Judd Family: Christmas Portrait Session in Scottsdale, AZ

Halloween isn't even here yet, but I've already begun to photograph Christmas card sessions, and I am so excited to share this one!

I've heard several times about the LOVE sculpture at the Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts from clients and friends, but until this week I hadn't had the chance to see it.

It was awesome!

I can see now what everyone is talking about-it's huge, colorful and whimsical and I think it is the perfect backdrop for this adorable family.

Meet the Judd Family!


We met on Sunday afternoon at the park where the sculpture is located, and had a great time clowining around and getting some fun shots.

The kids were adorable:





I had a great time with all of you, and hope you enjoyed it too!

Disney-Part 3

I never intended to turn our Disney trip into a 3-day series of blog posts, but now that we live so far away from all of our family and most of our friends, this is the easiest and best way for me to share with them. So here goes my final installment!

Having two boys at very similar ages (they are one year, one month and one day apart) means that for the most part their interests are very similar. The both love to read, love all things Lego, and both happen to love Star Wars. We didn't see a ton of shows while we were at Disney, but one that we had to make time for was the Jedi Training. I was worried that they wouldn't get picked to participate, or worse, that only one of them would, but luckily they were both chosen from the mass of screaming kids to go up onstage.

This is TJ getting his Jedi robe:


Garrett was focusing hard on his training:





TJ face to face with Darth Vader:




At the end of their training, they received diplomas. So cute!


The park was getting very crowded by Friday afternoon, we had pretty much done everything that we wanted to do and we were exhausted, so we spent the remaining few hours playing in the various activity areas, shopping and eating.









We all went to sleep happy that night:



I don't know when we'll have the opportunity to go again, but I do know that I'm making family vacations a bigger priority from now on. So if you come to my house and wonder why we don't have a big-screeen TV or high-end furniture, it's because I'm spending all the money on trips with my kids. And loving every minute of it.

More of Disneyland

I don't know why I have a blog, I have the most boring life anyone could possibly imagine. I guess that is why when something even slightly exciting happens I tend to completly blow it out of proportion. So yeah, our trip to Disneyland last week was the highlight of my year, maybe even of the last 5 years, and I'm just going to go ahead and keep sharing the entire trip even though the only people who really care are me and possibly my mom.

As I mentioned in my previous Disney post, the week ended on Morgan's 6th Birthday. I had decided that the best way to celebrate was with a trip to the Bibbity Bobbity Boutique for some major pampering and girl time. I knew she would love it, she is a total girly-girl just like I was at that age.

The week before the trip, I took Morgan shopping for a special party dress, but I told her that it was for her cousin, and that Aunt Andie needed her to choose it as a surprise for Addison. She surprised me by picking out the exact same dress I had my eye on. Great minds think alike! She never suspected that it was really for her, even when I had her try on shoes.

The morning of her birthday, I revealed the dress, shoes and finally told her about the boutique plans. She was so excited! We ended up putting her comfy tennis shoes on with her dress, though. I knew what a day of walking around Disney would do to her feet and decided that this time we would put comfort ahead of fashion.

Here she is, ready for her makeover:



She was a little nervous at first:



But her Fairy Godmother-in-training quickly put her at ease:





This cracks me up:


Some finishing touches:


A sprinkle of magic fairy dust:


Ta-da!


We skipped the Disney photo session because we were pressed for time, but I did manage to get a few snapshots outside in the garden of my beautiful little princess:




She received several phone calls from her grandparents who wanted to wish her a Happy Birthday:


Her up-do never moved!


This is my favorite image of the day:


I was so proud to be seen with such a beautiful girl. It really doesn't get any better than this:


I still have one more set of images from our trip, I can't leave out the Jedi Training the boys received. I'll be back tomorrow with those awesome images!

Our Magical Disney Vacation

Soon after moving here to Arizona, we began to notice that every time there is a school vacation or long weekend this place becomes a ghost town. Everyone seems to go somewhere fun and exciting, and the only place we ever went was back to San Antonio (four times in one year-it got old!). I finally had enough and decided that we were taking a real family vacation to a fun place for Fall Break-and the most fun place I could think of was Disneyland!

This was the first Disney trip ever for the Littles (in case you don't know, that's what I call my three little ones). Devon wanted to go back to Texas with her friend Paige, and so they headed in the opposite direction for some Big Kid fun.

I have been beyond excited for this trip. Morgan's 6th birthday happened to be on Friday while we were there, and it was the perfect time to capture her facination of all things girly with a trip to the Bibbity Bobbity Boutique. Garrett and TJ loved the rides and swimming at the resort's pool. Knowing how much fun there were having made it even more fun for me.

I used our little point-and-shoot camera for most of the images because I didn't want to carry around my heavy DSLR, and so the pictures are really pixilated! I did, however, manage to lug the big one around on Friday so that I could get some good ones of Morgan on her special day.

So, here we are at Disney! I only took one picture the entire week with all of us in it:



We began on Wednesday at the main park, and somehow managed to arrive at the gates before they opened for the day. We paused for a quick pic at the entrance:



Our very first ride of the day was on Buzz Lightyear and we couldn't have picked a better one for the boys:



Next up, Dumbo! Morgan LOVED this ride:




Morgan was facinated by all of the characters, and we made it a priority to get an autograph and and a picture each time we saw one:









One of my favorite shows was "Bugs Life" 3D, here we are with our bug eyes. It totally looks like the boys are creepy little bugs stuck to the wall:



It took Garrett an entire day to work up the nerve to ride the BIG roller coaster, and this is his worried little face just minutes before we boarded for the first time:



By the end of the day, he rode it 3 times:


Yes, that's the one, the California Scream:



I think I'll have to finish this up tomorrow-this is already a long post and I haven't even gotten to the good part yet!

Stay tuned!