Tamara

I met Tamara almost 2 years ago at a party at Mike & Melanie's house, and after seeing their engagement images, she referred her newly engaged friends Casey & Samantha, and then she contacted me about doing some photography for her and her mom. Mom wanted to get some new photographs of her 'little girl', but Tamara only agreed to the deal if her mom came with her and was in a few of the images as well. Ahh... who says blackmail doesn't work?

Lemme tell ya, Tamara is one of those people that's just got an instant smile... it's hard work for her not to smile. Here's just a few images from our session.

Meet the LaScola's

Admit it. It's just fun to say, isn't it? LaScola... I'm hearing the song, 'That's Amore' in my head (and now you probably are, too) as I let it role off the tongue.

My friend, Sarah (LaScola, it never gets old), had her brother, Matt (awesome name), his wife, Sandy, their little pride and joy, Joe, and her mom, Sally, in town recently, so we went to a local park and documented the fam before the next installation in the LaScola (nope, not tired of it yet) family arrives later this year. Congrats, Matt & Sandy!

Sarah just moved into her new house in Frisco and was nice enough to have a bunch of friends who didn't have family in town over on Easter for a HUGE dinner. We had a an Easter Egg hunt for little Trinity and Joe, although "hunt" might be a bit of a stretch - Trinity's mom and dad (Jerry & Tina) brought over somewhere in the neighborhood of about a million plastic eggs filled with candy, so Jerry, Matt & I ran out of hiding places in the back yard and just started tossin' them smack dab in the middle of the yard after a while. Trinity and Joe were practically trippin' over 'em as soon as they walked out the back door.(BTW, Sarah, did you ever get the egg out of the tree or are you still staring at it bitterly every time you walk outside?)

Here's a few images from our party in the park the day before.





























Thanks, Sarah!

Princess Trinity

Most of you long-time readers of the blog already know little Trinity by now as she's made several starring appearances over the last several months. Last Saturday we set out to find this little Princess' magic castle, and we photographed our journey along the way.

The weather was a bit windy, maybe even borderline monsoonish at times, but when a 2-and-a-half-year-old little girl makes up her mind to get dressed up and go exploring, there's no stopping her.

Here's a couple of my favorites from our adventure.

The Larsen Family

In my experience, there's basically 3 possible outcomes from any photo session. The first, and fortunately least typical, is the session where you know the best part about the session is that it's over. Sometimes kids just aren't in the mood to be photographed no matter how badly you - and oftentimes the parent(s) - inflict self-humiliation in an attempt to crack an elusive smile from said kiddos. You're already checking your calendar availability on the way home to see when you schedule a re-do session.
The 2nd outcome is one of uncertainty. You think the session went okay, but you won't really know until you get back to the studio and cross your fingers as you download the images, all the while making a deal with the photography gods that you'll promise never to shoot hand-held at less than 1/30th of a second again without flash if they just give you a couple good images this time.

Then there's the 3rd type of session, the one photographers pray for every time they walk out the door. This is the type of session where you can't wait to download the images because you know you've got great images. That's the kind of session we had on Sunday afternoon with the Larsens. Jana and Scott have a beautiful and wonderfully friendly & playful little girl named Jordan, and we had lots of fun exploring the neighboring woods and fields by their house. Poor mom, though- I felt bad for her by the end of the session. I think the temperature dropped 40 degrees (well, at least 15) while we were outside... and she was wearing a sleeveless dress. Sorry, Jana!

Here's a few sneak peeks of a couple images from our session.

The Smith Family

Last weekend I met the Smith family for the first time. Karen called me about a month ago and said that her friend, Trisha - another client - told her she needed to get images of her family made as well. (Thanks for the sales job, Trisha. The check's in the mail... well, kind of. With the referral program, you now get $50 off your next session. Sweet!)

So Karen & Larry and their adorable (and extremely polite and well-mannered, I might add) kids Jenny and Taylor loaded up the car and met us at a beautiful park near downtown Dallas last Sunday taking advantage of the amazing fall weather we've been having to create some great images. Once again, I managed to schedule a session that coincided with an important sporting event - Larry races motorcycles and had a race that afternoon, but was gracious enough to skip that one in favor of spending some time with the family to do some photography. Good choice, dad.

Everyone was great and both Jenny and Taylor we're the human equivalents to Play-Doh... willing to mold themselves in any position I threw at them. Thanks guys.

Here's a few sneak peak images from or session. Click on images for a larger preview.

The Holiday Season Can Now Begin

Well, it's finally happened. That annual ritual that signifies Christmas is right around the corner has transpired, and the holiday season is now officially open for business. Call it the Groundhog's Day equivalent of indicators that Jolly St. Nick is packing up the sled. Yep, the Chambers family scheduled their annual Christmas pictures. Every year, I use the Chambers as my gauge that it's time to start thinking about getting serious about the holidays. Laura and Andy were brave enough to volunteer to be my first official clients back in December of 2004, and we've been creating images of every year since.

I was shocked how much little Emma had grown in the past year since our last session. And her hair! Wow... she's a Julia Roberts starter kit! And John, this little guy wasn't even around yet for our very first session, and now he's well on his way to becoming a big boy who looks just like his dad.

Here's a few images from our session last Sunday. Click on the images for a larger preview.

Ava Turned 2!

Yikes, where does the time go? I still can't believe it's already been a little over a year since we created images to commemorate Ava's first birthday. And now this little princess is already two. Well, 2 and change, really - her birthday was a couple months ago, but we pushed out her session a time or two, but this way we also were able to do some Pulitzer-worthy Christmas card images while we were at it. If you're friends of the Gaonas, check your mailbox around Christmas time to see this beautiful family.

I'm so glad we waited. The weather yesterday was fantastic, and so was Ava - a diva starter-kit for sure. She's already melting hearts, so watch out boys.

Here's a couple sneak peek images for mom and dad. Click images for larger previews.


































I love this image. Such a rockin' outfit... and a matching suitcase! Are you kidding me? How cool is that?