Matthew at Six Months

Can I just tell you how much I love this family? I love that when I walk into their home I see that most of the pictures on their wall were taken by me. They are so sweet! I photographed Shannon and Robert's wedding two years ago. Then last year I got to meet their sweet little baby. Remember Matthew? He's one of my Bundle of Joy babies now, and I can't believe he's six months old already! We had a lot of fun yesterday. (And as you can see, I'm in a black & white mood!)

We played with some blocks...




We munched on some fingers...


And of course we had to plop him down in my big mug. He wasn't quite sure what to make of it!

Introducing Ella

Meet sweet little Ella, only six days old and my newest Bundle of Joy baby. I spent this morning photographing her and her parents. She was a good little sleepy girl...

But oh, the indignities we made her suffer. :) Like the big teacup...

...and the ballerina skirt...

...and of course the bookshelf.

But she didn't complain much. I hope her parents enjoy this little preview. Your gallery will be coming soon.

Labor Day!

Happy Labor Day everyone!

I know that the Labor Day holiday is supposed to be celebrating the working kind of labor, but as a mom of two kids the word "labor" will always mean something completely different to me. Today I would like to honor this other kind of "labor day."

So, if you know a woman who is in labor right now and who delivers her baby today, September 1st by 11:59pm, let me know! The first person to email me (jmarriner@twcny.rr.com) with the happy news by the end of the day tomorrow will win the new mom a free newborn portrait session and two free prints (up to 8" x 10"). The only catch is that the portrait session must take place by 9/15/08.

This post had me all nostalgic for my days as a new mom. Here's Grant's hospital pic from almost ten years ago!

Introducing Matthew

Here is my newest Bundle of Joy baby! This is Matthew, son of Shannon and Robert. You may remember them from the beautiful wedding that they had last year at Fort Ontario. Matthew is just two and a half weeks old, and is the sweetest, best little guy. I loved holding him and getting to feel that soft baby skin. :)

I have waaaaaay too many favorites from this session, but I'll just post a few for now...

I actually remembered how to swaddle! Amazing!

Hanging out in his crib...

This is my favorite picture of the day. There's nothing like the love between a mama and her little boy. I should know. :)

She cracks me up...

I've been working on finishing up the last of Ali's pictures from last weekend, mostly because I have a wedding to shoot this evening and I want to be able to concentrate on one thing at a time. I'm almost done and I hadn't planned on posting any more of them, but this one just KILLS me every time I look at it so I just had to share. Such a great expression on her face!!

More Ali!

A few more from yesterday. Processing these images has been slow going due to technical issues that have plagued me all weekend. I recently got a new camera and then I upgraded to Photoshop CS3 and between the two I've been experiencing some problems with file formats. It's all fixed now but made for a very frustrating few hours yesterday. I also maxed out one of my dual hard drives (waaaaaaaay too many pictures!) so I had to start migrating everything over to the other drive.

And as if all this technical stuff weren't bad enough, this morning I was doing some sewing and managed to jam a pin straight into the middle of my left palm (don't ask - it was a million-to-one odds kind of a thing; too bad I can't have that kind of luck playing the lottery!!). The pin came out when I pulled my hand back so I don't know exactly how far it went in, but from the way it's swollen and bruised and from the depth of the pain, I'd say it went at least half-way through my hand. I think it may have nicked a nerve or something along the way as well. It's amazing that something as small as a pin can cause so much pain!!

But anyway, enough of my complaining. Enjoy little Ali, and I'll post more as I get them done...

Introducing Little Miss Ali...

I had the honor of photographing little Aliana this morning. She's almost a month old, and she's already completely in charge of everyone and everything in her household. :)

She slept for a grand total of about 10 seconds the entire time I was there, despite everything we did to try to lull her off to dreamland. Fortunately I was able to grab a couple of sleepy shots, including this one. More to follow in the next couple of days.