Life Songs
“If you want to sing out, sing out”
by Cat Stevens.

Welcome to a little blog post series that I (er..we) like to call Life Songs. I am thrilled to be a part of this life stories project with eleven other talented photographers! In this series, we will be documenting our lives with a different theme song each month. The images in the posts will be taken from a less traditional approach, showcasing “real life” in our own ways. This month’s inspiration is ” If you want to sing out, sing out” by Cat Stevens. It might be worth finding it and having a listen as you browse our blog circle. See the link to the next photographer in the circle at the end of this post.

I’ll have to admit, I’ve never heard of this song. I still haven’t listened to it. But, I like the title, and with daily life in our house, I knew I’d find something to photograph that would fit. Most mornings, when the kids don’t have preschool, we just goof around and play. We have a late breakfast (my kids love frozen waffles. Not toasted. Just straight up frozen. I figure it probably won’t kill them), and eventually change out of our jammies (see below – my youngest usually just changes into a different pair of jammies, while my oldest loves to dress himself in too-short sweat pants. I keep taking them out of his dresser, but somehow they keep showing up in there). I figure as long as we’re not going out in public, I’ll totally let them dress themselves. And this time of year they need to wear a jacket out anyways, so even less reason to fight their *awesome* clothing choices.

After giving all the plastic animals a bath in the kitchen sink (and making a huge mess), running through their pillow obstacle course, and playing “camping” (which consists of sitting on the counter eating sunflower seeds. Where they got this idea, I don’t know), we inevitably end up having some sort of dance party. What can I say – there’s not a ton to do in MN during the winter with two small kids who hate the cold. Usually we’ll bust out the radio, and if I have my CD’s, they’ll pick some random disc and we’ll all jump around. I sing while they just laugh at me because – well, they don’t know the words and I love to sing at the top of my lungs if no one can hear me. These are my favorite mornings – when we get to listen to MY music. Most of the time, however, we end up listening to some kids CD with nursery rhymes or kid songs (they call it “the orange CD”). They like the animal noises and babies laughing – apparently it’s pretty hysterical if you’re a toddler. This particular morning I decided to bring my camera out to try to get some photos for this series. We started out reading some books that morning, and eventually came across a Cars book. My kids LOVE the Disney Cars movie, and they REALLY love to jump up and down (their version of dancing) to the music in the beginning of the movie. So, reading the book lead to giggles and them trying to remember the words to the song. I put the dvd in and cranked it up and this is what ensued. Pure toddler craziness. They do this every time they hear that song in the beginning of the Cars movie (and also the Mighty Machines theme song – that’s another huge hit in our house). I’m not a rock-star lifestyle photographer by any means, but I had fun with this! I don’t often take photos of my own kids with anything other than my camera phone, so it was nice to actually download some photos and do something with them. I’m really looking forward to the rest of year with this project. Be sure to check back on the 21st of each month for our (the other photographers participating and myself) Life Songs posts!

Here’s how it all started this particular morning…

Which eventually lead to this:

Notice the awesome combo of Thomas the train jammies and horsie bottoms. My kid is SO stylin’!

And when we were all done…SPENT!

This was definitely a challenge, in that I had to crank up my ISO because our house doesn’t get a lot of natural light, and the yellow walls in my boy’s room give off all sorts of color casts. But, I had a lot of fun with it. Might find a different spot to shoot next months session.

Thanks for looking! Please be sure to check out Alexis Shell Photography – Alexis’ take on this months theme can be seen here. Each photographer from our group will be linking to the next photographer’s take on it – lots of great posts you won’t want to miss!

A couple of weeks ago I photographed a little newbie named Greyson. LOVE that name! I had a great time hanging out with his mom and dad while we took his newborn photos, and I think we set a new record. He slept the entire time – didn’t even wake up to eat! Out of all of the newborns I’ve photographed, that might a first. I have so many favorites from this session that I couldn’t just pick one or two to post. I’m sure you’ll be seeing more of him soon – he’s one of my first year babies, so he’ll be back a few times throughout the year. I think we need to put him in this nest again at 1 year and see how he fits in it then.

Danielle and Sean – I had a great time meeting you guys! I hope you enjoy your photos!

Meet Morgan. I photographed her newborn session back in December, and am finally getting a chance to get some photos up on the blog. I usually post photos on facebook first (because it’s easier – LOL!), so you might have seen some of these already but I thought I’d post them here, too. When mom contacted me and said that Morgan was already almost 5 weeks old, I told her that I wasn’t sure if we’d be able to get any sleepy baby shots, but man, did this little girl prove me wrong. She was born 5 weeks early, so her session was right around her actual due date – she really was just like a newborn still. She slept fantastic! We were able to get a lot of sleepy shots and some awake ones, too. She did awesome through it all.

Breann and Dave – I had a great time meeting you guys – I hope you enjoy your photos!

A few weeks ago I met up again with Arybella and her mom for Arybella’s 9 month photos.  She’s becoming a blondie!  You can see her 3 month photos here and her 6 month photos here.  So fun to see how much they change in that first year.  This girl always makes me work for some smiles, but I love her serious looks, too.  She’s pretty much adorable no matter what she does.  :)

Early in December I had the chance to meet up with Ellie and her family again. Last time I saw her was a little over a year ago. Her 1 year photos can be seen here – I still have that photo as a canvas hanging in the studio. She’s got a little more hair this time, and is cute as ever! I just LOVE her big smile, and had to post one to share here with everyone. Enjoy!

As the day after Christmas is winding down, my house is finally clean again (well, cleaner than it was after Christmas morning). The recycling bin is full, the leftover cookies are disappearing fast, and the kids are still on their Christmas high from all the late nights and presents. We spent the day playing with their new toys, making room for all the new toys, and making a huge pile of items to bring to GoodWill (had to get rid of stuff to make room for all the new goodies). I took most of December off to enjoy time with my family, get my holiday shopping done, and take a much needed break. I did schedule a few sessions this month, and now that Christmas is over, I’m ready to get back in the swing of things! First off – getting caught up on my blogging. Starting off with Claire’s 9 month session. Love the pig tails!!! The weather lately has been beyond awesome (I’m not one who was hoping for a white Christmas – I’m totally fine with a 40-50 degree brown Christmas). There was a tiny bit of snow on the ground for this session, but we still managed to get outside for a few family shots. Even Bruno the boxer made it in for some pics! I hope you all had a fantastic holiday – looking forward to 2012!

So, I stayed up late two nights in a row working on what was going to be the most awesome Christmas card in the history of Christmas cards. Beautiful, ornate, 5×10 with a pearl finish. Yep, it was going to be gorgeous. Then I realized that Christmas is only a week away, and these things don’t even come with envelopes. By the time I actually got them out Christmas would be long over and my clients would all think I’m crazy. *sigh* I think next year I’ll start working on these in, say, August? I’m horrible with getting out Christmas cards on time (but I am going to do my Christmas shopping today!). Rather than let this awesome card go to waste, I thought I’d at least post it here for you guys to see. Merry Christmas, everyone, and have a great 2012!

I always love seeing this family. I met Ethan about a year ago when he was just a week old. Now he’s one and on the move! Unlike his 6 month photos seen below, his plan for the day did not include sitting still for pictures – LOL! We were still able to get some adorable shots, and it was even nice enough to go outside for a little bit! Can’t complain about this fall/winter so far. I wore my flip flops to drop the kids off at preschool yesterday. Can’t say that happens too often in December!

Enough talking – here is Ethan! Some photos from his newborn session, his 6 month session, and his latest session at 1 year.

And I had to include this one because his expression cracks me up. I think he was about done with me at this point.

I finished up with Leela’s session a little while ago, but I am finally getting around to posting some photos.   You might remember her from her newborn photos (seen here).   She has already had a few haircuts since then – more than my almost 3 year old!  This girl has some awesome hair!  I fully expect it to be down to her knees at her 6 month session, pending no further haircuts.    She was so full of smiles, and I loved all of her different outfits.   We had so many cute photos that it was hard to choose which ones to post, but these are some of my favorites. Enjoy!

Just wanted to post a couple of quick photos from Amilia’s newborn session before I head out the door. There were SO many cute ones (always seems to be the case…), but these are a couple of my favorites so far. I’m sure there will be more later, but here are a couple for now. Enjoy!