He's getting so big

Eli still loves to let me photograph him. He eats up the attention. The girls had on new spring dresses the other day, so I put Eli into a little button down shirt and thought we could take some Easter(ish) pictures. Turns out the boy doesn't care to share the spotlight. He refused to sit next to Grace and Charlie and kept trying to drag his favorite little posing stool back onto the center of the backdrop. I'll post those soon. They're funny if nothing else.

Here is Eli a few days ago.

Oh wait

You wanted to actually see the family shot? I meant to save that last post as a draft but I guess I published it instead. So here's the first of our 5 family portraits that I was describing. I would love to do some more candid action shots in the series, but it is tough using the self timer. We'll see what we can come up with.



Eli is 20 months old. He still doesn't have a single reliable, recognizable word (in English). He does a lot of interesting sounding babbling, though. He seems to think he is speaking and he definitely knows what he wants to say. I can't wait until he lets the rest of us in on his secrets. He has a board book that he loves. It is a Baby Bop (from Barney) counting book. When you get to the end he flips back to page 1 so you can start all over again. When I close my eyes I can clearly see a little 2.5 foot person chasing after me waving this book in his hand.

Gracie makes me laugh all the because she can use all kinds of big words in everyday conversation, but she still has a very lisp-y, slurred way of making her letter sounds. She's in speech therapy twice a week and I am guessing it will continue when she gets to Kindergarten. She was telling me all about something we couldn't find and how maybe it was camouflaged, only she says it like camoufwaged. There are lots of other funny examples, but that's the first one I thought of.

I really wanted Charlotte to wear jeans for the shoot above. You can see who won out. She knows what she wants to wear and it is usually not worth the argument to try to change her mind. She had an outfit of her own design on the other day that consisted of a shirt, skirt and pants all in conflicting shades of pink and patterns. I told her she would have to change before going to her friend's birthday party. I showed her some ideas of what would be acceptable combinations. She said with pouty reluctance, "but that's not as beautiful to me."

5 people 5 times

A really great photographer Tara Whitney whose blog I read is doing a family self portrait a month for 2010. She calls the project 6 people 12 times and she invited others to join in. There is no way I will get 12 family shots this year (I'm already 2 months behind) so I am calling mine "5 people 5 times" and we'll see how we do. Here's our first one taken this Thursday.

Arizona

While in Arizona, I had the great opportunity to shoot a session with Doni. She and her sister in law Brooke have been planning this trash the dress session for a year or so as I understand it. I was thrilled to be able to be a part of it.

Brooke is not only drop dead gorgeous, she is an incredible person all the way around (and a kick ass rider!). She was really fun to photograph.

Um yeah, she stood up on the horse.


Doni shot the session with a 24-70 lens and I used my 70-200. You can see her version of the shot aboove on her blog here I like the moutains looming in the distance in the telephoto persepctive (my shot) but I love the dramatic clouds in Doni's wider angle shot.

Balancing up there was not that easy (nor was it particularly comfortable I imagine). Brooke was a great sport about it and pulled it off incredibly gracefully.



Brooke's husband Daniel kept urging her higher and higher up the ladder. It was windy.







The horse experts were explaining to me that the horses ears should be forward for a good shot so I am not sure this really qualifies, but I really like it anyway.




This is Gracie and Brooke's daughter Braxtyn in the barn. Braxtyn is the sassiest little 3 year old I have ever met (and I type that with a big smile on my face remembering her little body language) I loved her!


I will end this post with one picture of each of Doni's three kids. I have read about them on her blog for so long, it was an absolute joy to meet them in person and get tto spend some time together. They are wonderful and the girls had a great time playing with them on our vacation.

Tanner at the car graveyard. He is such a nice kid.


Ty lights up whatever room he is in with his enthusiasm and unadulterated joy.


Tori is adorable. So much will and personality in such a tiny little body. She is a little sweetheart, but she definitely has a mind of her own. You go, little girl!

Eli

My boy, he likes to be photographed. He actually threw a little fit the other day when I had him in the studio and I decided I was done so I put the camera down and started to push everything off to the side. He pouted and cried and went over to find where the camera was. I picked it back up and he ran back to the backdrop and pushed the stool back to the middle and got up on it.



I stopped the car on the side of the road on our way to the grocery store over the weekend. The girls stayed inside while Eli and I took a few pictures. I'm not thrilled with what I got (my fault), but doesn't he look cute? I am trying to teach him to put his hands in his pockets on command. I started by putting pennies in them and having him find them, which he loved.


A year ago, I posted this list of reasons why I am reminded daily that I married the man of my dreams. I have one to add to it for this year...

46. When I called you at 7:00 pm and confessed that my mother had just called to wish you a happy birthday and, oh yeah, hey it's your birthday! Happy birthday and everything! you laughed as hard as I did.

Here's to many, many more years in which I can forget your birthday, babe. And we can laugh about it together.

Just One For Now

So what do photographers do on vacation? Go to cool junkyards and oogle the photographic possibilities. On our first day in Phoenix, my friend Doni took us on a day trip up to this very cool old car graveyard. I only managed this one of the girls together. That little red headed guy in the background is Doni's son Tanner who is the sweetest, nicest 8 year old boy I have ever met. The girls had a great time playing with him and his siblings Ty and Tori all vacation long.



I went away for 5 days and managed to come home a week and a half behind. I am not sure how that math worked out. I have lots of fun pictures to edit, but they will probably wait until next week.

Been a long time

Well hello! It has been awhile since I posted. It has been awhile since I took any pictures of the kids. I have some plans for pictures of Eli, but haven't even picked up the camera (for fun) in a month. This week, the girls and I travel to visit a good friend of mine who is also a great photographer and we have lots of plans in store. So hopefully next week I should have lots to post here. In anticipation of the usual photographic resistence from Grace and Charlotte, I took them to the mall yesterday and let them each pick out a new dress for the trip. They had alot of fun with that, we even went in the fitting rooms and tried them on and they twirled in the mirrors. Think pink. Lots of pink.

Today, Eli is home sick from daycare and I had to reschedule my morning session but the studio was still all set up. Charlotte let me shoot her for a few minutes. The blanket is typical. The girls like to carry the blankets from their bed around and wrap themselves up in them.

Charlotte wrinkles her nose when she smiles. Here is the first one, in which she is giving me her gratutious smile-for-the-camera smile.


Here, a second later, I must have said something that genuinely made her laugh. Can you see the difference on the web sized versions? It's subtle, but it makes a difference, I think.


The first one cropped in close. I like this one alot.


More Charlotte giggles.



Then, Charlotte wanted a turn so she took the camera and I sat for her. She shot these with my 70-200 F2.8 IS lens. For non-photographers, that thing is really heavy! This first one was her uncropped first frame (I did edit out the bags under my eyes, I admit). YWhy yes, I'm still in my pajamas. Who are you to judge me?


Then, I snagged Eli and she took this one of the two of us (I cropped this). Be still my heart.

Baby Model

So I joked a few posts ago about how Eli loves to be photographed and that he is like my little baby model. Tonight just before bedtime, Derek and I dressed him up and brought him into the studio. He absolutely lit up. I think Derek was even surprised. He ran over and climbed onto the box and laughed and laughed. He is fast and he gets up and down and runs around alot, but he definitely gets that he is "on" and he performs. I can work with that! Plus, I know I am totally biased but isn't he one of the cutest little baby models you've ever seen?






There are lots more I could show, but being the end of the day and all we really should have washed his face before shooting these. I got tired of editing his dinner (and probably some lunch, too) off his face.