I’ve know the Mortensen family since the beautiful Miss Y was in my first grade class 10 years ago. She was the smartest, sweetest little girl and her mother was always there ready to help out with anything I needed. Fast forward many years and two schools later, I had the pleasure of Miss B in my first grade class. Again, her mom was right there, always helping in any way she could. Her presence filled a room with love, laughter and voice! Shortly after the 2007 San Diego wildfires (when this family lost their beautiful home), Fayme was diagnosed with cancer. For over 2 years, she fought with everything she had against this terrible disease. With great sadness this fall, her family and friends said goodbye and celebrated the life of this incredible woman. Fayme’s favorite place to be was at home with her family at sunset. I know she was watching out for us on this beautiful evening and she couldn’t be prouder of her incredible husband and two beautiful daughters.
xoxo
our first stop of the day was to ‘color me mine’
we thought we were done for the night, but Miss Y came jumping back into the house … she wanted to show us this… stunning
and I really L.O.V.E. this …
Brooks and I planned an adventure in Little Italy and brought along good buddy C and new friends Sylvia Borgo (another fun photographer friend) and D. C was so excited that he was up at 4:00 am … Brooks got his day started at 5:30 … we should have planned for a sunrise shoot! :)
The boys loved climbing, jumping, running and chasing their airplanes through this beautiful neighborhood.
Sylvia and I loved watching them laugh and play!
this one rocks the fierce look!
look out girls … little c is too cool!
catchin’ some air!
she loves me… she loves me not … she loves me
LOVE his concentration!
I used ‘one willow retro candy presets’ once again and it couldn’t have been easier! Just a touch in CS4 … played with some textures (still working on how/when to use them) …and a quick resize and these were done!
Before we left Santa Barbara, I got together with a photog friend, Tamara, from SLO to do a red and pink shoot! With inspiration from New Year’s and Valentine’s day, we had a great time with all of the kiddos. They, of course loved the treats, balloons, flowers and ’snow’. We’ll be using some of these captures for Valentine’s day cards … there’s nothing like a darling personalized card with your child’s image!
Yes… I know I posted too many, but I was so excited to have these beautiful girls to shoot and play with. Our favorite hill in Santa Barbara never looked so good! Brooks didn’t mind being the only boy at all. :)
Thanks Tamara! Can’t wait for our next session together in SLO!
What better way to celebrate the new year than a curb side seat at the Rose Parade!
Thank you so much to the Newman family for inviting us to join the fun with their friends and family!
Brooks and I got off to an early start by leaving Santa Barbara at 4:00 am. … and no, Brooks didn’t fall back asleep for the drive. It only took 1 1/2 hours to get to Pasadena, but more than an hour to go just a few miles to our meeting spot. Extra thanks to Rich who spent 2 chilly nights curbside to save a great spot for the viewing crew.
As you can see by the photos, the marching bands were my favorite part of the parade … especially the bagpipes toward the end. Brooks loved the snowboarding bulldogs!
These photos show just a bit of the spectacular parade and they also show that I don’t have much of a future in parade photography! :)
Brooks was mesmerized by the knights waiting for the parade to start!
Love the flippers these duck fans were wearing!
OK … he was not as happy with the marching bands as I was near the end
These photos were done in Lightroom using my new ‘one willow retro candy raw presets’ … I lOVE them! I especially love that I didn’t need to do a thing in Photoshop except for resize and watermark! :)
Brooks’ cousin has just started to surf competitively and lucky for us, many of his competitions are in SoCal! The weekend before Christmas, we met Carter and Uncle Joey for the morning in Cardiff! Little Santa Brooks didn’t seem to care that it was December, he just wanted to hang out in the sand and surf while watching Carter surf!
A little pep talk from dad…
Brooks would have loved to follow Carter right out if he had a wetsuit on…
his own little happy dance…
These kiddos were the perfect way to end my holiday sessions. We had a great time at the park and captured lots of fun shots for their holiday cards. Thanks for the fun! Love you!!!
During Thanksgiving break, I also had the opportunity to do a quick session with my sister’s darling family to get some shots for their holiday card.
Before we left for the beach, Brooks enjoyed showing off some of his new reading books. His cousins are always so sweet and encouraging! Love this family!
we tried to sneak a few of Brooks in but he just wasn’t ‘feeling it’
mom mom and grampy with all of the grandkids!
this is always my favorite time of a shoot , when all of the more posed shots are done, the fun begins … too bad we had hungry kids, I would have loved to capture more of this fun!
2009 Christmas card!
One of our traditions on Thanksgiving day is to take a walk up to our favorite hill … Elings Park … it overlooks the ocean on one side and the city of Santa Barbara on the other. B.L.I.S.S. This is one of Brooks’ favorite places to be! Before dinner was ready, we went for our walk with all of the kiddos … I brought along my camera ‘just in case’. When I asked Brooks if he wanted to take some pictures, he politely answered ‘no thanks’. I still had nothing to put in a Christmas card so I offered the big bribe … hot tamales! He’s a sucker for hot tamales! All he gave me was 5 minutes and he earned his prize box of hot cinnamon goodness. I love these captures because they truly show who he is right now… sticks and all!
I had picked out a tri-fold template last summer and couldn’t be happier with how it went with the images! I picked my favorite for the full panel center image…4th one down … that’s my boy!
Merry Christmas!
xoxo
Brooks and I enjoyed a wonderful ‘adventure’ with the Sullivans, at the Quail Botanical Garden to kick off our holiday vacation. We hadn’t had a chance to visit the new children’s garden so we picked a warm December night to enjoy some fun and to see Santa. This was the Sullivans first visit to the Gardens and they LOVED it just as much as we did. If you haven’t been there, be sure to check it out!
The new children’s garden has so many fun things for kids! These three loved the giant treehouse, the watering garden, the instrument area and so much more. When it got dark, there were marshmallows to roast and a visit with Santa. Brooks and Phoebe even enjoyed a turn on the dance floor. :)
Thanks for such a fun night out!
xoxo
naughty little boy … trying to sneak a peek
someone needs to give Brooks some gardening lessons
BOO!!!
it was starting to get dark so I upped my ISO to 4000-6400 … I love this camera!
I brought my external flash along just in case … it worked perfectly to capture the rest of the night!
I couldn’t wait for this session with 6 beautiful girls…including the gorgeous mom! We had tried to schedule this session last summer, but just couldn’t get the timing to work. I was so glad to meet up with them when I was home in Santa Barbara for Thanksgiving. They spent the holidays at this beautiful family ranch outside of Santa Barbara. The days leading up the the session were filled with warm weather and a blue sky… perfect fall weather. The evening of the session was soooo windy and cold … the girls were such good sports … you can’t even tell that they were freezing. :)
Thanks!
xoxo
by Jules Trandem
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