I first met Jaime and Peter a year ago when they’d just come home from an extended stay in the hospital due to Westley’s premature birth. He was one of the tiniest humans I’d ever seen – perfect in every way and completely proportional but just very small. You can see his newborn photos here.

You would never know it now. He caught right up.

Parents often are concerned about how their kids will do during a photo session, but think of the photographer more like a guide. The session should be relaxed and all about accommodating your child. We let Westley do his own thing and then encouraged participation periodically. It’s all about keeping the baby happy!

We met at Highland Park, which is near Jaime and Peter’s house.  He was definitely ready to run around and explore!

Putting babies up on things can be a useful way to keep them in one place for a minute or two. He was distracted by being on the park bench, which he thought was a pretty interesting experience.

Jaime had seen this idea on pinterest and wanted to recreate it for this photo session. Quick tip – if you try this at home be sure to take the glass out of the frame to eliminate glare.

One of my personal favorites is having the kids in the foreground and the parents in the background. You’d think it would look the same each time but it always turns out a little bit differently.

Thank you so much Jaime, Peter and Westley for spending the past year with me! It’s been such a joy to watch him grow.

When Laura and I were setting up the session she was very concerned that it would be too cold.  The weather was predicted to be in the 60s.  When we first met my first questions was, “so, where are you from?”

The answer was Georgia. They left the deep south to start their own family in a new location.  Interestingly they are far from Disney, a place that has roots deep in their hearts.

Which is why William is sporting the Mickey gear. Incorporating your personality and things you love into a session is a fantastic way to make your session unique. You can do this through location (this family chose to their home with their vintage car collection), your clothing (such as a Mickey outfit for Disney lovers), or through an activity (this family chose to do some weightlifting at Crossfit).

They weren’t expecting to be in the photos but gladly participated, which William was very happy about.

Highland Park is a popular portrait photography location because of the wide variety of backgrounds that it offers and various flowers that bloom throughout the year.  For tips on how to choose a great location, click here.

Toward the end of the session he started to get a little less interested in being interacted with in the let’s-be-silly-so-you’ll-smile kind of way, so we headed over to the playground at Highland Park and he was all smiles again.

Thank you so much Laura and Wayne for sharing your family with me! I hope you get a trip to Disney in soon!

This beautiful girl is 3 years old now and I recently realized these images never made their way into a full blog post.  It seemed sad to leave them in the bowels of my external hard drive, so here you go internet!  Warm fuzzy feelings are on their way.

This quilt was a gift to Story when she was born. It was a bit too bright to incorporate into her newborn photos, but perfect for one year old photos.

She had an equally snazzy diaper cover.  Kara was my cloth diapering mentor and left me with a little bit of “I-wish-I-had-another-girl” envy.

Robert is the kind of dad people who didn’t have this kind of dad wish they had.

Story’s language skills were out of this world. She could identify 10 body parts before my kids could say “ba.”

This image was fun variation on the below shot from their maternity session.

It was an impromptu idea.  It reminds me of the change from no children to children – such as the way our body language and expectations change.  To view the rest of their maternity session, click here.

In another fun recreation of a session image, Story had the opportunity to be photographed with her mom and dad’s love letters to each other.

At one point they were writing a memoir of the story of their lives together.

Here first photos with these letters were in the image below.

To view more images from her newborn session, click here.

And because she was such a good sport, we were also able to get some more mom and dad images.

Story was very interested in this statue. Kara and Robert were even able to sneak in some kissing.

And last but not least, a few individual images of Story exploring the world.

Thank you so much for sharing your beautiful life with me.

A few months later, baby TJ made his entrance into the world and we met at their beautiful home in Pittsford to capture his miraculous little life.

Six months later, TJ was laughing (hysterically), smiling and almost sitting. Betsy said sometimes she just would sit and watch Andy and TJ play together.

Recently, TJ celebrated one of life’s childhood’s greatest milestones – his first birthday. We met at the Memorial Art Gallery to mix it up a little. Of course, there was some kind of huge event in the atrium, so we found a picturesque corner and then went outside for a while.

Below is one of my very favorite images from the session.

TJ was a perfect one year old during the session finding that thin line between being hugged and being held in place. He was also happy to show off his extensive toddling skills.

Congratulations TJ on your first birthday!

It was a beautiful day in Highland Park and Danielle and Larry came equipped with a bag full of toys and a truck load of enthusiasm.  They were jumping and singing and squeaking and having a great time behind me reducing my job to button pushing.  Needless to say Trevor enjoyed the show and his parents loved the gamut of facial expressions which they then turned into framed artwork.

Of course this one was a bit harder since they were in the photo.  I actually had to be silly.

And the ever so slightly amused look of a toddler.

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