I Heart Texas

Saturday I went out to Flower Mound to "shoot" the Stevens family. It's really fluky how this even panned out. Melissa emailed me regarding a session and then realized I was in Phoenix. Long story short, we worked in the session for this week. They were such a fun family to spend the afternoon with. Little CJ was a carefree little soul who eventually let down his guard. I'm not really even close to finishing this job, but I thought I would throw out some teasers. Let's face it, I'm always just as excited to see how the session turned out.
Thank you, Stevens Family, for allowing me to get my favorite place in the world into the backdrop of one of my sessions.

Dang, They're Cute.

This Thanksgiving, I took a moment away from my turkey to check on my kiddos. I never found Andrew, but I did find Abbey. Hey, 50 percent is not too shabby. I did loose the problem child. If I had to pick one to loose these days, Andrew would be the one to loose. He's old enough to ask for help and he knows all of the right spots to kick if he gets caught. He's probably the kid that is most likely to be returned. I digress.

I found Abbey and her cousin Lacey out blowing bubbles. They were just so dang cute, I had to go for the camera. Just between you and me, I always have my camera, but that's not important here. Abbey was having such a great time and even gave the occasional pose. Rare.

They also made the best out of a spill by dragging their wand over the bubble puddle. Did I mention how cute they are?

Mi Familia

Here we are, minus three. It really is a bit of a miracle that I managed to get everyone in and looking in the same direction. (Click any of these to enlarge) (if you dare)

This is my mom and her sisters and most of the cousins. We are missing the oldest, Michael and the youngest, Robin and her older brother Chris. Robin would be in the front row sticking out her butt with me in the front.

These are all of the babies of us cousins. Our DNA improves with every generation.

This is my immediate family, minus my sweet dad.

This is my crew. We really dressed up for this one!When I get together with this group, memories of old times come flooding back. Memories, some good, bad and ugly. Some of my favorite include the year the famous kid table got moved outside. It was downright freezing, and we took drastic measure to stay warm. We went inside in intervals and swiped all of the brown and serve rolls and stuffed our jackets for warmth. On the rare occasion that we had Thanksgiving at my grandparents house, we spent most of our time in trouble for kicking and retrieving the ball from the forbidden garden. There were also the many Thanksgivings at Cottonwood Park. Our parents had no earthly idea what we were doing for about 7 hours every Thanksgiving. Most of our adventures included spinning someone on the merry-go-round until the involuntary vomit emerged. We threw stuff, and occasionally each other, into the creek. We also passed time by blaming everything on Chris and making Casey cry. We went way too far past our boundary's and did countless acts that we would never admit to. Than of course, there was the Thanksgiving that we lost April and Robin all together. They went "exploring" out in the woods behind our house. Several hours later the girls were found and all was well.
Today, there is a whole new generation of mischiefs. They seem like seasoned vets already. It's so neat to see a family grow and change. There also seemed to be a huge hole in our celebration. There was someone missing. My dad was sorely missed. He always kicked the dinner off with a prayer. I dare to say that some did not even notice that he did that every year and maybe no one noticed that he was not the one that did it this year, but I did. I love that he always wanted to take time to thank God for our crazy family and our over abundant lunch and dinner. I am so thankful that he walks with angels this year, and he is no longer in a silent pain, but he is desperately missed.

Let the Good Times Roll

I've been looking forward to "shooting" the Amiel Family for a while now. I think we started making appointments a couple of months ago. After several rescheduling attempts, we were full steam ahead. As soon as we pulled up we noticed the "Stay off the Grass" signs posted. As you can see, we fully respected the request. My favorite two things were in full effect here. No, wait, sleep and ice cream are my two favorite things, let me rephrase. My two most favorite photographic things are outdoor shots and candids, and I had both here. Mom gave me free reign on her family, and knowing her love for "real" expressions, I had a blast. Thanks Amiel family!!

Taking pictures of people I know really stresses me out. They are, however, my favorite to look at. I took pictures of my neighbor's family for their holiday cards. My neighbor has been my guinea pig for 3 years now, and she has been very patient with me. She has always been so supportive of me in all of my fancy photography endeavors.

L and Z and some of Abbey's best friends, and I had so much fun with them.

My Favorite Triplets

About 7 months about I meet the Stauss family. I had the honor of of being at the hospital the day they were born, and a couple of weeks later I did their newborn session. My two favorite things are going back to photograph a family after my initial session, and having the freedom to take some casual candid shots. The more I worked on these photos, the more I noticed little Brayden stealing the show. He has two beautiful sisters and a beautiful mother, but he continued to steal the show. Here's to you Brayden. Below is a link to their complete session.

http://jenniferweems.com/slideshows/Strauss.Family.html

Party Girl

Abbey is shown here with two classmates Abby and Rylee

Here is Abbey, my child who will find a way to not look directly at the camera. She is getting very creative.

Abbey with the oh so cute Johnny

This year we had a super fun party planned for Abbey's 6th birthday. I was unusually on the ball planning wise. I had made reservations for a bounce house and snow cone machine for the park down the street. I even went ahead and pre-printed party invitations with all of the party info.

All of our planning and prep work went out the emergency room window on Halloween. She confided herself with the thought of her bounce house party. I figured I would wait until we were home and no longer on morphine to break the news to her. We later decided to just have a pizza party. It seemed the safest anyway, physically speaking.

Abbey had most of her class show up for the party, with a couple of preschool Goldie-oldies. Her friend, Lily brought the Easy Bake Oven. She asked everyone for that silly thing, and I told everyone not to bother. My dear sweet neighbor fell for her scheming ways. The party could not have been more chaotic and insane. I think there were 500 other children there celebrating their own birthday's. They looked like a swarm of ants. Really, I don't know if ants swarm, maybe bee's would be a better analogy? Maybe a heard of elephants? No, much too large. Maybe a big 'ole bunch of alley cats. I can't know for sure.