump truck. He could not stop picking it up by the handful, and squeezing it, and there was nothing that any of us could do to catch his attention to look up towards me–he was simply not going to be distracted!

Have I ever mentioned that I absolutely love photographing newborns?

They are more challenging to photograph than a lot of my subjects:

• they often need to eat,
• or have their diaper changed,
• the room needs to be kept so warm that I’m generally sweating,
• I’ve been pooped and peed on so many times that I now pack at least 3 shirts to change into, just in case…
• and they are tiny, little humans who you need to treat carefully and with respect for their needs and more importantly their safety.

But in spite of the challenges, they are truly my favorites. I am touched every single time by their newness, their innocence, and what an absolute miracle they are. I remember when my son was born, my OB (who was the oldest doctor in the practice and had delivered thousands of babies) remarked that he is amazed every single time and counted himself blessed to be in the presence of one of God’s miracles at each delivery. That’s pretty much how I feel about photographing these little ones!

Nicholas was a little older than most of my newborns, just a little over 2 weeks old, and he was a BIG little guy! Okay, that’s a little contradictory, but you know what I mean. He had also gotten used to s-t-r-e-t-c-h-i-n-g out, so those curled up types of poses just weren’t working for him.

Can you believe all that hair?! His big sister and his momma have the same gorgeous, thick, dark hair.

During our session, he was an absolute angel with only a few peeps when he woke up to be fed.

During one of his awake times, we brought his enthusiastic big sister upstairs for a few pictures with her new little brother. Amanda is only 2 years old, and she was utterly fascinated by her new baby. Her parents were a bit nervous about trying to have her hold him, so when she flopped herself down next to him, I just went with that!

While mom was taking care of feeding Nicholas and freshening up his diaper, I got to chat for a bit with Amanda. She is such a doll!

Just a few more little bits of delicious newborness:

I was so struck by his sweet little ears! Love that fine fuzz on his face…

I think this picture of Nicholas’ hand, nesting in his mom’s, nesting in his dad’s is one of my favorites from this session. I love seeing just how tiny these newborns are, and comparing them with their parents makes for a great contrast.

Thank you for the honor of documenting this time for the newest member of your family!

I love getting to watch my Little Sprouts babies grow during their first year–it is amazing how quickly they change! I got together with the O family for our 3rd session just before Christmas. Catherine has become a little ham! She is curious, and smiley, and mobile.

I so love photographing this family because while they like some posed-type pictures, their preference, like mine, is for what is described by some people as “lifestyle” photos, and by others as “camera unaware.” These are the types of photographs to which I refer when I say that “real life happens between the poses.” These are the pictures that capture your family interacting with each other in an authentic way. In my personal experience, these are the types of photos that when we look at them in the future bring back a true wealth of memories. And isn’t that why we take photographs?