M family

The mom in these pictures is one of my oldest and dearest friends and I love her dearly. We met in Kindergarten and have remained friends ever since (that's a lot of years of friendship, somewhere around 36 years). I'm so thankful for her friendship and that she has allowed me to take her family photos over the years. She has done an amazing job raising her two beautiful girls and they are always a delight to photograph. They brought their cute dog, Paisley, to the photo shoot this time and she made it active and so much fun! We laughed a lot at all the funny things she did. We did their photos in downtown Mesa.

G family

This was a photo shoot that almost got cancelled because of rain which means I almost broke my streak of never having to cancel a photo shoot because of rain. It was still down pouring at 3 p.m. and we planned to start photos around 3:30 and finally at a little past 3, the rain stopped, the clouds parted and it was crisp and gorgeous outside. The lighting was perfect and the trees glistened with vibrant fall colors. It was fabulous. You would never guess by these photos that we were still in Arizona. I have known this wonderful family for about four years. We go to church together and are in a life group with them, our kids are friends, and we love spending time with them! They are super fun and chill which made for a great time on this photo shoot. Their location was in downtown Mesa. The more photos I take downtown, the more I fall in love with this place. It is just so pretty, especially after a rainstorm. You will notice that one of these pics is not like the other, we had a random man join in for a photo. He may have been slightly drunk, but was super friendly and gave us all a good laugh. There was a music festival going on while we were there so it was quite the happening place!

Birthday photos #13

This photo shoot was so much fun! These sweet girls were celebrating the 13th birthday of one of these gals and the mom surprised her and her friends with a photo shoot! Talk about fun and what 13 year old girl doesn't like some time in front of the camera. We met at downtown Mesa and spent some time in the heart of downtown and then headed over to the Mesa Arts Center for a few more pics. These girls are darling! What a fun photo shoot!

-W- Family

I had the honor of meeting this family over four years ago when their daughter became part of the junior high life group I was leading at our church. I got to know this family through those two years and now their daughter is a Sophomore in high school! Time sure does fly and for some reason kids just keep growing and growing! I've enjoyed a photo shoot with family a few years ago and they were due for updated photos so they asked me to do them. I love returning customers, it's like the best compliment ever! And I was super excited that we got to do some of their photos in my new favorite location, downtown Mesa. We did some at Mesa Arts Center as well. The more I go to the downtown area, the more I love it! Here are some of my favorite photos from their photo shoot.

My family photos- downtown Mesa

It's been two years since we did family photos so we were well overdue. I knew just where I wanted to take them, downtown Mesa (one of my new locations I'm shooting at this season). So tonight we headed to downtown with the kids, camera, tripod and self timer and did our little photo shoot as a family. Someday we will let someone else do the honors of taking our family photos, but I really wanted to try out this new location for myself. Here are some photos from our photo shoot, I'm so excited I have a few families interested in doing their photos at this location because from what I see; it photographs really well.

New location #1, downtown Mesa

I've added two new locations to my list this photo season and I'm really excited about this one. I've always wanted to take family photos in a busy downtown atmosphere with an urban feel. Somewhere that is mildly chaotic, shouts city dweller, perfectly imperfect yet provides a lot of color and fun. I found all that and more when I walked around the city of Mesa this morning looking for a few spots that could bring all of this together and I not only found a few, but so many great spots. Now all I need are some families who say yes to this location so I can have some fun with you. Here are some of the spots I found, just imagine your family posing in front of these fabulous backgrounds. Oh the fun we could have! Stay tuned for a blog post later this week introducing you to my other new location of the season, it's pretty much the opposite of this location; Coon Bluff offers a peaceful country feel with tons of trees, green grass, a river, rocks, and maybe even a few wild horses in the background. I can't wait to show off that location too!