I had the pleasure of shooting my cousin Amanda and her son Aaron Reese a few weeks ago, originally we had planned to have dad apart of the shoot but he was sick on their shoot day and Amanda still really wanted to take some pictures. So we decided to go ahead with the shoot and then have another shoot later on in the year with the whole family together. We had our session in Mesquite, Tx and we started out in their cute home and then went down the street to a park to finish the session. There were so many great shots of Aaron from this shoot it was hard to choose my favorites, hew as full of personality and had some of the cutest faces in between shots as well. I had such a fun time getting to play around with Aaron and watch him play with his stuff. Enjoy these images!

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It is FINALLY time to share this super fun family session with you, I have been dying to edit these ever since I took them but I had several sessions to edit before I could start on these! This is the wonderful Harisis Family and this is not the first time for me to photograph their session and I am sure it won’t be my last. I have the pleasure of being related to this fun family, these are all my cousins

We met up in the old downtown Mesquite Square for this session and I was so excited for this session because I knew we would all have fun. I had already pre-planned the first shot on this post before it started and knew it would be a cute picture if I could get what I had in my head on camera. In my head though I pictured a happy, fun, smiling family willing to do whatever I wanted them to do, I wasn’t counting on one tiny member of the family not willing to cooperate with me. This tiny member of the family, who shall remain nameless, didn’t want anything to do with my picture and didn’t want to even lay on the ground, so he (or she) started to throw a little fit (anyone with little ones know the kind), after a little bit of persuasion from Pappa Bear we were at least able to get everyone on the ground. Everyone was ready to go, having a good time, and smiling, except that one! But I didn’t let that stop me, we started taking pictures and everyone who wanted to smile for the camera did, but I still didn’t want just one person crying in the picture so I had an idea, why not have everyone start crying in the picture! So that is exactly what we did, we had everyone in the picture pretend to cry so that everyone would have the same expression, and I am so happy we did it because this has ended up being one of my favorite family portraits to date.

I loved so many of the images from this session so I hope you take the time to click the link at the end of this post to see all my favorites. I have one more story to share as well to give you some insight on some photos. Xander is the smallest one of the bunch and he was cracking me up during this session because one of the ways we were able to keep his attention was to play music through an iphone, but we aren’t talking about some kind of kid music, we are talking hard-core heavy metal, think along the lines of Slip Knot, hahaha! I thought it was the funniest thing that this hard-core music would calm him down, he would start singing and playing some air drums and all would be well with the world. The family also loves to play games such as Rock Band so I thought it would be appropriate to get a family shot of everyone pretending to be rocking out, I am talking air drums, air guitar, air singing, whatever they wanted to do to bring out their inner-rock star. So I included one image of them rocking out and then I added a little animation putting their frames together so you could get the full effect of the whole family rocking out.

Enjoy these fun images!

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I met up with my cousin Andrea to shoot an updated family session since it had been a couple of years since we had one. It is great to have family that is so supportive of what I do, it helps me keep the dream alive. This session was in the little town square out in Terrell, Texas. Here are a few of my favorite images from the session. Enjoy!

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Let’s be honest, it is scary to follow your dreams or to pursue something you love to do. It is scary because it is not always the most logical or safest thing for you to do. I wouldn’t consider myself much of a risk-taker, I am a play it safe kind of a guy. If there is a possibility of failure or getting hurt, there is a good chance I won’t do it. But two of the biggest things I have done with my life up to this point have been huge risks to me and they both have one thing in common, love. The first big risk was the day I (finally) decided to pursue my wife, it took me a long time to work up the guts to ask out my wife on our first date, just because I had that big fear of rejection and not wanting to put myself out there and risk getting hurt. But I did it, after much prayer (and the threat of not being allowed back in my home or being beaten with a hammer by my college roommates if I didn’t ask Jessica out) and confidence building I asked her out, and now we are married and in our first home. The second biggest risk was the day I decided I would quit teaching and pursue my love and passion for photography. It is by no means an easy decision to say goodbye to a nice and steady paycheck, but Jessica and I decided it was a risk we would be willing to make together and just see what God has in store. God would be the underlying foundation in all the huge decisions and risks I have taken up to this point, because his son Jesus Christ would be the ultimate example of risk and love. Coming to earth knowing he would die on a cross in order for us to have the chance to be seen as guiltless in the sight of God, solely on the act of love. Because His sacrifice was done out of pure love and faith in God, there ended up being no real risk involved at all, because God was in complete control. I feel the same way about my decision, since I am pursuing what I love and have put my trust in what God wants, I have faith that He knows exactly what He wants for our life and whatever happens is in His will, which makes this big risk seem much more manageable when it is not in my own hands.

With all that to say, 2009 has been an exciting year for my wife and I. 2010 will be the first full year of business and I can’t wait to see what is in store. I am continually amazed and blessed to see my business begin to slowly grow each month, I love getting inquiries for weddings and portraits and just amazed that more and more people find my site daily. Just that simple idea blows my mind. To close out the 2009 year I wanted to share some of my favorite portraits and weddings from 2009. Today I am going to share my favorite families, kids, and babies. Stay tuned for seniors, engagements, and weddings. Enjoy!

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Time to share another great family session with you! I had the pleasure of having a family session with Blake, Kristin, and baby Cade Clickner again during the holiday season. Here is the post from last year from our session together in their home. It is crazy to see how much can change in a little baby over a year, Cade is such a big boy now. The Clickner’s go to church with us and we are all in a bible study together, so I see Cade all the time and don’t see the change so dramatically until I look back at our old pictures. Cade is one of the happiest babies I know and I love being around him, I actually rarely even call him just Cade, it is actually more like Cade-erific or Cade-oroni. I may be confusing him for the rest of his life? Ha. Alright, well enjoy our session we had together at the Dallas Museum of Art.

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