Good friends, a park and a-wwwaaaaaaay we go!

I thought this session would be sooo easy because the weather was good, there would be no dad (no offense to dads that are easy at picture taking, but most I’ve met want it done as quickly as possible) and we chose beautiful gardens…oh, and mom is just one of the nicest people that you’ve ever met and we’ve been friends for awhile now. Lastly, grandma came along…now WHAT could go wrong?

It seems as soon as I become tooo confident, I find a hurdle. C and J really didn’t want too much to do w/ me. It never occurred to me that the gardens would be waaaaay more interesting that me and that every plant / water garden was really something to be explored and not just to be looked at. So while making sure to not offend any of the volunteers (J you know the inside joke here), we poked and proded our way along. I should say, I ran following, trying to catch them and get some great pictures.

All in all it was fun and I think we caught more great interaction w/ mom than anything. I wish I had pictures like these of me and my kids!!
Hope you enjoy!

click the thumbnails below to make the pictures bigger.  Use your arrow keys to go back and forth between the pictures and escape or close to close the window!

 

The J’s and Renton Mom’s Group

Well, I don’t usually do volunteer work.  It’s not that I don’t enjoy it or think that’s a waste of time (quite the contrary).  It’s just that we are beginning to get out of the beautiful wash of children that we’ve been given in the last couple of years.  I’m hoping when they are out of diapers I can give more regularly (and focus on my business more).  But, this Easter,  Renton Mom’s Group on meetup.com had their 2nd annual Easter bash and as a fundraiser the members were asked to donate something if they could.  I donated a free session, including the pics a couple of prints and a wallet sized book that includes 10 pics for mommy’s purse.

I felt like I’ve been such a deadbeat with this group the last year because we were trying to keep our home peaceful and this was an easy way for me to help.  I was also happy to hear one of my good friends M won the raffle for the prize.  So, in typical Leya style I processed too many pics because I loved her family.

I was warned the kids might not cooperate (they are just 13 months apart and these ARE difficult ages), but also in my style we didn’t pose much and just kinda let the kids loose.  I had a blast and I think they did too.

I sent M a slideshow last night, but she is in Venezuela now so I hope you guys aren’t seeing the pictures before she does.

Enjoy (you can always click on each pic to see it BIG):

RMG is a closed group right now, but maybe in the future it’ll open up again.  I feel like I have REALLY benefited from such a tight knit, giving, loving, and non-judgemental group of mommy’s.

Here’s the link: http://moms.meetup.com/1315/

One of my favorite little models

One of my dearest friends and her adorable little boy.  I have been taking his pictures since he was a bump.

He’s just adorable and so easy to work with.  Mom’s also an easy target as well!   The pics are not posed.  We just went to the park and let little C play.  I followed and just captured what I saw as everything about him that was 2!

There were soooo many great pictures.  I couldn’t make up my mind. Here’s a few:

Hope you like them: (you can always click on the pics to see them BIG …. like they were meant to be seen!!!)

Wow, he’s sooo fast!!

I’ve known J for a long time. Her son has grown into such a little man, ADORABLE! But from a photographer’s perspective… I’ve forgotten those beginning toddler stages. You remember, the “you can’t catch me”. I really spent a bit more than an hour TRYING to catch D, but he was -=FAST!!!

Did she tell you she’s expecting?  CONGRATULATIONS J!!!

Family Fun 

 Daddy’s world