Fall Fest

I am really loving that Evan can hang out with the family on weekends this year and I am taking advantage of it as much as I can! I know that next year and then the next 3 to 7 years after that will be pretty hectic all the time, so I am just soaking up the normal schedule this year.

The boys love cars and I've wanted to put some "art" in their room for a while. Since they are more interested in cars than dinosaurs or even super heroes, I figured it would be a fun little idea to go to a car show and take some pictures to go on their walls. So we went to the Herkimer Fall Fest today and they had a little car show. It'll take me a while to figure out if I want to do black and white or color and how to arrange them, but it was fun to see all the classic cars. 

Along with the car show, they had free cider, doughnuts, and cotton candy, pumpkin painting, games, horse drawn carriage rides, swimming, and frisbee golf. We took advantage of most of those activities and the kids were wiped out by the end! 

My sister in law Kristy gave me her old camera which is way better than mine! So I got to try that out today and she even let me have one of her lenses as well, which was super fun to play with. I didn't take too much time trying to set up the right shots because I was just playing around with the camera, but here are a few pictures from the day. 

Thayer Family // Old Orchard Beach, ME

A couple of months ago, our church's youth group held a service auction as a fund raiser to go to their camp this summer. There were several acts of service and baked items up for bid, and one that I donated to the pile was a photo session with me. The Thayers bid on it and I couldn't ask for a cuter family to take photos of!

It was a particularly long winter and the blooms are still not on the trees, but we headed down to the beach anyway, and you really can't tell that spring hasn't really arrived yet! Here are just a few of the shots I took.

Location Scouting, Maine Audubon and Mackworth Island

One of the great things about doing photography is that it makes me see the world through a lens. No matter where I am, I'm setting up shots in my mind. Figuring out how to work with undesireable backdrops is one of the challenges I am constantly working out in my mind. I'm able to see so much more beauty in the world that I might not have noticed before. 

Then you bring kids into the mix with their thousands of questions and that adds 10 times the amount of wonder you notice in the world. This is why my babies are my favorite location scouts. They definitely don't want to rush things and they are always noticing the smallest details. 

"These trees look scary!"

"Who lives in this barn?"

"The sand is so warm."

Photographers are always trying to tell a story in their photos and kids have a way of pointing you in the right direction of a compelling story.