Hi and thank you for visiting!
My goal is to post daily, but sometimes life just gets in the way! You know, the daily stuff like being a wife and mom, sister, niece, aunt and friend; grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, laundry and let's not forget . . . . . photography!
I am a natural light, on location photographer residing in Santa Cruz. I love babies, children and families and would love to help you preserve your memories for generations to come! Please contact me if you're looking for a photographer!
I hope you enjoy my BlogSite as much as I do!! Feel free to browse around and please leave me a comment when you pop in to visit!
I'm looking forward to sharing with you......my life, my thoughts, my photos! Enjoy!
I love it when my sister shares her grand-daughters with me!! I got to spend a morning with the girls and we did a few photos, followed by lunch! You’ve got to love sister time, niece time, a beautiful sunny day and a good hamburger 
Such cute little girls, what do you think??
A couple “storyboards” for the fun of it:
The slideshow:
And last but not least, the final shot of the day and my favorite!!
Ok, it’s confirmed! I am absolutely totally in love with this little guy! I was so lucky to be able to spend 3 weeks with him, but alas, had to return to SC. It will now be a long painful 10 days before I get to see him again!
He is just the cutest! He has big hands (not long and skinny girly fingers) but BIG hands, sort of like an overgrown puppy! He needs to grow into them. And as you can see by the photos, his hands are always by his face when he sleeps. He loves to be swaddled tightly by Daddy at bedtime, except for the arms. Within a few minutes he breaks free of the swaddle and the arms are either by his face or above his head. And oh my gosh, his little ears are the cutest. They lay absolutely flat but have little ripples on them.
Isn’t is true that you can sit and just look at a sleeping (or awake baby) for hours? Their little facial expressions are so adorable! I guess photos like these will just have to hold me for 10 days………10 long days!
I am having so much fun with my new little Grand-Baby! He is the best little guy and oh, so cute! He does everything he’s supposed to: eats, burps, sleeps, poops and occasionally wakes up and looks around. He’s definately best at eating, sleeping and pooping! Normally when I do a newborn photo session, I do it all in one day and have it edited and posted within the week. I’m not sure why Beckett’s photos are taking so long. I take a few here and a few there and keep saying, “tomorrow I’ll finish.” Well tomorrow was last week and I’m still working on them!
Here’s a cute one of him sleeping (he didn’t even mind that I put one of my knit creations on him). Keep up the good sleeping Beck, Mommy & Daddy love getting a 5 hour stretch of sleep!
He is so perfectly adorable!
Beckett James was born on Wed, June 3rd. He weighed in at 8lbs 12 oz and was 21 inches long! He is just a perfect little guy! He is already so loved and such a blessing to our families! He is a little mini-me of his Daddy (and his Daddy’s five brothers)! Looks like the only thing he got from his mommy is his little dimple!
Don’t you just love itty-bitty fingers and toes?? And cute little baby lips?
These storyboards are available from your newborn session for only $75!! They are 10×10, linen textured, mounted and sprayed with a UV coating for years of “itty-bitty” enjoyment!
This is from my recent newborn session with sweet little Avery!
FREE $50 print credit with paid session! That right, I like good deals and I bet you do too!!
Here’s all you have to do:
1) Email or call me and tell me you want to book your session.
2) Session fee must be paid at time of booking.
3) Session must be paid for in June, but since I’ll be gone a lot in June, you may have your session in June or July.
4) Sorry not good with other offers.
I read a great article in Business Week this morning. It was short, informative and really does apply to anyone in business (even little ‘ole me).
The gist of the article is quite simple and layed out in 5 steps.
It really got me thinking about how Professional Photography fits into hard economic times. My mind really wanders sometimes and usually it just sort of races around and doesn’t make much sense at all. Maybe it’s the elephant in the room? I dunno. But my thoughts kept going to what’s important to me and what I could and could not do without in these tighter economic times.
For instance, we are having a retaining wall rebuilt in our backyard as I write this. I woke up this morning to hammering! Did we want to spend the money on this right now? That would be a big fat NO! But we’d put it off long enough and before the wall began to crumble and caused further damage to the surrounding concrete we made the decision to do without in other areas and get it fixed!
I told you my mind wanders……..here’s another thought I had……..
We’re in business on the boardwalk in SC and we certainly wonder how tough financial times will affect the business. Well, so far, business has been good this year. The Boardwalk is a day trip, so unlike taking a long expensive trip and spending hundreds of dollars just on gas and even more on hotels, visitors can quite affordably come to the beach & boardwalk for a day (or weekend) and have a great time! Of course, if you come, you know you’ll want to splurge on a little boardwalk food! How ’bout a Funnel Cake, some Dippin’ Dots or a Self-Serve Slush??
My last thought, yes, all stemming from the article in Business Week, was……what is really important to me? What would I grab if there were a fire? Most of our stuff is just that…… stuff. I can replace my clothing, furniture and dishes. But I cannot replace memories and photographs!! I know exactly what I’d grab if I only had a short amount of time……..our family photos and computers!
Ok, back to the points of the article and my interpretations:
“Five Don’ts for Marketing in Tough Times” www.businessweek.com
1. Be smart and thrifty. Absolutely, think wisely before spending your money!
2. Marketing is muscle, not fat. You don’t want to lose all business by not marketing at all. Just be wise. In my case word of mouth is my best marketing tool. I try to go above and beyond for all my clients (even if it costs me a little more) and hope they spread the word.
3. Don’t loose focus by chasing business you wouldn’t normally want. I couldn’t agree more! In fact, just this week I told a friend of mine who’s trying to decide what to do with her wedding photography market, to focus on her focus (don’t waste time, energy and money marketing to a market she doesn’t want).
4. Don’t discount. Now here I have to disagree! While I understand the reasoning in the article, I believe everyone enjoys a discount/coupon/sale/freebie now and again!
5. Don’t neglect the elephant in the room. What the heck? See I told you there was an elephant!! Basically it just means that you can’t avoid it. We live in a 24/7 news society. It has affected everyone; from the cost of running a business, to the daily things like buying gas and grocery shopping. Be smart, have a plan, spend wisely!
Stay tuned, because I do believe in discounts and sales! I love them!
Little Miss Avery was only 7 days old when I had the privilege of photographing her! What a little doll she is! I just love the halo of very blonde hair on her head! While I wasn’t able to get the “sleepy newborn, all curled up” shots I still think I got some cute ones! She just didn’t want to stay asleep!
I hope you enjoy your little sneak peak!
**edited 5/21
Today was the day to get the test results………….
WILSON IS CANCER FREE!!!!’
Thank you everyone for your prayers!! GOD IS GOOD!!
This little cutie is Wilson. He is the son of a friend of mine. He is five years old and has lymphoma. Wilson has just finished his chemo treatments and next week will have several tests to see if the chemo did it’s job against the cancer. If any cancer remains, he will need to start radiation.
Please PRAY that they get good test results next week and that he is free of cancer!!
Don’t you just love this picture of him??? His mom took it right after he got his mohawk!
*Mere, hope you don’t mind I added my “do not copy” to your photo. It’s such a cute photo, it needs to be “smacked” with a watermark!
My nieces invited me over to do a few pre-prom photos for them! They were running a little late from hair appointments (that always seems to happen), so I only got a few photos of them before their friends started arriving. hmmm, when I asked my sister in law how many kids she thought would be stopping by before prom, her reply was, “I’m not sure, but I don’t expect too many.” Check out the group shot……..that’s more than not too many!
As you can only imagine, with that many kids and parents it became chaotic quite quickly! I’m lucky I got the shots I got!
Aren’t my nieces gorgeous???
As are their “not too many friends?” Look at all these cute girls and their dress were all adorable! Not quite like prom dresses back in my day (thank goodness!!)
Thank you Riley and Makenzie for letting me be a part of prom day! I hope you both had a great time!
by Renee Whiting
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