I am simply beyond thrilled with what I captured.  Kelly, thank you so much.  I cannot wait for your big family session!

North Shore Peeps… stay tuned… next week I’ll be announcing some local mini sessions that you can take advantage of in preparation for holiday card season… yes, it’s approaching that fast!

But back to Milo.  Milo’s mom’s friend from back home just knew that Milo would be a delicious little baby… so missing her friend, and wanting to see Milo ASAP, she searched the internet, found me, we chatted, she decided on a gift certificate, and voila!  What a great friend is that?  Maybe I will have to hook up and meet HER when I head out to Erie (hopefully this summer).  The great thing about it all is that when I got to Susan and Andy’s home, I realized I really liked them and I was pretty psyched that by chance, they ended up as clients!  You know me, within 5 minutes in the door it’s all “oh, so you grew up where and know who?” and then “oh, you work less than 1/4 mile from where my parent’s live and  I live within 5 miles of where your parents live?”  And so my life goes.

Back to the boy.  Milo really was awesome.  Once he had a full belly he just slept and slept!  Then he got to hang out with Dewey and his ‘rents in his new hood, meet some new neighbors, chill in the city… the good life.

I hope you guys enjoyed your Friday as much as I did.  You are totally keeping it real as parents and I love that.  Enjoy your little boy!

I loved meeting Clive’s parents… his dad is pushing through that looooooooong last semester at Babson for his MBA.  And I know how that feels.  And his mom is just beautiful, and looks amazing for 5 weeks postpartum [who am I kidding, she looks better than me at about 92 weeks].  She has an amazing sense of style and had his little nursery just done up right with these wonderful colors and stories!

Couldn’t have started my weekend any better.  Really.  Thank you.

We had a great day at Elm Bank and I had a blast with these guys.  It was a fun challenge to shoot two different sessions and not just replicate one after the other.  I really like people to have different, and unique sessions.  The kids were great and I really loved getting to know them all.  I love watching how kids interact with each other and I love looking back at the images and seeing how the kids resemble their parents in not only features, but affectations, smiles, glances.  I also love developing connections, finding out how parents met, figuring out what makes them work as a family.

What I netted out with these two families is that good parents make good kids.  Plain and simple.  So that’s my lesson for the day.

Enjoy the weekend.

Meet Bode.

Meet Ketch.

Kit-kat came home from school, literally RAN past me to the shower so she could look all awesome for our session… and she was a ROCK STAR… no, maybe more like a Gap model.  Sort of like Christofer, she’s a little excited because someone else is around, but WHAM she can turn it on for the camera in a split second.  She is ever gorgeous, ever a teenager at age 5.  Love her.

And Erica is beautiful.  Really.  What else is there to say?  I stinkin’ love her too.  She and I have these off the wall conversations that I think about after I leave her house and I kill myself laughing.

I want to post more, but I have to go pay a few moving violation fines so I don’t end up in the clink… and as much as there are about 30 more I’d love to show you, we really want to keep them a surprise!  We’ll share another time!

So here is our sneak peak from April with a gallery and uploaded Facebook albums (and a canvas display wall diagram) all coming at you!  It might be fun for you to see my logic in suggesting canvas displays, and I have a few others I need to complete (Terri Lee)…. so maybe I’ll share that thought process as well!

Back to the boys.  Love these two.  They are doing SO well at sitting.  I would be they are even better two weeks later, so when I am there at end of this month, we’ll have way more to show you as these guys develop, the grass is greener, the temps are warmer and we move outside!  I already have grand plans for those rose bushes and just wait ’til I can get into that barn!

We might need to revisit the baseball theme next month so I can do it up right!

Actually, yes, because Amanda would be working as she is Night Nurse extraordinairre.  If you live on the North Shore and are having a baby and think you might need some night help, email me and I’ll give you Amanda’s 411.  She is an amazing nurse and has ventured out on her own and I highly reccomend.

I digress.

Amanda & AJ and their kids are really awesome.  Like any parents, they were worried about how everyone was behaving, probably thinking that I wasn’t getting much and what a rambunctious brood of children have they.  But really, their kids were kids and they are the kind of kids I love.  In my world, I say you can take spirit out of a kid, but you can’t put it back in.  Anyway, I loved them… and I was really thrilled when I looked at what I captured.  I could stare at family images forever… I love seeing the little nuances between parents, each kid, how they have each other’s traits and how they interact.

So Amanda, I am so sorry it took so long to blog these… but the good news is that they are all done and I should have your entire gallery to you sometime in the next few days while I hustle between here and Austin!

So this totally adorable family won the nursery contest.  And you can see why.  They are very cute, very put together, very creative, and most important, very happy!  I had such a great time getting to know them.  I came home and immediately sized up my mismatched upholstery issues and was motivated to finally decide on some fabrics.  Then I painted the kid’s [Owen's] bathroom.  It would be nice if I was this inspired every day.  But really, this home/nursery has all the little touches that I never think to complete.

This family is also just really neat.  I love meeting families who are just really in sync and so clearly love each other.  It is so evident in how they interact that they are threesome that is just blessed to be joined together.  Baby Paige is adorable… and she’s going to be a beauty.  She has a great little attitude, complete independence (I’d bet pretty soon they’ll hear “I do it myself!”), but still knows enough to snuggle in with her mom and dad.

Thank you for a great morning, and for participating in my contest.  I am thrilled I was able to capture your family as it is today.

An explanation.  Sometimes I shoot a session and immediately run home to blog.  This is usually the case if I am not behind on blogging OR if I get home and no one is home bugging me, and making me answer the never-ending question “Why do you come home and immediately race up to that computer?”  Sometimes I shoot a session and immediately proof it because of specific conditions and it’s done, blogged and in the can super fast.  And sometimes I have a hybrid of those things and I don’t blog until the session is proofed, but the bonus is a big blog sneak peak and the client gets their blog/slideshow/gallery all in one shot.  I just figured I’d explain that because it’s not that I forget about people or jump people ahead in the queue… it just depends on what harddrive I have with me and which child is needing me.

Catching up with Wendy and Gerard was great.  I hadn’t seen them since our wedding and now we are combined 5 kids into it and both finally seeing the light with kids being a tiny bit more self-sufficient and self-entertaining.  We commiserated over how your life becomes a time warp and a time suck and how even though you wouldn’t want it any other way… man, it is HARD being a parent [and a spouse].  I am thinking parenthood is a lot like the weather in New England — one nice day makes up for twenty days of rain, snow and wind! Anyway, she looks amazing, her family is beautiful and we decided there is no way we can let another five years go by.

I am off to Austin mid-week for an amazing wedding, so hopefully before I leave I’ll blog the 2-3 sessions that are all proofed and about to go out to some very cool families I spent time with last week/weekend (including my nursery contest winner and a very awesome family with a very awesome house).  And tomorrow is another installment of the Jack & Will Show!

On that note, I am outside pretending to garden with the littlest terrorists [this actually means I put on a garden glove, stand with a shovel, and play with my iPhone and when I hear Owen I pretend to weed and dig -- and occasionally keep the kids from running into the street].

I was so excited to meet Stacie and her family because she came to me via Erica (and apparently via quite of few of you Topsfield peeps).  I love it when friends connect friends.  The weather was great, the timing was great, and everything just sort of fell into place for this one!  Yay!

And with that, I am off to make up two hours of cleaning in about 15 minutes!