There are days when there are no plans, probably more often than not around here. But on one of those days, there’s a yard sale down the street and a piggy bank full of quarters, (which she has been carefully saving for the past few months). Suddenly, those unplanned hours are filled with soon to be magical memories. She spots a board game box wedged between a cookbook and an old handbag. Her twenty-five cents is pulled from her pocket and handed to the neighbor. Instantly, the morning transforms and is full of imagination, giggles, dress-up, and twirling until she falls to the ground in a dizzy pile of crinoline and beads.

These are the moments I love capturing. As a mother and a family photographer, I know not every shot is going to be in perfect focus- but to me that is all part of the game. I love embracing the blur. To me, it’s all part of what tells the story and conveys the energy of my four and a half-year-old tomboy-princess. I know many of you have found or re-found your love of photography because of parenthood. For me, it’s the enchanted moments I hope to capture. For us, for them, but mostly for us- because their childhood goes by so.stinking.fast. Today, I invite you to stop asking you babies to “smile” and “look at the camera” and to see what happens when you let them just be. Snapping as they get lost in their world of play and wonder.  Mess with your shutter speed and your f-stop, and see if you can’t bottle that lightning spark energy your little ones hold and share with this big world. Keep chasing that light, Vanessa