a day with simplicity photography

i recently had the opportunity to spend the day with one of my favorite photographers!  angie from simplicity photography in salt lake...  she was AWESOME!  she had arranged for these adorable models - aren't they sooooooo cute? and they were really good sports too.  they had three people taking portraits of them all morning (my mom was with me too!)  it was a wonderful day of learning for me :0)  lots of great tips.....  thank you SO much angie!

my little nate is SIX!

nate turned six in april so we're a bit late capturing his 6 year birthday portraits....  but i thought they were worth the wait!  he did so great.  his front teeth have taken a beating during the toddler years so we finally got him to tweak his smile a bit in a few (without his teeth hanging out!)

as usual i LOVE the fun textures of downtown boise!  and as usual he entertained us all the way through the shoot with his charming, fun personality :)  isn't he just adorable??

we got this pose when i told nate to "quit posing and just be your cool self!" it just cracks me up so i had to throw it in...

shawn & ashlee :)

i had the chance to photograph this stunning blonde (who happens to be a friend of mine) and her handsome fiance!  and together they are the parents of six beautiful children.  ashlee is an amazing mom and a great friend to everybody who knows her.

thank you for letting me take portraits of such an important and exciting new start for the two of you.  congratulations!!

an alaskan CRUISE!

i just returned home from ALASKA!  we drove to vancouver, british columbia and boarded the zuiderdam for a week on the inside passage cruise.  my husband & I met my mom, siblings & all their spouses for a week of heaven...  it was fantastic!  we'd been to the caribbean & i have to say i enjoyed this so much more....  hope these pictures will help you see how breathtaking this area really is.

we docked in juneau -

mendenhall glacier...

one of the shore excursions we chose in juneau was whale watching...  i kind of expected a "shamu experience" with these humpback whales - although they never leapt out of the water and did a flip for us, one thing we saw (and of course i didn't have my camera ready at those exact moments) was the bubble net feeding they do.  google that sometime.  it is absolutely phenomenal.

let me explain this one!  so this is my fabulous family..............  but we're all in UGLY SWEATERS!  my mom planned the famous "ugly sweater exchange" before our cruise & we had to shop for the ugliest sweaters we could find.  (there were prizes involved so we did our best :)

the day we docked in juneau we all had to sport our nasty sweaters and guess who won?  sorry you can't see the boys in back - we didn't spend much time posing ourselves obviously - but my blonde sister (with the sunglasses) wore the ugliest sweater that day.  it was a lovely pink easter bunny vest with a stitched basket that served as a pocket.  the big prize went to brian!  you had to be there, but it was pretty embarassing going out in public this way.

so my favorite day was "glacier bay day".  the ship cruised up the icy strait and spent the entire day in this area checking out glaciers.  you'll notice the water is turquoise - very different than the normal ocean water.  we spent most of our time watching the marjorie glacier hoping for huge chunks of ice to fall off! (calving)  you'll see some of the pics i got of that.  unbelievable!


this photo was taken across the deck of the ship on the 9th level so we were up pretty high.  it was my favorite spot on the ship because you could see both sides of the channels we traveled.

this little ferry gives you an idea of how large the marjorie glacier really is!