Renee and... a bun in the oven

I couldn't help feeling a little sad and homesick when I was preparing this post.  These photos are from a maternity session I did for a close friend back in Atlanta.  She has a son that is two months older than my little guy, and they were good buddies when we were there.  We loved getting together for play dates... which gave both us mommies some adult time while the boys kept each other busy.  In November she had her second little guy (photos to come next week), and we went out the week before she was due (talk about last minute) to get these shots.  As you can see the light was GORGEOUS when we got to McDaniel Farm Park (oh how I miss you too!), and we had so much fun strolling around with the boys and snapping photos. 

I miss you so much already, Renee!  I pray that God will keep us close even with the miles that separate us and that he will bring us both another mommy friend to fill the gap.  :)

Happy hump day, everyone!
 

  

The Forum Shoot- Day 3

This is the final post for my Forum photo shoot.  Day 3 was short and sweet.  The ladies at the Forum set up a mock day care room in one of the conference rooms, and if you could have seen how plain the room was before they started, you would not believe that these photos could have come from that room.  They told me they were bringing in a few things to help make the setting more believable, but when I walked in, I was completely blow away!

See their hard work for yourself below.

Have a Marvelous Monday!

The Forum Shoot- Day 2

This is a continuation from last Tuesday's post.  As I mentioned before, I shot for the Forum on three separate days focusing on children of different ages each day.  The second day, we took a group of school aged kids to a local park and got several photos to represent the after-school programs that the Forum supports.  This was probably my favorite shoot.  The kids really had a great time "playing" for my camera.  They kept coming up with ideas of other activities that they do in their after-school programs, which made the brainstorming part of this job much easier... they did it for me!  We "worked on homework", climbed a rope tower, swang on the swings (is "swang" correct English?), turned cartwheels, played the trombone, shot hoops, and so much more.  It was such a fun "day in the park", and I am so grateful to have had this opportunity!

Here are a few of my favorites from this session.  It was hard to narrow it down because I have so many!

Thankful it's Thursday!

The Forum shoot- Day 1

So I am finally sitting down to blog about the Forum shoot that I did back in October! Phew morning sickness is a killer! All day everyday! I'm glad that is behind me! I have just now finally caught up on all the housework and photography editing/designing that had backlogged while I was so under the weather. In the meantime, I went to Nicaragua, Central America for a friend's wedding and we got an offer on our house. We closed last week! YIPPEE!! Off to Spartanburg we go... and more importantly, Dada/hubby here we come!

Anyway... getting back on track... when I was down in Florida in October I did a shoot for the Florida Children's Forum. Their graphic design artist was tired of the forum spending bundles purchasing individual stock photos for their publications, and since she's a long time family friend and is familiar with my work, she came up with the awesome idea of having the Forum employees bring their kids to different locations for me to photograph them "doing what kids do." The Forum paid a lump sum for me to take, edit and deliver the photos for their unlimited use. We both made out well on the deal! It was definitely a HUGE challenge coraling so many kids at one time and trying to get shots of all of them (and at the same time avoid including the parents who were all standing around observing). I have definitely learned to have a little more backbone and say when I need adults to "vamos" from my shots. (Sorry I know.... that's horrible Spanish!)

The first day we went to a local day care center and I got photos of children of all different ages doing everything from reading, playing dolls, and building with blocks to climbing on a playground and riding bikes.  It was a crazy fun-filled day, but it went off better than I could have ever imagined!  Check out some of the fun photos from Day 1 below.

Happy Tuesday!  ;)

Amber... super fun maternity photos!

Here's a fall session that I am finally blogging. 

When I was getting ready for this session, I was both excited and nervous.  I always feel that way when I'm shooting for a friend.  I want to take the best possible photos and capture exactly the feeling they are envisioning.  This one had some added craziness because Amber had SEVERAL props that various family members had given her that needed to somehow appear in at least a photo or two.  She was so great though!  She took the time to photograph each item beforehand and email them to me so I could brainstorm before I got to the shoot.  That was awesome!  I also went to Little Mulberry Park (in Dacula, GA) a few days before the shoot so I could have a basic flow in my mind to hopefully keep my poor expectant model from walking back and forth all over creation while I scoped out a spot for each shot.

When the day came, the weather was GORGEOUS!  We started out early in the morning with sweet morning light.  Amber and Shaun were awesome to work with.  As a matter of fact, I was so shocked with how laid back Shaun was.  Some dads (and guys in general) get impatient with me during a shoot because getting creative shots is probably not high on their priority list, but Shaun was so easy-going about the whole shoot.  He posed however I asked him to, and he pushed Amber's clothes and props around all morning with a smile on his face.  (To really appreciate the last sentence check out the photo at the bottom of the post of the strollers we drug around with us!)

Amber was so precious!  I don't think she stopped smiling the whole shoot (except for when I asked her to try to look more "natural"... maybe "serious" is a better word because smiling is "natural" for her!), and it was obvious that she was so excited to finally be starting their family.  She was such as trooper as we marched up and down hills and I asked her to sit, stand, lie down, etc. over and over and over. 

After all was said and done, the photos from this shoot are my favorite maternity photos that I have shot to date.  This session really stretched my creativity level a lot, and as I've said before, "I like a challenge!"

Have a terrific Tuesday!