The Oliver Family

We had a great afternoon hanging out with the Oliver family. It was our first time to meet them, so it's always fun making new friends! They have 2 girls - Aubrey and Taylor Grey - and they're so precious! We started off with some family shots of the 4 of them. I'm torn between 3 shots for my favorite of them all together. I'm quite attached to all 3 of these shots (the one above and two below) and keep changing my mind about which is my favorite!

The oldest daughter Aubry was so much fun and quite energetic - she's at such a fun age. I love this one with her precious little belly button!

We also spent some time inside the Oliver house which was fun. Here's Aubry in her room! What a cutie!

And playing in the guestroom - this is one of my favorites from the whole shoot (and maybe from all of our Nashville shoots!):

When we first arrived at their house, I instantly spotted this amazing bowl in their dining room, and feeling adventurous, I asked if we could put Taylor Grey in it! I love how this one turned out and it's even more special as the bowl belonged to Erica's grandmother.

Erica loving on Taylor Grey:

Aubry's turn in the bowl - she may have just outgrown it, but we made it work for at least a couple of seconds to grab a quick shot!
What a fun afternoon playing with the girls and I'm so thrilled with so many of the shots!

Sam & Lynnette

I love collaborating with clients on their shoots - it's great to get creative input from everyone and I love seeing other people's visions and ideas. So I was really excited when Sam said he had a great idea of where to get some cool shots of he and his wife Lynnette. Sam is a friend from my early college days, so it was great to see him, meet Lynnette, and catch up on what he's been up to.

So, needless to say, we were thrilled at their location choice! We shot near LP Field (Go Titans!) and had so much fun on the pedestrian bridge, at the new Symphony Center, and running around the streets of downtown.

I love shooting in the middle of the day when no one's around, and, since it was Veteran's Day, the streets were even blocked off so we had the run of the place!

That last shot is one of my favorites - yes, I definitely was laying flat in the middle of a downtown street but it was totally worth it. Let's be honest, that usually happens on most shoots but it's worth the sacrifice!

The photo session was an early birthday present for Lynnette, and it was definitely a success! Happy Birthday, Lynnette!

The Hillin Family

So many images, so little time! I'm in the final editing stages from "The Nashville Sessions" (sounds like an album!) - I have lots to share with you and hopefully will have a little more time for blogging soon as editing wraps up.

The next session we had was the Hillin Family. Adam and I have both known the Hillins for years, and we're looking forward to shooting Katie's wedding in May (that's one of her engagement pics up there in my blog title! She's famous!). So it was great to see the whole Hillin gang together, AND, it was a SUPER exciting time as they just added a new member to the family - baby Jackson!

What a cutie and what a spoiled little baby he'll be with an aunt, three uncles, and two awesome grandparents to love on him!

It was a great fall afternoon and we had so much fun with all 8 of them!

Laing & Todd

Our next shoot was Laing and Todd, whose wedding I'm shooting next October in Nashville - it's going to be so much fun and I'm even more excited about it after getting to meet them last week and hang out for a while! It was a perfect chance for us to get some casual shots of them together before the big day. I love shooting downtown when we're in Nashville - the old buildings have so much character that we miss here in the OC!

As usual, we ended up wandering the streets a little just to see what we ran into. Grey is my favorite color right now, so I instantly loved this building with the big graphic numbers - what a find!

We got so many great shots of the two of them just hanging out - I couldn't decide which ones to put on here! I particularly love these two:

I also got really excited when we came across a railroad yard nearby. We were hanging around, getting some great shots next to the trains, when a man approached us and informed us that someone might call the railroad police on us if we weren't careful. Really? The railroad police? He was very kind to give us a warning but I couldn't stop laughing at that in my head - it still makes me giggle a little! It was totally worth the risk of a run-in with the railroad police to get some cool shots like this!

Next October is going to be great! I wish it wasn't so far away! What a great time with Todd and Laing! Thanks, guys!

The Self Family

Our first shoot of our Nashville trip was Matt, Jennifer, and Mary Carter. I've been trying to connect with them for a while, so I was so glad to be able to fit them in! We met up at their house and got some precious shots of MC and all three of them together both in and around their home. I love this shot of MC loving on her Pooh. What is it about Pooh and Elmo that entrances all kids? They must have magical powers!


MC and Jennifer hanging out in the nursery:


MC is super lucky to have a mom who plays the piano and is teaching her from an early age. I think piano lessons are one of those things that were torture at the time, but looking back, we all wish we had stuck it out. I specifically remember being so mad in jr.high that I missed out on going to O'Charley's with the jr.high boys basketball team to go to a dumb piano lesson. Hindsight is 20/20!




Lastly, I totally love this casual family portrait with the dog!

It was so great to meet all four of these guys and get to hang out for a while! Thanks for having me over!

Back Home

We are back home from an amazing trip to Nashville! I added up all of our shots from the 3.5 days of shooting and overall we pulled down about 8000 shots total between Adam and I. We were talking on the plane ride home to OC about how lucky we feel to have such great friends and family! We loved being back East, meeting really cool people, enjoying the AMAZING fall weather, and capturing lots of great moments.

As you can imagine, I'm a little buried in editing right now but am trying to get stuff out to you all as fast as I can!

I can't wait to introduce you all to the great people that we got to hang out with this week! Check back! Until then, I thought you might enjoy a behind the scenes look of the measures we go to to get a good reaction (I shouldn't say "we" - Katie and Shae are the ones making the sacrifices here!)!!!

Baby Jill

This week we got to meet a new friend in our life: baby Jill! Our friends Sarah and Daren had their second precious little girl this week and what a privilege to be there in the first couple of hours of her life and capture a few of those first precious moments together!

Jill is just beautiful (as you can see) and Sarah was such a champ through a very hard labor. We're so glad that she is here! Congratulations to Sarah, Daren, and big sister Annie!

Robin & Ben

We had such a fun day shooting in Pasadena. After Darcy and Adam, we met up with Robin and Ben. My favorite time of day to shoot is about an hour before sunset and we hit that window exactly with this shoot! It was such great light - what a treat for me!! I absolutely love that shot of them above. Here are a few of my favorites from the session around town. We loved hanging out with Robin and Ben for the afternoon and can't wait to see them again soon! Enjoy!

Darcy & Adam

This past Saturday, we headed up to Pasadena for a couple of shoots - our first official holiday shoots for the year! After a stop at Sonic on the way up (strawberry limeade, please!), we met up with Darcy and her husband Adam. What a great couple - we had so much fun just running around town! I love Pasadena - there are endless hours of really great shooting locations so we were trying to fit as much as we could into one measly hour! The city has a great mix of old and new, so we shot a little bit of both! We started at the newly renovated City Hall - wow! What a gorgeous building!



And don't miss this AMAZING stairwell - I loved the banisters.




Just across the street from City Hall is a beautiful old church - how cute are these two?



And lastly, you guys know I love me a good weathered brick wall - this one was great and I love these casual shots of Darcy and Adam just hanging out and being them!


What a fun afternoon it was! We loved meeting and hanging out with Darcy and Adam and even finished the night with some A'Float Sushi that was SO good. We'll definitely be back for some more of that!

Check back soon for some highlights from Ben and Robin's shoot coming in the next week or so!