Window light portraits {Pullman, Colfax, Palouse Washinginton Child Photographer}

During the long dreary winter months.... it can be hard to be an inspired portrait photographer. 

The out of doors is too cold, wet, windy, or all of the above, and without a dedicated room for a studio, dragging all of the furniture about to set up a mini-studio is a.... drag (pun intended).  

So what are our options?  

What I enjoy doing is finding available natural light in the form of a large window.... and we just happen to have such a window (actually french doors) on the south side of our house.  

When it is overcast outside, the light is perfect.... absolutely perfect for portraits.

(Look at that boy.... aren't his eyes mesmerizing?)

Here the light is behind me, beautifully illuminating his face.

(How did you grow up so fast, young man?  Weren't you just a babe in my arms?)

Here the light is to the left, as you can tell by the wonderful catch lights in his eyes.

A must for every one of my shoots is letting the child(ren) pick some poses that THEY want to do.  Mixed in with poses that I want them to do, they are not only a nice combination, but it makes the child(ren) feel like they have input into the shoot.  

This is his tough boxer dude pose.

The one is just a tiny bit OOF (out of focus).  You can see the focus fell on his sleeve instead of his right eye.   He was laughing and I was laughing , so it's just lucky anything was in focus.... but I love this photo so much that it is still a keeper.

Seriously.....

I rather like how the shadows on his face, from the directional natural light, show depth and contours.

The light front on here is nice for completely showing his face, but can look a little flat.

Some more goofiness....  I think it's time to back up!

And although he's almost nine (really?).... and way too cool for some things....

...he still gives this Momma great big bear hugs.... with much gusto.

(and he asked for this photo shoot -- really?  twist.my.arm.)

More...

more freckles ..... good

more friends..... good

more snow .... just don't ask the cat

more food.... good 

more tummy aches, more tears, more cabin fever...... not good, so very not good.

Innocent Wonder @ I ♥ Faces

The theme this week at I ♥ Faces is innocent wonder....

and I know my faithful readers have seen this image one or two or maybe even three times (forgive me)...

but to me, this image speaks of innocent wonder.... 

a young boy on the cusp of understanding and wonder....

wondering ..... wondering..... wondering...... his innocence still secure..... but wondering.

..... who told me the other day, "I know what you and Dad do after we go to bed...... you watch movies all night long."   

(whew..... narrowly missed that one!)

It's hard being the oldest child..... constantly wondering at this or that.... with no bigger sibling to just tell you.

Click on over to I ♥ Faces for more interpretations of Innocent Wonder

Smile -- I ♥ Faces

Brothers.

...they might be laughing...

...they might be fighting...

...but they'll always be brothers...

They make me smile.

Surprises!

There have been all kinds of surprises around here in the past week.....

...black eyes brought home from school  (a first for us)
...not a fist... just a collision on the playground!

A call from the school nurse to come and take a certain boy to get stitches...

Honestly, I thought... right, how bad can it be?
They just want me to come take him home.... he probably doesn't need stitches.
But, not only did he need 15 skin sutures, he also need a dozen or so sutures in the subcutaneous tissues to pull things back together.
How did he do it?
 A case of bad luck.... tripping and falling just at the right spot so that on the way down, his leg came in contact with a bolt on the chain-link fence around the playground.
Hmmmm..... it takes talent to do that..... he gets it from his Mom.

And.... a Lovely Blog Award from Phyllis at All Things Beautiful.

Phyllis blogs about homeschooling, baking, science projects, history, and all things related to raising 5 children.

Hop on over ..... you'll be amazed at the in depth homeschooling ideas she has.

Now, I'm supposed to tell you about 3 things I love dearly:

1) My family.... can you tell?

2) My camera..... can you tell?

3) And YOU, dear bloggy friends!  Without your sweet comments from across the globe, what would my blog be?

Now, I have 3 lovely blogs that I would love to share the surprise with:

1) Betina at B-Happy... a wonderful Mom, photographer, and marathon runner.

2) Molly at My Suitcase Heart .... a wonderfully sweet big sister to my 4 red-heads, horse lover,  photographer in training,  globe trotter,  teacher to many little girls in Abu-Dhabi, and an all around compassionate daughter and friend.

3) and Jill at Battered Suitcases.... a talented seamstress, vegan cook, photographer, globe trotter, and also a teacher to many little girls in Abu-Dhabi.... you will love both of these blogs from across the globe.

And with that..... I am done with surprises!

(and very thankful that the unknown brown substance on the bathroom floor and toilet seat was just chocolate... left there by chocolate cookie coated fingers....)

Little Shepherds and Cow Pokes at the Fair

We're done at the Fair.... and 14.2 million loads of laundry later.... I am finally able to make some sense of all the photos I took. I'll try not to bore you too much.... but I'm sure you'll see many more photos of the Fair as the week progresses. All of our entries got blue ribbons, one of my photos got a "Best of Class" ribbon, and one dozen of our eggs got "Reserve Grand Champion".
Woo hoo!!!
Another year, another fair.... so glad to be done.
Here are a few photos of the boys showing their animals.

Wyatt with pre-show jitters....this was his second year at Daddy's Little Shepherd.

Ladd-i-"Tude" as we have come to call him, behaved himself pretty well, even though he was the only white-faced lamb in the bunch.

Everyone gets a fancy ribbon...and each one of them feels special.
Laddy tried to eat his ribbon.

Here's Reid, just entering the show ring. This was his fourth year showing a calf.
We've come a l-o-n-g way, baby.
He has one more year in the Cow Pokes before he can do 4-H.

Reid spent some time watching the 4-H and FFA entries show their calves earlier in the day.
He picked up a lot of showing "How to's" this way
(Even though Randy and I may know a fair bit about animals...we know very little about showing.... it's quite funny actually.)

Reid did a great job showing, and was very pleased to be asked back for the championship round.
(which he didn't win, but proceeded to tell everyone that the judge had a real hard time picking the winner...hehe)

And this is how we all feel at the end of a very long, and very stressful day.
Right there with ya, Nona.

And somehow... we came home with a few extra things.... can you I.D. them for me?
These I found in the laundry....

...and these I found swimming around in the back yard.
Geezloueeezzzzz.

{linking up to Mosaic Monday at Mary's Little Red House}

I didn't expect......

....to feel so sad to see them get on the bus this morning...

Today was Wyatt's first day of Kindergarten.
(Reid started 2nd grade on Tuesday)
I'm surprised that he actually slept last night because he was SO excited!
(Reid is super excited to have a brother in school with him....I hope he gives Wyatt some breathing room!)

Waiting for the bus....
(I had my glasses on and totally blew the exposure because I couldn't see the light meter!)

I didn't expect to feel so sad to see him running down the driveway....
delirious with anticipation....no time for walking with Mom.

"Are you done yet, Mom?"
"I'm gonna miss the bus!"

Here's his spot... his landing pad in Mrs. Johnson's class.
How I wish I could be a fly on the wall today.... to watch his excitement....

Frankly...this is how I thought I'd feel....well, not quite that exuberant... but still...
after some of the fiascoes between these two this summer...
I thought I would be relieved when school started.....

But sadly, no....

....what will it be like in 4 years when Nona starts?
*sniff, sniff*
*blink, blink*
(maybe it wasn't my glasses...)

PS. Have a good first day, Wyatt.

Swim Team.... or what we did during the month of July

Where has summer gone?
It feels very much like fall outside, and it is supposed to be in the low 30s tonight. Brrrr.
I'm praying that the garden survives tonight!
(but won't take too many chances and am covering the tomatoes)


Summer has flown by, and I stop and ask myself,
"What exactly did you accomplish this summer?"
And I cannot think of much...........
except swim team..... and more swim team.
We spent the whole month of July doing swim team....
rather I should say, Reid did swim team and the rest of us watched ..... hehe

Practice, practice, practice..... and more practice
(needs to practice being the first one in the water....hmmmm)

Reid made some great improvement over the summer, which was the best thing about swim team.
He essentially could just barely swim at the beginning, and now is quite confident in the water.
He even learned the butterfly stroke, which to me looks painful at best.

The best thing for Reid was hanging out with friends....

The worst thing for Reid was the meets.... twice a week.
(Reid is the closest one)

He did make the final county meet of the summer, but much to his disappointment, he did not place.
I knew this would be the case, and tried very hard to make him understand that getting a medal wasn't the only way that he could feel successful.... I tried.
But I remember those same feelings as a child.... success measured by winning.
It is a hard one.... and I am still working on it.

But I am very proud of him. He stuck with it, he worked hard, he learned a lot, and he had fun....
even when his goggles filled with water and he couldn't swim straight,
even when he was time and again disqualified for some wrong stroke or wrong kick.
He was a trooper.
Will we do it next summer? Good question.

And what did the rest of the family do during the 3-4 hour swim meets?
Well, sometimes we all went, and sometimes half of us stayed home.
Frankly, the swim meets were quite disrupting for our family's summer.
But we tried to be creative.... we played by ourselves and we played with others...

we pretended that we were super-heroes....

and we played at the city parks that are near the county pools.

And now were are faced with the beginning of school and the county youth soccer league.
Two boys in two different teams with two different sets of practice times and game times.
It will only get worse....
Argghhhhh!!!!!

Am I the only mother on this planet that is frustrated with the pressure to have her kids in so many activities?
When is enough, enough?
Seriously.
Just wondering......

I ♥ Faces -- Shades

The theme this week at I ♥ Faces is "Gotta Have Shades".
Here is Reid with his "I'm way too cooooool for this" look......
Think I'll be seeing more of this as time goes by.....
The sunglasses are from the movie "How to Train Your Dragon"....


I think I should title this photo "How to Train Your Inner Dragon"
(he he)



Click on over for more fabulous shades.....