maybe it’s the desert heat, maybe it’s just that i love california, but i find myself daydreaming about cali today.

i love how “two” she looks here. just focused on exploring and having fun, with no concern for what the rest of us were doing.
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…a little cruise along a little pacific coastline to soften the blow of this rather monday-ish monday. there’s not much that some sand-between-the-toes therapy can’t at least band-aid up.

those toes all belong to my brood. all of ‘em.


as we occupied our morning with sandcastle building, this cheater brought out the big guns to show us up. actually, it worked out fabulously, he was really just getting some sand to build up the lifeguard station (you may have noticed it had a bit of a lean) and left us with a huge pile of sand and cool tracks. i can’t quite express the fun that this presented us with.

i looove being under a pier, there’s a sort of romance to it.

it’s all about perspective.

there’s a bit of contradiction going on here. which would you prefer? the ferrari is rad but i’d love the vw.

american apparel along the ocean, it’s just classic. plus, i’m a card-carrying american apparel t-shirt junkie.

i’ve got to find out what kind of tree this is. it’s probably the loveliest tree i’ve encountered.

i wanna live here. i’m wondering how many millions i’ll need?

this just seems like a parting shot. such a serene little guy, perched on his throne.

…seen through the eye of an iphone. the last iphone photography post seemed to be appreciated and i really love using my iphone for impromptu photographs…so, maybe i’ll post those with more frequency.

again, simply out of a desire to show off all of my beautiful, wonderful and simply divine friends and clients, well, actually, if i met you as a client…chances are, you’re now a friend…so let’s just go with “friends”, i’m posting another mishmash, miscellany…hodgepodge. however, you may certainly find your lovely face, feet, hat, hands…etc on the blog again over the next few days. so, if you’ve only gotten a tiny glimpse… keep checking. one more thing, i have found myself out of words today and since i’m a firm believer in that whole “a picture is worth a thousand words” thing…i’ll let them do the talking for me. about 18,000 words comin’ at ya.

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hey, does this cup make me look weird? confused? that’s actually an inside joke between my family and the kelley family and since inside jokes aren’t nice when everyone listening, or in this case, reading, isn’t on the “inside”…i’ll explain. we were having dinner at the kelley’s home a few years ago when my then, very tiny gabe, was drinking out of an ordinary, solid color plastic cup, spotted some way better cups with characters on them and decided he’d rather have one of those. i suppose in an effort to avoid seeming too needy he decided to find fault in the plain old ordinary cup. that fault was, apparently, that it actually made him look “weird”. hysterical laughter broke out when he stood in the kitchen and asked “does this cup make me look weird?”. 

this is corey and cameron, the youngest of the kelley clan. i have to give thanks to these two super, extra-special kids for always hanging with my two oldest kids, who are younger and probably sort of well, you know how it is when “little” kids wanna hang with you. cameron actually holds a very special place in my claudia’s heart…claudia would have never made it through her first summer at camp without cameron. i have the sweetest and at the same time, saddest picture of the girls on the last day. cameron has a sweet little smile and claudia’s poor face is swollen and red from sobbing all day long because it was time to say goodbye to cameron and hop a flight back to phx.

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while i’ve been plowing through the edits for the okc sessions, i’ve had little time to blog any of the images. it actually takes more time than one might think to get the images ready to blog, load them onto the blog and write the blog copy…so, just for the sake of giving my lovely clients a little something to look at, i think i’ll try a couple of these posts with random client and miscellaneous images all together. sorta feels like i’m introducing people to each other…

this first one really made my day. it was early the first full day of shooting and i was having a hard time getting motivated, until, my natty was so delighted by these amazing “robots” at panera. something about her seeing robots in newspaper dispensers was seriously magical to me. i’ll never look at newspaper dispensers the same way again, they’ll forever be robots. of course, getting to start the day with panera was also a treat.

oh boy, big sigh. this is adrianne, she’s been my friend longer than anyone in the world. we met in 4th grade when she sauntered into school wearing a purple barret and  a huge attitude. my heart just loves her. (obviously, i didn’t take this shot…my dear husband did.)

and this is adrianne’s stunning, amazing, funny, witty, precious and wonderful daughter Darian. i witnessed this young woman come into the world, she’ll forever have part of my heart.

this is perfection. love is messy, gooey, ragged, sometimes withered…beautiful.

fall. i had almost forgotten what it looked like.

this is duff, along with my babiest girl and boy.

this is duffs mom and dad. my heart loves aubra too. i’m pretty sure that she’s the prettiest person i’ve ever met in real life (now, fake life…sorry aubs, i’ve met prettier). i think colby agrees, but for him, if he knows whats good for him, she’d better be the prettiest in fake life too. now, all of my other friends who are also amazingly beautiful, i’m sorry, but just look at her. i know you agree. guess what else? you’ll never find a more precious soul.

this is kelley and her boys

and her girl

this is my girl, one of them…loving her dad on the tram at the best zoo in the history of best zoos, The OKC Zoo.

this is my gabe, checking out some badgers at the zoo.

and two of the most photogenic, precious, polite and best dressed children you’ll find. gabby and gavin.

this, well, this beauty belongs to gabby and gavin’s dad, john, and may get it’s very own blog post.

here’s a litte more of it, along with john, the proud owner and his stunning wife, angel “fearless” fairless.
big sigh…so much love.

…a new blog post.  it’s been a week since i’ve posted anything, it’s just been one of those weeks. all week i’ve felt like i’m two steps behind, feverishly playing catch-up. so, i thought i’d post a re-cap of the week. my week in photos, a visual representation of why i’m so remarkably behind.

first, a weekend trip to vegas. yes, vegas you are fabulous!
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during our visit to oklahoma in december claudia overcame some serious fears and finally got her ears pierced.  this particular excursion had been about a year and a half in the making. it started as a way to ease the disappointment of our friend christie leaving us to go back to oklahoma at the end of her visit here when miss natalie was brand new.  claudia was heart-broken so the very clever christie devised the plan to help claudia look forward to seeing her again.  so, month after month claudia counted down the days, fighting hard the entire time not to give in to her fear of how much she thought it would hurt.  but, she stood strong and did what she wanted to do!  you may not think it’s that big of a deal afterall, tiny babies do it.  well, this is the child that very literally jumped off of the exam table, ran out of the exam room, passing me, the nurse and doctor and then right down the hall passing plenty of other medical staff and right out the front door of the clinic when she had to get a flu shot a couple of years ago.  she also just mastered escalators a year ago and wouldn’t go down a typical playground slide until she was 5. let’s just say ”safety”  is her middle name. good job claudia, i’m so proud of you.

take a peek inside the world of 8 year old girl drama…

as you can see, there are no sharp objects anywhere near her ears at this point but the tears are flowing freely.
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