Driving out to his house today to drop off some stuff, I realized that I hadn’t blogged his session yet! Gasp! Especially since out of all the sessions I’ve had with his family, this was my absolute favorite. The first time I met him a few years back, I dubbed him Mr. Cool because no matter what I did (and I know a lot of tricks) he was soooooo serious!  He was just a baby at that time and I could not figure out what he could possibly have to be so concerned about. Mr. Cool has always plays it cool.  So, I was a little nervous this time because I was out of fresh ideas to break Mr. Cool. But evidently, Mr. Cool is now Mr. Giggles.  Seriously, he was laughing and giggling and cracking us all up the whole time. I think we finished up the entire session in less than an hour, he was so easy to work with!

Check out the sweet mom and dad time. By the by, I had to take these shots with Mr. Cool Giggles on my back to make sure he stayed safe. It was a kick butt location, though.  Definitely want to go back here!

Lurved this shot. He’s such a sweetie! Thanks again guys for such fun and relaxed session. (Now hurry up and finish that tree!)

We held our last round of the Austin 2009 Xpressions Sessions today and all I can say is, "Wow!" I cannot even begin to tell you how beautiful all of these families were, how wonderfully charming the kiddos were, how kind and patient the parents were, and how absolutely outstanding my baby sis/assistant was. Thank you from the bottom of my heart to all of you who made these Xpressions sessions FANTASTIC!  As always, the images shown have only received basic edits to enhance contrast/color, but no full retouching.  I’ll show you an example of the difference at the end of the post.  Also, before I forget, if you’re pregnant in the Austin area and want maternity portraits and are due in February, March, or April of 2010, you can get a FREE mini maternity session (kind of like these Xpressions Sessions) in January. And, I *still* have a few spaces open for the Xpressions photo sessions in Washington, DC and Richmond, VA in December.  Meanwhile, to continue these awesome sneaks:

And to illustrate the difference between the digital negatives (the files that are sent on CD with the Xpressions sessions) vs. the files that are fully retouched (prints ordered through me or those that are available as part of a Premium Session):

Oh, I cannot wait to go through all of these images! Today was a great day all around. Thank you all again!  I’m so honored to get to do this for you.

I’m going to *try* to just narrow it down to a few favs for the blog. But I’m not promising anything. Aren’t they a BEAUTIFUL family? And such a joy to work with them.  The kids had great personalities and everyone was game for whatever I threw at them. Truly couldn’t have asked for a better session!

Okay. This is just too difficult. I can’t help myself. Here’s their session in full: 

Looking for fairies at sunset…sigh. This session was such a joy!

This last shot was quite literally the last shot of the evening. Doesn’t it always happen this way?

All in all, I’d say the first-ever round of Pinkle Toes Xpressions sessions rocked my world. Such BEAUTIFUL families and such patience—you wouldn’t believe the kind of heat and Texas-sized mosquitoes we were dealing with here. So sorry we didn’t get to do the morning sessions this weekend (thanks to the threat of storms and a bad radar map), BUT that works in your favor because…

I’m adding a NEW Xpressions date! If you’d like me to notify you of the new date and times available, please fill out the form here.  Also, we’re going to make another exception this round…I will accept families up to 5 members (extra fee over 3 subjects), but babies still must be at least 3 months old.

To these beautiful families that had their Xpressions sessions this weekend…I’ve already got your disks burned (everyone ended up with around 70+ images!) and prints on order! It won’t be but a few more days and you’ll have everything in hand!  How about that??? And by the way, these previews have only received the basic edits for contrast/color…no additional retouching, etc., so this is exactly the kind of stuff you’ll see on your disk.

There’s just something extra special about getting the honor of photographing friends…dear friends. Laura’s eldest was (is?) my eldest’s first love since they met in preschool a couple of years ago. Through that relationship, our own friendship grew into an easy understanding, a love of all things artistic, and sharing in the joys (and challenges) of motherhood. 

When my business was just getting off the ground, I found myself very overwhelmed with it all and struggling to enjoy being a mom. I would watch how Laura embraced motherhood with such poise…like it was her extreme honor to be granted such a job (hence, exhibits A & B above – grace under pressure). I used to tease her and call her Supermom and really, it’s true. I don’t think she knows this (well, now she does) but she is my living example of the kind of mom I try to be with my kids: involved, creative, nurturing, and willing to do whatever it takes to encourage her children to thrive. She’s been such a source of support (ie. letting us leave a Brett Dennen concert in the middle of his set because I was hurling in the lovely bar bathrooms thanks to morning sickness) and understanding (ie. following my escape that night, she didn’t laugh once as I sped us to Wendy’s where I proceeded to order and devour two cheeseburgers before she had even gotten 1/2 way through her own). She’s a great listener.  She has a knack for keeping things calm. Her family just glows with love and peace and it was my extreme pleasure to get to spend a few hours trying to capture that on camera.

And just like the troubles I had when trying to narrow down the images from their session, I’m finding it difficult not to blog them all right now. So, here ya go–the whole enchilada: 

I’ve been itching for a while now to try something a bit more edgy, different, more hip for babies and kids. Tonight I had a willing model ;-) and we gave it a go. LOTS of possibilities here for a *very* different and unique kind of children’s portraiture.

Limited engagements in Austin, TX, Washington D.C. and Richmond, VA. Learn more!

(Photogs…even if you’re not interested in a session, do check it out if you want to get together for a "meet & greet" lunch December 20th in Richmond).

It was an honor to be asked to photograph this family while dad was home from Iraq for his 2 week R&R. I loved watching them together, how close they were, how it was dad and *only* dad that could get little man to crack a smile.  But it made my heart ache to think how much he is missed when he is away. All I can say is thank you, Bonnie, for lending us your husband and thank you Rick for doing what you do.