Than a baby wearing sunglasses? NO! Miss Madison has been a client of mine since she was first born. These were her 9-month portraits taken a few months ago, just as the weather warmed up and the sun came out. She’s always such a little ham for the camera, smiling and posing.

I think she’s getting to the point where she recognizes me and remembers that I’m fun–because, I AM FUN! FUN ENOUGH TO REMEMBER!!! (That’s my excited voice I use to get kids to smile. It’s much better in person, I promise) I’m looking forward to the day that she can say my name and come give me a hug. =0)

This puppy decided to randomly come up to Madison and give her some kisses…

This might come as a bit of a surprise to people, but my niece Adelynn is the absolute hardest portrait subject I’ve ever had to photograph. Because I’m her aunt, she doesn’t tend to take the time we have together seriously (portrait-wise). She DEFINITELY doesn’t want to sit or stand still long enough for the shutter to click and she doesn’t like being told to smile.  Oh, she smiles plenty on a normal day, but the second I hold that camera up to my eye, she stops smiling altogether. These smiles that you see were taken in the last 5 minutes that she was in town–while Bridget and Adam were packing up the car. Luckily, they were A+ smiles…

Usually when I come to visit, it’s for a holiday or a birthday. The weekend typically involves copious amounts of sugar and presents. On this last trip, however, it was for no specific reason. Just a weekend that I decided to come down and see everyone. We celebrated things like a late mother’s day, an early father’s day and my (early) birthday while I was in town, but it was very low-key.  I think that for this reason, Addie and I finally had a chance to bond.

Saturday morning she slipped into my bedroom with a box of birthday candles to wake me up. She crawled into bed with me and we watched Clubhouse Mickey while my sister showered and dressed. I rubbed her back and her head for the 30 minutes that the show was on and as the credits rolled, I stopped momentarily to stretch. In those 20 seconds that I stopped rubbing her back, Adelynn put her hand on the small of her back (like I’ve seen my dad do after lifting something heavy) and gave a loud sigh. “Oh, my back, Aunt Colleen.” She moaned as if she had just spent the whole day at the office and all she could use at the moment was a backrub and a brewskie. It was THAT kind of grunt.

Obviously, I had to continue with her backrub after that. We spent the rest of the weekend playing dress-up, tea parties, doing Addie’s and my make up…all those girlie things that you can do with your auntie.

The following week after I had gotten back to NY, my sister sent me an email. She had bought Adelynn a pack of headbands (which comes with 3 to a pack) and upon giving them to Adelynn, Addie set one aside.

“Who’s that for?” My sister asked.

“Aunt Colleen,” she responded as though it was the most idiotic question she’d heard in her life, “because she has fashbon-cents.”

Damn right, kid! Don’t you forget who the “fashbonable” one of the family is!

I feel like this poor little blog is being neglected slowly but surely. Life tends to take over and next thing I know, weeks have gone by sans any updates. One of my resolutions is to attempt to keep up with my posts so that I’m not 6 photoshoots down the line. In any case, here are a few highlights from my autumn/holiday card photoshoots….

Above are a few images from my shoot with Kate, Dan and Zach–a very sweet family from one of my favorite areas, Hoboken. I seriously LOVE Hoboken and if I could afford it, I would move there immediately. I hope to see them again soon. Poor lil’ Zach was teething and not feeling too hot that day, but you’d never be able to tell from that adorable grin plastered on his face!

The three collages below are from the Stern family–we had a lot of fun running around in the leaves and eating our lollipops! I was jealous…theirs looked way better than my blow pop that I had. That’s the beauty of being an adult I guess–the fact that I was able to run out after that shoot and have a ginormous lollipop for dinner!

And lastly, we have Sophia…my newborn session from November. She was just a doll with her full head of spikey black hair and sweet chubby cheeks.

Brody and Matteo are brothers out in Hoboken–which, for the record is one of my favorite places ever right now. It is such a cute little area and seems like a great place to live. Brody is 4 months old and Matteo (they call him Teo) is, I think, 5. Teo was VERY into posing for the camera. He went from one pose, kneeling to laying on his side–I’m pretty sure he would have sommersaulted to stand on his head if I had asked for it.

And sweet little Brody was all smiles for me–well, except when it came time to photograph with his brother. Then I think he was cranky and so over the whole “camera” thing. My favorite is the one with Brody crying and Matteo looking at me–it looks like he’s rolling his eyes at the baby. I love it!

I am seriously SO behind in posting my recent photoshoots. This session was actually taken back in JULY. What month is this? Oh yeah…it’s September. Anyway, these cuties are Nissi and Dori (I have no idea if I got their spelling right!) and they were two of the sweetest kids ever. Both so happy despite how hot it got. And we photographed in a park near DUMBO–otherwise known as Down Under The Manhattan Bridge Overpass. One of the greatest places ever to photograph!