I always look forward to photographing this next little girl. I have photographed her more than any other individual and I would think I would tire of it but thanks to her mom's vision and creativity I always leave each sitting with a big smile on my face. Grace has fallen in love with ballet so I met her at the ballet studio. And what I'm about to say is not because they are my #1 fans, REALLY!! I was completely BLOWN away by how incredible she was. She celebrated her 6th birthday the week I was in town & I think she moved like she was 5 years older. She got to try on toe shoes for the first time but she didn't just try them on, she moved across the floor like she had been dancing in them forever. And then there was her sense of musicality, she really moved to the music, not just doing steps she had learned. I was amazed!! And I hope she loves seeing her first ballet pictures.

****Warning...lots of images from one family below...

I am buried with work & need to continue blogging & I realized as I started to narrow down images from this next family that I was spending way too much time trying to narrow to my most favorites so I decided to stop wasting time & just post. And I think it is appropriate that this family gets to benefit from my indecision because yesterday was Mother's Day and this mom deserves to be celebrated all week long and more. It has been a few years that I have photographed her with her family. She made sure I didn't miss capturing them as they grew & changed but she remained behind the scenes. For the past 2.5 yrs she has been in the fight for her life & in January finished her treatment for Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. Have you ever met anyone who has had spinal tap chemo treatments? I had never heard of it. Well Amanda had numerous rounds and that is just the tip of the iceberg of all she has been through. She has AMAZED me over the time I have known her. And it was the highlight of my El Paso trip to get to finally photograph her again with her family. I had so much fun with them & you will see why it was so hard to choose.
Happy Mother's Day Amanda!!

Next week I am celebrating a birthday and decided for the occasion I am going to come up w/ a list of 12 things I have never done before & each month of the big year I am going to do one of them (and I am recruiting great women friends to join me in my firsts if they haven't done it either). And today I am excited because I am celebrating a first. It arrived in my mailbox a few hours ago. For years I have had people telling me to try and publish some of my work. I have never had time or knowledge of how to do that. But right before I left for our S. Africa trip I contacted my college alumni magazine letting them know that I had images of Sudan that they may be interested in printing in celebration of the upcoming separation. They liked that work but were really interested in my return trip to my Peace Corps site as this year Peace Corps is celebrating its 50th anniversary & my alma mater is in the top 10 for the number of graduates who joined the PC. I wrote a little piece about my return to my PC site & they ran the story and then I was surprised that they chose an image for the cover. So I am starting the year of firsts off today. Hoping for many more! If you have some great ideas for "firsts" send them my way & maybe I can do more than 12.
Also, if you are visiting my blog for the first time because of the Arches article and you would like to see image & read more about my travels enter Lesotho, South Africa &/or Laos into the search field (blog tag organization is not my forte).
And here is a look at the cover...

A few weekends ago I returned to El Paso. For the first time in years I was blessed with almost perfect weather which was such a nice surprise. Usually I am fighting high winds, high heat or swarms of mosquitoes. It was such a refreshing change. I met my first family at my favorite El Paso spot and they were brave enough to follow me over barbed wire and out onto train tracks. These are great kids that are excited to welcome a new sibling into their brood this year. What a lucky baby it is to join this crew.

I can't believe it is already May. Last year I jumped off the cliff and did the Giving Every Day in May. It was an incredible month & I so wish I had the bandwidth to do it again this year. But I am buried in work and the amount of work GEDIM requires would drive me into the ground this year. Hopefully I will be able to do something similar in the future.
A few weeks back I photographed another BEAUTIFUL senior. I kept thinking to myself as I was working that I was amazed by her beauty and she has the brains, personality & athletic ability that even surpass her looks. She is off to California for college and I am sure she is going to blow doors off everything she does!

I am back from my quick trip to Texas to photograph some great families (and enjoy a little sunshine & heat...this NW weather is really getting ridiculous this year!!) & have have some anxious parents waiting to finally see their little one's class picture. This are the last preschool picture I will be posting this year, I have another school I photographed recently but I am sure viewing these pictures is getting a little repetitious for you non-preschool parent readers.
Spring break for my oldest is this week so I am heading out of town again (this time against my will as I have so much work on my plate I would actually prefer to spend the week at my desk), hopefully when we return spring will finally have arrived in Seattle!
And now let me share the last of the bright, smiling faces of these adorable kids.