Is that the smell of coffee and burnt pancakes?

Which must mean it's Mother's Day morning.



The one day a year Joe uses his chemistry degree, somewhat unsuccessfully, but with my sincere and heartfelt appreciation.

Happy Mother's Day. :)

And in the mail today...

Just a little something to make me feel old.



My husband's (need I bold that?) invitation to his 20-year high school reunion. (There's still several years left before it's time for mine, thankyouverymuch. :)

Wow--20 years. How'd that happen?

Seconds

I wasn't quite sure how to title this one since I had two sessions today--both quite different from one another. The first was a reschedule from my Portraits in the Park session (all which had to be rescheduled due to bad weather that weekend), and it was also their second time meeting with me; and the second appointment was the second baby born in my cul-de-sac to the maternity couple below (and not to disappoint those following the theme here: also their second baby ;)

The family wins my award for a perfect coordination; and Baby M wins my award for the cleanest newborn I've ever shot since he didn't pee or poop on me (or his dad) once. I can't believe I walked out of a newborn session without two loads of laundry! (As an aside, I've been dying to shoot a newborn with a tattoo'ed dad--I'm so glad I finally got the chance.) Isn't Baby M perfect? *sigh*

New feature - new stuff

If your eyes take a little look over to the right over there --->, you might see that I installed a handy dandy subscription service to my blog. If I did it correctly, all you should need to do is enter your email address, and every time my blog is updated, you'll get an email message alerting you to new posts. (If it's not working, someone let me know, OK? ;)

As part of that, I've decided to blog a little more regularly with some non-client images. Lately, I've been obsessed with macro (close-up) work, and these are of the pansies on my front porch. I just love pansies--I'm just hoping there's some way that I can make them survive into the dead heat of the summer? Anyone got any good tips on how to do that (and wanna come over and make sure I don't kill them with my brown thumb? ;)

Anyway, for now, I'm loving the purple and the rich tones. :)

Was that a sigh of relief I just heard?

Doing large group family portraits with young kids is unpredictable at best. Literally, you've probably only got the first 5 minutes for their cooperation, and anything beyond that is just borrowed time. (This is also true for most of the men involved in the session, too. :)

I have a slight feeling at the end of the session that the person who organized it wasn't quite sure if it was successful or not, but I'm hoping she'll be relieved when she sees these three. While I feel a great sense of accomplishment getting those traditional, everyone-looking-straight-at-the-camera shots, I truly love family images that capture interactions and relationships so much more (and really, I think they're almost more challenging to get).

Meet the most daring couple in the world...

Because they hired me--yes me--to shoot their wedding. Really, I couldn't feel more honored that they asked me in the first place, but, honestly, I gotta tell you that despite my nerves at going into unchartered waters, they're so much fun (and really, so cute together) that I think they're going to make me feel quite at ease and make my job quite easy.

Look for more of them on their big day a mere 8 weeks away (and if you could spare a prayer for perfect wedding and photography weather, that would be awesome...:)

Just a few I enjoyed from today's impromptu mini e-session. (That's photographer speak for engagement. Not something I talk about much here primarily shooting 2 year olds. ;)

Perfection in Pink

Oh, it's torture living next door to a baby so sweet and just so perfect.

(There's two neighbor babies coming in the next month, too. Apparently, my husband unknowingly installed a water filter to prevent whatever was in my cul-de-sac's water from making it to our faucet. Perhaps three fresh babies in the neighborhood will change his mind. I mean, seeing her, how could resist? :)

Jet and a GMC

Requests for sessions with family animals are pretty commonplace for me, but I've been dying to do a session with a girl and her horse. While there's lots of things that I drive past on a regular basis wishing I had my camera (really, it's time I get a small one that can be dropped in my purse), I gotta tell you that, other than people, nothing draws me more to grab my camera more than driving by fields of horses. So when I had the opportunity to photograph this teen and her horse, Jet, I completely jumped at the chance.

(Though I must admit that the old GMC parked by the barn had me equally as excited. Funny how the older, more beat up, textured and weathered the item is, the more I know it's going to be fabulous in pictures. ;)

Returns

My dear friend from college, whom I haven't seen in four long years, returned home to visit this week, bringing the warm weather from North Carolina and her first born with her. I've been dying to get most adorable little "Mouse" in my arms and in my lens since her birth, though I'm not too sure she was as thrilled with me holding her (though she looks like her daddy, she is certainly her momma's girl), nor maybe photographing her as she certainly showed me her more serious side today. Still, I was thrilled that J and I persevered in finding a patch of yellow flowers somewhere--anywhere--in Berks County today to place Mouse in. Ah, spring has returned, too.

Much love, and many thanks, J&P. What an amazing and beautiful little girl you have.

Anticipation

I often don't get asked often by friends to photograph their bellies during their pregnancies. So when my friend and neighbor told me she was expecting last year, I must admit that I sincerely hoped she'd ask me to photograph her pregnancy. Certainly, every pregnancy is miraculous, but some are just moreso than others. Hers is one of those: took a long time to happen, and then was difficult not only in the beginning, but also in the middle. Seeing her and her family touch her now full-term belly today, you just knew that they're not only anxiously awaiting soon meeting their baby, but that they're also feeling a well-deserved sense of accomplishment that they've finally made it.