Before the snow came

On Friday I had scheduled a session with my friend Amy and her family. We were getting a little nervous because of weather reports. It was cold and snow was on the way! After going back and forth on whether to go through with it or not we finally decided to try it and if it didn't work out to try it again another day. I don't think we'll have to do any retakes, I'm loving these shots and I hope you do to Amy!

Sometimes I like to play with images and try new things out on them, new looks, new texture, etc. Today I wanted to do something special with this image, but everything I tried didn't look right. Then I decided to try the Midnight Sepia action I have and there it was, what I was looking for.
I am actually excited about how it turned out.
It kind of reminds me of a mix of Greg Olson and Liz Lemmon Swindle look, only in a photograph instead.

It's not often

That I get to do family portraits, and when I do, usually I refer them to my friends who do more family portrait photography than myself. I've mostly been doing babies and weddings. But I just couldn't pass up the chance to be this family's photographer. I was privileged to be two of these girls youth leader a few years ago and just adore their family. Their oldest daughter has graduated and is shortly going out west for college and their mom wanted family pictures done before she left.
Thanks A. for being such a trooper and walking all over the place to all the spots I asked (and Dad for carrying you!), I hope your foot heals quickly and you'll be running around soon!

When I loaded their session into my Lightroom, I couldn't wait to play with this one. I'd asked the girls to stand out in the grass and suggested they could do any number of things, play with the grass, look at the lake, talk to each other... and this is what they did.

Sisterly love... naturally.

brings a tear to my eye.