Sarah & Allie

Right after Thanksgiving, I had the opportunity to photograph Sarah & Allie. Sarah & Allie are sisters, and their Dad leads worship and is an elder at my church. His wife thought it would be a great surprise to have photos of the girls taken for him for Christmas. So, they came over to my place on "Black Friday" and we had some fun! Since it was a surprise, I couldn't share them with you until after Christmas, but now that the cat's out of the bag - check 'em out!!

Sarah & Allie laughing it up in the warm glow of the sunset. The sunlight was warm, but the air outside was COLD - they were such good sports!!

A slighty more vintage version of the same scene

and cross-processed...

Allie in the sun

And Sarah

Eventually, we had to put jackets back on to keep them from freezing. Here's a couple shots against the back of my house.



Sarah joked about climbing the tree in my back yard, and I wasn't about to let her get away without actually doing it! Allie got up there too, and the shots ended up being some of my favorites from the day! (don't you just love that barn next door in the background?!)



Finally, their noses were getting all red and my fingers were getting numb, so we headed inside. I don't have a studio in my apartment, but I do have some awesome wallpaper in the hallway - so that's where we shot :)



And for the last shots of the day, we headed to the kitchen. See, Allie & Sarah are AMAZING cooks - or bakers, rather. So, my original idea was to get them cooking in their kitchen. Since it was a surprise for Dad, and he was at the house, we made do with looking at cookbooks in my kitchen instead. My kitchen is small, but right at sunset, it has the most beautiful light!


All in all, it was a really fun shoot! Thanks Sarah & Allie for being such good sports and for making my job so easy :) I hope your Dad loved his Christmas present!!

Photo Biz Boot Camp

Wow! It has been a crazy couple of weeks around here! Just when I thought I was about as busy as it gets with finishing up jobs in time for the holidays - I spent much of last week at Photo Biz Boot Camp. Liana Lehman came up from Atlanta and spent 3 days with 8 of us from 7 studios in the area going over the business side of photography and helping each of us develop some goals for the coming year and beyond. It was incredible and I am SO glad I was able to go (thanks to a scholarship from Davina Fear)! I have so much going on in my head and I need to take some more time to get it all out on paper and make some plans for the coming months. Now that all jobs are up online and prints have been ordered, I can't wait to take a few days to process and plan ahead!

Here are some photos from our last day of camp...

Matt Grazier workin' it for the camera

Enna Grazier looking like HOT STUFF!

Matt & Enna having their portrait taken by Liana

Maureen Ford being photographed by, um, everyone


Eric Laurits, aka :e: in between shots


Meghan Thomas - one of the few of us who actually seems to like having her picture taken

Lauren Rutten laughing it up, enjoying life, thinking about the "darkroom," I'm sure ;)
(ah, you had to be there...)

Amanda Harris playing with the Grazier's puppy, Jackson

Liana working it Santa-style for Enna and Eric

Thank you for coming all the way up to Boston to be with us, Liana! You are a great teacher and an absolute blessing! And thanks to each of my fellow photographers - for being such an encouragement to me! I'm so glad to have met each of you and can't wait for that follow-up session on the cruise ship next year :)

I'm really excited about the next year in my business and I can't wait to see what happens when I start putting all of this into action. Big changes will be coming, so stay tuned...

A Day at the Fells

A few weeks ago, I photographed a family from my church. This family is awesome and so unique! Doug & Neilani have an amazing capacity to love. They recently had a baby, Ezekiel who they call Zeke (isn't that a great name?). But, they also have 3 teenage boys who they adopted from Haiti! This is one of the most diverse families I've ever photographed, or known for that matter. It's just so awesome to see how they have opened their homes and hearts in obedience to God and have built a wonderful family in the process.

So, Neilani & Doug had me come along as they took the boys for a walk in the Fells near their home. It was a great Fall day - sunny & warm - and the woods were a great backdrop for our shoot. Check it out...

Here's baby Zeke laughing as we tromp through the woods.

Here are the older boys, heading through the trees...

...and coming out at the pond where we planned to shoot.

And posing for the camera

It was really cool to see these 3 big teenage boys hanging out and playing with their little brother. They're totally sweet with him - and don't they make a handsome bunch?

Neilani & Zeke hanging out by the pond

Doug & Zeke back at the house

This is Sheku. He was totally camera shy and did not want his picture taken! But he loosened up after a while :)


This is Paul. Totally cute and very comfortable smiling for the camera!



And then there's Ephesien. This guy was like a professional model - he just kept posing for me. It was great!


He even took me over to the soccer field by their house for some shots of him in his element...





It was a great afternoon hanging out with you guys! Thanks so much for trusting me with your memories!