A lovely friend. {Utah Family Photography}

One of the benefits of being a photographer is the opportunity to see friends that one hasn't seen for years. Everyone needs their family photos updated and even if one lives out of state there is time during trips home to visit. Plus I love to travel (hint,hint). This is my friend Sarah and her beautiful family. Sarah was one of the wonderful people who took advantage of the special that I ran to help my sister and her family who lost pretty much everything in the flooding in Australia last January. It was a win for everyone. Sarah got a great deal, I got to see my friend and not have to charge full price (which I hate), and my sister was able to purchase a fridge which we will all agree is rather crucial to family survival. Sidenote: My sister and her family are finally back in their home along with an addition. Leah had a beautiful baby boy who sadly I haven't seen yet but hopefully will in the next year.

Sarah wanted an urban look and also to not travel too far as they were all so tired from all the visiting and travel and reunions so we chose this location in Ogden.

I loved meeting her children, they were absolutely delightful!

When I photograph families I like to take both headshots for the Moms and also let each child pick their own place to take full-length and three-quarter shots. I like to get the kids involved in the shoot so that they feel that they have some say and are a part of the process. They always seem to like picking their spot and it makes them excited for their turn. I always get more cooperation when it's "their" idea. Every once in awhile I get a challenge location chosen so if it's too nutty I still shoot in the place that they have chosen and then I say "Hey, let's just do a couple more over here." Always works!

We chose this location partly so that they could have the two different looks of the urban buildings and the green of the foliage behind the bridge. I also love the beautiful rim-lighting that I get here as the sun is going down,

I love two-year-olds, they are so much fun! It's a little challenging to get them to sit still and smile at you so I just shoot and shoot and shoot like a madwoman. Of course, when I'm editing I see all these fantastic expressions that I just love and can't possibly choose between so I love to make composites. This is a 20X20 nine image composite and it's meant to be printed as a gallery wrap. As a parent we love all the different expressions that our children have and here they are, all together. I'm working on making these up for each of my children, I just think they are so much fun!

Thank you Heiner family for the opportunity of photographing you. It was so great to see you all and I hope it won't be long until we can play together again. Loves!!

We make this, look good! {Utah Family Photography}

I'm starting this post with one of the last images from the photo shoot because this was the main image that we were trying to capture. A good friend of mine had purchased this fantastic dress for her daughter and wanted to tailor the shoot around having her look like a movie star in a back alley, like she was headed to the theater surrounded by her bodyguards. She even said that she wanted to have her boys have a Men in Black look. When she said that I was hooked!
I was originally planning to do this image in Salt Lake but the day before the shoot my friend called me and said that she also wanted to have her kids portraits taken at the ponds in Kaysville so in order to have the time to get both images we decided on taking the above in a little alley behind the Kaysville theater. I really like how it turned out though I would have wished for some ambient lights in the background. If that light over the doorway would have been on it might have made this perfect. The kids were so fun and so willing to try anything. As it turned out I was glad that we hadn't tried to go to Salt Lake because the little one had had it by the time we were done. We had to bribe him with frozen yogurt...it was really good! As a general rule I try to keep family sessions to an hour though sometimes more stylized sessions like this take more time. It takes a lot of energy to have your photos taken and kids especially don't need too long of a marathon session.

This was a quick grab shot as we were starting. I love casual images like this and the light was just magic. I took out a lot of flying cotton which is a bit sad because I loved the look of it but this turned out to be one of the clients favorite images and I don't think she wants white smears all over her gorgeous wall portrait.
I get many questions about what to shoot from aspiring photographers. I tell them to shoot from their heart and they tend to look at me with baffled expressions. You know those moments where you see something and your breath catches a little and your heart skips a beat? Take the shot! I don't care if it's random, or unplanned, or not what you were looking for. Those are the pictures that mean the most. And if they don't turn out? Who cares! Creativity is a muscle that needs to be developed, just like anything else.


Love the casual walking shots. I was telling them to walk in slow motion so I had more time to shoot and they started going into slow-mo walk and we were all laughing so hard and I just kept shooting. I absolutely love the image below. My cheeks hurt just looking at it and remembering how much fun we had!
Thanks guys! I can't wait for what we come up with for the next shoot!

Memory Mates {Utah Family Photography}

Ta-dah! My first Memory Mate! I've always had a bit of a love-hate relationship with memory mates. I love getting pictures of my cute kids with their little soccer teams etc. but usually the photos are well, let's just say they leave a bit to be desired. So I was a little apprehensive when a friend of mine asked me to photograph his music school but it turned out to be a great experience. There were about twenty-five kids so it wasn't too crazy and they were all such fun to work with. I loved all their little personalities and the parents were great too. I wish I could post the pre-school group. It's my favorite because all their little characters shine through and every time I look at it I can't help but laugh. However, in the interest of privacy I'm just posting the oldest group who dubbed themselves the "Soy Boys" I have no idea what that means but they were a blast!
Hope I get to do this again next year! :)

The Froerer Family (Utah Family Photography)

I am SO excited about this session! I love pictures in the snow but find it strangely hard to talk people into doing them, so sad. Luckily my friend Jamie wanted to take her families pictures in the snow so it was a perfect match! We were thinking about doing colorful scarves and hats (which I would still love to do hint hint lovely friends) but I love the colors they chose. We've actually been watching the weather since last fall, literally! We wanted fresh snow and that's harder to coordinate than you might think. So last week when it stormed we threw this session together and I love how it turned out!

This is actually the last photo I took but it represents a triumph for me so I'm starting with it. Yes, there is a little photoshop magic going on but I'm not tellin' what exactly. :) They were all such troopers. By now they are freezing, especially the youngest. I love hand holding to show connection between family members but it's also awfully handy when your little girl is about to cry because her hands are so cold. I'm so sorry sweetheart, you did great!

I love when kids look like themselves in pictures. I absolutely love how she is standing because it's so "her". As soon as she stood like this I was like "DON'T MOVE, you're perfect!" and then I had to happy dance when I saw the shot.

I love this picture because he's in this awesome perfect kid hut place that we found. You can't see as well from the picture but it is the perfect boy spot, heck I wanted to crawl in there and start building a fort. It was just the perfect spot for him. I know they'll most likely pick a different shot for the wall portrait but I had to post this one 'cause it makes me happy.

Hahaha, I probably don't have to explain this one. I've known these kids for ages and they are a riot, I wanted to do a shot of them just being themselves and having fun.

SO cute, look at you two. I'm not sure I've ever been able to get Nick smiling this much, I had to make them laugh and shoot fast. Happy, happy, happy!

And now the greatest triumph shot. There are not words for how much I love this picture. This is my third time photographing this family but I've done the children twice more and I've never been able to get this little cutie to smile like this. She's cold, and tired, and so done but she was patient enough to give me just a couple more shots and it's the best I've ever taken of her. Her Mom and I were both so excited I can't wait for Jamie to see these, I'm over the moon!

I love my job!

Oh, the humanity!! (Utah Family Photography)

The irony of my life is that when I have lots to blog about I have absolutely no time and when I have plenty of free time for blogging I have nothing to talk about...sigh. Right now the former would be the case so here I am finally posting my own family pictures that I took on October 17th out at Saltair. I was going for an edgy grunge look with the black and white attire and graffiti walls. I just want to point out here that I am so very sympathetic to how excruciatingly painful it can be to have family pictures taken. My family is just like every other, and believe me, I am not above threats and bribery. Lol, luckily I had my parents come along to help wrangle the heathens and push the shutter button. I'm now good for a year, well, maybe two. =)

This was the picture I had in my head when I decided on this location and I love everyone in it... except for me. But, oh well, I'm being the self-sacrificing mother and using this for the parental Christmas gifts. I do love everything else about it. My family is the cutest! =)

This is probably my favorite though the two stripeys were NOT supposed to be next to each other...family pictures are uber frazzling.

I love, love, love this photo of my children. Four of the stubbornest mules in existence but I love 'em for it (when I don't want to kill them, lol).

Not a huge fan of this shot but the setting is cool. My kids wanted to take pictures here SO badly and so we did, all a part of the bribery for good behavior. Mostly I look at it and want to move Todd and I to the right. I don't like it enough to go to all of that hassle in PShop so it's just gonna have to stay the way it is.
I love the composition of this shot with the repeating framing. Just thought the lines were cool. SO wish I could just switch my two boys so that the stripeys aren't next to each other. That's the kind of thing that drives me crazy. I knew I didn't want them together but you get there and there's tension, and whining, and grumbling, and that's not even counting the kids!! Haha ;D

Me and my fabulous husband!! I need to drum up my photog pals to do a couple shoot of the two of us, doing it yourself is just too hard. I love my boy! Here we are just a couple days back from him taking me to New York for the best birthday ever!

This is my oldest daughter. She'll turn thirteen in just a couple of weeks and she is almost as tall as I am. My literal words when I first saw this picture..."Oh, crap!"

This is my second daughter and she is a spitfire and then some! Tomorrow she defends her title as the Spelling Bee champ at her Elementary. She won it last year as a fourth grader beating out her older sister who ended up taking fouth place. yeah, that was a fun week at our house. The girls were actually great to each other but one was naturally upset that she got out and the other was upset that she got her sister out, Oy Vey! SO tomorrow I will be a nervous wreck waiting to hear the outcome, I'm already feeling sick about it. We've done the whole spill of "Spelling Bee's are a lot about luck" and "We are proud of you no matter what" but I know my daughter.

Here is my sunshine boy. The happiest, friendliest, most outgoing kid you will ever meet. Of course he has his horrifying termagant moments but apparently only for his parents. Good times!

And my baby. This is the only single shot I got of him not crying, he was ready for his fruit snacks. Quick anecdote. This last Monday was his fourth birthday but Todd and I were both going to be gone so we told him his birthday was Sunday. We made a big deal, did the whole cake and presents party, threatened his siblings with death if they ratted us out (his brother had to be "reminded" of that), even enlisted the Primary Presidency in the scam. Of course the next day on his actual birthday I went to wake him up with a big Happy Birthday and then realized I had to pretend all day that it WASN'T his birthday...I had to laugh.

So why am I juggling? Well, you know how New Year's resolutions are usually pretty lame like losing weight and all that? I decided I wanted to do something fun. Ages ago my Grandmother made all of the grandkids juggle balls out of balloons and sprouted wheat, no really, after awhile mine actually started to grow. Anyway, my cousin Tony got phenomenally good and I've always been a little envious. This year for New Year's I decided to juggle every day as best as I could. And I have. Sadly I'm still not all that great but I can, at least, juggle. I think I'll give it one more year and then it's on to the bagpipes! Sidenote: My mommy made me these juggle balls for my birthday and on my birthday I juggled with them on Times Square. So fun! They are silver and black with sparkly sequins. I love my Mommy!!


I heart this picture. I love the lines of the window above and the silhouettes. I just love it. Well, this is us, thank so much for taking the time to meet my family. Loves!! xoxox