Alex

Finally. . . my first photo shoot in my new studio/office. I was a little nervous - new lighting, new area, new family to meet. I didn't get a chance to test everything out first, but everything went well. Alex was great and full of smiles. He thought it was fun to scream in the room - lots of noise with no carpet. Look at those eyes - they are beautiful!

I have tons of new props that I can finally use. If I find something shopping now I have places to store it. I will constantly be in the lookout for new props. Anything fun that you find, send me info. I love this pottery bowl & photos . . .

I really didn't know if a seven month old would fit into this basket, but Alex did. These photos turned out so cute.

I still love the candid photos. So precious. . .

It was so fun to meet your family. Thank you for waiting until the studio was finished. I hope you enjoy every photo. . .

Studio Project

So the office/studio remodel is not done quiet yet, but getting so close. My girlfriend, Amanda, encouraged me to give the infant/children's studio a try. I have so many fun, unique ideas, and I am so excited to start up this area of children's photography. It is hard to take photos of children in Montana when you never know what the weather is going to be like. My love is shooting photos with natural light, which I will still do. This studio will be geared toward infants, children, and seniors if they want a few indoor photos along with their outdoor session.

Man have we been busy. I say "we" because this has been a family effort. Last year I started thinking about a winter project. Winter in Montana is definitely a slow time in the photography business. There are not a lot of weddings and most families want to wait until spring to take family pictures.

We had a huge office in our home and a huge mud room. My office was always a mess, not organized, and drove me CRAZY! Our mud room was huge and just stored Costco diapers, coats, boxes, etc. So I started to think. I am the person in the house that comes up with the next remodeling idea - I blame my parents. Not that remodeling is a bad thing, but while I grew up they added on to their home 4 different times and I helped rebuild our family deck at least 3 times.

I come up with some ideas in my head, then mention them to Donovan, finally I draw them in AutoCadd, and then the critique. This helps us come up with the best design. This office remodel was changed quiet a few times before we started demolition. The new design gave us (mostly me) a huge office closet and a nice closet in our mud room to "hide" our family mess. You can never have too many closets can you?

One thing I hate most. . . picking out tan? Really I always though, it's tan how can you go wrong. Well we've had pink looking tan, yellow looking tan, too dark, and too light. I think we picked an alright tan, but still not my favorite. If anyone out there has a "must have" tan, please let me know!


There are not any photos of the whole office complete yet. We just got the flooring in and the trim is our next task. We still have a long list of things to complete, but we have walls, paint, and beautiful flooring. My goal is to get the studio complete by March 21st/28th.

Samantha & Luke

I am going to be the lucky photographer at Sam and Luke's wedding in August. After this engagement session I am really excited. They are such a great couple and were up for anything.

It snowed the day before and we were still able to find a few areas with snow for some great pictures. Here are just a few of my favorite pictures from the photo shoot.

I love this picture below. The sun was starting to set and we got some great pictures towards the end of the session.

This is my favorite photo from the session and one of the last pictures we took. They look so relaxed and cute together. These are the pictures I love to capture. It feels like I am not even there.

Thanks for the great evening. Luke is was great to finally meet you. Enjoy planning the final wedding details and we will be in touch!

Pavin & Palmer

I'm back. Not that I've been gone, but recouping from the busy Christmas season. I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and rung in the New Year with family and friends. I have been healing from a horrible cold (2 weeks long) and slept through the New Year celebration.

Now on to the photo shoot. I have had so much fun watching Pavin and Palmer grow throughout these last 2.5 years. I get to photograph them at least once a year. Palmer is the same age as my son, so Kelly and I will have to get together more often on play dates. They would have so much fun together.

This was a fun photo session to start off the year and probably my favorite so far. Pavin is getting older and did great for each picture, and Palmer loves to copy his big sister. So my job was a little easier getting them to sit for the pictures.



This photo shoot was at Pavin & Palmer's house. In Montana you have to take advantage of indoors because you never know what the weather will be like outside. They had plenty of places around their home to take great photos. Palmer was flirting with the camera at first. He was pretty serious during the photo session, but still had tons of great pictures. Here are some of my favorites.






I love this photo of Palmer. He looks so cute sitting there along the banister.


We were lucky on Saturday to be able to go outside. It was gorgeous reaching almost 60 degrees. Below are my favorites from outside.




I love Palmer's face below. He was so excited to hear the dog next door. Pavin was having a blast playing football, tackling her brother, and coming up with poses for me to take her picture in.

I had a great time. Thanks for inviting me over to your home. It was a great location for photos.

Lila

This was a fun photo shoot. When Jill called and asked if we could take their family session at their home I was excited to try something a little different. They wanted candid family pictures around their house and I had so many ideas. There were so many favorite pictures from this family session.

Lila had just fallen asleep when I arrived. I had to take advantage of nap time. She fell asleep in her onsie so no naked baby pictures. She is 8 weeks old and it gets hard to get them back to sleep. So we went with what she was wearing and they still turned out precious.


Lila had her photo shoot while mom and dad were getting ready.

Then we included the family. I love this photo.

Of course Sam (their dog) needed to be included also. He is part of the family and very good with Lila.



I love these next two black and white photos. Precious Lila moments.

Thank you so much for inviting me into your home - it has a wonderful atmosphere. I enjoyed meeting your family, and had a great time capturing your morning.

Scott Family

This was another busy day with two photo shoots in the same day. Renae is a close high school friend of mine and I love photographing their family. Grace is a doll and seven months old. She is so cute and was starting to teeth the day of the photos. Her parents kept saying she isn't smiling and seems grumpy. I think we got some great pictures of the whole family and Grace.



This was mostly a Grace photo shoot. They wanted to wait until she was sitting to take her next set of pictures.





Look at those eyes!





It is always great catching up. Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Ethan

Ethan was six weeks old at his photo session and did great. He took a whole bottle from his mom and then was ready to be a model for the two hours. I haven't had an infant session since April. Ethan was so cute and was a great little model.



Now when I say be ready to possibly be peed on I mean it. I think the whole 3 ounce bottle ended up on mom and dad.









I am going to end this post with two of my favorite pictures. The sleeping picture below is a favorite because it took us 15 minutes or more to try and get Ethan to sleep. Finally the little guy closed his eyes. I bet he crashed once he got in the car.



This photo below gets me into the Christmas spirit. I love it.



Thanks so much for calling. I enjoyed meeting the whole family.

Griffin Family

This was a fun photo shoot. It has been a long time since I took pictures of a family with older kids, and these kids were great. Hopped right into every picture and smiled on que. I had a great time with this photo shoot trying to get some fun shots of the kids and family.



This family is another busy family with a 10, 9 and 8 year old running in every direction. They have wonderful personalities and kept me laughing during the whole photo shoot.











I love this picture of Taylor, Ryan, and Spencer.



Thanks for taking pictures right before CAT-GRIZ football game. Hopefully you made it to pregame. It was fun to catch up with everyone. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving.